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"Most Excellent Majesty," declaring themselves his. dutiful subjects, and praying that His Royal magnanimity and benevolence might be interposed to direct some mode by which the united applications of his faithful Colonists might be improved into a happy and permanent reconciliation. "Notwithstanding our sufferings," they added, our breasts retain too tender a regard for the kingdom "from which we derive our origin, to request such a re"conciliation as might in any manner be inconsistent "with her dignity or her welfare."-This appeal, which if unsuccessful they resolved should be their last, they determined to lay before their Sovereign by the most solemn means in their power, by the hands of Mr. Richard Penn, one of the Proprietaries of the province in which they were assembled, in conjunction with the agents for the Colonies in England. Mr. Penn accordingly sailed homewards on this important mission; a mission which then and afterwards was commemorated in America by an expressive phrase "the Olive-branch." From the kindly and respectful but vague and general words of this Petition it is not easy to discover what terms at that juncture the Congress might wish to propose or to accept. There is no doubt that they considered as indispensable the total repeal of the late obnoxious Statutes. There is no doubt also that they desired a solemn and final compact in recognition of their rights,

a compact which might be to America what Magna Charta had been to England. As to the conditions of such a compact there is reason to believe that they intended to offer an alternative. Either they would submit as heretofore to an absolute restriction of their trade for the benefit of the mother country, but in that case they would stipulate that no further aid or contribution of any kind should ever be required from them. Or else they would agree to raise through their own Assemblies their share of revenue for the support of the whole empire, but according to a certain rate, so that the Colonies should not be taxed one farthing without a security that Great Britain must at the same time tax herself in a still heavier proportion. In that case, however, the Americans would expect to be relieved of all restraints on their trade and navigation, and be empowered to regulate such matters

*

without regard to any interests besides their own. On these terms, or on terms resembling these, there is reason to believe that even then-even after Lexington and Bunker's Hill,-the progress of civil war might have been arrested, and the integrity of the empire might have been maintained.

The Petition to the King of July 1775 was drawn up by John Dickinson and adopted mainly through his influence. I do not call in question the perfect sincerity and honour of the great majority of those who signed it. But as to one at least, Dr. Franklin, whose name appears beneath it, I may observe that its expressions of "tender "regard" towards the mother country stand forth in striking contrast with some other expressions in his private correspondence. Almost on the very day that Franklin subscribed this Petition to the King he wrote as follows to a former friend in London. "Mr. Strahan : "You are a Member of Parliament and one of that ma'jority which has doomed my country to destruction. "You have begun to burn our towns and murder our people. Look upon your hands, they are stained with "the blood of your relations! You and I were long "friends; you are now my enemy, and I am Yours, "BENJAMIN FRANKLIN." +

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The Petition to the King was by no means the only document which the Congress at this period prepared. There was an Address to the people of Great Britain. There was another Address to the People of Ireland. There was a Declaration ordered to be read aloud to their assembled troops and public bodies, and setting forth in uncompromising language the causes of their taking up arms. At this very time their spirits were sustained by the accession of Georgia; an accession which had been much desired and long delayed, and which enabled them to speak henceforward in the name of the THIRTEEN UNITED COLONIES. The same shrewd observer whose dia

* See the American Archives, especially two letters dated June 20. 1775 (vol. ii. p. 1033.).

† July 5. 1775; Franklin's Works, vol. viii. p. 155. I can by no means concur with his last American editor in thinking of this production that "in truth it was meant to be nothing more than a "pleasantry!"

tribe to Mr. Strahan I have so lately cited bears in another letter a striking testimony to the earnestness and determination which he beheld around him. "Great frugality "and great industry are now become fashionable here. "Gentlemen who used to entertain with two or three courses pride themselves now in treating with simple "beef and pudding. Thus we shall be better able to pay our voluntary taxes for the support of our troops."

The troops to which Franklin here refers were indeed in such a state as to require all the aid that zeal could prompt or that money could supply. On reaching the head quarters at Cambridge, Washington had expected to find an army of twenty thousand men ; he found no more than sixteen thousand on the rolls; and of them only fourteen thousand fit for duty. Even these he was obliged to describe as "a mixed multitude of people under very little order or government." The men had no uniforms, but continued to wear the common working dresses in which they had come; a deficiency which was afterwards in some degree remedied by a supply from Congress of ten thousand hunting shirts, at the General's suggestion. "I know nothing," says he, "in a speculative view more "trivial, yet nothing which, if put in practice, would "have a happier tendency to unite the men and abolish "their provincial distinctions." The want of money was most severely felt. On the 21st of September Washington reports the military chest totally exhausted and the Paymaster without one single dollar in hand. For lack of commissaries the supplies of provisions were both insufficient and ill-distributed. Entrenching tools were wanted and likewise engineers. It was also found by Washington that the late action at Bunker's Hill inspired with much higher spirits those who declaimed upon it at a distance, and who by unanswerable arguments proved it an undoubted victory, than those who had closely viewed or themselves partaken in it. With a heavy heart, though with a resolute courage, Washington while making known his wants to Congress could not

* Dr. Franklin to Dr. Priestley, Philadelphia, July 7. 1775. † Letters to his brother, July 27. and to the President of Congress, July 10. 1775.

conceal from them that there was a total laxity of discipline among his troops, and that the greater part of them were not to be relied on in the event of another action.

It is highly to the honour of Washington, labouring under so many disadvantages, to have yet achieved so much. The active scenes which followed his arrival are well described in a private letter from one of the Chaplains in his army. "There is great over-turning in the camp as to order and regularity. New Lords, new laws. "The Generals Washington and Lee are upon the lines every day. New orders from His Excellency are read "to the respective regiments every morning after prayers. "The strictest government is taking place, and great dis"tinction is made between officers and soldiers. Every one is made to know his place and keep in it, or be tied "up and receive thirty or forty lashes according to his "crime. Thousands are at work every day from four till "eleven o'clock in the morning. It is surprising how "much work has been done. The lines are extended "almost from Cambridge to Mystic River, so that very "soon it will be morally impossible for the enemy to get "between the works. . . . . My quarters are at the foot of the famous Prospect Hills, and it is very diverting to walk among the tents. They are as different in their form as their owners are in their dress, and every tent is a "portraiture of the temper and taste of the persons who encamp in it. Some are of boards, and some of sail"cloth. Some partly of the one, and partly of the other. "Others again are made of stone and turf, brick or brush. "Some are thrown up in a hurry, others curiously wrought "with doors and windows, done with wreaths and withes, "in the manner of a basket. Some are your proper tents "and marquees, looking like the regular camp of the "" enemy.'

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There was one deficiency, however, which no skill in Washington could retrieve or atone for, and which he could only endeavour to conceal. That deficiency was

* Letter of the Rev. William Emerson, printed in the Appendix to Mr. Sparks's Washington, vol. iii. p. 491. Washington himself speaks of "incessant labour, Sundays not excepted." (Ibid. p. 39.)

of powder. The first statement made to him on this point by the Massachusetts officers had been quite satisfactory but quite erroneous. "They," says Washington, "not being sufficiently acquainted with the nature of a "return, sent in an account of all the ammunition which "had been collected by the province, so that the report "included not only what was on hand but what was "spent!" !"* On calling for more exact returns, the General found to his amazement the stock so small as nearly to preclude him from the use of his artillery, and to leave but nine rounds of powder to each musket; and even this small stock was further reduced by the little affairs of outposts which sometimes occurred. Dr. Franklin declares that in the month of October when he visited the army, it had not five rounds of powder a man. "The world,” he adds, "wondered that we so seldom fired a cannon; why we could not afford it."+ Washington did not fail to make most urgent representations on this subject both to the Congress and to the neighbouring Colonies, but many weeks, nay months elapsed, before he was effectually supplied. To a brave officer scarce any position would be more painful than thus to stand in front of a numerous and disciplined enemy; daily awaiting an attack which he knew that he could not repel, and unprovided even with means to fire his own artillery in his own defence.

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This deficiency of powder, in some degree at least though not to its full extent, was known to the British General. It had been disclosed by a deserter; it was moreover clearly implied in a vote of the Massachusetts Assembly: "Resolved: That it be and it hereby is recommended to "the inhabitants of this Colony not to fire a gun at beast, "bird, or mark without real necessity therefor."‡ Nevertheless, General Gage remained quiet in his lines. He may yet have hoped for a favourable issue from the last

* To the President of Congress, August 4. 1775. This curious passage appears in the American Archives (vol. iii. p. 28.), but is omitted in Mr. Sparks's edition.

† Letter to Dr. Priestley, January 27. 1777. Works, vol. viii. p. 198.

Resolution, August 12. 1775. American Archives, vol. iii. p.