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meeting; as also, that they proposed to adjourn till the 24th of the month next ensuing."

The return to this was, that the governor 'had no objection to the proposed time of adjournment; that he thought, with the house, there was no immediate necessity for laying an embargo on provisions; that he should lay before the commissioners the affair of the Indians now in town, and endeavour to send them away well satisfied; that he expected the house would have made some preparations for executing the plan of operations for the ensuing campaign, but as they had not, it must lie upon them; that as to the Indian trade, and excise bills, he should consider them against the next meeting; and lastly, that he thought it proper to mention to the house by their messengers, that although he had had more burdens laid upon him than any of his predecessors in the same time, yet he had received less from the house than any of them.'

Lastly, the house taking into consideration what the governor had said relating to their not having made preparations for executing the plan of operations for the ensuing campaign, resolved, in these words, that as this province has received no assistance from our mother country, and as we have already expended large sums of money for the raising and supporting a considerable body of men for the defence of our extensive frontiers, against the continued depredations and encroachments of a savage and merciless enemy, besides what has been expended in maintaining the friendly Indians, French neutrals, and in other purposes for the king's service, which expences are likely to be continued for some time; the house are of opinion, that the present circumstances of the province will not now admit of their going into any preparations for executing the aforesaid plan of operations; and that it would be not only impracticable, but very imprudent, at a time the country is so greatly distressed by the unjustifiable taking of indented servants, and so many of our freemen are inlisted and gone away, to send so great a proportion of men as is demanded of us, to so great a dis

tance, and thereby deprive ourselves of their assistance, which we have too much reason to think we shall soon have Occasion for.'

These were the transactions of April 16th; and, as the reader will observe no notice was taken of the governor's remonstrance concerning himself, he will from thence, perhaps, be led to account for his re-convening them so soon afterwards as the 10th of May; he being then absent at a place called Harris's ferry, and having nothing more pressing to lay before them, than what is contained in the following abstract of his message to them upon that occasion; to wit,

"That the people of the frontier counties westward having lost great numbers of their fighting men, and the remainder being either driven from their habitations, or worn out with fatigue, there was the greatest reason to apprehend, the next attack would produce the entire evacuation of the two next counties, York and Cumberland; that the consideration of this deplorable and dangerous situation of those counties, which the most considerable of their inhabitants had, in the most affecting manner, laid before him, had induced him to call them together; that the best and speediest means might be taken to prevent, if possible, farther desolation; that the law for establishing a voluntary militia had contributed very little, if any thing, to the defence of the frontier; that he had observed it was defective when he passed it, and that it required so much time to carry it into execution, that nothing good was to be expected from it; that, though many companies had been formed under it, yet, for want of sufficient power lodged in him to order them to the frontiers, they were, as to that most material service, entirely useless; that he must therefore recommend it to them to form such a militia as might be just, equal, and carried into immediate execution, so as that he might be able to draw the strength of the province to such parts as stood most in need of it; and the whole burden of defending the province might not fall too heavily on the few inhabitants whose circumstances obliged them to remain in the back counties; that, as by the

latest accounts from Europe, a considerable armament from France was to be expected in America, now to become the seat of war, and as the enemy would in such case depend upon being supplied with provisions from the king's colonies, by the intervention of the Dutch, he conceived a general embargo would be necessary; and that it should be rendered effectual, by some such special law as should be thought necessary by himself and the governors of the neighbouring provinces, which he recommended to them to prepare; and that the affairs of the province, and, in particular, the building a fort at a place called Shamokin, which was of so great importance to the province, requiring his personal care and attendance, it gave him concern that he could not be then at Philadelphia; but that they might be assured he would give all the dispatch imaginable to any bills they might propose, which the secretary was to send to him from time to time by express.'

To give the more weight to the militia clause, a petition was presented to the house from the officers of the association companies in the city of Philadelphia, complaining of the insufficiency of the present law, and praying that a new one might be framed, in which the defects of the former should be remedied.

The assembly gave the petition a civil but cool reception; and, in their reply to the governor's message, furnished the public with a brief of their sentiments and proceedings on the present occasion; to wit:

"That being met in pursuance of the governor's call, they were concerned for his absence; as the public business could not be transacted as it ought, where the several parties were so far asunder; that as by the joint care of himself and the commissioners, for disposing of the sixty thousand pounds, the frontier was now in a better state of defence, than that of any other colony on the continent; the forts being numerous, all strongly garrisoned, and both officers and soldiers now reduced to due obedience and discipline, by means of the act of parliament, which, at their last sitting, they had extended to that province, they could not

but hope, that the distressed inhabitants of the two counties mentioned, might by the blessing of God, become more secure in their settlements, and, consequently, more easy in their minds; and that more especially as they understood, there were in the interior counties many formed companies as yet uneinployed, who were ready to enter into the service, and march to the frontier, whenever the governor should think fit to call them; and a considerable sum was still in the hands of the commissioners, wherewith the expence might be defrayed; that, as they conceived, the marching the militia to the frontier on every alarm, would be less effectual for its defence, and much more expensive and burdensome to the people, than their proportion of a tax for the maintenance of standing guards; that, indeed, they had little experience of a militia in this province, consequently, in framing so new a thing as a law to regulate it, their first essay might have its defects; that, however, as the governor did not point them out, when he passed the act, and they had not since occurred to them, all they could then say was, that when he should think fit to send down any supplementary amendments, they would take them into their serious consideration; which he, the governor, might possibly be ready to do by the time to which they stood adjourned, then not far distant; that they had therewith sent him a bill for prohibiting the exportation of provisions or warlike stores from this province, which they hoped would meet with his concurrence, being in conformity with the law lately passed at New York; but that as all restrictions made by them would be ineffectual, unless the lower counties (the territory as formerly called) were in like manner restrained; they had referred the continuance of their law, to such future act as the governor and assembly of those counties should pass for that purpose; that they apprehended a strict compliance with that law would be of great service to the British interest, and therefore earnestly recommended it to the governor, that when passed it might be carried effectually into execution. And, lastly, that as the season required the present attendance of many of the members at their plantations, they proposed to

re-adjourn themselves to the same time as before; wher they hoped the governor would find himself enough at leisure to meet them at Philadelphia.'

Thus ended this session of four days; the prohibitory law was passed by the governor at Harris's ferry; and when they met again, they received from the secretary two other messages from the same place; one designed for their farther amusement at their last sitting; but which arrived half an hour too late; and the other for the present.

According to the former, 'the governor had received letters from the governors Dinwiddie and Sharpe, giving an account of the miserable condition of their frontier; and the danger they were in from the enemy who had penetrated as far as Winchester in Virginia; he had, thereupon, redoubled his diligence for the better securing the most exposed part of their own; but he was still fearful, that, for want of a sufficient force to take the field, the garrisons on that side would not be able to keep off the numbers of the enemy, which there was the greatest reason to expect would soon appear in those parts; so that no time was to be lost in preparing, in some more effectual manner, for their defence.'

According to the latter, 'all the dispatch he had been able to make in his works had not brought them to such a forwardness as would permit him, without prejudice to that important part of the public service, to be in town at their meeting; he had, however, the satisfaction to tell them, that he had made a lodgment in a very secure place upon the river, beyond the Kittatinny hills (the place from whence, it must be recollected, he fired his first beacon to alarm, or rather distract, the province); the secretary would lay before them a letter from governor Sharpe, with the extracts of an act of his government for granting forty thousand pounds for his majesty's service; only twenty-five thousand pounds of it was conditional [so that conditional acts were regular in Maryland though not in Pennsylvania] that Pennsylvania and Virginia contributed their reasonable quotas towards the expedition it was granted for; they must be sensible there would be no peace or safety for them [his old argument]

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