a service; and the three hundred thousand pounds, which you seem to think so much clear profit to us, when, in fact, they never spend a penny among us, but they have for it from us a penny's worth. The manufactures they buy are brought from you; the provisions we could, as we always did, sell elsewhere for as much money. Holland, France, and Spain would all be glad of our custom, and pleased to see the separation.

"And, after all, and in spite of any thing you can do, we in Britain shall still retain the greatest part of your European trade, because we shall give a better price for many of your commodities, than you can have anywhere else, and we shall sell to you several of our manufactures, especially in the woollen-stuff and metal way, on cheaper terms."

Oho! Then you will still trade with us! But can that be without our trading with you? And how can you buy our oil, if we catch no whales?

"The leaders of your parties will then be setting all their engines to work, to make fools become the dupes of fools."

Just as they do in England.

"And instead of having troops to defend them, and those troops paid by Great Britain, they must defend themselves, and pay themselves."

To defend them! To oppress, insult, and murder them, as at Boston!

"Not to mention, that the expenses of your civil governments will be necessarily increased; and that a fleet more or less must belong to each province for guarding their coasts, ensuring the payment of duties, and the like."

These evils are all imaginations of the author. The same were predicted to the Netherlands, but have never yet happened. But suppose all of them together,

and many more, it would be better to bear them than submit to parliamentary taxation. We might still have something we could call our own. But, under the power claimed by Parliament, we have not a single sixpence.

The author of this pamphlet, Dean Tucker, has always been haunted with the fear of the seat of government being soon to be removed to America. He has, in his Tracts on Commerce, some just notions in matters of trade and police, mixed with many wild and chimerical fancies totally impracticable. He once proposed, as a defence of the colonies, to clear the woods for the width of a mile all along behind them, that the Indians might not be able to cross the cleared part without being seen; forgetting that there is a night in every twenty-four hours.

PROPOSED COLONY IN ILLINOIS.

Some time after Dr. Franklin went to England on his second mission, as agent for Pennsylvania, a project was formed in America, originating with Sir William Johnson, Governor Franklin, and others, for settling a new colony in the Illinois country. They wrote to Dr. Franklin, requesting him to use his influence to procure a grant from the crown for that purpose. The ministers at first seemed to listen to the proposal, but, after two years' consideration, the plan was finally abandoned. The following extracts are from letters written by Dr. Franklin to his son on this subject. The copy from which they are printed was found among Sir William Johnson's papers.

Soon after this project was laid aside, however, another was set on foot, which proved more successful. In June, 1769, a company, consisting of Thomas Walpole, Samuel Wharton, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Pownall, John Sargent, and others, petitioned the king for the right to purchase of the crown a tract of land bordering on the Ohio River, amounting to two millions four hundred thousand acres, for the purpose of establishing a new colony. The petition was favorably received by the Board of Trade and the King's Council, the terms of sale were agreed upon, and all the forms for confirming the grant and providing for civil government passed through the proper offices. From the name of the principal proprietor, an eminent banker of London, the territory was sometimes called Walpole's Grant; but the name assigned to it by the associates was Vandalia. The business was not finally closed till the spring of 1775, and the war then breaking out in America prevented it from being carried into effect. See the paper, entitled Settlement on the Ohio River, in the present volume; and Washington's Writings, Vol. II., .p. 483.-EDitor.

May 10th, 1766. I like the project of a colony in the Illinois country, and will forward it to my utmost here.

August 25th, 1766. I can now only add, that I

will endeavour to accomplish all that you and our friends desire relating to the settlement westward.

September 12th, 1766. I have just received Sir William's open letter to Secretary Conway, recommending your plan for a colony in the Illinois, which I am glad of. I have closed and sent it to him. He is not now in that department; but it will of course go to Lord Shelburne, whose good opinion of it I have reason to hope for; and I think Mr. Conway was rather against distant posts and settlements in America. We have, however, suffered a loss in Lord Dartmouth, who, I know, was inclined to a grant there in favor of the soldiery, and Lord Hillsborough is said to be terribly afraid of dispeopling Ireland. General Lyman has been long here soliciting such a grant, and will readily join the interest he has made with ours, and I should wish for a body of Connecticut settlers, rather than all from our frontiers. I purpose waiting on Lord Shelburne on Tuesday, and hope to be able to send you his sentiments by Falconer, who is to sail about the 20th.

A good deal, I imagine, will depend on the account, when it arrives, of Mr. Croghan's negotiation in that country. This is an affair I shall seriously set about; but there are such continual changes here, that it is very discouraging to all applications to be made to the ministry. I thought the last set well established, but they are broken and gone. The present set are hardly thought to stand very firm, and God only knows whom we are to have next.

The plan is I think well drawn, and I imagine Sir William's approbation will go a great way in recommending it, as he is much relied on in all affairs, that may have any relation to the Indians. Lord Adam

Gordon is not in town, but I shall take the first opportunity of conferring with him. I thank the Company for their willingness to take me in, and one or two others that I may nominate. I have not yet concluded whom to propose it to; but I suppose our friend Sargent should be one. I wish you had allowed me to name more, as there will be in the proposed country, by my reckoning, near sixty-three millions of acres, and therefore enough to content a great number of reasonable people, and by numbers we might increase the weight of interest here. But perhaps we shall do without.

September 27th, 1766. I have mentioned the Illinois affair to Lord Shelburne. His Lordship had read your plan for establishing a colony there, recommended by Sir William Johnson, and said it appeared to him a reasonable scheme, but he found it did not quadrate with the sentiments of people here; * that their objections to it were, the distance, which would make it of little use to this country, as the expense on the carriage of goods would oblige the people to manufacture for themselves; that it would for the same reason be difficult both to defend it and to govern it; that it might lay the foundation of a power in the heart of America, which in time might be troublesome to the other colonies, and prejudicial to our government over them; and that people were wanted both here and in the already settled colonies, so that none could be spared for a new colony. These arguments, he said, did not appear of much weight, and I endeavoured by others to invalidate them entirely. But his Lordship did not declare whether he would or would not pro

I fancy, but am not certain, that his Lordship meant Lord Hillsborough, who, I am told, is not favorable to new settlements.