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LIII.

While the campaign had thus recommenced in Canada, the troops of General Howe, eager as 1776. they were for action, still remained cooped up in their dismal Nova Scotia quarters. Thus writes one of the officers: "The Dragoons are under "orders for Halifax - a cursed, cold wintry place "even yet; nothing to eat, less to drink. Bad "times, my dear friend!" * In such a situation the delays in the arrival of the armament from Europe, great as they really were, seemed greater still. General Howe, at length losing patience, resolved, with the forces already under his command, to sail towards New York. Setting out on the 10th of June, he arrived off Sandy Hook in the latter part of the same month. He proceeded to land his men on Staten Island, where Washington had placed only a small military force, with a view to the supplies, and where the English accordingly encountered no resistance. So far from it, that they were received with great demonstrations of joy by the inhabitants, who took the Oaths of Allegiance, and enrolled themselves in bodies of Militia under the authority of Mr. Tryon, lately Governor of the province. No less favourable representations as to the state of popular feeling reached the camp from Long Island, and the neighbouring parts of New Jersey. By the 12th of July, the General found himself joined by his brother the Admiral; and some time later there

Letter in American Archives, vol. v. p. 426.

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arrived the greater part of the transports due from CHAP. England. Lord Howe had first touched at Halifax, and from thence been directed to Sandy Hook. There were on board his fleet, besides British troops, many of the expected mercenaries from Hesse and Brunswick, but their last division had not yet left England; and, indeed, it is to be observed of them, that dear-bought as they had been, they never at any time reached the full numbers required by the treaties.* It was reckoned that the whole united force, comprising the troops returned from Charleston, and the lingering detachments due from England, would amount to 30,000, although, as it proved, it fell short of 25,000 men.

The

Besides the troops, Lord Howe had brought with him a document, which it was hoped might render them unnecessary the Royal Warrant appointing himself and General Howe Commissioners under the late Act of Parliament for the pacification of America. No doubt that the selection of such men was most wisely made. memory of their elder brother, who had fallen gloriously in the wars against the French in Canada, was endeared to the colonists who had fought by his side. Both Lord Howe and the General, but Lord Howe especially, had ever since cultivated a most friendly intercourse with the Americans, and

* The men serving in America, and "subsidised " in addition to the national troops, are computed by Chief Justice Marshall at "about thirteen thousand." (Life of Washington, vol. ii. p. 382.)

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CHAP. now entertained a most earnest wish to conclude the strife against them. But judicious as was the choice of the Commissioners, the restricted terms of the Commission were certainly in the highest degree impolitic. Lord Howe had laboured, but vainly, to obtain its enlargement; it amounted, in fact, to little more than the power, first, of receiving submissions, and then, but not till then, of granting pardons and inquiring into grievances.* Yet still, since these terms had not been divulged and were much magnified by common rumour, the name of the Commission was not ill adapted for popular effect. Had Lord Howe arrived with it a few months, or even only a few weeks before, as he might and should have done, we are assured by American writers that an impression might have been produced by it, in some at least of the Thirteen Colonies, to an extent which they "cannot "calculate" or rather, perhaps, which they do not like to own.† But these few months had been decisive in another direction. During these months both the feeling and the position of the insurgents had most materially changed.

At the beginning of the troubles, as I have

* MS. Instructions, May 6. 1776, State Paper Office. It is therein required as a preliminary condition, before any province shall be declared in the King's peace, that its Convention, or Committee, or Association, "which have usurped powers," shall be dissolved.

† See, for example, the Life of President Reed, vol. i. p. 196.

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already shown, and for a long time afterwards, the CHAP. vast majority of the Americans had no wish nor thought of separation from the mother country. Their object was substantially, and with only some new safe-guards for their rights, to revert to the same state in which they had been before the administration of George Grenville. But the further the conflict proceeded, the less and less easy of attainment did that object seem. How hard, after what had passed, to restore harmonious action between the two Powers now at strife; for the people to trust the Governors appointed by the King; for the King to trust the Assemblies elected by the people! Even where the actual wrong might have departed, it would still leave its fatal legacy, rancour and suspicion, behind. Under the influence of these feelings, a great number of persons in all these colonies were gradually turning their minds to the idea of a final separation from the parent State. Still in all these colonies, excepting only in New England, there were many lingering regrets, many deep-rooted doubts and misgivings. John Adams writes as follows: "My dear "friend Gates, all our misfortunes arise from a single source- the reluctance of the Southern "Colonies to Republican government.” * Here are the words at the same period of another popular leader: "Notwithstanding the Act of Par"liament for seizing our property, there is a strange

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*This was in March, 1776. (American Archives, vol. v. p. 472.)

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CHAP. "reluctance in the minds of many to cut the knot "which ties us to Great Britain." Besides such 1776. total difference of views, there were also, as in

most popular changes, some wild misapprehensions current. One gentleman, a correspondent of Washington, states that he heard this question asked and answered as follows:- "What do you mean by Independence? — We mean a form of government to make us independent of the rich, "and every man able to do as he pleases!" +

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To inform and to animate the people on this subject, several writers of pamphlets now appeared. The chief among them was Thomas Paine, afterwards so notorious for his conduct in Revolutionary France, and for his authorship of the "Age of "Reason." Paine, I regret to own it, was a native of England; at his outset a Quaker, and a stay-maker of Thetford, in Norfolk. Ere long he became estranged both from his profession and his principles. He had espoused the views of a scoffer in religion, and of a leveller in politics. He had tried various trades and walks of life -as sailor, excise-man, schoolmaster, and poet—but at last he settled down to that of democratic agitator, rightly conceiving that to bawl and to scribble must be at all times easier than to work. Having attracted the

*Letter of Reed to Washington, March 3. 1776.

† See the American Archives, vol. vi. p. 390. Of another silly speech in his hearing, the same writer says: "I shamed "the fool so much that he slunk away, but he got his election by it!"

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