remained in their hands, which might be applied to the present emergency; but we find, that the fifty-five thousand pounds, to be sunk by the provincial tax, is expended; that near four thousand (part of the five thousand) pounds, given by the proprietaries, in consideration of their being exempted from their share of that tax, is not paid into the commissioners hands; and if the whole sum was paid, the debts already contracted for the defence of the province, are nearly equal thereto. Nevertheless, as we apprehend the treaty proposed to be held with the Susquehanna Indians, and the Delaware king Teedyuscung, may be attended with lasting good consequences, we have resolved, that the sum of three hundred pounds, be allowed by this house for that purpose.'

The members sent herewith, were also to apprize him, that if it was pleasing to him, they should adjourn to the 16th of August; and his answer was,

'That he should not engage for the proprietaries contributing any thing towards the expences that may attend the proposed conference; that as the house had voted three hundred pounds for that purpose, he should wait at Easton or Bethlehem till the whole was expended, then take his horse and ride away to New York to meet lord Loudon; and that as to the time of adjournment, he should not say whether he was pleased or displeased with it, but leave it entirely with the house to do as they pleased.'

A compliment from general Shirley to the province on his being recalled, acknowleging the "repeated instances of their contributing towards the defence of his majesty's just rights and dominions, and to assure them of his hearty wishes for their welfare," without one civil thing to his brother governor, though the letter is directed to him, is the only thing remarkable of the session hitherto omitted; and injuriously, wickedly, and impudently, as the province has been aspersed, no voucher of that authentic nature can, or ought to be dispensed with.

On the 16th, according to their adjournment, they met again; and the next day they were honored with the governor's message; which told them, in the first place, what they

S s

pay;

that a

sup

had long told each other before, namely, "that their treasury was exhausted; that the troops wanted their ply was necessary," &c. The taking and burning of an outfort on the Juniata, called fort Granville, made a good terrifying ingredient in it; the rest was the stuff that he had talked over and over, till the ear was weary of hearing it; except that major Rutherford, the commanding officer in that province, of the new American regiment then raising, wanted barracks for one thousand men; and that his recruits being chiefly indentured servants, it would be necessary for the house to make provision for the payment of their masters, for the residue of the time each had to serve, in conformity to his majesty's instructions."

The next day the house sent up their reply which was as follows:

'May it please the Governor,

'The house have repeatedly offered the governor bills for granting considerable sums to the king's use, to which he has refused his assent, being restrained by the proprietaries, as he says, from passing any bills in which their estate is to be taxed towards its defence. We know of no equitable way of raising such large sums as are now necessary, but by a general tax on all estates, real and personal. We have voted another sum of forty thousand pounds, to be raised in that manner, and are preparing a new bill to lay before the governor for that purpose. But as we are, and must be still, of opinion, that the proprietary estates ought to be taxed in common with those of their fellow subjects in all the rest of the king's dominions, for their common defence, we cannot omit a clause of that kind in our bill, without injustice to the king's other subjects, ourselves, our constituents, and posterity; and we believe, that an equal number of men, of any sect, nation, name, or party, among us, will never be chosen to represent the province, who would be of a different sentiment in this particular.

In the mean time, we earnestly request the governor would use his influence with the proprietaries' receiver geneneral, to induce him to pay the remaining sum of near three

thousand pounds, yet behind of their contribution of five thousand pounds, which by law was to have been immediately advanced, but is still wit held from the commissioners, to the injury of the poor soldiers, whose pay is in arrear for want of that money, the fifty-five thousand pounds, we granted by the said bill for the king's use being expended.

'We are sensibly affected with the distressed state of our frontier inhabitants; though we apprehend they are in a much better situation than those of the neighbouring provinces, who are equally near the enemy: and we hope they may be rendered still more secure, by a vigorous exertion of the force now on foot for their protection, and the annoyance of the enemy.

'The other matters recommended to us by the governor, we will take into consideration, and hope we may be able to do therein whatever ought to be expected of us.'

This was the last parley between the assembly of Pennsylvania and Mr. Morris, who makes so notable a figure on their list of governors. Captain Denny his successor was at hand; and therefore he did not think it worth his while to compose a reply, which he might reasonably suppose no body would think worth reading.

Change of Devils, according to the Scots proverb is blithsome!

Welcome ever smiles,
And farewel goes out sighing

says Shakspeare,

The whole province seemed to feel itself relieved by the alteration of one name for another. Hope, the universal cozener, persuaded them to believe, that the good qualities of the man would qualify the governor. He was received like a deliverer. The officious proprietary mayor and corporation, more than once already mentioned, made a feast for his entertainment; and having invited the assembly to partake of it, they also were pleased to become forgetful enough to be of the party.

That the said assembly should congratulate him on his arrival and accession (though the term is a royal one) was, per

haps, no more than a decent and respectful compliment; and that they should augurate from the excellence of his character, that his administration would be excellent, a fair and candid inference. But that they should find six hundred pounds at that time in their treasury to present him with, as an initiation-fee, may be matter of surprize to all readers of their votes alike. Tired they might be of opposition; pleased to find some pretence for relenting; but how they should find money where no money was, would be beyond conjecture. The order, therefore, on their treasurer, for that sum could only be considered as a present mark of their good will, and an obligation on the house to provide, in some future moneybill, for the discharge of that order.

Compliments over, government began. And in the new governor's very first speech, the province was given to understand, "that the French incroachments on the Ohio, which his majesty in his declaration of war had assigned as the principal cause of his entering into a just and necessary war, were within the limits of it, [which the province could never yet be convinced of;] and that therefore it was particularly incumbent on them16 to exert themselves in the support of such measures as had been, or should be, concerted for carrying on the same with vigor; the state of the frontiers too, the devastations, cruelties, and murders committed there, and the horror they excited in him, made as good a topic in his hands, as the back counties, and the back inhabitants had done in his predecessor's; nay, those very back inhabitants are brought forward in the next paragraph; and,

16 Had the French fort really been within the bounds of the grant to the proprietor, that would not have made the support of the war more particularly incumbent on the assembly of Pennsylvania, than on any other neighbouring government, equally affected and incommoded by its situation. For the country was as yet uninhabited; the property of the soil was in the proprietors; who, if it could be recovered from the French, would demand and receive exorbitant prices for it of the people. They might as justly be told, that the expence of his law suit with the proprietary of Maryland, for recovering his right to lands on that frontier, was particularly incumbent on them to defray.

what is more, left naked and defenceless to a savage and merciless enemy by an immediate disbanding of the provincial troops, which, as before, was represented as unavoidable, unless fresh supplies were quickly raised for their support."

In short, if Mr. Morris had made the speech himself, he could not have carried on the thread of government with more consistency; for, as to the douceur at parting contained in these words, "let unanimity and dispatch prevail in your councils; and be assured I will deny you nothing that I can grant, consistent with my duty to his majesty, and the rights of the proprietaries," it amounted to no more than this, do as my masters the proprietaries would have you, and I will say nothing to the contrary!

It is not to be conceived, that men of such long experience in the affairs of the province (so the members of assembly were characterised by their new governor) could be one moment at a loss for the meaning of his speech, or what was to be apprehended in consequence of it.

They had voted a supply of forty thousand pounds before Mr. Morris was superseded. They did not sit, as usual, in the afternoon of the day the speech was delivered; and though in the next day's deliberation they dropt the former bill, and ordered in another with a blank for the sum, they adjourned the day following, without doing any business at all; nay, though quickened the next following with a message accompanied with an extract of a letter from lord Loudon, as also several other letters and papers (among the latter, one containing a letter from colonel Armstrong, concerning some secret which was to be kept a secret still) they demurred both that and three days more, before they came to any farther resolution; and then they agreed upon an address by way of answer to his speech, in which, after a paragraph or two of compliment, they dryly gave him to understand, 1st, "that from the very nature of their frontier which was so extended that it in a manner covered the three lower counties, Maryland, and New-Jersey, and consisted of dispersed settlements, the horrors he talked of