60 FISHER— MYTH-MAKIXG PROCESS IN [April i8, 



testimony and arguments of the torics who from the point of view 

 of impartial history are entitled to exactly the same consideration 

 as witnesses as the whigs and patriots. You must ignore and vilify 

 the testimony and arguments of the loyalists, who, if history is to be 

 anything more than falsehood agreed upon, are entitled to exactly 

 the same consideration as witnesses as the patriots, whigs and tories. 



The whig point of view ignores completely the whole mass of 

 evidence coming from -the tories and the loyalists and does not accept 

 all the evidence coming from the patriots. As the whigs were al- 

 ways trying to show that the patriot party in America did not really 

 want independence, but would be content with a compromise, they 

 accepted no evidence that did not accord with that view. 



All through the Revolution the English whigs sneered at the 

 loyalists, rejected all their statements, and were only a step behind 

 the patriots in condemnation of them. It seems now a little con- 

 temptible, this merciless whig condemnation of the loyalists who 

 were trying to save the same empire which the whigs professed to 

 have a remedy for saving. At the close of the Revolution, when 

 the treaty of peace was signed, a section of the whig party shifted 

 their ground, took up the cause of the loyalists and attacked the 

 ministry for making a treaty of peace which abandoned the loyalists 

 to the mercy of the patriots. 



If you confine yourself to the whig limitation, you must not only 

 ignore the great mass of information about the loyalists, but you 

 must also ignore the military strategy of the war, scarcely noticed 

 in our histories, but, as Mr. Adams shows, almost as important 

 and interesting as the campaigns of Napoleon. 



The great controversy over General Howe's motives and military 

 conduct fills the first three years of the evidence of the war appear- 

 ing in pamphlets, letters and charges against him and finally, in the 

 voluminous evidence of his trial or investigation by Parliament. 

 This great mass of evidence about Howe, very familiar to the people 

 of that time, but unnoticed in our histories, gives us entirely new 

 views and ideas of the situation. Another controversy carried on 

 with the greatest acrimony between, Clinton and Lord Cornwallis 

 and also unnoticed in our histories, gives us an entirely new un- 

 derstanding of the last three years of the war and its final issue. 



