^6 NATURAL AND CIVIL 



"ivith the prospect, that they should draw off a 

 considerable part of the continent, to their gov- 

 ernment and measures, the British carefully 

 avoided all hostilities against Vermont, restored 

 her prisoners, forbade their troops to enter or 

 attack her territory, and considered the people 

 rather in the light of friends, than enemies. 

 Thus while the British generals were fondly 

 imagining that they were deceiving, corrupting, 

 and seducing the people of Vermont, by their 

 superior arts, address, and intrigues ; the wiser 

 policy of eight honest farmers, in the most un- 

 cultivated part of America, disarmed their north- 

 ern troops, kept them quiet and inoffensive dur- 

 ing three campaigns, assisted in subduing Corn- 

 wallis, protected the northern frontiers, and 

 finally saved a state. 



Not only the British generals, but so much 

 was the British government deceived by these 

 appearances, that the ministers flattered them- 

 selves, that tliey had nearly eifected the defec-s 

 lion of Vermont from the American cause, and 

 drawn them over to the British interest. Lord 

 George Germain was nt that time minister of 

 state, for the American department. A letter 

 which he wrote to sir Henry Clinton, comman- 

 der of the British troops in New York, was in- 

 tercepted and carried into Philadelphia. The 

 letter was dated Whitehall, February 7, 1781, 

 in which he wrote ^thus : " The return of the 

 people of Vermont to their allegiance, is an event 

 of the utmost importance to the king's affairs ; 

 and at this time, if the French and Washington 

 really meditate an irruption into Canada, may 

 be considered as opposing an insurmountable 



