104 DESOLATION OF THE FRONTIERS. [1763. 



hundred.^ The demand was granted, on condition 

 that the New England provinces should also con- 

 tribute a just proportion to the general defence. 

 This condition was complied with, and the troops 

 were raised. 



Pennsylvania had been required to furnish a 

 thousand men ; but in this quarter many difficulties 

 intervened. The Assembly of the province, never 

 prompt to vote supplies for military purposes, 

 was now embroiled in that obstinate quarrel with 

 the proprietors, which for years past had clogged 

 all the wheels of government. The proprietors 

 insisted on certain pretended rights, which the 

 Assembly strenuously opposed ; and the governors, 

 who represented the proprietary interest, were 

 bound by imperative instructions to assert these 

 claims, in spite of all opposition. On the present 

 occasion, the chief point of dispute related to the 

 taxation of the proprietary estates ; the governor, 

 in conformity with his instructions, demanding that 



1 MS. Gage Papers. 



Extract from a MS. Letter — William Smith, Jr., to : — 



" New York. 22d Nov. 1763. 



" Is not Mr. Amherst the happiest of men to get out of this Trouble 

 so seasonably ? At last he was obliged to submit, to give the despised 

 Indians so great a mark of his Consideration, as to confess he could not 

 defend us, and to make a requisition of 1400 Provincials by the Spring — 

 600 more he demands from New Jersey. Our People refused all but a 

 few for immediate Defence, conceiving that all the Northern Colonies 

 ought to contribute equally, and upon an apprehension that he has called 

 for too insufficient an aid. . . . 



" Is not Gage to be pitied ? The war will be a tedious one, nor can it 

 be glorious, even tho' attended with Success. Instead of decisive Battles, 

 woodland skirmishes — instead of Colours and Cannon, our Trophies will 

 be stinking scalps. — Heaven preserve you, my Friend, from a War con- 

 ducted by a spirit of Murder rather than of brave and generous otFence." 



