A BLOODY MASSACRE. 



197 



transportation, for they could survive without 

 them, provided, of course, that a sufficient 

 stock of tobacco had been laid in. And yet, 

 with all their phlegm and apparent indiffer- 

 ence to the outside world, they arose as one 

 man when the news reached them of the first 

 symptoms of a revolt against unjust taxation 

 at Boston in 1774, and sent to that city their 

 message of sympathy. Whatever may be true 

 of other portions of the country, it seems con- 

 clusive that among the farmers along the Hud- 

 son and Hackensack there was from the first, 

 practical unanimity in resisting this system of 

 robbery, not only in council, but in arms, 

 while at the same time, as in this instance of 

 the address of the Bergen people, they were 

 still loyal to the King. It was only when a 

 part of the community thought that the object 

 of the war might be accomplished without 

 independence, and the other part differed with 

 them, that there were deadly enemies in the 

 same town, sometimes in the same house, and 

 even in the same bed. 



It was about three miles from Tappan when 

 we passed the spot of one of the most bloody 

 massacres of the war. It was where the 

 American Col. Baylor had quartered himself 



