60 Life of Count Rumford. 



esteemed. But he was nevertheless faithful to his 

 official trust when the royal authority was defied, though 

 he acted most unwisely and blindly. 



Yet some of the foremost men in all the Colonies 

 men of intelligence, rectitude, high character, and un- 

 questionable patriotism hesitated as to the rightfulness 

 or the policy of the first measures which initiated the 

 Revolution. Some such honestly doubted whether the 

 colonists had real, substantial grievances, and if, having 

 such, they ought not to seek quite different means of 

 redress. We can afford in these days, and in the calm- 

 ness of our retrospect, to distinguish between the facts 

 of history and the rhetoric of demonstrative orators. 

 We certainly must distinguish between the grounds for 

 hesitancy and mistrust which influenced wise and honest 

 men who were obliged to take a side before actual hos- 

 tilities opened, and the character of the struggle as it 

 went on. The exasperation of feeling which followed 

 upon the successive measures and acts of the British 

 government and forces, in burning our towns and sea- 

 ports, and employing mercenary troops, and in other 

 outrages, doubtless made many of the " Tories " regret 

 their loyalty, while at the same time it intensified the 

 popular acrimony against them. 



Ten years before the outbreak of hostilities there had 

 been even an era of good feeling, in the New England 

 Colonies especially, towards the British monarchy and 

 ministry. The Indian and French War, in which 

 Thompson's own kin had many of them done good 

 service, had happily freed the frontier towns of all the 

 apprehensions and horrors of savage inroads, and the 

 treasuries of the other settlements from the exactions 

 of a military force for their defence. Though the 



