Life of Count Rumford. 103 



important papers relating to the American Colonies 

 had lain unopened in government offices. Indeed, 

 the first knowledge which .some of the custodians of 

 those papers and many more recent historical and 

 political essayists obtained about important documents 

 hid away in those offices came to them through the 

 requests sent in for the privilege of examining them by 

 investigators like Mr. Sparks, who crossed the ocean for 

 that purpose. 



The receipt in England of the intelligence that the 

 British army, after having been cooped up in Boston 

 for nine months, had been compelled by Washington 

 to evacuate it by their ships, and that a whole fleet of 

 store-vessels and transports on their way to Boston to 

 relieve the army were likely, one by one, to fall into 

 the hands of the Yankees, furnishing them with just the 

 munitions and goods which they most needed, caused 

 an intense excitement and dismay. The intelligence of 

 the evacuation was made public in the London Gazette 

 of May 3, 1776, though, during the storm which the 

 announcement raised in Parliament, suspicions were 

 thrown out that the ministry had had earlier knowl- 

 edge of the mortifying fact which they had concealed. 



It would be pleasant to think that Major Thompson 

 bore the tidings of that significant prognostication of 

 the course of the war. That, however, could hardly 

 be regarded as the reason for his welcome from Lord 

 George Germaine, to whom he would have carried the 

 despatch, nor for his immediate admission to a desk 

 in the Colonial Office. He, of course, proffered, and 

 showed he could impart, "information," as Pictet 

 learned from himself. That a youth of twenty- three 

 years should thus at once be relied upon and rewarded 



