644 



BRITAIN. 



Britain. 



Ifeoceed. 

 injp of 

 congress. 



Proceed, 

 ings of par 

 liament, 

 October. 



Secession 

 of the 

 Rocking- 

 han party 



1777. 



tains ; but the British troops, in the full career of 

 success, were ordered into winter cantonments. A- 



' midst these successes, Rhode Island was seized by 

 the British ; and General Lee, an active American 

 commander, whose talents were equal in value to a 

 province or a fortress, was taken prisoner at Basken- 

 bridge. Nothing could seem, indeed, more forlorn 

 than the aspect of American affairs at this period, 

 to those who forgot, that it was still more difficult 

 for Britain to retain than to make those conquests, 

 painfully as they had been made. 



That the spirit of freedom had not been subdued 

 in the new commonwealth, appeared from the acts of 

 their congress. Though obliged to retreat from the 

 seat of war into Baltimore, they adopted the most 

 vigorous measures : They voted an army of 88 bat- 

 talions, and gave enlarged, almost dictatorial, powers 

 for six months to their chief general. Far from low- 

 ering their tone to Britain, or meeting her indefinite 

 proposals of revising the acts of parliament obnoxious 

 to the colonies, they sent Franklin and other cotn- 

 miseioners to treat for alliance and assistance at the 

 court of Versailles. 



The intelligence of the successes of our arms on 

 Long Island and at New York reached England 



. before the meeting of parliament in October 1776, 

 and gave scope to the most boastful prediction* 

 of those who anticipated a forcible subjugation of 

 the colonies. By the minority a different use of 

 these advantages was recommended ; and the mi- 

 nistry were exhorted rather to concede, while they 

 could with dignity, such terms as -would conciliate 

 the vanquished, than drive them to despair. A mo- 

 ment of success, however, was as inauspicious for the 

 arguments of the minority to prevail, as for the claims 

 of America to be admitted. The motions of the 

 Rockingham party being uniformly rejected, the 

 most of its members absented themselves from parlia- 

 ment, and supplies for the future campaign were vo- 

 ted with scarcely the shew of a debate. The mem- 

 bers of the secession justified their conduct by de- 

 claring, that it was too degrading to be the ineffec- 

 tual instruments of resisting a system supported by 

 majorities and not by reason, and that they would re- 

 serve tht-ir exertions for a season, when the national 

 delirium had so far subsided as to afford some hope 

 of advantage. Their secession, however, was but of 

 short deration : they returned soon after the recess, 

 and, with a success to which they had been little ac- 

 customed, obliged the minister to limit the suspen- 

 sion of the Habeas Corpus act to America, by alter- 

 ing the contents of a suspending bill : a bill which 

 was originally framed with such latitude, that it 

 would have equally subverted the rights of the sub- 

 ject within and without the realm. A vehement con- 

 test arose towards the close of the session, when 

 the debts of the civil list, amounting to L. 600,000, 

 were submitted to the house, and a claim for that 

 sum, and L. 100,000 per annum, made upon the ge. 

 nerosity of parliament. The minister prevailed in 

 this motion ; but when the speaker, Sir Fletcher 

 Norton, addressed the king on presenting the bill, 

 he conveyed a bold and free advice to his majesty in 

 the name of the house, stating their expectations, 

 that what had been liberally granted would be wise- 



-Jy applied. The zealous friends of loyalty, fired 



with indignation at this freedom, contended, that the 

 speaker had not conveyed the sense of parliament. 

 At Mr Fox's instance, the question was put, (in de- 

 fiance of this charge,) whether the speaker had spo- 

 ken the sense of his constituents or not : and here, 

 once more, the minority had a short triumph ; for 

 the house, though they would never have voted such 

 an address, chose to support the dignity of their 

 speaker ; and a vote of thanks was carried to Sir 

 Fletcher Norton. 



The health of the venerable Earl of Chatham had 

 for some time prevented him from giving public tes- 

 timony to his abhorrence of the war; but at the risk 

 of his life, he attended the House of Peers on the 

 30th of May, wrapt in flannels, and supported by a 

 crutch in each hand. He made a motion for ad- 

 dressing the throne to put a stop to the unnatural 

 contest, by redressing all the grievances of the co- 

 lonies, and by putting America exactly as she stood 

 before 1763. The justice of unconditional redress he 

 supported on the grounds of Britain having been the 

 unqualified aggressor in the dispute. The policy of 

 such redress, he deduced from the impossibility of 

 conquering the colonies, and from the immediate 

 prospect of France interfering. " You cannot," said 

 he, " my lords, conquer the colonies. I may as well 

 pretend to drive them before me with this crutch. 

 1 am experienced in spring hopes and vernal pro- 

 mises, but at last will come your equinoctial disap- 

 pointments. If it be true, as ministers say, that no 

 engagements are yet entered into between America 

 and France, there is yet a moment left; the point of 

 honour is still safe ; a few weeks may decide our fete 

 as a nation." The peers in administration repeated 

 their arguments against concession of any kind, and 

 denied any danger from Fiance. The pacific motion, 

 as usual, was lost. During the session, a memorial 

 was delivered by Sir Joseph York, ambassador at the 

 Hague, to the States General, complaining of the 

 seizure of an English vessel, by an American pirate, 

 within cannon shot of the Dutch island of St Eusta 

 tia, and of a salute given by the fortress to a rebel 

 flag. The memorial was couched in haughty and 

 peremptory language, and denounced immediate ven- 

 geance if satisfaction should be denied. The Dutch, 

 though they decliacd giving an answer to our ambas- 

 sador, and complained, through their resident in Lon- 

 don, of the tone of menace which pervaded his ma- 

 jesty's memorial, disowned the conduct of the gover- 

 nor of St Eustatia, and recalled him ; but the utmost 

 coolness from this time subsisted between the courts 

 of London and the Hague. 



The gloomy state of American affairs, as they ap- 

 peared at the close of the former year, was gradually 

 retrieved by Washington, after his retreat behind 

 the Delaware. Perceiving the cantonments of the 

 British widely extended, " Now is the time," said 

 that sagacious general, " to clip their wings, while 

 they are so spread." On the morning of the 26th 

 of December 1776, he crossed the Delaware above 

 Trenton, and marching with his whole force, not ex- 

 ceeding 3000 men, in the midst of a storm of hail 

 and snow, he surprised three regiments of Hsoians, 

 and made them prisoners. In the evening he repr.s- 

 sed the Delaware, and having entered Philadelphia in 

 triumph, took possession of Trenton. Here he 



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