IV INTRODUCTION. 



that subject, and being possessed of a considerable number 

 of local facts, the idea occurred to him of putting the ma- 

 terials in his possession into the shape of a history of our 

 County. The subject was accordingly brought by him 

 before the Institute, and meeting with the approbation of 

 the members present, it was at once placed in the hands 

 of a committee, with the understanding that the whole 

 labor of drawing up the history should devolve on Mr. 

 Edwards. 



Circulars were now addressed to every person supposed 

 to be in possession of f^icts or information calculated to 

 add value to the work, but again the response was for the 

 most part slow and unsatisfactory ; and the feeble health 

 of Mr. Edwards did not permit him to engage in the 

 laborious task of personally examining voluminous ancient 

 records, and other manuscripts of vital importance to the 

 work in question, and only to a very limited extent of elicit- 

 ing from the aged of our County their recollections of by- 

 gone times. 



Thus circumstanced, Mr. Edwards engaged energetically 

 in the Avork, and, at the time his earthly career was so 

 suddenly brought to a close, he had brought his narrative 

 down to the commencement of Penn's government. The 

 task of completing the work was imposed by the Institute 

 upon the author, wdio assumed it as a duty he owed to his 

 departed friend, as well as from a desire to place beyond 

 contingency a multitude of local facts, that were to be 

 found only in ancient manuscripts, many of which it w^as 

 known were not in safe keeping, nor in a good state of 

 preservation. 



When the appointment of the Institute was accepted, 

 he had no idea that his labor would extend much beyond 

 the completion of the narrative commenced by his friend, 

 and he supposed that a large amount of the materials had 

 already been collected for that purpose. He was aware 

 that the manuscript of Mr. Edwards was too voluminous, 

 and if used, would require some abridgment, but a careful 

 examination of it soon satisfied him that it could not be 

 used at all, as part of a work for which he was to be mainly 

 responsible. It was discovered that Mr. Edwards in 



