172 Carson: Franklin 



on his legs is higher than a gentleman on his knees"? 

 Or anything truer than "The eye of a master will do 

 more work than both his hands"? 



He infused humor into practical citizenship. During 

 the administration of Sir Robert Walpole, the trans- 

 portation of convicts to this country was regarded as a 

 very great grievance. Franklin wrote to the Minister 

 the thanks of the colonists for the maternal care of 

 Britain so strongly manifested in this instance, and as 

 a satisfactory proof of American gratitude sent him a 

 collection of rattlesnakes, which he advised him to 

 introduce into His Majesty's Gardens at Kew, so that 

 they might propagate and increase, assuring him that 

 they would be as beneficial to His Majesty's English 

 dominions as the British rattlesnake convicts had been 

 to America. 



When difficulties arose among the members of the 

 Continental Congress as to how they should communi- 

 cate to the soldiers of Sir William Howe the principles 

 for which the Continental army was fighting, Franklin 

 had copies of the Declaration of Independence printed 

 in English and German and wrapped around packages 

 of tobacco, which were distributed by farmers and fisher- 

 men in the British and Hessian camps. When the 

 Declaration of Independence was being signed, Charles 

 Carroll, of Carrollton, is said to have remarked, "We 

 must be unanimous about this; we must all hang to- 



