future condition, and several were left to their fate.

It was a difficult matter to move so large a body of troops at so short a notice, for the civil administration of the army had been scandalously neglected. "When the transports came to be examined," wrote one of the British officers, "they were void of both provisions and forage. Never were troops in so disgraceful a situation; and that not in the least our own fault, or owing to any want of skill or discretion in our commanders, but entirely owing to Great Britain being fast asleep." While the preparations for removal were going on, Howe, on the 8th of March, made an informal proposal to Washington, through the select-men of Boston, that the English should be suffered to leave with out molestation, on their undertaking to spare the town from injury. As this proposal was not signed with the General's name, Washington declined to reply to it; but the suggestion appears to have established a tacit understanding between the two commanders, and the English forces were allowed to depart without being attacked, though the Americans continued to advance their lines, and to threaten Boston by every means at their disposal.

At four o'clock on the morning of the 18th of March, the British army, accompanied by more than a thousand loyal sympathisers, began to embark, and before ten they were all on board and under way, so great was the despatch. Ere leaving, they had wholly dismantled, and in great part demolished, the fort called Castle William; but, probably owing to want of time, the barracks were left as they stood, with a large quantity of cannon and ammunition, which proved of the greatest service to Washington. What was worse than this, however, was the insufficient provision made by Howe for giving information to ships from England that the town was now in the hands of the rebels. It consequently fell out that several English store-ships, containing munitions of war, sailed into the harbour and were seized by the Americans; and one vessel conveying seven hundred troops shared the same fate. These unfortunate soldiers, who did not submit until after a gallant resistance, were treated with considerable severity. The remaining loyalists of Boston, also, were made to suffer sharply for their devotion to a failing cause. Having been brought to trial, and found guilty, their effects were confiscated; and the estates even of emigrants, who could hardly have been expected to feel that desire for American independence which may have been natural in children of the soil, were seized, and turned to the benefit of the rebellion. The insurrection had

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triumphed, and was not troubled with many scruples in the exertion of its power.

Immediately after the rear-guard of the British army had quitted Boston, the American vanguard marched in, under command of General Putnam. They found marks of hasty flight everywhere; for the enemy had left behind him, not merely guns and gunpowder, but large quantities of wheat, barley, and oats, a hundred and fifty cavalry horses, and bedding and clothing for soldiers. Washington himself entered Boston on the 19th, and the main body of the army followed on the 20th. Six of his best regiments were at once despatched by the Commander-in-Chief to New York, and preparations were made to repel any possible attack on Boston itself. That such an attack might be attempted was feared for a while in consequence of the British fleet, with the troops on board, remaining ten days in Nantasket Roads. Their real object was simply to complete their preparations for the voyage which lay before them; but this, of course, could not be clearly known to Washington, though it was suspected by many of the Bostonians; and it was therefore wise to take precautions. The General had no great reliance on his troops. "We have a kind of people to deal with," he wrote, referring to his New Englanders, "who will not fear danger till the bayonet is at their breast, and then they are susceptible enough of it." He consequently fortified Fort Hill, and demolished the lines on Boston Neck, which he found to be a defence only against the country. But his position was still a difficult one in some respects. The short periods of enlistment were the ruin of his army, and a constant source of trouble. Some time before, he had written :—“ It takes you two or three months to bring new men acquainted with their duty; it takes a longer time to bring a people of the temper and genius of these into such a subordinate way of thinking as is necessary for a soldier. Before this is accomplished, the time approaches for their dismissal, and you are beginning to make interest for their continuance for another limited period; in the doing of which you are obliged to relax in your discipline, in order, as it were, to curry favour with them. Thus the latter part of your time is employed in undoing what the first was accomplishing." The General had only too many occasions of proving the truth of this; and in March another was at hand. It was now close upon the time when the ten regiments of militia which were brought in to serve until the 1st of April would be disengaged; and,

* Washington to Joseph Reed, March 25th, 1776.

said Washington, writing to Joseph Reed, "from former experience we have found it as practicable to stop a torrent as these people when their time is up." Had the British forces been better handled, it can hardly be doubted, Boston might have been saved.

Washington, however, had done nobly, and the honours he received were not more than his due. That he should have performed so much with such poor materials-that, in the face of the enemy, he should have created something like an army out of a mob of reluctant farmers, and, when that had dispersed, should in a few weeks have raised another-that with these raw levies he should have accomplished a difficult and important strategical

movement, and that by such means he should have compelled the evacuation of Boston-were feats of generalship of which any commander might well be proud. The thanks of both branches of the Massa chusetts Legislature were voted to this great man, who in his reply gave his soldiers far more credit than he was accustomed to express in private. A commemorative medal in gold and bronze was ordered to be struck, and it was afterwards very beautifully executed in France. Meanwhile, Howe and his discomfited troops resumed their course, and proceeded, not to New York, according to the design of a few weeks earlier, but to the shores of Nova Scotia.

AMERICA, in the early months of 1776, stood in a very singular position towards Great Britain. Nominally, the English colonies were still portions of the British Empire. They had not yet denied in terms the sovereignty of George III.; they professed-with what sincerity let the reader himself judge from facts already recorded-to desire a continuance of the old connection with the land from which they had proceeded. A subtle distinction had been set up between the King and his Ministers, but more to save appearances than for any solid reason.

It was

assumed that the objectionable and tyrannical acts of which the provinces complained were due entirely to the Government and the Parliament; although it was well known that the monarch himself was the most determined assertor of his own prerogatives (real or supposed), and that the majority of the English people were heartily in favour of manifesting with vigour the power of the parent over the child. To keep up this politic pretence of loyalty as long as it was thought desirable to maintain such a pretence at all, the army at Boston was spoken of as the Ministerial, and not the Royal, army; as if the King himself had nothing to do with it, or were being defied by its Generals. Yet, side by side with these verbal assertions of duty, a distinct purpose of independence, to be obtained by martial force, was steadily followed. years, the political leaders of America had persistently disobeyed the commands of the English sovereign; they had established a Federal Government which was certainly not warranted by any admitted relation between the colonies and the mother country; they were making open war against the King's forces; and they had even gone to the extent of invading a portion of the British dominions which was known not to sympathise with the revolutionary movement.* While the intention of establishing a separate Government

For many

Mr. Grahame has remarked on this incongruity in his History (Book XI., chap. 5).

was sedulously denied, preparations for independence were being made with skill and resolution; and now that those preparations were nearly completed, there was every day less disposition to observe the pretences under cover of which they had been pursued.

Nothing evinced the maturity of this determination more than the opening of relations with foreign Powers-relations, it is true, of an informal character, yet pointing in the future to others of a more recognised description. It was especially to France that America looked as her friend and supporter in the struggle for independence; partly because France was one of the chief military nations of Europepartly because of her hereditary ill-will to England. The French Government, glad of any opportunity to injure a rival, encouraged the aspirations of the Americans, and permitted a number of French officers and engineers to accept commissions in the insurgent army. France, in common with other countries of the European continent, desired to see the English monopoly of American commerce broken up; and the large contraband trade which had recently arisen in consequence of the state of civil war in the western world, was practically effecting that result. The report of Bonvouloir from Philadelphia reached the French Minister, Vergennes, at the commencement of Man h. Shortly afterwards, Vergennes drew up for the consideration of his Royal master a paper in which he reviewed the chief aspects of the case. Speak ing with constant reference to Spain, as well as to France (for the two countries were closely bound together by family ties and by community of ob jects), the Foreign Minister of Louis XVI. r marked that, although the prolongation of the civil war might be infinitely advantageous to the two Crowns, since it would exhaust both the victors and the vanquished-such was the eighteenth cen tury conception of the interests of nations-the was also room to fear many untoward events; as amongst others, the possibility of England, whet beaten on the continent of America, seeking in

It

demnity at the expense of France and Spain, and, to conciliate the insurgents, offering them the commerce and supply of the West India Islands. was also feared that the colonists, on attaining their independence, might become conquerors from necessity, and, by forcing their excess of produce upon Spanish America, might destroy the ties which bound the colonies to their metropolis. The state of the colonies, both of France and Spain, was described as such that, with the exeption of Havannah, probably not one was in a condition to resist the smallest part of the forces which England was then sending to America. There was consequently no physical reason why the French and Spanish plantations should not be successfully invaded; and Vergennes had so had an opinion of English political honour as to feel well convinced that no considerations of public morality, of breach of faith, or of violation of treaties, would deter Great Britain from making sach an attack if she found it desirable. Chatham and the other American sympathisers might be called to power; peace might be concluded between the belligerents; and an enormous mass of fighting men might thus be put in motion. Englishmen of all classes, said Vergennes, were persuaded that a popular war against France, or an invasion of Mexico, would terminate, or at least allay, their domestic dissensions, as well as furnish resources for the extinction of their national debt. The French Minister then continued :

"In the midst of so many perils, the strong love of peace which is the preference of the King, and of the King of Spain, seems to prescribe the most measured course. If the dispositions of these two princes were for war- if they were disposed to follow the impulse of their interests, and perhaps of the justice of their cause, which is the cause of humanity, so often outraged by England-if their military and financial means were in a state of development proportionate to their substantial power-it would, without doubt, be necessary to ay to them that Providence has marked out this moment for the humiliation of England, that it has struck her with the blindness which is the sarest precursor of destruction, and that it is time to avenge upon her the evils which, since the commencement of the century, she has inflicted on those who have had the misfortune to be her Leighbours or her rivals. It would then be necessary not to neglect any of the means suited to render the next campaign as animated as possible, procure advantages to the Americans; and the degree of passion and exhaustion would determine the moment to strike the decisive blows which

and

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would make England step back into the rank of secondary Powers, ravish from her the empire. which she claims in the four quarters of the world, and deliver the universe from a greedy tyrant who is bent on absorbing all power and all wealth. But this is not the point of view chosen by the two monarchs; and their part appears, under actual circumstances, to limit itself, with one exception, to a circumspect but active foresight. Care must be taken to avoid being compromised, and not to provoke the ills which it is wished to prevent; yet we must not flatter ourselves that the most absolute and the most rigorous inaction will guarantee us from suspicion. The continuance of the war for at least one year is desirable for the two Crowns. To that end the British Ministry must be maintained in the persuasion that France and Spain are pacific, so that it may not fear to embark in an active and costly campaign; whilst, on the other hand, the courage of the Americans might be kept up by secret favours and vague hopes, which would prevent an accommodation, and assist to develop ideas of independence. The evils which the British will make them suffer will embitter their minds; their passions will be more and more inflamed by the war; and, should the mothercountry be victorious, she would for a long time need all her strength to keep down their spirit ; so that she would never dare to expose herself to their efforts for the recovery of their liberty in connection with a foreign enemy."

The true policy of France, continued Vergennes, was to tranquillise the English Ministry as to the intentions of that Power and of Spain. At the same time it would be proper for the two monarchies to extend to the insurgents secret aid in military stores and money; yet it would not comport with the dignity of the King to treat with the insurgents till the liberty of English America had acquired consistence. In other words, it was undignified to recognise the insurgents openly, but not at all so to conspire, by an elaborate system of chicanery and false pretence, against a country with which France was then at peace. The support of the Americans by the French Monarchy, out of no love for the interests of freedom, but from mere hatred of England, is one of the most flagitious facts in history; and never was retribution more amply merited than that. which afterwards overtook the Bourbons, partly as the result of their selfish dallying with principles which they blindly encouraged abroad, and as ignorantly attempted to defy or to cajole at

* Bancroft.