one of the wisest men in this nation has proved ought not to have been taxed, and which would not have been destroyed, if the ships that carried it had not obstinately persisted in landing it; for that reason, I say, a whole city, a whole Province, must suffer all the dreadful effects of Ministerial vengeance. The worthy magistrate, the innocent merchant, the honest tradesman, the well disposed poor, all, all must be treated with the most unexampled, the most diabolical rigour, for the outrage of a few, have, like the city of London, their humble petitions and just remonstrances ridiculed and disregarded; their Charter violated; their ports blocked up; their trade removed; their inhabitants dragged three thousand miles for trial; and to complete the tragedy and their slavery, a military Governour and troops sent over to enforce the Ministerial mandate. Excellent measures these to stir up a civil war at home; compel the exasperated Americans to take up arms, and to ruin the trade of the mother country. But whatever gratification such measures may afford to a wrong headed, deluded Minister, they are highly offensive to unemployed and impoverished manufacturers, whose business is their dependence and support, and who are too sensible of the loss, not to curse those who would deprive them and their posterity of it. Happy is it for Lord North that he is not a tradesman, lamenting for orders, and distressed for remittances. Unhappy for him that the Kingdom at large condemn his American measures, and are ashamed of his conduct. In a word, pensioners may flatter, and levees may applaud; but it is too clear, that unless he conciliate the esteem of the Colonies by a repeal of the cruel destructive laws he has framed, and restore the trade he has taken away, that he will kindle a flame he will find himself unable to quench, and load himself with the execrations not only of innumerable poor that may be deprived of employment in the manufactory of this city, Birmingham, Sheffield, and Yorkshire, but those of every sensible and spirited person in the Kingdom.

Williamsburg, June 16, 1774.

On Monday evening last, the 13th instant, an express arrived in this city from Hampshire, with letters from Colonel Abraham Hite, residing there, to his Excellency our Governour, which give us fresh assurances of the determined resolution of the Indians to declare war against us. It would be needless to expatiate with respect to the distresses of the inhabitants in many of the back parts of this Colony, as their situation must be sufficiently obvious to every one who has attended to the many late accounts of the barbarity of the Indians towards them. Colonel Hite reports, that he has received intelligence from Cheet River, upon which he can depend, that on the 4th instant some people going to or by the house of one William Speir, they discovered him, his wife, and four children murdered and scalped, with a broad-axe sticking in the man's breast, and his wife lying on her back, entirely naked. At another place they found a man's coat, with a number of bullet holes in it; and a child murdered close by the same. The cattle they have likewise killed; in short, the outrages committed by these barbarians are hardly credible; and, we are told, that scarce a day happens but some cruelty or other is committed. Colonel Hite declares, that although he resided there during the two last wars, he never saw greater consternation and distress among the people than is at this time.

Philadelphia, Monday, June 13, 1774.

On Thursday evening last, June 9th, about twelve hundred Mechanics of this city and suburbs, assembled at the State House, to hear a letter and other papers read from the Mechanics of the City of New- York, and to form such resolutions as should be judged proper for their future conduct at this most alarming and critical time, when American liberty is so deeply wounded, and her rights so unjustly invaded by levying taxes on us without our consent, for the purpose of raising a revenue; and for refusing payment of those illegal taxes, blocking up with divers ships of war the port and town of Boston, thereby most unjustly depriving that once flourishing town of its whole trade; the inhabitants of their private property; and the labouring poor of the means of subsisting themselves and families. These proceedings of the parent State against her American children, call aloud upon all Americans to assemble, consult, and determine firmly to pursue such measures for their own and neighbours future security, as shall be judged most likely to avert the present calamity, and secure to them the perfect enjoyment of their liberties and properties upon a fixed and lasting foundation; for which purpose, the Mechanics of this city did propose, and intend at this meeting to form such resolutions to co-operate with the Committee of Merchants, and to strengthen their hands, as will convince the world Americans were born and determine to live free, and that they never will be slaves; that liberty is their birthright: they cannot, they will not give it up. But since the sending out the handbills for calling this great assembly, information was received that the present Committee have sent expresses to all the Southern Colonies for their advice on this alarming occasion, and returns to those expresses are expected in a very few days; that the Committee had determined to call a general meeting of all the inhabitants in the city and county, to be held here next Wednesday, the 15th instant, at three o'clock in the afternoon, then to chose one Grand Joint Committee, to represent the whole inhabitants of this city and county, to correspond with the Committees of the neighbouring Provinces, and to adopt such measures to be pursued by all, as their united wisdom shall direct; wherefore it is judged best at present to omit going into particular resolutions, or appointing a particular Committee to represent the Mechanics, as the grand general meeting is so near at hand.

As it was judged there would not be sufficient time to give proper notice to the county, it was agreed on Saturday last by the Committee and a number of the most respectable inhabitants called to advise on the present occasion, that the general meeting be postponed to Saturday next, at or near the State House, at three o'clock, P. M., at which time and place the inhabitants of this city and county, qualified to vote for Representatives, are desired to attend, in order to take into their consideration certain propositions prepared to be laid before them.

GEORGE CLYMER TO JOSIAH QUINCY, JR.

Philadelphia, June 13, 1774.

DEAR SIR: The business I have been engaged in, almost ever since I had the pleasure of seeing you, has in a great measure prevented me from improving a friendship and correspondence in which I expected the greatest satisfaction.

Knowing how much you have at heart the welfare of your country—the character you sustain, and your circle of connexions—any information from you respecting the true springs and motives of action in your people on many late occasions, would have been extremely agreeable to me, feeling myself much interested in every thing that can affect them.

I have ever been the advocate for the political conduct of the people of Boston, wherever it has been made the subject of conversation; but manners dissimilar to those of many of the more Southern Colonies, and perhaps, some other causes, have most undoubtedly contributed to fix prejudices, which nothing but a clear knowledge of circumstances can possibly remove.

I sincerely believe that fair representations of things would always have freed them from any suspicions of an impatience of good order, and of just authority. Those among us of the most enlarged sentiments, and who have elevated ideas of liberty, are unwilling to censure any irregularities, or even extravagances, which a zeal for her cause may have produced; but narrow minds can scarcely in any case, be brought to approve, where domestic economy and good order seemed to be disturbed. I would willingly hope that the number of such shortsighted censurers are diminished, and that the distress now so unjustly inflicted upon the town of Boston, has fixed their attention more upon the danger which so fatal a precedent