and the latter open wide the doors of bribery and corruption.

From an innate aversion to every thing that is ill, he was determined to leave no stone unturned, no means untried, to hasten the golden period when tyranny and oppression should reign supremely triumphant, and liberty and happiness be banished out of being. He, therefore, because County officers (some justices and one sheriff) had behaved extremely ill, that is, had nobly disdained a concurrence in his open exertions or more private machinations, represents the indispensable necessity of holding their commissions for one or two years only, or of having their appointment and removal entirely in the power of himself or his Royal master.

It was not enough, originally, to appoint, in general, those who were allied to his schemes, but the moment they deserted his glorious cause they must be dismissed from their office, and yield to an obsequious successor. Not only officers, but processes must be stamped with the characters of servitude. A writ of error was to lay from the County to the Courts of the King's Bench, in England, by a statute for the purpose, in order, says he, among other acts, to keep up a sense of the authority of Parliament; imagining that we should not dispute it, as it would affect the titles to our lands and estates.

Let the man of property, the reader of the landed interest, pause here. Let him paint to himself some one in power, or a high Court favourite, trumping up a claim to his possessions; or some Crown officer prosecuting for a pretended forfeiture, upon an old British Star-Chamber statute that he had never heard of, and which possibly never existed; or filing an information upon some new penal edict, or perhaps Royal proclamation, which ought never to be complied with. Let him suppose himself dragged before a Provincial judicature upon the Ministerial model, and there, in a tedious, expensive attendance in defending, stripped of his money, but with a favourable issue. Then let him consider himself as carried to Great Britain upon a writ of error, an appeal, or some other process, and depending there from court to court, until he is dodged out of his right, or ruined by defending it. Or reverse the scene, and let him suppose himself plaintiff, prosecuting for a reparation in damages, a compensation for injuries, or for the recovery of his just rights, with a similar issue. In this situation does not property lose its value? Is not iniquity established by law, and courts a mockery upon justice? Detestable as it is, this would have been the unavoidable effects of Government success.

Already the Jacobitish law sages at home have determined, not only that processes lie from the West-India Colonies to the King's Bench, but from thence a mandamus is issuable to those Colony Courts—an oppressive dependance too galling for an Englishman to bear, for any American to brook.

The destructive qualities of the worst of beings, are, in Holy Writ, compared to a roaring lion roaming for prey. The famous Randolph, for his restless exertions against his country, is, in Mr. Hutchinson's history, compared to the same ferocious animal seeking to devour; exertions which, although treasonable in themselves, in competition with the bloody efforts of the above historian, dwindle into misdemeanours, and hardly deserve the name of crimes. I will not, therefore, injure the one or the other of the above characters, by comparing our hero with either. If we may trace him by his letters, he went from Kingdoms to Continents, from Colonies to Counties, and from Counties to Towns, breathing destruction, and lurking for prey! His epilogue to every scene is a prayer for the concealment of the part he was acting. He may, therefore, fitly be compared to the crocodile, an inhabitant of the torrid zone. This animal is said to frequent rivers and marshes, where it lies concealed among the reeds and rushes, till it finds an opportunity to seize men or creatures, which it drags into the water, always taking this method of drowning them first, that it may afterwards swallow them without resistance.

Our amphibious destroyer imagined that he could first suffocate, by an inundation of British laws, and then riot unmolested on American spoils, its wealth and its happiness. Hence his unremitting clamours against assembled towns, in consultation on matters of their nearest concernment. Pressing are his solicitations, repeated his demands that the subjects of Great Britain would prohibit the subjects of America holding any town-meetings, and subject all concerned in them, except for certain purposes, to incapacities, and the dreadful punishments of a premunire; not only are their thoughts and debates to be circumscribed and restrained to a few licensed subjects, but even an eccentrick slip of the tongue was to be corrected by penalties of the severest kind. In vain may you search the records of a Spanish Divan, in vain the alcoves of an Ottoman Court for similar oppression.

It is painful, it is astonishing, it is grievous to reflect, that this country, late the peaceful abode of tranquil freedom, the favourite seat of virtue, the place where was the greatest effulgence of genuine liberty, where a difference of religion, competition of interest, variety of sentiments, subordination of politick bodies, and a multitude of constitutional privileges playing in consort, danced in unjarring harmony in a pleasing round, mutually producing the offices of friendship, hospitality, and social happiness, should, by the treason and villany of one, with his cooperators, be interrupted, overthrown, and yield to the unavoidable calamities of war. That by him publick justice should be assassinated, publick chastity polluted, publick faith prostituted, and the laudable endeavours of the wise and honest suppressed. That the wretch who had caused every branch of our Constitution to droop and hang its head; had paved the way, and opened wide the avenues to servitude; had given bleeding wounds to his country, beat down her most graceful ornaments and firmest bulwarks; that he who had furnished bones for the clashing of discord and the combustion of arms, should, in the storm of war, escape with impunity.

"More yet the methods yon, Oh chief! ordained,

To sink your country, and its loyal name.

The shameful efforts 'gainst your native town,

May force from George the Third the British crown."

ANDREW SYMMER TO GOVERNOUR PENN.

Turk's Island, February 17, 1776.

SIR: I have the honour to transmit you a petition, which hath been given to me by a very useful and industrious body of his Majesty's subjects, residing on an island destitute of every necessary of life, salt alone excepted.

Captain Budden hath engaged to the people, to supply them in case he meets with no obstructions; I am certain, sir, he will meet with none from you; and, I flatter myself, the inhabitants of North-America, being well convinced of the importance our salt trade is to their commerce, no hindrance will arise from them.

I have the honour to be, sir, your most obedient, humble servant,

ANDREW SYMMER.

To Governour Penn.

EXTRACT OF A LETTER TO A GENTLEMAN IN SCOTLAND, DATED NORFOLK, VIRGINIA, FEBRUARY 17, 1776.

All the well-affected to Government betook themselves to the shipping, where they are in great safely, and well provided. Lord Dunmore, having foreseen the event, had laid plentifully in of all sorts of provisions. He has given orders to fortify Tucker's Point, where bake-houses and mills are fast erecting. Several vessels are taken from the Rebels, loaded, from the northward, with salt, flour, arid grain. The Roebuck, with General Clinton, and a tender, are arrived safe. The tender is to proceed for Cape-Fear, in North-Carolina, in order to raise volunteers, thousands of whom are ready to join the King's troops on being properly accoutred, and provided with arms and ammunition. The Rebels are in the deepest distress, being divested of clothes, ammunition, and lodgings; and, from their not keeping themselves clean, they are overrun with vermin, which, in the Summer season, must breed much sickness. Great numbers of them are already in their hospitals; and, at the least calculation, seven hundred of them are killed, wounded, sick, and taken prisoners. They are, however, desperate to the last degree, and intrenching themselves backward to secure their retreats. The back settlers would, willingly, supply Lord Dunmore with fresh provisions, but have no means of conveying them, except what die negroes forage in the night time. All the Highland emigrants are most friendly to Government.