who they were, those governing persons so far away, who claimed to dispose of the property and make forfeit the lives of those industrious Americans around him, who were not indebted to them for life, nor for a crumb of bread. But those fatuous governing persons could send armies into this distant country; and though they could not reason, nor understand reason, they could destroy, and destroy, and destroy. Many expedients-he had proved it at the cost of his own patience—had seemed insuperably difficult to them; but the last, the most brutal, and, to a humane mind, the most difficult of allinto that they could throw themselves with a light heart. So he reasoned, remembering the past and looking round at the present; and to him, reasoning so, Bunker Hill and the burning of Charlestown left, of his old allegiance for England, but a very slender filament of remembered feeling by the time October of that year had come. Then he went to the conference with Washington. When setting out to return home, accounts reached him of the wanton destruction of Falmouth in Maine, by British menof-war; neither church nor school spared; the houses which had escaped the cannonade deliberately fired by the torch, marines being landed to carry out that splendid exploit; all the shipping burned, so that the poor people should neither have the means of restoring their fortunes nor of finding food-and all this done on the verge of a northern winter! Such was the wisdom and mercy of the King, whom some folk were still for petitioning; such were the rights of sovereignty and, to Americans, the blessings of the English connection. Whatever others might think of it, Franklin resolved at once that rights like these were to be warred against by all good men, and that the sooner the egregious connection ceased to exist, the less anomalous the world would be. If he had doubted at all before, he had

done with doubting now. From this moment he devoted himself utterly-every power of his mind, every fibre of his body—to the cause which he now publicly declared for, the Independence of America.

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My topic not being the history of the Revolution, I can do little more than name rapidly the three or four chief events with which he was connected during the next twelvemonth. In the winter of 1775-6, the Colonists, accepting what was a tacit declaration of war against them by the MotherCountry, had begun military operations against the British forces in Canada. After opening well, these operations became inglorious, if they did not bring disgrace. Congress decided early in the spring to send a commissioner to see if its affairs could not be retrieved somewhat; and in spite of his seventy years and two months, it chose to send Franklin. Never sparing himself in his country's service, he did not refuse the duty now imposed upon him but the journey into these Polar regions went near to killing him; and though he came back alive, he felt for many a day afterwards the effect of the hardships then undergone. As to the situation there, it was fairly irretrievable, and he reported to that effect. Two pieces of good news gladdened his heart on getting back. The first was that a plentiful supply of gunpowder was now on hand. The second was that during the past two months Independence had been gaining new adherents by the hundred every day. It was no longer the whispered word of two or three, but the war-cry of a growing host. This was good hearing; and he threw himself with a will into making that disposition prevail more and more. In June the great issue was fought out in Congress and the momentous Resolution carried. Franklin was one of a committee of five appointed to draw up a Declaration; but the Declaration was the work of Thomas Jefferson alone.

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few days later came the first Fourth of July in universal history. Eight days later still, arrived off Sandy Hook Franklin's esteemed friend Lord Howe, bringing overtures of conciliation; and a fleet and an army (a second army) to enforce them with. On September II, there took place, in a hut on Staten Island, a picturesque conference between Lord Howe and a commission consisting of Franklin, John Adams, and Edward Rutledge, who had been sent by Congress in compliance with Lord Howe's request, to hear what his lordship had to offer. The Commissioners sat very tight, and his lordship was bound by his instructions, so between the two parties matters got no forarder. His lordship, indeed, had nothing ready for immediate offer, save the King's pardon for those who would give in their submission. Pardon, submission!-these were not the things that Americans were asking or giving eight weeks after the Fourth of July. So the Commissioners withdrew; and Lord Howe continued his negotiations with the help of two armies and a fleet. Against such arguments one needed to have a strong case; and the eyes of Congress looked across the world for signs of aid, Better than watching and waiting, was to go and seek for it, go and ask it. So, on an evening towards the end of October, there slipped secretly out of Philadelphia an old man of seventyone accompanied by two boys, his grandsons. Early next morning they rode from Chester on the Delaware to Marcus Hook, three miles beyond, and embarked on board a sloop of war-the Reprisal sixteen guns-which was waiting out of sight to receive them. Then the sloop stole down the river and put out into a wintry sea. The old man was Benjamin Franklin, accredited Envoy to the Court of Versailles.

FRANKLIN WAS not venturing into a strange world in going to France for aid, nor into one where an interest in the American cause had yet to be created. During his residence in England he had paid visits to the French capital, and had been received with the distinction which his fame as a savant, and his European prestige as a practical moralist, could not but ensure for him in that city of the philosophers and the economists. He made also He made also many friendships of that kind, that fervour and fastness through life, which he had the gift of making wherever he went. These, like every other power or acquisition of his, were now at the service of his country. When a Committee of Secret Correspondence was formed in November 1775, he had written at once to men on the continent of Europe who would have moved the world, or tried to, at his request. And some of them had effected much, before the following summer was come. There was indeed a very general social and popular interest in the subject of American insurgency throughout all Europe, but especially in France: an interest sympathetic in the highest degree. In France there was also an interest felt by statesmen, an interest of special vivacity, in the progress and upshot of England's quarrel with her colonies. For if the colonists were to shake themselves free, as they well might, then the balance of power as between England and France would be more comfortable to contemplate than the issue of the last war had left it. Those two kinds of interest in the question-that of popular enthusiasm and that of political deliberation-met and fused in the mind of Caron de Beaumarchais. As a privileged person at court and almost a statesman (on occasion) without an office, he maintained for some months his parable that the historic juncture involved almost a call of destiny to the Most Christian King, to come

to the aid of the insurgent colonists and so, by breaking the power of an insulting enemy, secure the safety of France for generations. His eloquence and ingenuity, however, made no headway against the reluctance of the King and the wisdom of Turgot. But when Turgot was dismissed, Beaumarchais' views received the qualified support of the new Foreign Minister, the Comte de Vergennes, and the King complied in part. Direct intervention was on all grounds out of the question, but some degree of aid might be extended to the Colonists. For this benevolent purpose, a comic-opera scheme of the Enthusiast's own conceiving was put into execution about the middle of June 1776. With a capital of a million livres (advanced by the court) Beaumarchais opened a commercial house with a Spanish style and title. Its business (a mystery to passers-by) was really to ship to the English colonies all sorts of military supplies, receiving as payment consignments of American produce. The operations of the house were for a few months most successful, several ships laden with contraband having been got safely away. But as no return consignments appeared, the operations of the house began to be hampered owing to overtrading or lack of funds. They were still more hampered presently owing to the repeated remonstrances of the British Ambassador, angrily calling attention to the kind of business being done by Roderique Hortalez & Company. The innocent French Government, surprised and shocked, promptly put the ships of that firm under lock and key. But though some would manage, somehow, to get away, yet no consignments of produce came to off-set the account. Towards the end of the year, all life was gone out of the venture. The head of the house was dejected; not so much at being insolvent as at being out of favour at court. It was alleged that but for his gross imprudence in certain places, the