The memorials were laid before a committee, who recommended that a public conference should be held with Smith and Gibson, to consider the grounds of complaint. To this the governor, in view of the illegal position assumed by the frontiersmen, would not give his consent, an assertion of dignity that would have done him more honor had he made it when the rioters were in arms before the city, at which time he had shown an abundant alacrity to negotiate. It was intimated to Smith and Gibson that they might leave Philadelphia; and the Assembly soon after became involved in its protracted quarrels with the governor, relative to the granting of supplies for the service of the ensuing campaign. The supply bill passed, as mentioned in a former chapter; and the consequent military preparations, together with a threatened renewal of the war on the part of the enemy, engrossed the minds of the frontier people, and caused the excitements of the winter to be forgotten. No action on the two memorials was ever taken by the Assembly, and the memorable Paxton riots had no other definite result than that of exposing the weakness and distraction of the provincial government, and demonstrating the folly and absurdity of all principles of non-resistance.

Yet to the student of human nature these events supply abundant food for reflection. In the frontiersman, goaded, by the madness of his misery, to deeds more horrible than those by which he suffered, and half believing that, in the perpetration of these atrocities, he was but the minister of divine vengeance; in the Quaker, absorbed by one narrow philanthropy, and closing his ears to the outcries of his wretched countrymen; in the Presbyterian, urged by party

spirit and sectarian zeal to countenance the crimes of rioters and murderers, in each and all of these lies an embodied satire, which may find its application in every age of the world, and every condition of society.

The Moravian Indians, the occasion-and, at least, as regards most of them, the innocent occasion — of the tumult, remained for a full year in the barracks of Philadelphia. There they endured frightful sufferings from the small-pox, which destroyed more than a third of their number. After the conclusion of peace, they were permitted to depart, and, having thanked the governor for his protection and care, they withdrew to the banks of the Susquehanna, where, unde the direction of the missionaries, they once more formed a prosperous settlement.1

1 Loskiel, Part II. 231

LL

CHAPTER XXVI.

BRADSTREET'S ARMY ON THE LAKES.

THE campaign of 1763, a year of disaster to the English colonies, was throughout of a defensive nature, and no important blow had been struck against the enemy. With the opening of the following spring, preparations were made to renew the war on a more decisive plan. Before the commencement of hostilities, Sir William Johnson and his deputy, George Croghan, each addressed to the lords of trade a memorial, setting forth the character, temper, and resources of the Indian tribes, and suggesting the course of conduct which they judged it expedient to pursue. They represented that, before the conquest of Canada, all the tribes, jealous of French encroachment, had looked to the English to befriend and protect them, but that now one general feeling of distrust and hatred filled them all. They added that the neglect and injustice of the British government, the outrages of ruffian borderers and debauched traders, and the insolence of English soldiers, had aggravated this feeling, and given double effect to the restless machinations of the defeated French, who, to revenge themselves on their conquerors, were constantly stirring up the Indians to war. A race so brave and tenacious of liberty, so wild and erratic in their habits, dwelling in a

country so savage and inaccessible, could not be exterminated or reduced to subjection without an immoderate expenditure of men, money, and time. The true policy of the British government was therefore to conciliate; to soothe their jealous pride, galled by injuries and insults; to gratify them by presents, and treat them with a respect and attention to which their haughty spirit would not fail to respond. We ought, they said, to make the Indians our friends, and, by a just, consistent, and straightforward course, seek to gain their esteem, and wean them from their partiality to the French. To remove the constant irritation which arose from the intrusion of the white inhabitants on their territory, Croghan urged the expediency of purchasing a large tract of land to the westward of the English settlements; thus confining the tribes to remoter huntinggrounds. For a moderate sum, the Indians would part with as much land as might be required. A little more, laid out in annual presents, would keep them in good temper; and by judicious management, all hostile collision might be prevented, till, by the extension of the settlements, it should become expedient to make yet another purchase.1

This plan was afterwards carried into exccution by the British government. Founded as it is upon the supposition that the Indian tribes must gradually dwindle and waste away, it might well have awakened the utmost fears of that unhappy people. Yet none but an enthusiast or fanatic could condemn it as iniquitous. To reclaim the Indians from their savage state has again and again been attempted,

1 MS. Johnson Papers.

and each attempt has failed. Their intractable, unchanging character leaves no no other alternative than their gradual extinction, or the abandonment of the western world to eternal barbarism; and of this and other similar plans, whether the offspring of British or American legislation, it may alike be said that sentimental philanthropy will find it easier to cavil at than to amend them.

Whatever may have been the merits of the scheme proposed to the lords of trade, it was necessary, before attempting its execution, to suppress the existing outbreak to beat the Indians into submission, and bind them by treaties as firm and stringent as circumstances would admit. With this view, it was resolved to march two armies, from different points, into the heart of the Indian country. The command of the first was given to Colonel Bouquet, with orders to advance to Fort Pitt, and thence to penetrate into the midst of the Delaware and Shawanoe settlements. The other army, under Colonel Bradstreet, was to ascend the lakes, and force the tribes. of Detroit and the regions beyond to unconditional submission. The name of Bradstreet was already well known in America. At a dark and ill-omened period of the French war, he had crossed Lake Ontario with a force of three thousand provincials, and captured Fort Frontenac, a formidable stronghold of the French, commanding the outlet of the lake. He had distinguished himself, moreover, by his gallant conduct in a skirmish with the French and Indians on the River Oswego. These exploits had gained for him a reputation beyond his merits. He was a man of more activity than judgment, perverse, selfwilled, vain, and eager for notoriety; qualities which