US History/US History (Bureau Development Inc.)(1991).ISO/dp/0013/00131.txt

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$Unique_ID{USH00131}
$Pretitle{11}
$Title{Our Country:  Volume 3
Chapter LI}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Lossing, Benson J., LL.D.}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{colonies
massachusetts
governor
assembly
freedom
ninety-two
boston
forty-five
liberty
americans}
$Volume{Vol. 3}
$Date{1905}
$Log{}
Book:        Our Country:  Volume 3
Author:      Lossing, Benson J., LL.D.
Volume:      Vol. 3
Date:        1905

Chapter LI

     A Royal Order - Its Effect upon the People and the Assemblies - Views of
Patriots and Legislatures - The Colonies an Unit - Hopes of the French -
Numbers "Forty-five" and "Ninety-two" - John Wilkes - Propositions for
Punishing the Leaders in Boston - Perfidy of the Governor - Indignation of the
People - Non-Importation League - Committee Before the Governor - Convention
in Boston - The People Aroused - Troubles in North Carolina - The Regulators.

     THE royal order sent by Hillsborough late in April, 1768, requiring the
American assemblies to treat the Circular Letter of the Massachusetts
Legislature with contempt, as "an unwarrantable combination and flagitious
attempt to disturb the public peace," and threatening them with dissolution in
case they should refuse compliance, created a tempest of indignation all over
the land.  That order was properly regarded as a direct attempt to abridge or
absolutely control free discussion in the colonies, and so deprive them of
their best guaranty for the preservation of their liberties.  They resented
the king's action in the matter in respectful and decorous words that were
full of the spirit of a people determined to be free; and that order was more
potential in crystallizing the colonies into a permanent union than any event
in their past history. They felt that in union only would consist their
strength in the great conflict that now appeared inevitable, and which
thinking men believed near at hand.  Franklin in England, writing to his son
concerning a proffered colonial office, said: I apprehend a breach between the
two countries. Samuel Langdon of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, who had been a
chaplain in the provincial army at the capture of Louis burg, wrote to Ezra
Stiles, then a clergyman at Newport and afterward President of tale College It
is best for the Americans to let the king know the utmost of their
resolutions, and the danger of a violent rending of the colonies from the
mother country." Stephen Hopkins, then sixty years of age, and a Son of
Liberty of truest metal, wrote from his home in Rhode Island to a friend in
Boston: Persevere in the good work.  We will abide with you to the end; the
God of wisdom and of justice is with us.  Roger Sherman, the thoughtful
shoe-maker, on the judicial bench of Connecticut, and afterward, with Hopkins,
a signer of the Declaration of Independence, wrote: No assembly on the
continent will ever concede that Parliament has a right to tax the colonies
and in another letter he said The right of unfettered discussion is
inalienable, and we must maintain it." William Williams, a citizen of the same
State and afterward a signer of the great Declaration, wrote from Lebanon to a
friend: We cannot believe that they [the British government] will draw the
sword in their own colonies but if they do, our blood is more at their service
than our liberties." John Morin Scott, an ardent Son of Liberty in New York,
and brave fellow-soldier of William Livingston, in the battle with the pen
against the Church and State of Great Britain, wrote to a member of the
Massachusetts Legislature: You are right, and that is sufficient for me.  We
will fight the tory faction here, and the British regulars too, if necessary."
When Chandler, the good rector of Elizabethtown and champion of the Church of
England, wrote, "The colonies will soon experience worse things than in the
late Stamp Act, or I am no prophet," the patriots of New Jersey smiled at the
covert threat, and Richard Stockton, then a conservative member of the
governor's council, but afterward a signer of the Declaration of Independence,
wrote to William Livingston, saying: We must maintain the natural and
chartered rights of the colonists, but by peaceful and lawful means."

     The colonial assemblies everywhere took decided action, and exhibited
remarkable unanimity of sentiment.  New Hampshire was warmly responsive to the
sentiments of Langdon's letter.  The Assembly of Rhode Island highly approved
of the action of Massachusetts.  In Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey, the
same spirit was manifested.  The New York Assembly adopted the Massachusetts
Circular, and declared, by resolutions, the undoubted right of the people,
through their representatives, to correspond and consult with any of the
neighboring colonies on subjects of public importance. They chose a committee
of correspondence and the inhabitants of the city of New York, in a public
letter addressed to their representatives in the Assembly, denounced the royal
order as the most daring insult that was ever offered to any free legislative
body."  That Assembly, which had yielded a little to the requirements of the
mutiny act, now had more backbone of patriotism, and stood up manfully in
support of the people's rights.  The Sons of Liberty in New York were very
active at the same time, and in the newspapers, hand-bills and pamphlets, they
offered their sentiments with great boldness.  A hand-bill, which was widely
posted about the city on a dark night, bore these words: - " Let these truths
be indelibly impressed on our minds, that we cannot be free without being
secure in our property that we cannot be secure in our property if, without
our consent, others may, as by right, take it away that taxes, imposed by
Parliament do thus take it away that duties laid for the sole purpose of
raising money are taxes, that attempts to lay such, should be instantly and
firmly opposed."

     The Legislature of Pennsylvania treated the royal order with decorous
scorn; and a large public meeting in Philadelphia urged a cordial union of all
the colonies in resistance to oppression.  The Delaware Assembly boldly
asserted the right of intercolonial correspondence, and declared their
intention to co-operate with the other colonies.  When the arrogant Governor
Sharpe of Maryland laid the obnoxious royal order before the Assembly of that
province, that body assured his excellency that they could not be prevailed on
to take no notice of or treat with the least degree of contempt, a Letter so
expressive of duty and loyalty to the sovereign, and so replete with just
principles of liberty and added, We shall not be intimidated by a few sounding
expressions for doing what we think is right."  They then sent their thanks to
the Massachusetts Assembly.  North Carolina rejected the order, and offered a
respectful remonstrance and at the same time the Massachusetts Circular was
heartily approved.  Virginia had already spoken out boldly in applause of the
Circular, and the Assembly sent a letter of their own to all the colonial
assemblies inviting their concurrence with Massachusetts.  A committee of the
South Carolina Legislature, composed of leading men of the colony like
Gadsden, Laurens, Pinckney, Rutledge and Lynch, reported resolutions (which
were adopted) declaring the Circulars of Massachusetts and Virginia to be
replete with duty and loyalty to his Majesty, respect for Parliament,
attachment to Great Britain, care for the preservation of the rights of
British subjects, and founded upon undeniable constitutional principles.
Twenty-six members voted for these resolutions.  The offended royal governor
immediately dissolved the Assembly, and the "Twenty-six" became as popular as
the ninety-two of the Massachusetts Assembly who voted not to rescind their
Circular. The citizens of Charleston burnt the seventeen Massachusetts
rescinders in effigy, and illumined the streets of the city by almost three
hundred torches carried in procession.  By their light they garlanded with
flowers and evergreens an effigy of the Goddess of Liberty, which they had
crowned with laurel and palmetto leaves.  Georgia responded with equal but
less demonstrative patriotism.  In the face of the warnings of the royal
governor, that their action tended to independence and would bring ruin on
America, they approved the Massachusetts Circular, and rejected the royal
order.  Their dissolution followed.

     All of the assemblies instantly sent reports of their action to that of
Massachusetts and when the Letter from North Carolina, dated November 10,
1768, reached Boston, the Evening Post of that city remarked: "It completes
the answers to our Circular Letter.  The colonies, no longer disconnected,
form one body a common sensation possesses the whole the circulation is
complete, and the vital fluid returns from whence it was sent out." It was so.
At the beginning of 1769, there was a perfect union of the thirteen colonies
in a determination to maintain their liberties at any cost; while English
statesmen, infatuated by the possession of power, were adopting measures for
the abridgment, if not the utter destruction, of their liberties.

     It is instructive, in this connection, to consider the feelings and ideas
of the French cabinet at that time, concerning the Americans - a cabinet
composed of changing materials which, as we have observed, played an import
ant part in the struggle of the colonists for their independence.  We have
already noticed the hopes of Choiseul, the French minister, that an
open rupture between the American colonies and Great Britain would speedily
occur, and inflict a severe blow upon the strength of the latter.  He was then
supporting the decaying French empire with wisdom and energy.  Ten years
before, he had become the favorite and chief minister of the profligate Louis
the Fifteenth through the influence of Madame Pompadour, who really ruled that
monarch.  Choiseul had been created a duke, and was regarded as the foremost
living statesman of France.  He was watching the course of political events in
England and her American colonies with intense interest and in the attitude of
the latter toward the former in the summer of 1768, he saw a reason for
expecting an almost immediate outbreak of rebellion in America.  This
expectation was confirmed by a long conversation with an intelligent American,
who gave him a clear insight of the resolution of the colonies to resist
oppression, and their temper.  He immediately wrote to the Count du Chatelet,
then the French ambassador in London, that facts and not theories must control
the actions of France, and saying:

     My project, which is but a dream perhaps, is to consider the possibility
of a commercial treaty, both of importation and exportation, the obvious
advantages of which might attract the attention of the Americans.  Will it not
be possible to show them, at the moment of a rupture, an interest sufficiently
powerful to detach them at once from their chief government I According to the
predictions of some sensible men who have had opportunities to study the
character of the Americans, and to comprehend their progress every day in the
spirit of independence, this separation of the American colonies from their
parent government must come sooner or later.  The plan I propose will
accelerate its consummation.  It is the true interest of the colonies to
forever secure their whole liberty, and establish their direct commerce with
France and with the world.  The main business will be to engage their
neutrality.  That will necessarily secure a treaty of alliance with France and
Spain.  They may not have confidence in the strength of our navy; they may
suspect our fidelity to our engagements; they may fear the English
ships-of-war; they may indulge a hope of success against the Spaniards and
ourselves.  I perceive all these difficulties, and do not hide their extent
but I perceive, also, the controlling interest of the Americans in profiting
by the chance of a rupture to establish their independence.  This cannot be
done without risks; but he that halts at difficulties will never attempt
anything.  We firmly believe and hope that this government will so conduct
itself as to widen the breach, not to close it up.  It is true that some
persons of sagacity think it not only possible but easy to reconcile the
interests of the colonies and the parent country, but I can see many obstacles
lying in the way.  I meet too many persons who think as I do.  The course
pursued thus far by the British government seems to me to be completely
opposed to what it ought to be to effect a reconciliation."

     Choiseul had to wait full seven years for the gratification of his wish
which was father to his thoughts, and then, through the operations of a
faction, he had been dismissed from office.

     There was a curious feature in the political circles of England and
America at this time.  It consisted, in Great Britain, in the use of the
number Forty-five, and in America of that number and Ninety-two combined,
having a similar significance.  John Wilkes, an ardent politician and fearless
political writer in London, published a serial work called The North Briton.
In number Forty-five of that work, he made a very severe attack on the
government.  That was in 1763.  He was prosecuted by the crown lawyer for
libel and confined in the Tower, but was acquitted and received five thousand
dollars as damages from the undersecretary, Wood.  As Wilkes was regarded as
the advocate of the people, this prosecution of their champion, by the
government, was considered a malicious proceeding, and a blow at the freedom
of speech and the press by the aristocracy.  Violent political excitement
ensued, and Forty-five, the number of The North Briton that contained the
attack, became the war-cry of the democratic party in Great Britain and the
colonies.  After ninety-two members of the Massachusetts Legislature voted
against rescinding their resolutions embodied in their famous Circular,
Ninety-two became a political catchword here, and its application was curious.
Frothingham says:


"When the Americans in London heard of the action of the Massachusetts
Assembly, their favorite toast became: "May the unrescinding Ninety-two be
forever united in idea with the glorious Forty-five." These talismanic numbers
were combined in endless variety in the colonies.  Ninety-two patriots at the
festival would drink forty-five toasts.  The representatives would have
forty-five or ninety-two votes.  The ball would have ninety-two jigs and
forty-five minuets.  The Daughters of Liberty would, at a quilting party, find
their garment of forty-five pieces of calico of one color and ninety-two of
another.  Ninety-two Sons of Liberty would raise a flag-staff forty-five feet
high.  At a dedication of a Liberty Tree in Charleston, forty-five lights hung
on its branches, forty-five of the company bore torches in the procession, and
they joined in the march in honor to the Massachusetts Ninety-two.  At the
festival, forty-five candles lighted the table, and ninety-two glasses were
used in drinking the toasts; and the president gave as a sentiment: May the
ensuing members of the Assembly be unanimous, and never recede from the
resolutions of the Massachusetts Ninety-two."


     When news of these events in Massachusetts in the summer of 1768 reached
England, and was soon followed by rumors that nonimportation leagues were
again forming, anger, deep solicitude and dismay prevailed.  The exasperated
ministry determined to punish the disobedient colony most severely.  Lord
Mansfield thought the members of the Assembly who, by their votes, had invited
the union of the colonies in the assertion of their rights, ought to be
summoned to England to answer for their conduct.  The king, on the opening of
Parliament, charged the Bostonians with a subversion of the constitution, and
eagerness for independence of Great Britain.  Both Houses denounced the
proceedings of citizens and legislature of Massachusetts, and proposed to
transport Otis, Hancock, the Adamses and other leaders to England for trial
and punishment under an unrepealed act of Henry the Eighth.  Exaggeration
followed exaggeration as vessel after vessel reached England from America, and
the friends of the colonists abroad were dumb, for awhile, for they had no
available excuse to offer for the conduct of Massachusetts as misrepresented.
Their silence gave a tacit sanction to the hot temper of the government and
the harsh measures proposed by the ministry and the mercantile and
manufacturing interests were greatly disturbed by apprehensions of an absolute
cessation of trade between them and the Americans.  The colonial merchants
were then owing British merchants twenty million dollars.  Will this amount
and the trade of the Americans be lost together? was the absorbing question of
the hour in commercial circles.

     Unfortunately the British ministry were so satisfied with the supposed
eminent ability of the Earl of Hillsborough to manage colonial affairs, that
the whole American business was left to his discretion and control. Governor
Bernard was his chief source of information concerning the temper and conduct
of the Americans.  That officer was false to them and false to his master,
giving the latter untruthful accounts of events in our country. He perceived
the dangers that were gathering around the royal governments everywhere, and
he exaggerated every movement, hoping to induce the ministry to send troops
and war-ships to Boston to overawe the people and make his own seat more
secure.  He sought to keep the people there quiet until such forces might
arrive, by mischievous duplicity.  The council was assured that if the people
would cease the discussion of the question of parliamentary power over the
colonies, he would support their petition praying for relief from the recently
enacted revenue laws.  They consented, and Bernard showed a letter which he
had written to Hillsborough in favor of the petition.  Public excitement
cooled, and the loyal Americans had hopes of repose.  But in a secret letter,
of the same date, the perfidious governor gave to his master every possible
form of argument in favor of not relaxing, in the least degree, the stringency
and enforcement of the revenue laws.  Hillsborough, equally false, encouraged
the duplicity, and wrote a deceptive reply to be shown to the council.  He
actually used the name of his king as an abettor of the falsehood.

     Already orders had been given by the Secretary to General Gage to be in
readiness to furnish troops whenever Bernard should make a requisition for
them.  When that officer heard of the disturbance in the New England capital,
he sent word to the governor that the troops were in readiness. Bernard was
anxious to send for them, but he could not make a requisition without the
consent of his council.  That body declared that the civil power did not need
the support of troops, nor was it for his majesty's service or the peace of
the province that any should be required.

     When the duplicity, the desires, and the acts of Bernard became known,
the citizens of Boston could restrain their indignation with difficulty.
Satisfied that the troops would come sooner or later, they resolved to put the
engine of non-importation, which had worked so powerfully before, into
vigorous operation.  In August [1768] nearly all the merchants of Boston
subscribed such a league, to go into operation on the first of January
following, hoping, through the influence of the British merchants, to restrain
the hand of the government uplifted to smite the Americans.  The Sons of
Liberty were active everywhere, and watched every movement of the crowd
officers.  They soon discovered a British military officer in their city,
evidently making preparations for barracks for troops.  They gave the alarm.
A town-meeting was called at Faneuil Hall, when James Otis, Samuel Adams, John
Hancock and John Adams were appointed a committee to wait on the governor to
ascertain whether the visit of the military officer was for such a purpose,
and to request him to call a special session of the legislature.  Bernard told
them that troops were about to be quartered in Boston, and he refused to call
the Assembly until he might hear from home. The governor was evidently
alarmed, for he knew the great popularity of the men who stood before him.
All Boston stood behind them, but its whole population was not more than
sixteen thousand souls.  His tone was more pacific than usual.  Judging them
by his own standard of morality, he had actually stooped to make some of these
men his friends by bribes.  He sent a commission to John Hancock, as a member
of his council.  That patriot tore the paper into shreds in presence of the
people.  He offered the lucrative office of advocate-general in the court of
admiralty to John Adams, who instantly rejected it.  He cautiously approached
the sturdy Puritan, Samuel Adams, with honeyed words and an offer of place,
but received such a rebuke that the words I have already quoted were afterward
wrung from Hutchinson - "He is of such an obstinate and inflexible disposition
that he could never be conciliated by any office or gift whatsoever."

     The governor's refusal to call the Assembly impelled the town-meeting to
recommend a convention of delegates from all the towns in the province to be
held in Boston, under the plausible pretext that the prevailing apprehension
of war with France required a general consultation. Apprehending war with the
mother country was the real cause for the movement.  The convention assembled
on the 22nd of September, 1768, when more than a hundred delegates represented
every town and district in the province but one.  Thomas Cushing, Speaker of
the Assembly, presided.  They petitioned the governor to summon a general
court.  He answered by denouncing the convention as a treasonable body.  They
disclaimed all pretension to political authority, professed the utmost loyalty
to the king, and said they had met in that "dark and distressing time to
consult and advise as to the best manner of preserving peace and good order."
The governor, in daily expectation of troops from Halifax, which, on his
requisition, Gage had ordered to Boston, assumed a haughty tone, warned them
to desist from further proceedings, and admonished them to disperse without
delay.  The Convention, unmoved by his words, remained in session four days,
took moderate action, and stood firm in their purpose.  They adopted a
petition to the king, an address to the people setting forth the alarming
state of the country, and advised abstinence from all violence, and submission
to legal authority.

     The people were now thoroughly alive to a sense of their dangers and
duties.  The great political questions of the hour occupied their minds. The
pulpit became a sort of political forum.  Patriotism and Christianity were
regarded as twin sisters.  Order everywhere prevailed.  Excitement had given
way to Reason.  The other colonies were watching Massachusetts intently.
Virginia sent her salutatory greetings.  The good Governor Botetourt, in
pursuance of his prescribed duty, had dissolved her Assembly. They reorganized
in a private house, and then adopted a non-importation agreement presented by
George Washington.  Other colonies sent cheering words, especially after
troops had landed in Boston in the early autumnal days and at nearly every
public gathering in the several colonies, the stirring Massachusetts Song of
Liberty was sung.  That song was so powerful in moulding the popular mind in
favor of union and resistance, that I give it below, entire, with the music,
as it appeared when first printed in a Boston newspaper:


THE MASSACHUSETTS SONG OF LIBERTY.

     "Come swallow your bumpers, ye Tories, and roar.  That the Sons of fair
Freedom are hamper'd once more; But know that no Cut-throats our spirits can
tame, Nor a host of Oppressors shall smother the flame.  "In Freedom we're
born, and, like Sons of the brave, Will never surrender, But swear to defend
her, And scorn to survive, if unable to save.

     "Our grandsires, bless'd heroes, we'll give them tear, Nor sully their
honors by stooping to fear; Through deaths and through dangers their Trophies
they won, We dare be their Rivals, nor will be outdone.  "In Freedom we're
born, &c.

     "Let tyrants and minions presume to despise, Encroach on our RIGHTS, and
make FREEDOM their prise; The fruits of their rapine they never shall keep,
Though vengeance may nod, yet how short is her sleep.  "In Freedom we're born,
&c.

     "The tree which proud Haman for Mordecai rear'd Stands recorded, that
virtue endanger'd is spared; That rogues, whom no bounds and no laws can
restrain, Must be stripp'd of their honors and humbled again.  "In Freedom
we're born, &c.

     "Our wives and our babes, still protected, shall know Those who dare to
be free shall forever be so; On these arms and these hearts they may safely
rely For in freedom we'll live, or like Heroes we'll die.  In Freedom we're
born, &c.

     "Ye insolent Tyrants!  who wish to enthrall; Ye Minions, ye Placemen,
Pimps, Pensioners, all; How short is your triumph, how feeble your trust, Your
honor must wither and nod to the dust.  "In Freedom we're born, &c.

     "When oppress'd and reproach'd, our King we implore, Still firmly
persuaded our RIGHTS he'll restore; When our hearts beat to arms to defend a
just right, Our monarch rules there, and forbids us to fight.  "In Freedom
we're born, &c.

     "Not the glitter of arms nor the dread of a fray Could make us submit to
their chains for a day; Withheld by affection, on Britons we call, Prevent the
fierce conflict which threatens your fall.  "In Freedom we're born, &c.

     "All ages shall speak with amaze and applause Of the prudence we show in
support of our cause: Assured of our safety, a BRUNSWICK still reigns, Whose
free loyal subjects are strangers to chains.  "In Freedom we're born, &c.

     "Then join hand in hand, brave AMERICANS all, To be free is to live, to
be slaves is to fall Has the land such a dastard as scorns not a LORD, Who
dreads not a fetter much more than a sword "In Freedom we're born, &c.


     While the people of Massachusetts were preparing to fight for their
liberties, if necessary, those of North Carolina, far away from the seaboard,
were in open insurrection because of the cruelty of oppressors. Before the
Stamp Act excitement convulsed the northern provinces, rebellion had
germinated there; and when Governor Tryon, who was sent to rule North Carolina
in 1765, attempted to suppress free speech on the great question, he found
that he had an obstinate people to deal with.  Tryon was proud, haughty, fond
of show, extravagant, extortionate, treacherous, and naturally tyrannical when
in power, but cowardly when confronted by equal moral or physical forces.  He
tried to compel the people to take the stamps, but they compelled the
stamp-officer at Wilmington to go to the marketplace and publicly resign his
commission.  This tacit defiance of his authority by resolute men alarmed the
governor, and he tried to conciliate the militia at a general muster in
Hanover, by treating them to a barbecued ox - an ox roasted whole - and a few
barrels of beer.  The insulted people cast the ox into the river, poured the
liquor on the ground, and mocked Tryon.

     Soon after that, the rapacity of public officers in the province, from
the governor down, drove the people to the verge of rebellion.  They met in
small assemblies at first and petitioned for relief.  Their prayers were
answered by fresh extortions.  Finally, they resolved to form a league for
mutual protection, and to take all the power in certain inland counties into
their own hands.  Herman Husbands, a strong-minded and resolute Quaker, drew
up a written complaint and sent it by a few bold men to the General Assembly
at Hillsborough, in October, 1766, who requested the clerk to read it aloud.
It asserted that the "Sons of Liberty would withstand the Lords in
Parliament," and set forth that great evils existed in the province.  A
general convention of delegates was recommended to consider public affairs,
and two were afterward held.  At the one held in April, 1767, on the banks of
the Eno, not far from Hillsborough, it was resolved that the people in the
more inland counties should regulate public affairs there, and by resolutions
they almost declared themselves independent of all external authority.  From
that time they were called Regulators, and were a prominent and powerful body.
The pride of Tryon induced him to covet a palace "fit for the residence of a
royal governor."  The blandishments and liberal hospitality of the governor's
beautiful wife won the goodwill of the representatives of the General
Assembly, and they voted seventy-five thousand dollars of the public money to
build a palace at Newbern.  That sum was equal to half a million dollars now.
The taxes were thereby heavily increased, and the already overburdened people
were very indignant.  With the increase of taxation the rapacity of public
officers seemed to increase, and the industry of the province was subjected to
a most onerous tribute To feed the vultures.  Among the most rapacious of
these was Edmund Fanning, a lawyer of ability, whom the people soon learned to
detest because of his extortionate fees for legal services, but who was a
favorite of the governor.  The chief justice, Martin Howard, was Fanning's
accomplice, and prostituted his sacred office to the base purpose of private
gain.

     The Regulators, goaded by oppression, met in council and resolved not to
pay any but lawful taxes and just dues, but with such a judge they were almost
powerless.  Fanning resolved to punish their leaders, and so overawe the
people.  He induced the governor to issue a proclamation full of fair
promises, inviting the Regulators to meet the crown officers in friendly
convention to settle all differences.  They were betrayed.  Those plain
farmers trusted the fair promises, and relaxing their vigilance were preparing
to meet the governor, when the sheriff at the instigation of Fanning, appeared
with thirty horsemen and arrested Husbands and some other leading Regulators,
and cast them into the Hillsborough jail.  This treachery aroused the whole
country, and a large body of the people, led by Ninian Bell Hamilton, a brave
old Scotchman seventy years of age, marched upon Hillsborough with shotguns,
pikes, scythes and bludgeons, to rescue the prisoners.

     Fanning was alarmed.  He released the prisoners and hastened to appease
the angry multitude who were assembled on the banks of the Eno, opposite
Hillsborough.  With a bottle of rum in one hand and a bottle of wine in the
other, he went down to the brink of the stream, and urging Hamilton not to
march his host into the town, asked him to send a hole over that he might
cross, give the people refreshments, and have a friendly talk.  Hamilton would
not trust the wolf in sheep's clothing.  "You're nane too gude to wade, and
wade ye shall if ye come over," shouted Hamilton.  Fanning did wade the
stream, but his words and his liquor were alike rejected.  Then Tryon's
secretary rode across the river, and assured the people that all their
grievances should be redressed, when they marched away.  They drew up a
respectful petition to the governor, who, in imitation of his royal master,
spurned it with disdain.  He ordered the deputies who bore the petition to
return to their homes, warn the people to desist from holding meetings,
disband their association, and be content to pay taxes.  We shall meet these
Regulators and their oppressors again presently.