the great power which the orator possessed of diversifying his style, and of adapting it to the subject and the occasion.

The violence, (although some may think it both indiscreet and intemperate) used to the opposers of the people's will, can be justified by the maxims of policy, but was not the love of glory the motive, or power the reward sought by the active men who were in those days first in the path of liberty? While we approve the measures of Mr. Lee, and acknowledge that he had a mind to conceive and patience to execute the most arduous designs, may it not be thought that the rottenness of blasted ambition, mingling with, may have tainted purer motives, since it is known, that he was an unsuccessful candidate for the situation of collector of stamp duties? Such a charge was brought by those, who sought to weaken the efficacy by impugning the motives of his opposition to tyranny, and he found it necessary to state in the Virginia Gazette, that an offer of the situation had been made to him by a friend, which he promised to accept, but a few days deliberation convinced him of the consequences of the measure to his country, and therefore he forwarded no duplicate of his letter, but pursued such a course before the appointment was made, as effectually prevented his nomination. Should any, from a pretended zeal for justice, or from a false estimate of the devotion to the cause of liberty, which supported and animated those who achieved the independence of our country, think

this defence inadequate and say, "who can be found guilty, if it be sufficient merely to deny ?" to him, in the words of a Roman emperor, we reply, who can be innocent if it be sufficient to affirm? and it will be scarce necessary to add, that the affirmation rests on the faith of the bitterest enemies of his country.

The resistance of the colonies made it impossible to execute the stamp act; the failure of the revenue expected from it exposed, even to the English, its illegality, so that when the personal feelings of the king removed its supporters from his councils, the new administration lessened the difficulties of their station, without impairing their popularity by a repeal of the odious measure. Mr. Lee joined in the general joy of his countrymen, but was not satisfied, for the repeal was accompanied with a clause, declaring the power of parliament to bind the colonies.

The domestic politics of Virginia, at this season, were not without difficulty. The dangerous influence of the treasurer in the house of burgesses, did not rise altogether from the causes before stated, his situation of speaker contributed to them; the consequences of the union of these two offices in the same person were apparent to all, but to effect their separation, the combined energies of the patriotic party were necessary, directed by Mr. Lee and supported by Mr. Henry. The motion of Mr. Lee "that they be now separated and be henceforth filled by different persons," was advocated by Patrick Henry, and vigor

ously opposed by the royal party, but it finally brought power to the patriots and security to the colony.

The shock in the political horizon raised by the assertion that the parliament was omnipotent to bind, although lost to the many, in the brightness of the prospect which the repeal illumined, escaped not the watchful eye of Mr. Lee; to him it foreboded to his country a coming storm.

The estimation of Lords Chatham and Cambden among the English nation, had aided the colonies in their late opposition, for they were friends to American liberty or opposers of the power of the ministry, and gratitude prompted or policy made it necessary to secure, for future emergencies, the support of advocates so powerful. Hence the proposal of Mr. Lee to request the latter to permit his portrait to be taken, "that it might remain to posterity a memorial of their veneration," was joyfully accepted by the inhabitants of Westmoreland; a subscription was made to defray the expense, and Mr. Lee appointed to procure it for them. But the gentlemen of Westmoreland were constrained to submit to the humiliating feeling of a mark of their respect, spurned as vile or neglected as worthless. At first Lord Cambden promised, and made several appointments with Mr. West, to sit for his portrait, afterwards he seemed to forget his promise and not to walk in the path which fair fame and honest independence would mark out to him.

Mr. Lee was early and correctly informed of the proceedings of the British parliament, and promptly

acted on his information. The disobedience of NewYork to the law for the "quartering of the military," and the consequent suspension of its legislative assembly, hastened the crisis, and convinced all men of intelligence, that the union of the colonies offered the only chance of safety. To this outrage on the rights of freemen, temperate remonstrance was first opposed, and the address to the king was moved in the house of burgesses and written by Mr. Lee, stating the grievances under which the colonies laboured in consequence of the laws for imposing duties on tea, and for the quartering of the soldiery, and praying redress.

Massachusetts and Virginia, knowing the powerful influence of corresponding societies, contend each for the honour of having first established them, "to watch the conduct of the British parliament, to spread more widely correct information on topics connected with the interests of the colonies, and to form a closer union of the men of influence in each." But the impartial seem to agree, that the measure was brought forward at about the same period in the year 1773, in both legislatures, several years after a similar instìtution had been formed by the individual exertions of Richard Henry Lee. This last assertion rests on the faith of his letter to Mr. John Dickenson of Pennsylvania, and on the verbal testimony of Colonel Gadsden of South Carolina, who stated that in the year 1768, he had been invited by Mr. Lee to become a member of a corresponding society, "the object of which was, to obtain a mutual pledge from the members to write

for the public journals or papers of their respective colonies, and to converse with and inform the people on the subject of their rights and wrongs, and upon all seasonable occasions to impress upon their minds the necessity of a struggle with Great Britain for the ultimate establishment of Independence." His letter to Mr. Dickenson bears date July twenty-fifth, 1768, and contains the following sentence: "To prevent the success of this unjust system an union of counsel and action among all the colonies is undoubtedly necessary. The politician of Italy delivered the result of reason and experience, when he proposed the way to contest by division. How to effect this union in the wisest and firmest manner, perhaps time and much reflection only can show. But well to understand each other, and timely to be informed of what passes both here and in Great Britain, it would seem that not only select committees should be appointed by all the colonies, but that a private correspondence should be conducted between the lovers of liberty in every province."

The event alone and the glorious termination of the contest, could not shield from the charge of rashness or wild ambition, Mr. Lee's scheme of severing from the parent stem the flourishing scion, before a certainty that it had yet spread its roots sufficiently wide to imbibe its own nourishment; for it is known that the issue is often directed by a power beyond our control, be it fortune, or chance, or providence, which consults better for us than we for ourselves. But

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