colonists. This has been peculiarly the case in Virginia and Massachusetts; but it really appears to us, that Rhode Island may fairly dispute with them the honour they have assumed.. At any rate, it has called forth the notice of one of her citizens, who, in an interesting address lately delivered, has given us much valuable information relative to her early history, and thus notices the subject to which we have alluded.

"We are obliged to read in our own American books, disquisitions, almost controversial, on the question, who gave the first impulse to the ball of the revolution, as some in degrading metaphor have chosen to express the thought. I have been compelled to listen upon this topic, to inflated declamation, rather than just argument, from grave senators, on the question, whether Virginia or Massachusetts struck the first and decisive blow. The debate, in feigned mutual deference, and sweet complacency, always proceeded on the thought, that those two most important and meritorious states, solely began, sustained and accomplished the revolution. That all the other states had hardly an interest or participation. Rhode Island and the Gaspee it was always convenient to forget. It is from foreign and impartial historians, that we are reminded of the relative importance of that deed which first impressed a bloody hue on our proceedings, and doomed its perpetrators, if the virtue of the country could have permitted their detection, to irremissible death." The event created a general alarm among the royal party throughout the

provinces; they looked on it as an evidence of a determined spirit, which previously they had not believed to exist; and they resolved to quell it, if possible, by the most vigorous measures. Soon after its occurrence, governor Hutcheson thus wrote to commodore Gambier-"Our last ships carried you the news of the burning of the Gaspee schooner at Pro.vidence. I hope if there should be another like attempt, some concerned in it may be taken prisoners and carried directly to England. A few punished at execution-dock, would be the only effectual preventive of any further attempts." In another letter to secretary Pownall, dated August the twenty-ninth, 1772, he says, "People in this province, both friends and enemies to government, are in great expectations from the late affair at Rhode Island, of burning the king's schooner, and they consider the manner in which the news of it will be received in England, and the measures to be taken, as decisive. If it is passed over without a full enquiry and due resentment, our liberty people will think they may with impunity commit any acts of violence, be they ever so atrocious, and the friends to government will despond, and give up hopes of being able to withstand the fattion. The persons who were the immediate actors, are men of estate and property in the colony. A prosecution is impossible. If ever the government of that colony is to be reformed, this seems to be the time, and it would have a happy effect, in the colonies which adjoin it." Again, September the second, 1772, he writes

to Samuel Hood, Esq. that-" Captain Linzee can inform you of the state of Rhode Island colony better than I can. So daring an insult as burning the king's schooner, by people who are as well known as any who were concerned in the last rebellion, and yet cannot be prosecuted, will certainly rouse the British lion, which has been asleep these four or five years. Admiral Montague says, that lord Sandwich will never leave pursuing the colony, until it is disfranchised. If it is passed over, the other colonies will follow the example."

But these efforts of the enemies of American rights proved as vain as their threats; the colony was not to be so easily disfranchised; nor were the other provinces deterred from following the same bold example. As the British ministry became more violent in their conduct, the people of Rhode Island became more resolute and determined. In the year 1774, they carried their opposition to the government, and their open resistance still farther than the destruction of a royal vessel. They rose, as the British lawyers said, from common felony to high and atrocious treason. As soon as the proclamation, prohibiting the importation of arms from England, was known there, they dismantled the king's fort at Newport, and took possession of forty pieces of cannon. All the leading men, not only had it at heart, but avowed the same sentiment as that contained in general Greene's letter to governor Ward, then a member of the first congress, dated on the fourth June, 1774, at the camp on

Prospect hill. "Permit me," says he then, "to recommend from the sincerity of my heart, ready at all times to bleed in my country's cause, a declaration of independence, and call upon the world and the great God who governs it, to witness the propriety and rectitude thereof."

As soon as they heard of the massacre of their countrymen in the bloody affair of Lexington, on the evening of the very day on which the intelligence arrived, they determined at all hazards to defend their fellow citizens with their lives and fortunes. In spite of the evasions and attempts to dissuade and interrupt them, which were made by the governor and lieutenant governor, within three days after the battle they poured into Massachusetts, a large detachment of militia hastily collected. In the same year they raised and sent into actual service twelve hundred regular troops; and they afterwards equipped three state regiments during the war. When it is recollected that the population of Rhode Island at this period, did not exceed fifty thousand persons, it will be acknowledged, to be an instance of no common energy and resource.

As soon as the idea had been suggested of a general meeting of delegates from all the provinces, by the formation of a continental congress, Rhode Island cheerfully fell in with the proposition, and sent two of her most distinguished citizens, governor Hopkins and Mr. Ward, to represent her in that venerable body. In her instructions to these gentlemen, we find VOL. IX.-K k

nothing expressed of that anxious desire to conciliate the British government, which is visible in those of some of the other colonies-not indeed that any were disposed to surrender their liberties, whatever might be the peril, yet some were certainly more desirous than others, that no opening should be given to accuse them of defection from their union with the mother country. Rhode Island simply directed her delegates to "meet and join with the commissioners or delegates from the other colonies, in consulting upon proper measures to obtain a repeal of the several acts of the British parliament, for levying taxes upon his majesty's subjects in America, without their consent, and particularly an act lately passed for blocking up the port of Boston, and upon proper measures to establish the rights and liberties of the colonies, upon a just and solid foundation."

Finding, however, that nothing short of resolute measures, would be of any avail, it was determined by the province, that her delegates should carry to the congress which met in the spring of 1776, the strongest powers to adopt them; and in order that they might not want the sanction of her actions, as well as her declarations, she anticipated congress in the assertion of independence, for by a solemn act of her general assembly, she dissolved all connexion with Great Britain, in the month of May. She withdrew her allegiance from the king, and renounced his government forever, and, in a declaration of indepen