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HE history of the American Colonies from the close of the French and Indian war in 1763 to the Battle of Lexington in 1775, is the story of a mighty struggle for liberty. The people of the thirteen colonies, though widely scattered and selfishly guarding their own interests, gradually united in the face of a common danger, and at last became one nation under the Federal Constitution.

It is not strange that at first the colonies remained selfish and unwilling to unite with each other. The Puritans of New England, in spite of the persecutions from which they had themselves suffered, were filled with prejudice against other colonists, from a certain narrowness and bigotry. They persecuted the Quakers, and they hanged witches.

An amusing account of the severity of a council of ministers toward an Indian, who shot a deer on the Lord's Day, and the facility with which they

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condoned the offence by eating the venison, is found in a private letter of Rev. Lawrence Conant, quoted by W. R. Bliss in "Side Glimpses from the Colonial Meeting House." After the ordination of Rev. Benjamin Prescott at Salem, Mass., in September, 1713, the council and other dignitaries were entertained at the house of Mr. Epes, and sat down at a bountiful table with bear's meat and venison. "After the blessing had been craved that the buck was shot on the Lord's Day by Pequot, an Indian, who came to Mr. Epes with a lye in his mouth, like Anannias of old. Ye council thereupon refused to eat of the venison. was afterwards agreed that Pequot should receive forty stripes, save one, for lying and profaning the Lord's Day, restore Mr. Epes the cost of the deer, and counselling that a just and righteous sentence on the sinful heathen, and as blessing had been craved on the meat, the council partook of it, except

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exceedingly peaceful folk, so much so that they refused even to protect themselves from the incursions of the Indians of the frontier, until Benjamin Franklin in an ingenious and masterly pamphlet called "Plain Truth" frightened the people into measures for defence.

In 1755 the English colonies occupied a narrow fringe of territory bordering on the Atlantic, and not extending west of the Alleghanies. France claimed the region west of the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, while Spain laid claim to the vast unexplored and unknown territory west of the Great River. These colonies were all separate commonwealths, having slightly different forms

vania, Delaware, and Maryland were under proprietary government-that is to say, the royal grants of territory, including the right of sovereignty, were originally given to individuals, who practically owned the provinces, appointed their own governors, and collected the revenues and rents for their own use.

In Pennsylvania and Delaware the proprietor was originally William Penn. In Maryland, it was Lord Calvert. These proprietary grants descended from father to son, and produced the worst form of government in the colonies. The character of the population differed in the various colonies.

New England, Virginia, and Maryland

has not changed even to the present day. New York City, from its geographical position, its magnificent harbor, and its commercial supremacy, has always been and always will be a cosmopolitan city.

In the period immediately prior to the Revolution, Poor Richard's Almanac took the place of books and newspapers. These Almanacs were published annually by Benjamin Franklin for twentyfive years, beginning in 1733.

Town-meetings flourished, especially in New England, where were born many

whence travellers made their way over the Jersey meadows and marshes to the Hackensack River, and blowing a horn, which hung against a tree, summoned a ferryman to carry them across the stream, then journeying by short stages to the Passaic, the Raritan, and the Delaware were ferried across in the same primitive manner, and in three days the journey was made.

In travelling by land, the one-horse gig was used, and oftentimes long journeys were made on horseback. In Washington's first journey to Bos

of the great statesmen who by their patriotism and devotion made possible our life as a nation.

In 1760 the usual way of travelling from New York to Philadelphia was by small packet or sail-boats and stages. A boat would leave the Battery and sail down the Bay to the Kills on the North Shore of Staten Island, and thence to Perth Amboy; there stages would carry passengers to Burlington, N. J., on the Delaware River, and then another boat would take them to Philadelphia, the journey occupying three days.

Another route was established by way of Paulus Hook, on New York Bay,