QUEEN ANNE'S WAR.

61

sued to defray the expenses incurred. These soon sank to half their professed value. Thus was begun the endless issue of paper money in the colonies.

72. Sir William Phipps, a colonist of humble birth and of little education, had fished up a million of dollars from some Spanish wrecks in the Carribbean Sea. He was appointed Governor of Massachusetts, and brought the new charter from England.

THE SALEM WITCHCRAFT.-1692.

73. The delusions of the Salem witchcraft gave notability to the administration of Phipps. Parris, the minister of Salem, accused his Indian servant, Tituba, of bewitching his daughter and his niece, children of nine and eleven years of age. Tituba was whipped, confessed her guilt, and accused others. The accused made further accusations. Arrests, trials, and tortures were multiplied. Those who maintained. their innocence were hanged. Those who admitted their guilt, for the most part, escaped.* Twenty persons were capitally punished; more than fifty were tortured into confession. Numbers were confined in jail. The trials were at last stopped by the king.t

QUEEN ANNE'S WAR.-1702-1713.

74. The War of the Spanish Succession in Europe is known as Queen Anne's War in the history of the English colonies in America. The French and their Indian allies fell upon the frontier settlements of New England. The villages in Maine were desolated.

Deerfield, in Massachusetts, was

* Giles Cory, an old man, eighty years of age, was pressed to death between boards for refusing to plead to the accusation. The refusal was in order to save his property, as it would be forfeited if he were convicted of the felony. This is the only instance in British America of this punishment-the last in the history of English law.

+ Such delusions had prevailed everywhere. An act was passed in England, in the first year of James I., against witches. The acts against witches were not repealed till 1736. A royal edict against them was issued in France in 1682. Witch trials took place in Sweden in 1672. In the same year the younger Casaubon published in England a work asserting the reality of witchcraft.

surprised at midnight by enemies who marched through the snow, and who entered the fort over the drifts banked against the palisades. Forty-seven of its people were killed, and one hundred and twenty prisoners were dragged away to Canada. A fruitless attempt was made from New England to conquer that province. The Indian villages along the Penobscot and the St. Croix were destroyed by Colonel Church, with five hundred men from Massachusetts. Colonel Nicholson took Port Royal, in Acadia, and changed its name to Annapolis, in honor of the queen.

75. Grievous burdens were imposed upon New England by this war, but prosperity waits upon an industrious and intelligent people. Bishop Berkeley, who 1728. was said to possess "all the virtues under heaven," visited Rhode Island, and spent three years near Newport. While contemplating this visit and forecasting the destinies of America, he wrote:

Westward the course of empire takes its way;

The four first acts already passed,

A fifth shall close the drama with the day;
Time's noblest offspring is his last.

Already the desire of independence might be discerned in New England and in other of her sister colonies. The desire increased with increasing strength and wealth. These grew with population and tranquillity. Peace was made with the Eastern Indians. Quiet prevailed and progress was quickened till the next war."

*

KING GEORGE'S WAR.-1744-1748.

76. The War of the Austrian Succession produced violent hostilities between the English and French colonies, which faced each other in America. An English frontier gar

* Great religious excitement prevailed in New England, between 1735 and 1742. It was designated "the great revival," and "the new light." The pious fervor was much increased by the eloquent preaching of George Whitefield, who visited that part of the country during the period.

rison was seized by the French, and imprisoned in the strong for tress of Louisburg. Colonel Pepperell besieged it with a large force, and captured it in forty-nine days. Peace in Europe did not terminate the colonial warfare. Nova Scotia was conquered by an expedition from Boston. The Acadian 1755. peasants, whose conduct had been suspicious, were torn from their homes,* placed on shipboard, and dispersed among the English colonies from New Hampshire to Georgia. Many found a more welcome refuge in the French province of Louisiana.

At this time the New England colonies contained about 360,000 white inhabitants, and carried on an extensive and profitable trade with the West Indies and with Europe.

NEW YORK.

77. The Governors of New York, after its conquest from the Dutch, were appointed by the Duke of York, the new proprietor. Many were dissolute, greedy, and arbitrary. All met with bitter opposition, and with severe censure. The population was composed of various nationalities, and the larger part consisted of the recently conquered Dutch settlers, who submitted reluctantly to a strange rule. A treaty was made by Governor Carteret with the Five Nations, at Fort Orange, or Albany. They were converted into faithful friends, and formed a strong defence against the French in Canada. 78. Popular discontent prevented effectual resistance, when a Dutch fleet entered the harbor, during the war between England and Holland. The city,

1673.

* Longfellow's graceful poem, "Evangeline," is founded upon the story of the Acadian exiles.

+ The population was of origin so various that eighteen different languages were said to be in use. It was reported to be "the most polygenous of all the British provinces." There was constant dissension between the English and Dutch inhabi

tants.

the fort, and the province surrendered at once, but were restored to England on the reëstablishment of peace. A new charter, extending the territory, was granted to the Duke of York. His deputy, Sir Edmond Andros, embraced under his rule the country between the Hudson and the Delaware, but failed in his efforts to add to New York the tract along the west bank of the Connecticut River.

79. The people continued to complain, and had reason to complain. Under a new Governor they were allowed to elect a Legislative Assembly. This assembly en1683. acted a 66 Charter of Liberties.' It was set aside when the Duke of York became King James II. On his dethronement, Jacob Leisler, the commander of the militia, seized the fort at New York, and set up a government. A Governor, appointed by William III., arrived. Leisler and his son-in-law were tried, condemned, and executed.

80. The people were restless under good governors and under bad governors. Discords were frequent. Edward Hyde, Earl of Cornbury, the cousin of Queen Anne, made himself odious by persecuting dissenters, by extorting bribes, by embezzling public moneys, and by other tyrannical conduct. He was removed on the petition of the Assemblies of New York and New Jersey.

The commerce of New York was already of much value. It was annoyed by the depredations of pirates, of whom Capt. Kidd was the most notorious. Kidd was captured, and was hanged in London. He was supposed to have buried a large amount of gold somewhere on the shore of Long Island. This hidden treasure is still sometimes sought by persons more eager for fortune than steady work.

81. The city of New York was plundered by slaves, and a church and some houses were burnt. A conspiracy among the negroes was suspected, and severe punishment was inflicted. Thirteen were burnt, eighteen were hanged, and seventy-one were removed from the colony.

NEW JERSEY AND DELAWARE.

65

82. A Congress was held at Albany at the beginning of the French war in America. It was composed of

1754. delegates from the several colonies, and was gathered to strengthen the league with the Iroquis, or Six Nations, which had formerly been The Five Nations.* Benjamin Franklin presented a plan for a Colonial Union. It was rejected by Connecticut, but adopted by all the other Provincial Delegations. It was deemed hazardous by the British Government, and was dropped. It was an anticipation of the Union of twenty years later, by which American Independence was gained. Such a measure had been proposed long before by William Penn and several other persons of sagacity.

NEW JERSEY AND DELAWARE.

83. Charles II. had enlarged the grant of New York to his brother by adding to it the country on the shores of Delaware Bay and along the eastern bank of the Delaware River. The Duke of York conveyed New Jersey-the tract between the Hudson and the Delaware-to Lord Berkeley and Lord Carteret. Elizabethtown was settled by people from Long Island. Population was invited by liberal offers, by the promise of representative government, and by freedom from any taxation but such as might be imposed by the Colonial Assembly. Seventy-five acres of land were also promised for every stout slave" brought in. The experiment did not succeed, for the private gain of the proprietors was its chief object. One governor was deposed, and the colony was recovered by the Dutch on the surrender of New York.

84. Lord Berkeley sold his share of the Province to a Quaker, who assigned it to William Penn and two other Quakers. The colony was divided into East and West Jersey, the latter became Penn's. The Quakers, suffering from harsh

*They became the Six Nations by the reception and incorporation of the Tusca roras, on their expulsion from North Carolina in 1712.