Georgia 1774

Stories of Georgia
by Joel Chandler Harris

On the 20th of July, 1774, "The Georgia Gazette," published at Savannah, contained an invitation to the people of the Province to meet at Tondee's Tavern on the 27th of July to take into consideration the unjust laws that had been passed by the British Parliament. The cause of Massachusetts was the cause of all. The meeting was held, and stood adjourned to the 10th of August, in order to give all the parishes an opportunity to be represented by delegates. Governor Wright, loyal to the last, issued a proclamation warning the people of the Province to avoid attending the meeting; but the proclamation was disregarded, and a meeting of the people of the Province was held at Tondee's Tavern on the 10th of August, 1774. Resolutions were adopted, declaring that his Majesty's subjects in America owed the same allegiance, and were entitled to the same rights and privileges, as their fellow-subjects in Great Britain; that the act lately passed for blockading the port of Boston was contrary to the British constitution; that the act for abolishing the charter of Massachusetts Bay tended to the subversion of American rights; that the Parliament of Great Britain had not, nor ever had, the right to tax his Majesty's American subjects; and that every demand for the support of government should be by requisition made to the several houses of representatives. The resolutions covered all the grievances of the people of the Colonies.

Meanwhile, Governor Wright was not idle. He called a convention of Royalists, which met, and signed a protest against the resolutions. Copies of this protest were made, and sent into all the parishes, by the governor's friends. Under pressure, many timid men who were really in sympathy with the Liberty Boys signed the protest. The signatures of dead men were used, and other frauds practiced, in order to make the demonstration in favor of the King sufficient to overawe those who had pledged themselves to American independence. In all this, Governor Wright was aided by the fact that the only newspaper in the Province, "The Georgia Gazette," was under his control. He was also aided by the geographical situation of Georgia, and by his own personal popularity. He had made a good governor. He had worked as hard for the prosperity and progress of the Province as he now worked to prevent the people from joining the movement for independence.

The governor was successful to the extent that he was able to prevent Georgia from sending duly accredited representatives to the First Continental Congress; and this fact has been taken by some writers of history to mean that the spirit of liberty and independence was not as earnest and as enthusiastic in Georgia as in the other Provinces. Later, when Georgia was overrun by British and Tory influences, and appeared to be conquered, ill-natured critics recalled the fact that her people were slow to join hands with those who advocated resistance to tyranny.

When the South Carolina delegates to the First Continental Congress returned to their homes, bearing with them copies of the Declaration of Colonial Rights, the Liberty Boys of Georgia renewed their movement with great zeal. Copies of the Declaration were distributed throughout the Province. The result was, that the Liberty Boys grew steadily stronger in numbers, and more defiant in action. An idea of the situation at this time may be gathered from a letter written by Governor Wright to the Earl of Dartmouth on the 13th of December, 1774. He declared that the spirit of independence, or, as he called it, the spirit of enthusiasm, which many were possessed of before, "is raised to such a height of frenzy, that God knows what the consequences may be, or what man or whose property may escape their resentment."

No doubt the amiable governor misunderstood the situation. What he regarded as "frenzy" was merely the eager desire and the determination of the Liberty Boys of Georgia to redeem themselves in the eyes of their brethren in the other Colonies. They were humiliated by their failure to send representatives to the Continental Congress, and they endeavored to redeem themselves by increased zeal and enthusiasm.

They arranged to hold a provincial congress in Savannah on the 18th of January, 1775. Governor Wright, on hearing of this, determined to convene the Provincial General Assembly on the same day, hoping and believing that this would prevent a meeting of the Provincial Congress, or greatly hamper its action. But the governor was mistaken. The General Assembly met in response to the call, and so did the Provincial Congress. Governor Wright addressed the members, declaring to them the danger of the situation, and imploring them to be prudent and loyal. The upper house of the General Assembly made a response agreeable to the governor's expectations, but the lower house gave to its address a tone of independence that was not at all pleasing to the King's officer.

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The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe

The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe
by A.E. Nordenskieold

The opening of a communication by sea between the rest of Europe and these regions, by Sir Hugh Willoughby and Richard Chancelor in 1553, was the fruit of the first exploring expedition sent out from England by sea. Their voyage also forms the first attempt to discover a north-east passage to China. The object aimed at was not indeed accomplished; but on the other hand, there was opened by the voyage in question the sea communication between England and the White Sea; the voyage thus forming a turning-point not only in the navigation of England and Russia, but also in the commerce of the world. It also demanded its sacrifice, Sir Hugh Willoughby himself, with all the men in the vessels under his command, having perished while wintering on the Kola peninsula. In our days thousands of vessels sail safely along this route.

http://manybooks.net/pages/nordenskieolda2436524365-8/24.html

This voyage was accomplished about a thousand years ago by a Norwegian, OTHERE, from Halogaland or Helgeland, that part of the Norwegian coast which lies between 65° and 66° N.L. Othere, who appears to have travelled far and wide, came in one of his excursions to the court of the famous English king, Alfred the Great. In presence of this king he gave, in a simple, graphic style, a sketch of a voyage which he had undertaken from his home in Norway towards the north and east. The narrative has been preserved by its having been incorporated, along with an account of the travels of another Norseman, Wulfstan, to the southern part of the Baltic, in the first chapter of Alfred's Anglo-Saxon reproduction of the history of PAULUS OROSIUS: De Miseria Mundi.[22] This work has since been the subject of translation and exposition by a great number of learned men, among whom may be named here the Scandinavians, H.G. PORTHAN of Åbo, RASMUS RASK and C-CHR. RAFN of Copenhagen.

Regarding Othere's relations to King Alfred statements differ. Some inquirers suppose that he was only on a visit at the court of the king, others that he had been sent out by King Alfred on voyages of discovery, and finally, others say that he was a prisoner of war, who incidentally narrated his experience of foreign lands. Othere's account of his travels runs as follows:--

"Othere told his lord, King Alfred, that he dwelt northmost of all the Northmen. He said that he dwelt in the land to the northward, along the West-Sea; he said, however, that that land is very long north from thence, but it is all waste, except in a few places where the Fins at times dwell, hunting in the winter, and in the summer fishing in that sea. He said that he was desirous to try, once on a time, how far that country extended due north, or whether any one lived to the north of the waste. He then went due north along the country, leaving all the way the waste land on the right, and the wide sea on the left. After three days he was as far north as the whale-hunters go at the farthest. Then he proceeded in his course due north, as far as he could sail within another three days; then the land there inclined due east, or the sea into the land, he knew not which; but he knew that he waited there for a west wind or a little north, and sailed thence eastward along that land as far as he could sail in four days. Then he had to wait for a due north wind because the land inclined there due south, or the sea in on that land, he knew not which. He then sailed along the coast due south, as far as he could sail in five days. There lay a great river up in that land; they then turned in that river, because they durst not sail on up the river on account of hostility; because all that country was inhabited on the other side of the river. He had not before met with any land that was inhabited since he left his own home; but all the way he had waste land on his right, except some fishermen, fowlers, and hunters, all of whom were Fins: and he had constantly a wide sea to the left. The Beormas had well cultivated their country, but they (Othere and his companions) did not dare to enter it. And the Terfinna[23] land was all waste, except where hunters, fishers, or fowlers had taken up their quarters.

http://manybooks.net/pages/nordenskieolda2436524365-8/57.html

Coleridge 1848

Hints towards the formation of a more comprehensive theory of life.
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

In the first place, therefore, I distinctly disclaim all intention of explaining life into an occult quality; and retort the charge on those who can satisfy themselves with defining it as the peculiar power by which death is resisted.

Secondly. Convinced--by revelation, by the consenting authority of all countries, and of all ages, by the imperative voice of my own conscience, and by that wide chasm between man and the noblest animals of the brute creation, which no perceivable or conceivable difference of organization is sufficient to overbridge--that I have a rational and responsible soul, I think far too reverentially of the same to degrade it into an hypothesis, and cannot be blind to the contradiction I must incur, if I assign that soul which I believe to constitute the peculiar nature of man as the cause of functions and properties, which man possesses in common with the oyster and the mushroom.(4)

Thirdly, while I disclaim the error of Stahl in deriving the phenomena of life from the unconscious actions of the rational soul, I repel with still greater earnestness the assertion and even the supposition that the functions are the offspring of the structure, and "Life(5) the result of organization," connected with it as effect with cause. Nay, the position seems to me little less strange, than as if a man should say, that building with all the included handicraft, of plastering, sawing, planing, &c. were the offspring of the house; and that the mason and carpenter were the result of a suite of chambers, with the passages and staircases that lead to them. To make A the offspring of B, when the very existence of B as B presupposes the existence of A, is preposterous in the literal sense of the word, and a consummate instance of the hysteron proteron in logic.

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1611 writing sample

dated 7 May, 1611, addressed by Sir Francis Bacon to Cecil, Lord Salisbury,

"Understanding that his Majesty will be pleased to sell some good portion of wood in the Forest of Deane, which lies very convenient to the Company's Wire Works at Tynterne and Whitebrooke, we are enforced to have recourse to your lordship, as to our Governor of the said Company, humbly praying your lordship to afford us some reasonable quantity thereof, the better to uphold the said works, whereof by information from our farmers there, we stand in such need, as without your lordship's favour we shall hardly be able to subsist any long time. We do not entreat your lordship for any other or more easy price than that your lordship directs the sale of it to others; only we humbly pray for some preferment in the opportunity of the place where the woods lie, and in the quantity, as it may answer in some portion to our wants. Herein, if your lordship will be pleased to favour us, then we humbly pray your lordship to direct us to some such persons as your Lordship resolves to employ in the business. And as we humbly take our leaves of your lordship,

from
Iron Making in the Olden Times
by H.G. Nicholls
1866

http://manybooks.net/pages/nichollshg2433024330/22.htm

Tea Leaves

Tea Leaves
by Various Authors 1884
BEING A COLLECTION OF LETTERS AND DOCUMENTS RELATING TO THE SHIPMENT OF TEA TO THE AMERICAN COLONIES IN THE YEAR 1773, BY THE East India Tea Company


The people of the colonies everywhere seconded the non-importation movement, entering at once upon a course of rigid self-denial, and their legislatures commended the scheme. An agreement, presented in the Virginia House of Burgesses, by Washington, was signed by every member. For more than a year, this powerful engine of retaliation waged war upon British commerce, in a constitutional way, before ministers would listen to petitions and remonstrances; and it was not until virtual rebellion in the British capital, born of commercial distress, menaced the ministry, that the expostulations of the Americans were noticed, except with sneers. Early in the year 1770, the obnoxious act was repealed, except as regarded tea. This item was retained in order that the right of parliamentary taxation of the colonies might be upheld.
...
Three hundred women of Boston, heads of families, among them many of the highest standing, had, as early as February, 1770, signed an agreement not to drink any tea until the impost clause of the revenue acts was repealed. The daughters of liberty, both north and south, did the same.
...
Of course there were those who would not deny themselves the use of tea,--drinking it clandestinely in garrets, or preparing it in coffee-pots to deceive the eye, resorting to any subterfuge in order to indulge in the use of their favorite beverage. These people, when found out, did not fail to receive the condemnation of the patriotic men and women, who, from principle, abstained. There was still a considerable consumption of tea in America, as the article could be obtained more cheaply from Holland than from the English East India Company, and on arrival here could easily be smuggled ashore. It was supposed that of the three millions of inhabitants of the colonies, one-third drank tea twice a day, Bohea being the kind preferred; and it was estimated that the annual consumption, in Massachusetts alone, was two thousand four hundred chests, some eight hundred thousand pounds.
...
The application of the East India Company to the British government for relief from pecuniary embarrassment, occasioned by the great falling off in its American tea trade, afforded the ministry just the opportunity it desired to fasten taxation upon the American colonies. The company asked permission to export tea to British America, free of duty, offering to allow government to retain sixpence per pound, as an exportation tariff, if they would take off the three per cent. duty, in America. This gave an opportunity for conciliating the colonies in an honorable way, and also to procure double the amount of revenue. But no! under the existing coercive policy, this request was of course inadmissible. At this time the company had in its warehouses upwards of seventeen millions of pounds, in addition to which the importations of the current year were expected to be larger than usual. To such a strait was it reduced, that it could neither pay its dividends nor its debts.

By an act of parliament, passed on May 10, 1773, "with little debate and no opposition," the company, on exportation of its teas to America, was allowed a drawback of the full amount of English duties, binding itself only to pay the threepence duty, on its being landed in the English colonies.

In accordance with this act, the lords-commissioners of the treasury gave the company a license (August 20, 1773,) for the exportation of six hundred thousand pounds, which were to be sent to Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Charleston, S.C., the principal American ports. As soon as this became known, applications were made to the directors by a number of merchants in the colonial trade, soliciting a share of what promised to be a very profitable business. The establishment of a branch East India house, in a central part of America, whence the tea could be distributed to other points, was suggested. The plan finally adopted was to bestow the agency on merchants, in good repute, in the colonies, who were friendly to the administration, and who could give satisfactory security, or obtain the guaranty of London houses.

http://manybooks.net/pages/various2432124321-8/8.html

Home Rule

England's Case Against Home Rule
by Albert Venn Dicey
1886

The able writer who sets American Home Rule before Englishmen as an example for imitation says with the candour which marks his writings: "I do not propose to defend or explain the way in which" the Native Whites "have since then" (1876) kept the Government "in their hands by suppressing or controlling the Negro vote. This is not necessary to my purpose."[24] It is however necessary for the purpose of weighing the effect of American experience to bear this "suppression" constantly in mind; it has deprived the Negroes of political rights which possibly they had better never have received, and has falsified the result of Presidential elections. When we are told that the South votes solid for a Democratic President, we must remember that in the Southern States the Negro vote is "controlled"; and that in reckoning the number of votes to which a State is entitled in virtue of its population, the Negro voters of the South are counted for as much as the uncontrolled White voters of the North. Whether this state of things will always be contentedly borne by the Northern States is a matter on which a foreigner can form no opinion. It is a condition of affairs which does not conduce to respect for law, and the satisfaction with which thoughtful Americans regard a policy founded on the tolerance of illegality confirms the belief suggested by other circumstances, that deference to opinion tends in the United States to undermine respect for law; it certainly does not tend to show that self-government has much connection with justice.

http://manybooks.net/pages/diceya1488614886-8/82.html

Changes of the Weather

The Shepherd of Banbury's Rules to Judge of the Changes of the Weather, Grounded on Forty Years' Experience
by John Claridge, 1827

IT, that is, the Wind, proceeds from vast swarms of nitrous Particles arising from the Bottom of the Sea, which being put into Motion, either by the central Fire, or by the Heat and Fermentation which abound in this great Body of the Earth; and therefore the first Commotion excited by the said Fermentation, we call a Bottom Wind, which is presently discovered by Porpusses and other Sea Fish, which delight in sporting and playing upon the Waves of the Sea, and by their playing give the Mariners the first Notice of an approaching Storm.

"WHEN these nitrous swarms are risen towards the Surface of the Sea in a dark Night, they cause such a shining light upon the Waves, as if the Sea was on fire. And being delivered from the brackish Water, and received into the open Air, those fiery and shining Meteors which fix upon the Masts and Sides of the Ships, and are only nitrous particles condensed by the circumambient Cold, and like that which the Chymists call Phosphorus, or artificial Glow-worm, shine and cast a Light but have no Heat: This gives the Mariners the second Notice that the Storm is rising, for upon the first breaking out of the Wind, the Sea begins to be rough, and the Waves swell and rise, when at the same time the Air is calm and clear.

"THIS boiling Fermentation of the Sea causes the Vapours to rise, which by the Intenseness of the circumambient Cold are condensed into thick Clouds, and fall down in Storms of Wind and Rain, first upon the Sea, from whence they rose, and then the attractive Power of the Mountain-cold, by a secret Magnetism between Vapour and Cold, attracts the waterish Vapours, intermixt with nitrous Particles, to the high Tops of Mountains and Hills, where they hang hovering in thick Fogs and waterish Mists, until the atmospherical Heat rarefies the nitrous Part of the Fog (which is always uppermost, and appears white and translucent) into brisk Gales of Wind, and the Intenseness of atmospherical Cold having attracted the Vapours into the colder Regions of the Air, where being condensed into Clouds, the Wind breaks, dissipates, and drives them before it, till they fall down in Rain, and water the Surface of the Earth.

http://manybooks.net/pages/claridgej2416324163-8/18.html

Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800

Title: Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800 Read before the Cincinnati Literary Club, November 16, 1872

Author: William Frederick Poole and George Buchanan


Mr. Jefferson's indecision in dealing with an institution he so much abhorred, is seen in the anti-slavery provision of his ordinance. He would allow slavery to get a foot-hold in the western territories, and at the end of sixteen years would prohibit it. By southern votes, this clause was fortunately stricken out. Every northern state voted to retain Mr. Jefferson's fifth article of compact, and its rejection, which was regarded at the time, as a public calamity, was soon seen to be a piece of good fortune. Timothy Pickering, writing to Rufus King, nearly a year later (March 8, 1785), says: "I should indeed have objected to the period proposed (1800) for the exclusion of slavery; for the admission of it for a day, or an hour, ought to have been forbidden. It will be in finitely easier to prevent the evil at first, than to eradicate it, or check it, at any future time. To suffer the continuance of slaves till they can be gradually emancipated, in states already overrun with them, may be pardonable; but to introduce them into a territory where none now exist, can never be forgiven. For God's sake, let one more effort be made to prevent so terrible a calamity."

Mr. King, eight days later, moved, in Congress, to attach an article of compact to Mr. Jefferson's ordinance, in the place of the one stricken outs in substantially the words that stand in the Ordinance of 1787: "That there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in any of the states described in the resolve of Congress of April 23, 178-." The matter was referred to a committee; but was never taken up and acted on. If Mr. King's resolution had passed, it would have excluded slavery from Kentucky, Tennessee, and all the Western territories.

[13] George Keith, a Quaker, about the year 1693, printed a pamphlet in which he charged his own religious denomination, "that they should set their negroes at liberty, after some reasonable time of service." Samuel Sewall, Judge of the Superior Court of Massachusetts, in 1700, printed a tract against slavery, entitled, "The Selling of Joseph, a Memorial," which he gave to each member of the General Court, to clergymen, and to literary gentlemen with whom he was acquainted. This tract is reprinted in Moore's "Notes on Slavery in Massachusetts," p. 83. These were the earliest publications on slavery in this country. Dr. Franklin having mentioned Keith's pamphlet, says: "About the year 1728 or 1729, I myself printed a book for Ralph Sandyford, another of your friends in this city, against keeping negroes in slavery; two editions of which he distributed gratis. And about the year 1736, I printed another book on the same subject for Benjamin Lay, who also professed being one of your friends, and he distributed the books chiefly among them."

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