Page images
PDF
EPUB

between two long lines of American and French troops, and laid down their arms.

The news of Cornwallis's surrender flew like wild-fire over the country. Everywhere the victory was hailed as virtually ending the war. Bonfires and booming cannon told of the joy of the people. Congress assembled, and marching to church in a body, not as a mere form, we may well believe, gave thanks to the God of battles, so propitious at last.

CHAPTER VII.

PEACE

THE peace party and spirit in England increased month by month. Burgoyne's surrender had dissipated the hope of speedily suppressing the rebellion. And as the war dragged on and Englishmen by bitter experience came to realize the bravery, endurance, and national feeling of the Americans, the conviction spread that three millions of such people, separated from the mothercountry by three thousand miles of boisterous ocean, could never be conquered by force. Discouragement arose, too, from the ill conduct of the war. There was no broad plan or consistency in management. Generals did not agree or co-operate, and were changed too often. Clinton and Cornwallis hated each other. Burgoyne superseded Carleton, a better man. But for Lord Germain's "criminal negligence" in waiting to go upon a visit before sending the proper orders, Clinton might have met and saved Burgoyne.

There were enormous and needless expenses. By 1779 England's national debt had increased £63,000,000; by 1782 it had doubled. Rents were declining. The price of land had fallen onethird. Hence the war became unpopular with the

landed aristocracy. British manufacturers suffered by the narrowing of their foreign markets. American privateers, prowling in all seas, had captured hundreds of British merchantmen. English sentiment, too, revolted at certain features of the war. Ravaging and the use of mercenaries and Indians were felt to be barbarous. Time made clearer the initial error of the government in invoking war over the doubtful right of taxing America. An increasing number of lawyers took the American view. Practical men figured out that each year of hostilities cost more than the proposed tax would have yielded in a century.

In February, 1778, Parliament almost unanimously adopted proposals to restore the state of things which existed in America before the war, at the same time declaring its intention not to exercise its right of taxing the colonies. Washington spoke for America when he said, "Nothing but independence will now do." The proposals were rejected by Congress and by the States separately.

England's difficulties were greatly increased by the help extended to America from abroad. France, eager for revenge on England, early in the war lent secret aid by money and military supplies. Later, emboldened by the defeat of Burgoyne, the French Government recognized the United States as an independent nation. By a treaty, offensive and defensive, the two nations bound themselves to fight together for that independence, neither to conclude a separate peace.

The benefit from this treaty was moral and financial rather than martial. At Yorktown, to be sure,

the French forces rendered invaluable aid.

With

out De Grasse's French fleet at the mouths of the York and James rivers, the British might have relieved Cornwallis by sea. money more than foreign

But Congress needed soldiers, and without France's liberal loans it is difficult to see how the government could have struggled through.

Spain, too, joined the alliance of France and the United States and declared war against England, though from no love for the young republic. This action hastened the growth of public opinion in England against the continuance of the American war. In the House of Commons, Lord Cavendish made a motion for ordering home the troops. Lord North, prime minister, threw out hints that it was useless to continue the war. But George III., summoning his ministers, declared his unchanging resolution never to yield to the rebels, and continued prodding the wavering North to stumble on in his stupid course.

It was struggling against fate. The next year saw Holland at war with England, while Catherine, Empress of Russia, was actively organizing the Armed Neutrality, by which all the other states of Europe leagued together to resist England's practice of stopping vessels on the high seas and searching them for contraband goods.

England was now involved in four wars, without money to carry them on. North's majorities in Parliament grew steadily smaller. No doubt much of the opposition was simply factious and partisan, but it had, after all, solid basis in principle. England was fighting her own policy-eco

nomically, for she was destined to free trade, and politically, inasmuch as the freedom which our fathers sought was nothing but English freedom.

The surrender of Cornwallis tipped the scale. Lord North, when he heard the news, paced the room in agony, exclaiming again and again, "O God, it is all over!" The House of Commons, without even a division, resolved to "consider as enemies to His Majesty and the country" all who should advise a further prosecution of the war. North resigned, and Shelburne, Secretary of State in the new ministry, hastened to open peace negotiations with Franklin at Paris.

Benjamin Franklin, now venerable with years, had been doing at the court of Versailles a work hardly less important than that of Washington on the battle-fields of America. By the simple grace and dignity of his manners, by his large good sense and freedom of thought, by his fame as a scientific discoverer, above all by his consummate tact in the management of men, the whilom printer, king's postmaster-general for America, discoverer, London colonial agent, delegate in the Continental Congress, and signer of the Declaration of Independence, had completely captivated elegant, free-thinking France. Learned and common folk, the sober and the frivolous alike swore by Franklin. Snuff-boxes, furniture, dishes, even stoves were gotten up à la Franklin. The old man's portrait was in every house. That the French Government, in spite of a monarch who was half afraid of the rising nation beyond sea, had given America her hearty support, was in no

« PreviousContinue »