fested special interest in the German population, and just before his death made a donation to the college at Lancaster called after his name, and whose inauguration he attended in 1789.

Dr. Franklin was deputed, in 1757, to Great Britain, there to solicit the abolition of certain exemptions from taxation, which had been conferred on the family of Penn. He succeeded in the object of his embassy; and, during his stay in London, he published a pamphlet, pointing out the advantages that would result from the retention of Canada. This pamphlet produced the desired effect, and thus delivered his country from the danger of French aggression. During this mission, Franklin's acquaintance was courted by persons of the highest distinction in England; his cast of mind and remarks gained the admiration and esteem of the most enlightened and polished men in Europe; and he was every where honored and caressed as one of the great ornaments of the age. All the attentions that he received, however, did not estrange his heart from his family and country. The letters, written at this time to his wife, open a delightful view of his domestic and social character; and he longs, in the midst of his triumphs of his London existence, for his fireside and his family endearments. Before leaving England, he was created Doctor of Laws (LL.D.), by the universities of Aberdeen (in 1759), Oxford (in 1762), and Edinburgh. He had previously received the degree of Master of Arts from Yale College in 1752 and from Harvard in 1753. He had also the satisfaction to see his son, Mr. William Franklin, without any solicitation on his own part, made Governor of New Jersey, an appointment which probably cost the son his patriotism, as an appointment in the military service of the mother country, by the Royal Governor Wentworth, made Benjamin Thompson of Woburn, Mass., an adherent of the mother country, in the Revolutionary conflict.

In 1762, he returned to America, and was immediately greeted with the thanks of the Assembly of Pennsylvania, 'for the many important services done to America in general,' as well as for those rendered to the province; and the vote of thanks was accompanied by an appropriation of five hundred pounds as a compensation for his labors. During his absence, he had been annually elected a member of the Assembly, and, therefore, resumed his seat at once.

The year following his arrival in Philadelphia was full of local and provincial commotion, which took more of a personal character than before, and ended in his defeat in the election to the Assembly by the strenuous efforts of the adherents of the Proprietary Government, and in his appointment in 1764 as the Agent of the

Assembly to solicit from the King and Parliament a Royal Governor, and to oppose the passage of a Stamp Act.

In the agitation which grew out of the discussion of the Stamp Act, the entering wedge which finally sundered the British Empire, Franklin exerted every effort to prevent its passage and hasten its repeal-maintaining to the last the principles which he avowed when the subject of Parliamentary taxation was first broached in 1754 in the English plan of Union of the Colonies; and by his personal communications with Edmund Burke and Lord Chatham, as well as in his memorable answers in his examination before the House of Commons, achieved for himself and his cause one of those triumphs which Peace sometimes reserves for her champions.

The presentation of a petition from the Massachusetts assembly, occasioned Dr. Franklin to be called for examination before the House of Commons. The entire examination brought forth a body of information, so varied, and comprehensive, and luminous, communicated with such firmness and readiness, such precision, such epigrammatic point and simplicity, as to astonish even those who were most confident in his powers, and to render any immediate result, other than the one obtained, almost impossible. The interrogatories, with the answers, were printed without delay, and produced in his countrymen the liveliest emotions of gratitude and pride; for not only were their feelings, condition, and merits, thoroughly explained, but their rights elucidated and solemnly recorded.'

In 1772, Franklin came into possession of a packet of letters, written by persons in authority in New England, and principally in Massachusetts-placed in his hands without any agency of his own by Mr. John Temple, as evidence that the offensive measures of the English Ministry were suggested by native born Americans. These letters, known as the Hutchinson Papers, were sent by him to Boston, and finally, with the permission of Mr. Temple, became so public, that their contents were discussed in the Massachusetts Assembly, and a petition to the King for the removal of the two chief offenders, Thomas Hutchinson and Andrew Oliver from their respective offices-the former was Governor, and the latter Secretary of the Colony. The petition was presented, and on the 8th of January, 1773, he was summoned to appear before the Lords of the Council the Committee for Plantation Affairs.

During the discussion of this petition, Franklin was assailed in the privy council by Wedderburn, (afterward Lord Loughborough), and in the house of lords by Lord Sandwich, in the most vindictive

and violent terms. Sandwich declared him to be one of the bitterest and most mischievous enemies Britain had ever known,' and Wedderburn held him forth as 'a thief and a murderer.' Franklin betrayed not the least emotion; he saw and heard with calm dignity; his countenance remained as immovable as wood, and only 'expressed his sorrow to observe that the Lords of Council could behave so indecently (who had universally laughed aloud, and enjoyed the sarcastic brutality of the attorney-general), and to find that the coarsest language could be grateful to the politest ear.'

The ministry followed up their imaginary triumph, by dismissing him from his place of deputy postmaster-general, and preventing the payment of the arrears of his salary;-but as the clouds of the revolution thickened and lowered in the political horizon, the ministry, becoming alarmed at the increasing dangers and difficulties by which they were surrounded, turned again to Franklin for aid, and underwent a severe humiliation in making anxious advances to the man whom they had covered with contumelies, and malignantly dismissed from the service of his sovereign.

They opened a communication with him by means of informal agents, commissioned to draw him into some scheme of pacification agreeable to their immediate views, and bade him 'expect any reward in the power of the government to bestow,'-' unlimited recompense, honors, and emoluments beyond his expectation,'-in the event of his effecting an adjustment suited to the dignity of the government. The season when his country could be served by personal condescension being passed, Franklin repelled every suggestion of the kind, in the manner required by his character, his station, and his cause. To his friend Barclay, who ventured to hint something of an unlimited choice of office, he replied, with a decisive plainness, that the ministry, he was sure, would rather give him a place in a cart to Tyburn than any other place whatever: and when the same agent, in a conversation which was to be exactly repeated to the ministers, observed how necessary an agreement was for America, since it was so easy for Britain to burn all her sea-port towns, the aged patriot gave this answer, of which the spirit should be eternal among his countrymen :-The chief part of my little property consists of houses in those towns; you may make bonfires of them whenever you please; the fear of losing them will never alter my resolution to resist to the last the claims of parliament; it behooves Britain to take care what mischief she does us, for, sooner or later, she will certainly be obliged to make good all damages with interest.'

During all the discussions in England which preceded the Declaration of Independence, Franklin was the fountain head of information and argument on the side of the Colonies. In 1774, the Earl of Chatham sought an interview with Franklin on the situation of affairs in America, which was renewed by Franklin four months later when the Petition and Address of Congress reached England—and after that interview the 'Great Commoner' resolved to appear in his place in the House of Lords to move for an address to the King to send orders for the immediate removal of the troops from Boston, as preliminary to any reconciliation. When the day came, he introduced Dr. Franklin into the House as his presence will be of more service to America than mine.' His speech on that occasion was worth a triumphant battle to our fathers. 'When your lordships look at the papers transmitted us from America; when you consider their decency, firmness, and wisdom, you can not but respect their cause, and wish to make it your own. For myself, I must declare and avow, that in all my reading and observationand it has been my favorite study-I have read Thucydides, and have studied and admired the master-states of the world-that for solidity of reasoning, force of sagacity, and wisdom of conclusion, under such a complication of difficult circumstances, no nation or body of men can stand in preference to the General Congress at Philadelphia.' The motion, although ably supported by Lord Camden, was voted down. His son, William Pitt, who was present, a youth of eighteen, wrote to his mother-the speech was the most forcible that can be imagined. The matter and manner both were striking.' A few weeks later the great parliamentary orator again sought the advice of Franklin at his rooms in Craven street on a plan of reconciliation which he introduced with another powerful speech in the House. Franklin was present-and when Lord Sandwich opposed the reception of Lord Chatham's plan, he turned toward the spot where Franklin stood, with the remark, 'that the plan could not be the production of any British Peer. He fancied he had in his eye the person who drew it up, one of the bitterest and most mischievous enemies this country had ever known.' To this insinuation, Lord Chatham in his reply declared the plan was entirely his own; ' a declaration he thought himself the more obliged to make, as many of their Lordships appeared to have so mean an opinion of it; for if it was so weak or so bad a thing, it was proper in him to take care that no other person should unjustly share in the censure it deserved. That it had heretofore been reckoned his vice, not to be apt to take advice; but he made no scruple to de

clare, that, if he were the first minister of the country, and had the care of settling this momentous business, he should not be ashamed of publicly calling to his assistance a person so perfectly acquainted with the whole of American affairs as the gentleman alluded to, and so injuriously reflected on; one, he was pleased to say, whom all Europe held in high estimation for his knowledge and wisdom, and ranked with our Boyles and Newtons; who was an honor, not to the English nation only, but to human nature!' Franklin records the fact, that he stood the abuse of Lord Sandwich without flinching, but that he found it more difficult to appear unconcerned when such language of confidence and praise was used, by one so eminent, in such an assembly.

Among Franklin's efforts at this period, 1770-74, to serve the cause of the Colonies, and of the mother country, was the publication of articles in the newspapers, which attracted much attention. One was entitled 'Rules for Reducing a Great Empire to a Small one'-the reverse process of the ancient sage who valued himself upon this, that, though he could not fiddle, he knew how to make a great city of a little one. The Rules were simply the satirical statement of the policy pursued by England toward her Colonies. It had a great run, having been reprinted in the paper in which it first appeared, and copied into the Gentleman's Magazine and into the newspapers on both sides of the Atlantic. Of the same character was his squib entitled 'An Edict of the King of Prussia.'

From year to year, since 1768, Franklin, impelled by his feelings, and the condition of his private concerns, had been on the point of returning to his native country; but emergencies as often arose, which rendered the continuation of his residence in London obviously of the utmost importance to her interests. He yielded to the dictates of patriotism and the instances of friends from America, with a reluctance of heart, of which an idea may be formed by the following amiable phrase addressed to his son in 1772:- A violent longing for home sometimes seizes me, which I can no otherwise subdue but by promising myself a return next spring, or next fall, and so forth.' When, from the general aspect of affairs, in March, 1775, and his more intimate knowledge of the infatuation of the ministry, he saw the crisis to be complete, he resolved to embark at once; and little time was to be lost in executing this purpose; for, as was privately intimated to him, ministers were preparing to arrest him under color of his having fomented a rebellion in the colonies.

On the passage homeward, he wrote the history of the informal negotiations for reconciliation noticed above, which is a lasting