Page:History of the United States of America, Spencer, v1.djvu/195

] making suitable returns to his majesty for the extraordinary privileges they enjoy, are daily endeavoring to wrest the small remains of power out of the hands of the crown, and to become independent of the mother kingdom. The nature of the soil and products are much the same with those of Great Britain, the inhabitants upwards of ninety-four thousand, and their militia, consisting of sixteen regiments of foot and fifteen troops of horse, in the year 1718, fifteen thousand men; and by a medium taken from the naval officers' accounts for three years, from the 24th of June, 1714, to the 24th of June, 1717, for the ports of Boston and Salem only, it appears that the trade of this country employs continually no less than three thousand four hundred and ninety-three sailors, and four hundred and ninety-two ships, making twenty-five thousand four hundred and six tons. Hence your excellencies will be apprised of what importance it is to his majesty's service that so powerful a colony should be restrained within due bounds of obedience to the crown, and more firmly attached to the interests of Great Britain than they now seem to be, which, we conceive, cannot effectually be done without the interposition of the British legislature, wherein, in our humble opinion, no time should be lost."

Fretted and worried by this controversy, Governor Burnet was seized with a fever which terminated fatally on the 7th of September, 1729. Jonathan Belcher, at the time agent for the colony in England, was appointed his successor. The same charge was laid upon him to arrange for a permanent salary; but he met with no more success than his predecessor; and not long after he accepted the annual grants which the House was willing to make. Thus the unfaltering firmness of the colonists triumphed over all attempts to coerce them into submission on this point.

While these disputes between the governor and the people were in progress, fresh troubles arose on the eastern frontier. As was natural, the question of the boundary between the English and French territory was fruitful in trouble. The Massachusetts people looked with no pleasant feelings upon the Jesuit mission on the Penobscot, and were ready to make encroachments upon the Indian lands whenever opportunity offered. It was determined to seize Rasles, the Jesuit missionary at Norridgewock, on the plea of his exciting the Indians to hostility. The expedition was partially successful: Rasles escaped capture at the time; but two years later, in a sudden attack, he was killed, with some thirty Indians, and both the chapel and the village were burned and completely broken up. Following the example of the French, the government offered a large premium for scalps. This excited the cupidity of John Lovewell, a noted partisan of that day, to raise a company of hunters. He carried on his operations with success, surprised and killed ten Indians near the head of Salmon Falls River, and entered Dover in triumph, with the scalps hooped and elevated on poles. A few months later he met his death