Page:History of the University of Pennsylvania - Montgomery (1900).djvu/207

Rh to be held with the Five Nations at Albany, in New York, on the 1 4th of next month." 32 Franklin in his autobiography describes the opening of this drama, and the meeting which he was about attending was made memorable in the annals of the country as giving him the occasion to present his famous plan of union of all the colonies. At the instant of time when he had finally secured William Smith to become one of the faculty of the Academy and to lead onwards and upwards the well digested aims of the institution, he was then preparing this famous plan of a constitutional confederation, having the prescience of a seer that some kind of union of English interests in this cis-Atlantic must be effected ere many years would elapse. In his Gazette of 9 May, when narrating the capture by the French of Capt. Trent's party at the Ohio Forks, he concluded with a reference to the necessity of a union of the colonies for "one common defence and security," and closes with the illustration by a wood cut of a snake divided into several parts with the legend JOIN OR DIE; an effective picture which was often reproduced at the beginning of the Revolution. His autobiography narrates the steps leading to this: ^ In 1754, war with France being again apprehended, a congress ot commissioners from the different colonies was, by an order of the Lords of Trade, to be assembled at Albany, there to confer with the chiefs of the Six Nations concerning the means of defending both their country and ours. Governor Hamilton, having receiv'd this order, acquainted the House with it, requesting they would furnish proper presents for the Indians, to be given on this occasion; and naming the speaker (Mr. Norris) and myself to join Mr. Thomas Penn and Mr. Secretary Peters as commissioners to act for Pennsylvania. The House approv'd the nomination, and provided the goods for the present, and tho' they did not much like treating out of the provinces; and we met the other commissioners at Albany about the middle of June. In our way thither, I projected and drew a plan for the union of all the colonies under one government, so far as might be necessary for defense, and other important general purposes. As we pass'd thro' New York, I had then shown my project to Mr. James Alexander and Mr. Kennedy, two gentlemen of great knowledge in public affairs, and, being fortified by their approbation, I ventur'd to lay it before the Congress. It then appeared that several of the commissioners had 32 Smith, i. 45. 33 Bigelow, i. 242.