Page:The History of the University of Pennsylvania, Wood.djvu/41

Rh No further efforts, therefore, were for some time made to augment its permanent fund; but as it was highly desirable that the institution should be wholly independent of precarious supplies, and some inconvenience was occasionally experienced from the emptiness of the treasury, the trustees, about ten years after their application to the British nation, resolved to set on foot another subscription in the colonies. Their first attempt was made in South Carolina, where the college was well known, and many wealthy individuals were supposed to be willing to contribute liberally towards its maintenance. Nor were their expectations disappointed. During a short visit which Dr. Smith was induced, at the request of the board, to make to Charleston, in the winter of 1771-2, he succeeded, without much difficulty, in procuring a large subscription, from which upwards of one thousand pounds sterling were ultimately realized. In the following spring, a proposition was made to institute a collection in the West Indies; and Dr. Morgan, one of the medical professors, having expressed a willingness to undertake the business, received from the board the necessary authority, and soon afterwards sailed for Jamaica. In this island alone, to which, on account of great losses sustained by a severe hurricane in other parts of the English West Indies, he was directed to confine his exertions, the subscriptions amounted to six thousand pounds, of the Jamaica currency. How much of this was actually collected, I have not been able to ascertain. A large portion of it was probably lost, in consequence of the confusion in which the affairs of the colonies were subsequently involved. It appears, however, from the minutes, that when Dr. Morgan gave in his accounts, towards the end of the year 1773, an amount equal to at least two thousand pounds sterling had been received, and the profits of his voyage, at the lowest calculation, may be stated at this sum. Beside the contributions from Carolina, and the West Indies,