That sagacious
personage,--the sublime of common-sense, about equal in his instincts
and motives of character to the respectable average of the New England
that produced him, but gifted with a versatile power of brain rarely
matched on earth,--was then divided between his strong desire to repel a
danger of which he saw the imminence, and his equally strong antagonism
to the selfish claims of the Penns, proprietaries of Pennsylvania. This
last motive had determined his attitude towards their representative,
the Governor, and led him into an opposition as injurious to the
military good name of the province as it was favorable to its political
longings. In the present case there was no such conflict of
inclinations; he could help Braddock without hurting Pennsylvania. He
and his son had visited the camp, and found the General waiting
restlessly for the report of the agents whom he had sent to collect
wagons. "I stayed with him," says Franklin, "several days, and dined
with him daily. When I was about to depart, the returns of wagons to be
obtained were brought in, by which it appeared that they amounted only
to twenty-five, and not all of these were in serviceable condition." On
this the General and his officers declared that the expedition was at an
end, and denounced the Ministry for sending them into a country void of
the means of transportation. Franklin remarked that it was a pity they
had not landed in Pennsylvania, where almost every farmer had his wagon.
Pages:
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229