The dispute
became mingled with the teapot-tempest of New York provincial politics.
The Lieutenant-Governor, Delancey, a politician of restless ambition and
consummate dexterity, had taken umbrage at Shirley, of whose rising
honors, not borne with remarkable humility, he appears to have been
jealous. Delancey had hitherto favored the Dutch faction in the
Assembly, hostile to Johnson; but he now changed attitude, and joined
hands with him against the object of their common dislike. The one was
strong in the prestige of a loudly-trumpeted victory, and the other had
means of influence over the Ministry. Their coalition boded ill to
Shirley, and he soon felt its effects.[331]
[Footnote 328: _Johnson to the Lords of Trade,_ 3 Sept. 1755.]
[Footnote 329: _Johnson to the Lords of Trade, 17 Jan_. 1756.]
[Footnote 330: _John Shirley to Governor Morris, 12 Aug_. 1755.]
[Footnote 331: On this affair, see various papers in _N.Y. Col. Docs_.,
VI., VII. Smith, _Hist. New York_, Part II., Chaps. IV. V. _Review of
Military Operations in North America_. Both Smith and Livingston, the
author of the _Review_, were personally cognizant of the course of the
dispute.]
The campaign was now closed,--a sufficiently active one, seeing that the
two nations were nominally at peace. A disastrous rout on the
Monongahela, failure at Niagara, a barren victory at Lake George, and
three forts captured in Acadia, were the disappointing results on the
part of England.
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