BELKNAP TO HAZARD.

Dover, March 20, 1782.

Dear Sir, — Two packets from you, the one enclosing a copy of the Constitutions, and the other Mr. Evans's sermon, I received Saturday last, and am much obliged thereby. I have no personal knowledge of the gentleman, but have heard him well spoken of by those who are acquainted with him. The extract from Josselyn I shall send to Dr. Gordon, when I return his History of New York. I formerly read the book, and extracted the account of the White Hills, which is very loose, though in some respects it bears the marks* of having been given by somebody who had' seen them, but was disposed to give his relation in the style of romantic adventurers. I do hope to see them myself this fall, if there is no further irruption of the enemy in that quarter, and I shall most sincerely wish for the company of my friend Hazard. I here enclose the Chronology, to which I have added, as you desired, on some of the before blank pages, a minute of the principal events in New Hampshire to the time I have brought my History to. I have just finished the eleventh chapter, which ends with Allen's death, and am preparing to go into Queen Anne's war. I have particularly noted the time of Moody's prosecution and imprisonment, of which you made a query.* You have, I think, misplaced the N. H. petition, to be taken under Massachusetts. It must be March, 1689-90, according to the old way of reckoning, which made the year begin 25th March; and, according to our way, it should be placed in March, 1690, * and this you will be fully satisfied of, if you observe that you have placed it before the deposing of Andros, who was Governour of N. H., as well as Massachusetts. I have been sometimes blundered by such dates, especially as different dates were used by different persons. For instance, those letters of Governour Shirley, &c, which you procured for me, are all dated in the old way, beginning the year on Lady Day; but the newspapers of that period are dated as we do now, beginning it on 1st January. I intend to enquire of our fishermen and sailors whether they know where the cove is which is said to contain the scarlet muscle. The acorn # oyl I had not before noticed.

Would you choose to have the instructions given by Governour Shirley to Sir William Pepperell, when he was going to Cape Breton in 1745, among your collection? I have the originals now in my hands, with a large correspondence between the said Pepperell and Gov. Shirley, Commodore Warren, the British Ministry, &c. These are the papers I mentioned to you last summer, and wished you to come here to inspect. The instructions are a curiosity. They are just such as you would imagine a lawyer would give to a merchant whom he had placed at the head of a band of farmers and fishermen, and sent to scale the walls of a regular fortress the very night of their arrival on an inhospitable shore, in a stormy season of the year!!!! Had Douglas seen them, he would have been ten times more bitter and sarcastical in his account of that dangerous experiment, I have been thinking that the late Penobscot affair t in 1779 would be as complete a contrast to the Louisbourgi expedition as can be.

I have lately had put into my hands a number of letters and papers that passed between the Sons of Liberty in Portsmouth and their brethren in Boston, Providence, Connecticut, New York, &c, during the time of the Stamp Act. Some of them are very well wrote, and there is this one thing worthy of notice in them all; viz., the terms of affection and respect in which they speak of the King. Had there been any disaffection to the royal government, or desire to shake off their allegiance and raise a rebellion, as the enemies of America have often said, where would it be more likely to find evidence of it than in the private letters that passed between men who were endeavouring to form an union among the several Colonies to resist the usurped authority of the British Commons? But when in these letters we find the warmest expressions of duty and loyalty to the King, his person, family, and constitutional authority, together with a determined resolution not to submit to the dangerous innovations then making, must not every rational enquirer be led to believe that the public professions of loyalty made at the time were sincere, and that the firmest and most avowed enemies of the unconstitutional claims of the Parliament were far, very far, from desiring to disunite what was then the British empire; and that the blame must be laid elsewhere. The Vermont affair will, I hope, terminate without shedding any thing but ink. I shall enclose you the Proclamation sent by our General Court to them, as soon as I can get a copy of it from Exeter. Do you not find that your work grows on your hands? State papers are multiplied as fast as insects in a summer day. I have heretofore recommended to you to begin your publication before you have completed your collection; and I must now add, as my opinion, that, if you do not, you will never begin at all.

Common Sense, I find, has got to work again. Pray does he hold any office now under the States?

I expect to hear very soon that your present settled way of life will not prove such an impediment to a matrimonial connexion as your quondam roving one did. The Metropolitan is published, and I suppose you will soon see the consummatory paragraph in the papers. I thank you for sending the paper containing Mifflin's vindication. Is it not cruel that a man should be drove to the necessity of publicly telling the world of every penny and foot of land that he owns, and how he came by it? Should any thing more of the kind come forth, I should be glad to have it. Pray did Ben Town ever print the remaining part of Major Washington's Journal in 1753? The paper containing the first part, Jan. 13, 1781. I have an ardent curiosity to see the whole of it.

On what terms do you suppose the Philadelphia printers would undertake my History, what per sheet or per token, supposing it to contain from four to five hundred pages? Perhaps I may deliver over to you some more of the papers which I have collected for an appendix, as I find it swells continually. I like Bailey's type that Evans's sermon was printed with, but should choose better paper and a larger page, such as the Observations on the Involution, printed by Styner and Cist in 1779. Or would it (think you) be more for my emolument (supposing peace) to send the copy to London?

I return you also Gove's papers, &c. I have taken what historical hints they contain, and therewith corrected my account of his "rebellion," as it was termed. My opinion of it is that he was drunk or distracted, or both.* From the evidence at his trial (which I have at large) his actions amounted to a riot; but to indict him for treason, and hurry on his trial as they did, with the sentence, imprisonment, confiscation, and transportation that followed, was cruel and scandalous. His pretence for carrying his arms, that he was afraid of the Indians, was a mere sham, for he publicly declared both at Dover and Portsmouth (when asked why he carried arms) that he was going to set matters to rights, and would not lay them down till he had done it. I would advise you to suppress his private memorandum and letters, if you publish his petitions. I shall have enough without either for my appendix, but I am much obliged by your communicating them to me, as they have led me to a more precise understanding of the affair than I had before. I know one of his grandsons, who was a very warm brother in the time of the Stamp Act, and has been so ever since, and his courage is inflamed by liquor as well as his wit. I fancy he is a chip of the old block. 'T is not he of whom you had the papers.

But't is time that I should have done writing, to go to look out a conveyance for this long letter (with its et ceteras) to the post-office.

I am, with much esteem and affection, your assured friend and humble servant,

Jeremy Belknap.

Mrs. B. desires best regards.

To Ebekezer Hazard, Esq.

HAZARD TO BELKNAP.

Philadelphia, April 10, 1782.

Dear Sir, — The post will not go out before the 16th inst., but I begin to write now, lest hurry should then prevent my acknowledging the receipt of your favour of 20th ult., as it did the last post. I should be glad to bear you company to the White Hills; but, from present appearances, am apprehensive I shall never see them. I have entered the lists with Care, and have learned the meaning of Anxiety. The Chronology' Mason's and Gove's papers, came safe to hand. I thank you for your additions to the first of them, and your corrections of my