George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[307] cry; ‘no matter with what boundaries.’ ‘I have not

chap XIII.} 1758.

lost courage,’ wrote Montcalm, ‘nor have my troops; we are resolved to find our graves under the ruins of the colony.’

Pitt, who had carefully studied the geography of North America, knew that the success of Bradstreet had gained the dominion of Lake Ontario and opened the avenue to Niagara; and he turned his mind from the defeat at Ticonderoga, to see if the banner of England was already waving over Fort Duquesne. For the conquest of the Ohio valley he relied mainly on the central provinces. Loudoun had reported the contumacy of Maryland, where the Assembly had insisted on an equitable assessment, ‘as a most violent attack on his Majesty's prerogative.’ ‘I am persuaded,’ urged Sharpe on his official correspondent in England, ‘if the parliament of Great Britain was to compel us by an act to raise thirty thousand pounds a year, the upper class of people among us, and, indeed, all but a very few, would be well satisfied.’ And he sent ‘a sketch of an act’ for ‘a poll-tax on the taxable inhabitants.’ But that form of raising a revenue throughout America, being specially unpalatable to English owners of slaves in the West Indies, was disapproved ‘by all’ in England. While the officers of Lord Baltimore were thus concerting with the Board of Trade a tax by Parliament, William Pitt, though entreated to interpose, regarded the bickerings between the proprietary and the people with calm impartiality, blaming both parties for the disputes which withheld Maryland from contributing her full share to the conquest of Fort Duquesne.