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

[113] himself unable ‘to bring them to order.’ The As-

chap. V.} 1754.

sembly of Virginia, pleading their want of means, single-handed, ‘to answer all the ends designed,’ appealed to the ‘royal beneficence.’¹

In England, it was the ‘opinion of the greatest men,’ that the colonies should do something for themselves, and contribute jointly towards their defence.² The ministry as yet did nothing but order the independent companies, stationed at New York and at Charleston, to take part in defence of Western Virginia. Glen, the governor of South Carolina, proposed a meeting, in Virginia, of all the continental governors, to adjust a quota from each colony, to be employed on the Ohio. ‘The Assembly of this Dominion,’ observed Dinwiddie,³ ‘will not be directed what supplies to grant, and will always be guided by their own free determinations; they would think it an insult on their privileges, that they are so very fond of, to be under any restraint or direction.’ North Carolina voted twelve thousand pounds of its paper money for the service; yet little good came of it. Maryland accomplished nothing, for it coupled its offers of aid with a diminution of the privileges of the proprietary.⁴

Massachusetts saw the French taking post on its eastern frontier, and holding Crown Point on the northwest. The province had never intrusted its affairs to so arbitrary⁵ a set of men, as the Council and Assembly of that day. They adopted the recommendations