George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 7, 4th edition.

[250] that restoration, should be employed to impair the

Chap. XXIII.} 1775. Feb.

privileges of colonists of Dutch descent! By temperament moderate but inflexible, little noticed by the government, they kept themselves noiselessly in reserve; but their patriotism was inflamed and guided by the dearest recollections of their nationality. Many of the Anglo-Americans of New York were from New England, whose excitement they shared; and the mechanics of the city were almost to a man enthusiasts for decisive measures. The landed aristocracy was divided; but the Dutch and the Presbyterians, especially Schuyler of Albany, and the aged Livingston of Rhinebeck, never hesitated to risk their vast estates in the cause of inherited freedom. The latter had once thought of emigrating to Switzerland, if he could nowhere else escape oppression. In no colony did English dominion find less of the sympathy of the people than in New York.

In Virginia the Blue Ridge answered British menaces with a mountain tone of defiance. ‘We cannot part with liberty but with our lives,’ said the inhabitants of Botetourt. ‘Our duty to God, our country, ourselves, and our posterity, all forbid it. We stand prepared for every contingency.’ The dwellers on the waters of the Shenandoah, meeting at Staunton, commended the Virginia delegates to the applause of succeeding ages, their example to the hearts of every Virginian and every American. ‘For my part,’ said Adam Stephen, ‘before I would submit my life, liberty, and property to the arbitrary disposal of a venal aristocracy, I would sit myself down with a few friends upon some rich and healthy spot, six hundred miles to the westward, and there form a ’