Nor was the spirit of the Americans confined to de fensive operations. As it was known that Canada had determined to be neutral, and that her militia had re fused to obey General Carleton's orders to march beyond their own limits, they determined to carry- the war into that province. General Montgomery, with 3000 men, proceeded along the lake Champlain ; and having, with great gallantry, carried the forts of St John and Cham blee, pressed forward to Montreal. Meanwhile an irre gular band of the green-mountain men, under Colonel Allen, seized Ticonderoga ; and General Arnold, by a march of incredible hardihood and activity, reached the southern bank of St Lawrence, where he awaited Mont gomery. The latter joined him on the 1st of Decem ber, and commenced the siege of Quebec, which con tained a garrison of 1600 men. By a novelty in military science, arising from the dreadful rigour of the climate, Montgomery's batteries were composed of snow and water, which soon consolidated into ice. But his artil lery making only a slight impression, he determined on attempting the place by assault, and attacked the town in different quarters. Montgomery fell in this bold as sault, within 50 yards of the walls of Quebec. The attempt completely failed, and a whole division of the Americans were made prisoners. It reflected, how ever, no small credit on the surviving General Arnold, that, wounded and repulsed as he was, he still continued the blockade of the place, and reduced it to great dis tress.
In Virginia, after many disputes with the people, the governor, Lord Dunmore, at last took refuge on board a ship of war which lay off York town. He proclaimed martial law, and invited the negroes to arrest their own ers, and join the royal standard ; a measure which pro duced but few opportunities of emancipation to the slaves, and much more irritation than damage to the enemy. A more serious blow was inflicted on the town of Norfolk, which, for refusing to supply the shipping in the Chesapeake with provisions, was cannonaded, and laid in ashes in the space of a few hours. Governor Eden, with admirable moderation, for some dine averted the last extremities of the contending parties in Mary land: he retired from his government with universal esteem. In the Carolinas, Lord W. Campbell and Governor Martin, adopting the policy of Lord Dun more, fled, like him, to the ships in their harbours. In Pennsylvania a military association was formed, and the whole chain of colonies was now in arms.
Application was made by the British government, to obtain the alliance of the native Indians against the colonists. Some of these rude tribes, with au affecting and simple eloquence, which might have taught wisdom to those who boasted of more humanity, exhorted the brethren of the old and new world, to bring their unna tural quarrel to an end. But others of them, bordering on the great lakes and rivers, were prevailed upon by the presents and solicitations of Colonel Johnson, to take up the hatchet ; and, at a great war feast, they were in vited by that officer, in their own dreadful phraseology, to banquet on the blood of a Bostonian. In contemplat ing the inhumanity of having recourse to such aid, it is but a small consolation to think, that it was wholly in efficient to promote the arbitrary measures of a misguid ed government. However contemptible as a general in
strument of war, it produced abundance of misery in detail.
Parliament met, after a short recess, on the 26th of October 1775. From the speech from the throne, it was evident, that peace would not yet be offered to America, but at the price of her unconditional submis sion. During the summer recess, the Duke of Grafton, who had for some time viewed the hopeless state of the American quarrel, and the violence of his associates in the cabinet with extreme regret, had made an effort to procure a change of system ; and, on the receipt of a second petition from congress, renewed his solicitations, but without effect. On this his grace made a second resignation ; and some other changes took place in the cabinet, which left the management of affairs more un embarrassed than ever, by the suggestions of those who hesitated in the system of overawing America. In both houses, however, a strenuous opposition was raised to the present measures. " We have beheld (said the Marquis of Rockingham, and the minority lords, in a spirited protest which they entered on the journals of the peers), we have beheld, with sorrow and indignation, freemen driven to resistance by acts of oppression and violence ; and we cannot consent to deceive his majesty and the public into a belief of the confidence of this house in the present ministry, who have lost the colonies, and involved us in a civil war against our clearest inter ests, and upon the most unjustifiable grounds." On the loth of November, the Duke of Richmond ob tained a reluctant vote of the peers, to examine Mr Penn, who had brought the petition from congress, em phatically styled by the framers of it, the olive branch. The colonies, Mr Penn affirmed, would still allow the imperial authority of Britain, though not its right of tax ation ; that the rejection of the present offer would cer tainly prove an insuperable bar to reconcilement; but the prevailing wish in America still was, restoration of friendship with Britain.
In the commons, Mr 13urke's bill for quieting the troubles in America, and Mr Fox's motion of enquiry into the ill success of our arms in the same quarter, produced the strongest admiration of the speakers, but no change of resolution in the house. Large supplies were voted, and the land-tax was raised to four shillings in the pound. On this occasion, the country gentlemen, while they smarted under the taunts and sarcasms of the opposition at the first fruits of their American war, were alarmed by a declaration of the minister, that the contest with the colonies, was not now for taxes, but for sove reignty. With difficulty did the minister soften them by the assurance, that the project of taxing America would not be given up. Supplies were also voted for the payment of 18,000 mercenaries, the troops of the Landgrave of Hesse, and the Duke of Brunswick, who were to be brought, at the expence of many millions, to effect the reduction of the new world. By a bill, intro duced soon after the meeting of parliament, all trade and intercourse was prohibited with the revolted colo nies ; and their property, whether ships or goods, were declared to be forfeited, to the ships or crews who might be their captors.