and sufficiency in the said grants, have been at sundry
times acknowledged by Parliament."
To say nothing of their great expenses in the Indian wars, and not to
take their exertion in foreign ones, so high as the supplies in the year
1695, not to go back to their public contributions in the year 1710, I
shall begin to travel only where the journals give me light,--resolving
to deal in nothing but fact authenticated by Parliamentary record, and
to build myself wholly on that solid basis.
On the 4th of April, 1748,[25] a committee of this House came to the
following resolution:--
"_Resolved_, That it is the opinion of this committee, _that it is just
and reasonable_, that the several provinces and colonies of
Massachusetts Bay, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island be
reimbursed the expenses they have been at in taking and securing to the
crown of Great Britain the island of Caps Breton and its dependencies."
These expenses were immense for such colonies. They were above
200,000_l._ sterling: money first raised and advanced on their public
credit.
On the 28th of January, 1756,[26] a message from the king came to us, to
this effect:--"His Majesty, being sensible of the zeal and vigor with
which his faithful subjects of certain colonies in North America have
exerted themselves in defence of his Majesty's just rights and
possessions, recommends it to this House to take the same into their
consideration, and to enable his Majesty to give them such assistance as
may be _proper reward and encouragement_."
On the 3d of February, 1756,[27] the House came to a suitable
resolution, expressed in words nearly the same as those of the message;
but with the further addition, that the money then voted was as an
_encouragement_ to the colonies to exert themselves with vigor. It will
not be necessary to go through all the testimonies which your own
records have given to the truth of my resolutions. I will only refer you
to the places in the journals:--
Vol. XXVII--16th and 19th May, 1757.
Vol. XXVIII.--June 1st, 1758,--April 26th and 30th, 1759,--March
26th and 31st, and April 28th, 1760,--Jan. 9th and 20th, 1761.
Vol. XXIX.--Jan. 22d and 26th, 1762,--March 14th and 17th, 1763.
Sir, here is the repeated acknowledgment of Parliament, that the
colonies not only gave, but gave to satiety. This nation has formally
acknowledged two things: first, that the colonies had gone beyond their
abiliti
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