of Canada from the French,
and the peace of Paris between Great Britain and France in 1763. Even
the ancient and traditional disaffection of Massachusetts to England had
dissolved into feelings of gratitude and respect and avowed loyalty.
Indeed, loyalty and attachment to England, and pride in the British
Constitution, was the universal feeling of the American colonies at the
close of the war which secured North America to England, and for the
triumphant termination of which the American colonies had raised and
equipped no less than twenty-five thousand men, without whose services
the war could not have been accomplished.

2. The first five years of the war with France in America had been
disastrous to Great Britain and the colonies, under a corrupt English
Administration and incompetent generals; but after the accession of the
Earl of Chatham to the Premiership the tide of war in America turned in
favour of Great Britain by the appointment of able generals--Amherst and
Wolfe--and Admiral Boscawen and others, and by adopting constitutional
methods to develop the resources of the colonies for the war; and in two
years the French power was crushed and ceased to exist in America. When
the Crown, through its Prime Minister, made requisition to the Colonial
Legislatures for money and men, as was the usage in England, the
Colonial Legislatures responded by granting large sums of money, and
sending into the field more than twenty thousand soldiers, who, by their
skill, courage, and knowledge of the country, and its modes of travel
and warfare, constituted the pioneers, skirmishers, and often the
strongest arm of the British army, and largely contributed in every
instance to its most splendid victories. Their loyalty, bravery, and
patriotism extracted grateful acknowledgments in both Houses of
Parliament, and even from the Throne; while the colonies as cordially
acknowledged the essential and successful assistance of the mother
country. At no period of colonial history was there so deep-felt,
enthusiastic loyalty to the British Constitution and British connection
as at the close of the war between France and England in 1763. But in
the meantime George the Third, after his accession to the throne in
1760, determined not only to _reign over_ but to _rule_ his kingdom,
both at home and abroad. He ignored party government or control in
Parliament; he resolved to be his own Prime Minister--in other words, to
be despotic; he dismiss