n bringing the war to a close by depriving the
British of American support and sympathy. "It was a virtual end of
the war," he says. "Could one American, unless those shut up in New
York and Charleston, even out of prudence and self-preservation,
declare for England, by whose general they were so unfeelingly
abandoned?"

[3] Livingston to Dana, October 22, 1781.

* * *

"Oh God, it is all over!" exclaimed Lord North, on hearing that
Cornwallis had surrendered. And it was all over, although we have
Franklin's authority that George III. continued to hope for a revival of
his sovereignty over America "on the same terms as are now making with
Ireland." These hopes were soon dissipated, and a treaty of peace was
finally signed at Paris, September 23, 1783. The British troops sailed
away from New York on November 25, and General Washington, after a tender
parting with his officers, resigned his commission. A great number of
Tory refugees departed from New York with the British, but it is doubtful
whether their lot was happier than that of those who remained to accept
the new order of things. It is only necessary to glance at the diary of
Hutchinson, the royalist governor of Massachusetts, to perceive that,
even under the most favorable circumstances, the situation of the exiled
Tories was miserable indeed. Many of them settled in Canada, there to
hand down to their descendants feelings of antipathy which, in America,
have long been discarded. Many of them wisely returned to the United
States, and were magnanimously forgiven and received as brethren and
citizens. No voice was raised to plead more eloquently in their behalf
than that of Patrick Henry. "I feel no objection," he exclaimed, "to the
return of those deluded people. They have, to be sure, mistaken their own
interests most wofully, and most wofully have they suffered the
punishment due to their offences. * * * Afraid of them!--what, sir--shall
we who have laid the proud British lion at our feet, now be afraid of his
whelps?"

FOURTH PERIOD.

Union.

CHAPTER XX.

Condition of the United States at the Close of the Revolution--New
England Injured and New York Benefited Commercially by the Struggle--
Luxury of City Life--Americans an Agricultural People--The Farmer's
Home--Difficulty in Traveling--Contrast Between North and South--Southern
Aristocracy--Northern Great Familie