erected there Fort Duquesne as a menace to
all future English intruders. As yet war had not been declared between
France and England, but these skirmishings indicated that war in earnest
was not far off.

[Sidenote: The Congress at Albany, 1754.]

In view of the approaching war a meeting was arranged at Albany between
the principal chiefs of the Six Nations and commissioners from several
of the colonies, that the alliance between English and Iroquois might be
freshly cemented; and some of the royal governors improved the occasion
to call for a Congress of all the colonies, in order to prepare some
plan of confederation such as all the colonies might be willing to
adopt. At the time of Washington's surrender such a Congress was in
session at Albany, but Maryland was the most southerly colony
represented in it. The people nowhere showed any interest in it. No
public meetings were held in its favour. The only newspaper which warmly
approved it was the "Pennsylvania Gazette," which appeared with a union
device, a snake divided into thirteen segments, with the motto "Unite or
Die!"

[Sidenote: Franklin's plan for a Federal Union.]

The editor of this paper was Benjamin Franklin, then eight-and-forty
years of age and already one of the most famous men in America. In the
preceding year he had been appointed by the crown postmaster-general for
the American colonies, and he had received from the Royal Society the
Copley medal for his brilliant discovery that lightning is a discharge
of electricity. Franklin was very anxious to see the colonies united in
a federal body, and he was now a delegate to the Congress. He drew up a
plan of union which the Congress adopted, after a very long debate; and
it has ever since been known as the Albany Plan. The federal government
was to consist, _first_, of a President or Governor-general, appointed
and paid by the crown, and holding office during its pleasure; and
_secondly_, of a Grand Council composed of representatives elected every
third year by the legislatures of the several colonies. This federal
government was not to meddle with the internal affairs of any colony,
but on questions of war and such other questions as concerned all the
colonies alike, it was to be supreme; and to this end it was to have the
power of levying taxes for federal purposes directly upon the people of
the several colonies. Philadelphia, as the most centrally situated of
the larger towns, was mention