isters were active
in procuring such addresses as these; but at the same time it is equally
certain that the sentiments they contained proceeded from the hearts of
the people. The outrages committed at Lexington and Bunker's Hill had,
in truth, exasperated the people at large, and this exasperation was
increased tenfold when, at a later period, news arrived of the invasion
of Canada. They saw that it was a rude attempt to pluck a jewel from the
British crown, and it excited feelings of resentment in their breasts
deep and lasting. Not a few Englishmen who maintained that the Americans
were justified in taking up arms to assert their own rights were
converted by this step adopted by congress. In a word, the cause of
the mother country was generally considered just, and was, therefore,
popular.

PROSECUTION AND TRIAL OF HORNE TOOKE, ETC.

Government was so well supported by public opinion, that wonder is
excited at the serious notice which it took of some attempts made by a
few factious demagogues of creating popular commotion, and of raising
themselves into an unenviable celebrity. Among this class John Horne
Tooke stood pre-eminently forward. Horne Tooke was first the supporter,
and then the rival of John Wilkes, but he had now completely succeeded
him in the favour of a certain dubious class of patriots. This was the
natural consequence of tilings. John Wilkes having been raised to the
dignity of lord mayor, and having regained his seat in parliament,
although he was still in some degree a thorn in the sides of ministers,
had become more circumspect than heretofore. He no longer harangued
at the public meetings of the populace, and was hence looked upon as a
renegade, and Horne Tooke stepped into his place. The supplanter proved
as bold as the man he had supplanted--stern "patriot" as Wilkes had
been. This was seen in the midst of the agitation into which England was
thrown by the events which had happened in America. At a meeting of the
"Society for Constitutional Information," which had been formed in the
metropolis from the wreck of the "Bill of Rights Club," Tooke moved,
"that a subscription be raised for the relief of the widows, orphans,
and aged parents of their American fellow-subjects, who, preferring
death to slavery, were, for this reason only, murdered by the king's
troops at Lexington and Concord, on the 19th of April, 1775." No mention
was made of the widows and orphans of the British troops, which