Boston, doubtless with the view of
intimidation, and to enforce the collection of duties.

The English did not overrate the bravery of their troops or the
abilities of their generals, but they did underrate the difficulties in
conquering a population scattered over a vast extent of territory. They
did not take into consideration the protecting power of nature, the
impenetrable forests to be traversed, the mighty rivers to be crossed,
the mountains to be climbed, and the coasts to be controlled. Nor did
they comprehend the universal spirit of resistance in a vast country,
and the power of sudden growth in a passion for national independence.
They might take cities and occupy strong fortifications, but the great
mass of the people were safe on their inland farms and in their
untrodden forests. The Americans may not have been unconquerable, but
English troops were not numerous enough to overwhelm them in their
scattered settlements. It would not pay to send army after army to be
lost in swamps or drowned in rivers or ambushed and destroyed
in forests.

It was in the earlier stages of the revolt against taxation, in the
autumn of 1764, that Benjamin Franklin was again sent to England to
represent the province of Pennsylvania in the difficulties which hung as
a dark cloud over the whole land. He had done well as a financial agent;
he might do still better as a diplomatist, since he was patient,
prudent, sagacious, intelligent, and accustomed to society, besides
having extraordinary knowledge of all phases of American affairs. And he
probably was sincere in his desire for reconciliation with the
mother-country, which he still deemed possible. He was no political
enthusiast like Samuel Adams, desirous of cutting loose entirely from
England, but a wise and sensible man, who was willing to wait for
inevitable developments; intensely patriotic, but armed with the weapons
of reason, and trusting in these alone until reconciliation should
become impossible.

As soon as Franklin arrived in England he set about his difficult task
to reason with infatuated ministers, and with all influential persons so
far as he had opportunity. But such were the prevailing prejudices
against the Colonists, and such was the bitterness of men in power that
he was not courteously treated. He was even grossly insulted before the
Privy Council by the Solicitor-General, Wedderburn,--one of those
browbeating lawyers so common in England one hundred years