The oration was, in the style of the day, florid; but it was full of genuine feeling. Warren spoke of the rise of the British Empire in America, the hope of its future, the policy of the king, and the Massacre. Turning then to the present situation, he spoke in words which no one could mistake, bolder, perhaps, than ever before had been publicly spoken in the presence of hostile soldiers. He reminded his countrymen of their martial achievements, he spoke of the critical situation, and, while disclaiming the desire for independence, encouraged the colonists to claim their rights. "An independence of Great Britain is not our aim. No: our wish is, that Britain and the colonies may, like the oak and ivy, grow and increase in strength together. But, whilst the infatuated plan of making one part of the empire slaves to the other is persisted in, the interest and safety of Britain as well as the colonies require that the wise measures recommended by the honorable, the Continental Congress be steadily pursued, whereby the unnatural contest between a parent honored and a child beloved may probably be brought to such an issue that the peace and happiness of both may be established upon a lasting basis. But, if these pacific measures are ineffectual, and it appears the only way to safety lies through fields of blood, I know you will not turn your faces from our foes, but will undauntedly press forward until tyranny is trodden under foot, and you have fixed your adored goddess, Liberty, fast by a Brunswick's side, on the American throne."[53]
These were fearless words, and full of meaning. Had there been men of sense among the officers present, they must have been impressed by the solemnity of the warning; in fact, they were silent until the end. It was not until after the oration, when the meeting was voting thanks to the orator, that the officers endeavored to interrupt the proceedings. The cry of Fie! was mistaken for that of Fire, and there was a moment's panic. We have opposing accounts of it.
"It was imagined," wrote our discontented Lieutenant of the King's Own, "that there wou'd have been a riot, which if there had wou'd in all probability have proved fatal to Hancock, Adams, Warren, and the rest of those Villains, as they were all up in the Pulpit together, and the meeting was crowded with Officers and Seamen in such a manner that they cou'd not have escaped; however it luckily did not turn out so; it wou'd indeed have been a pity for them to have made their exit in that way, as I hope before long we shall have the pleasure of seeing them do it by the hands of the Hangman."
John Andrews looked at the matter differently. "The officers in general behave more like a parcel of children, of late, than men. Captain —— of the Royal Irish first exposed himself by behaving in a very scandalous manner at the South meeting.... He got pretty decently frighted for it. A woman, among the rest, attacked him and threatened to wring his nose." An outbreak may have been what the officers wanted. "But," says Samuel Adams, who acted on his maxim that it is good politics to put and keep the enemy in the wrong, "order was restored, and we proceeded regularly, and finished the business. I am persuaded, were it not for the danger of precipitating a crisis, not a man of them would have been spared."[54]
The whole was a type of the existing situation. Here were the officers, still causing petty disturbances; here too, no doubt, were Tories, contemptuous of the proceedings. Deeper still appears the real significance of the occasion. On the one side was the governor, unable, with all the power of the king, to prevent a meeting of the citizens to condemn his presence in the town—for the meeting was the "Port Bill meeting," adjourned from time to time since the previous May. And on the other side were the citizens, legally protesting and exasperatingly defiant, evidently under perfect self-restraint, determined not to strike the first blow.
The officers took, as usual, a puerile revenge in the form of a burlesque. "A vast number" of them assembled at the Coffee House in King Street, and chose selectmen and an orator, "who deliver'd an oration from the balcony to a crowd of few else beside gaping officers."[55] Others of them caught a countryman who had been decoyed into buying a musket from a soldier, and tarred and feathered him.
But these were surface trivialities. Beneath them the true situation was growing worse. Out in the country military stores were being collected at Worcester and at Concord; and over in Parliament the fisheries bill, designed to deprive thousands in America of their living, was sure of passing. At last Franklin, who had stayed in London as long as there seemed anything for him to accomplish, patiently bearing humiliation and insults, on the 20th of March took ship for Philadelphia. It was the sign that there was no further hope of peace.
FOOTNOTES:
[46] Bancroft.