**** John Wilkes, in his speech in Parliament, already alluded to, asked, significantly, "Who can tell whether, in consequence of this very day's violent and mad address [to the king], the scabbard may not be thrown away by them as well as by us?"
(v) Levit. xxv.. 10.
Unity of the American People.—Massachusetts Provincial Congress.—Accounts of the Battles sent to England
the militia. Britons were alarmed; Americans were elated. Individual wrongs were adopted by the whole people as their own, and every man slain at Lexington, Concord, and Menotomy or "West Cambridge, lived again in the strong arms of a thousand determined patriots. In Massachusetts, in particular, ties of consanguinity, property, marriage, manners, religion, social circumstances, and general equality, made whole communities weep over a single victim, and the hearts of the people of the whole province were made to bleed when the first martyrs in the cause of American Independence were laid in the grave. * Linked with that grief was the buoyant sentiment expressed by Percival:
"O it is great for our country to die, where ranks are contending!
Bright is the wreath of our fame, glory awaits us for aye—
Glory that never is dim, shining on with light never ending—
Glory that never shall fade—never, o never! away.
"O then, how great for our country to die, in the front rank to perish!
Firm, with our breast to the foe, victory's shout in our ear.