[57] Thus in a French book on flags (La Haye's), published in 1737, we see a "pavillon de Nouvelle Angleterre en Amerique." This is a blue flag, having on a white canton the Cross of St. George, and in the first quarter of this canton a globe, in allusion to America, the new world.
[58] In September, 1775, Moultrie, the heroic defender of the fort which still bears his name, devised this the first flag of the State of South Carolina, the uniform of the South Carolina men being blue, and some of the regiments having a silver crescent in their caps; but why they had the silver crescent as a badge no record seems to inform us.
[59] It may be somewhat of an assistance to our readers if we give a few chronological details: The obnoxious duty on tea and other articles imposed by the British Parliament, June, 1767. Tea thrown overboard in Boston harbour by the discontented populace, November, 1773. The Boston Port Bill, by which that port was to be shut up until compensation made to the East India Company for the tea destroyed, passed March, 1774. General Congress of the colonists at Philadelphia, September, 1774. Revolution, first blood shed at Lexington, April, 1775. Washington appointed Commander-in-Chief of the American Armies, June, 1775. Thirteen colonies declare themselves independent, July 4th, 1776. Independence of Colonies recognised by France in March, 1778, by Holland in April, 1782, and by Great Britain in September, 1783. John Adams received as ambassador from America by George III. in June, 1785, and first ambassador sent from Great Britain to the United States, in 1791.
[60] In an old print before us of the fight between the Shannon and the Chesapeake, we see that the latter hoists three American flags, all having the top and bottom stripes white, and at the foremast a white flag inscribed with the enigmatical motto, "Free Trade and Sailors' rights."
"Forty flags with their silver stars,
Forty flags with their crimson bars."
Whittier, "Barbara Frietchie."
[62] At a banquet at the Mansion House, when many leading Englishmen and eminent Colonists gathered together to celebrate St. George's Day, the American Ambassador, an honoured guest, said that he was very conscious that he was there at a gathering of the clans. "There was a tradition that the mischievous boy was generally the favourite of the household. His mother might confess it openly, his father secretly, but the rest of the family said nothing about it. Now there was a mischievous boy who broke away from home something more than a century ago, but let them not suppose that because he left the home he or his descendants ever came back without a strong feeling that it is the home." He went on to say that he never met a body of representative Englishmen, British men, speaking the same language that he did, without a sense of grave joy and pleasure: the sense that they were his brethren in a great cause, and that he joined with them, he and his people, in sustaining the best hopes and aspirations of the world's civilization. Blood is thicker than water, and all right-minded Englishmen will read his kindly words with pleasure, and give them heartiest reciprocation.
[63] To the Germans, in their campaign against France, this and the "Watch upon the Rhine" were worth many battalions as a spur and stimulus to heroic deeds. During the American War both Federals and Confederates owed much to the influence of stirring patriotic songs. There can be no doubt that the songs of Dibdin contributed not a little to our own naval victories, and every cause that is worth fighting for evokes like stirring strains. Perhaps one of the most marked illustrations of this is the birth of that grand war-song known as the "Marseillaise." Rouget de l'Isle, its author, was a captain of French Engineers stationed in Strassbourg on the opening of the campaign against Austria and Prussia in 1792. On the eve of the day that the contingent from that city was going to join the main army of the Rhine, a question arose as to what air should be played at their departure. Several were suggested and rejected, and Rouget de l'Isle left the meeting and retired to his own quarters, and before the gathering broke up had written both words and music of "Le Chant de l'Armee du Rhin." On returning to the meeting, still in consultation on the various details of the morrow, he sang his composition, and it was at once welcomed with delight. It flew like wildfire throughout France, and, owing to the Marseillaise troops singing it on entering Paris, it derived the name by which it has ever since been known. Its stirring words and the grand roll of the music aroused the enthusiasm of the country, and at once made it the battle-song of France, to be at times proscribed, but never forgotten.