"How about Lord North?"
"He has nailed up the door. The African zebra is a good student compared to him. It is a maxim of Walpole and North that all men are equally corrupt."
"It is a hateful notion!" Jack exclaimed.
"But not without some warrant. You may be sure that a man who has spent his life in hospitals will have no high opinion of the health of mankind. He and his friends are so engrossed by their cards and cock fights and horses and hounds that they have little time for such a trivial matter as the problems of America. They postpone their consideration and meanwhile the house is catching fire. By and by these boys are going to get burned. They think us a lot of semi-savages not to be taken seriously. Our New England farmers are supposed to be like the peasants of Europe. The fact is, our average farmer is a man of better intellect and character than the average member of Parliament."
"The King's intellects would seem to be out of order," said Jack.
"And too cynical. They think only of revenues. They remind me of the report of the Reverend Commissary Blair who, having projected a college in Virginia, came to England to ask King William for help. The Queen in the King's absence ordered her Attorney-General to draw a charter with a grant of two thousand pounds. The Attorney opposed it on the ground that they were in a war and needed the money for better purposes.
"'But, Your Honor, Virginia is in great need of ministers,' said the commissary. 'It has souls to be saved.'
"'Souls--damn your souls! Make tobacco,' said the Queen's lawyer.
"The counselors of royalty have no high opinion of souls or principles. Think of these taxes on exports needed by neighbors. The minds that invented them had the genius of a pickpocket."
"I see that you are not in love with England, sir," said Jack.