200. What President was the oldest when elected?
William Henry Harrison, who was sixty-eight years of age when inaugurated. The average age of Presidents, when elected, has been fifty-seven years.
201. What colony was founded as a home for the poor?
Georgia, the thirteenth American colony, was founded in a spirit of pure benevolence. The laws of England permitted imprisonment for debt. Thousands of English laborers, who through misfortune and thoughtless contracts had become indebted to the rich, were annually arrested and thrown into jail. Whole families were destitute or starving. To provide a refuge for these downtrodden poor of England, and the distressed Protestants of other countries, James Oglethorpe, the philanthropist, a member of Parliament, appealed to George II. for the privilege of planting a colony in America. The petition was favorably heard, and on the 9th of June, 1732, a royal charter was issued, by which the territory between the Savannah and Altamaha Rivers, and westward from the upper fountains of those rivers to the Pacific, was organized and granted to a corporation for twenty-one years, to be held in trust for the poor. In honor of the king, the new province received the name of Georgia.
202. Who was the “Colossus of American Independence”?
John Adams. By his energy and eloquence he did more than any other man to crystallize the American sentiment in favor of independence. He was a member of the celebrated committee appointed to draft the immortal “Declaration.” In the debates on that instrument, he was its chief defender; and it was he who persuaded Congress to adopt it. He was the most distinguished signer. Jefferson himself said, that “he [Adams] was the pillar of its support; its ablest advocate and defender.”
203. What were the last intelligible words of Benedict Arnold?
“Bring me, I beg you, the epaulets and sword-knots which Washington gave me. Let me die in my old American uniform, the uniform in which I fought my battles. God forgive me for ever putting on any other.”
204. What bird is an apt illustration of the proverb that “Pride will have a fall”?
The pouter pigeon. It stands perpendicularly erect, and seems exceedingly vain of the swollen crop which gives it the name of pouter. It can inflate its crop with air, until the head is almost hidden behind it. This inflation oftentimes causes the bird to lose its balance, and to fall down chimneys, on which it is fond of standing, thereby aptly illustrating the proverb, that “Pride will have a fall.”