The author of the following performance presents it to the public, not from any great value he puts upon it, but from an anxious desire of contributing towards a more complete and general acquaintance with the real state of our colonies in America. Provincial affairs have only of late years been made the objects of public notice and attention. There are yet many, both in Great Britain and America, who are unacquainted with the state of some of these settlements, and with their usefulness and imp

Among the various events recorded in the history of past ages, there are few more interesting and important than the discovery of the western world. By it a large field for adventures, and a new source of power, opulence and grandeur, opened to European nations. To obtain a share of the vast territories in the west became an object of ambition to many of them; but for this purpose, the maritime and commercial states possessed the greatest advantages. Having first discovered the country, with fac

During the period of the usurpation in England, popular anarchy prevailed, and levelled all ranks and distinctions throughout the nation. The lineal heir of the crown being expelled, Oliver Cromwell, that ambitious and crafty leader of the people, seized the reins of government, and ruled England with a rod of iron for several years. The nobles bowed to a fanatic, and the republican part of the constitution preponderated to such a degree, that the other two became as nothing in the balance. When

[Sidenote] A revolution in England. During the reign of the infatuated King James II. the English nation, oppressed by a Popish faction, and apprehensive about their civil and religious liberties, were ripe for a revolt; and, upon his abdication, William Prince of Orange accepted of the English crown, on such terms as the Parliament thought proper to offer it. Though history can furnish few examples of a daughter conspiring with subjects to exclude her father from the throne, and then accepting

After the death of King William, which happened on the 8th of March 1702, agreeable to the act made for settling the succession, the crown devolved on Anne Stewart, the youngest daughter of King James II. by his first marriage. At her accession to the throne, though in reality she was no friend to the Whig party, she declared that she would make the late king's conduct the model of her own, and maintain the succession to the crown in the Protestant line. The first object of her reign was to humb

After the death of Queen Anne, George, Elector of Hanover, ascended the British throne, and was crowned on the 12th of October, 1714. This event was far from giving general satisfaction to the British nation. A considerable party of the principal landholders favoured the pretensions of the house of Stewart, but were so divided in their councils and schemes, that they lost all influence and weight. Having no head, they were unable to turn the balance against the party in the other scale, who, by

The members of assembly, as I already observed, having formed their resolution to revolt, and gone so far as to bring the people to stand by and support them, in spite of every obstacle determined to proceed, until they should bring themselves under the protection of the King. As they had the whole civil power to encounter, and many difficulties to surmount it may not be improper the more particularly to mark the various steps they took to accomplish this end. United in their view by the greatne

[Sidenote] The form of legal governments. From that period in which the right and title to the lands of Carolina were sold, and surrendered to the King, and he assumed the immediate care and government of the province, a new aera commences in the annals of that country, which may be called the aera of its freedom, security, and happiness. The Carolineans who had long laboured under innumerable hardships and troubles, from a weak proprietary establishment, at last obtained the great object of the

[Sidenote] Trade obstructed by the Spaniards of Mexico. For several years before an open rupture took place between Great Britain and Spain, no good understanding subsisted between those two different courts, neither with respect to the privileges of navigation on the Mexican seas, nor to the limits between the provinces of Georgia and Florida. On one hand, the Spaniards pretended that they had an exclusive right to some latitudes in the bay of Mexico; and, on the other, though the matter had ne

    [Sidenote] All commotions and oppressions in Europe favourable to     America. The war between England and France still raged in Europe, and being carried on under many disadvantages on the side of the allied army, was almost as unsuccessful as their enemies could have desired. The battle of Fontenoy was obstinate and bloody, and many thousands were left on the field on the side of the vanquished. The victorious army had little reason for boasting, having likewise bought their victory very d

[Sidenote] A dispute about the limits of British and French territories. Although the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle extended to the subjects of both Britain and France residing in America, yet the boundaries of the respective territories claimed by those rival states were by no means fixed in so clear and precise a manner as to preclude all grounds of future dispute. The limits of Nova Scotia in particular, and those of the extensive back settlements of Virginia and Pennsylvania, were neither clearly

[Sidenote] A peace, and its happy effects respecting America. The peace of Paris, though condemned by many in England as inadequate to the amazing success that attended the British arms during the bloody war, and below the expectation of the British nation, unquestionably placed America in the most advantageous situation. As the flames of war first kindled in that continent, by a contest about the limits of the British and French territories, to prevent all disputes of this kind for the future w