theirs by immemorial right. But as they hunted only, the grounds were of no use to them except so long as the rivers yielded fish and the forests yielded game. Men who have no fixed place of residence-no altars and no homes-have yet to acquire the means whereby a sense of property in the soil grows up. The Iroquois and the Lenapé built no cities-permanently kept no fields. Wherever the woods afforded sport the lodge was pitched. The men tightened their bows and sharpened their hatchets; the women planted a rood or two of maize; and when the forest spoils and field produce were got in, they marched to more attractive spots. Their sachem was an hereditary ruler; but the order of succession was by the female line. The children of the reigning sachem could not succeed him in his regal office, but the next son of his mother, after whom came in the sister's eldest son.

Such was the country which Penn petitioned the King to grant him in lieu of his claim.

A year was wasted in debates. The Royalists lost all patience when they heard that Penn was asking for a grant of land, to put in practice certain theories held to be Utopian by wise and moderate politicians, and denounced by courtier and cavalier as dangerous to the Crown and State. Events had slackened his hold on James. Penn had publicly expressed his belief in the Popish plot; he had influenced his friends openly to support Sydney; he had himself become a leader among the Republicans. He had committed a still greater offence in the eyes of James-he had stood between

that prince and his prey. As lord-proprietor of the whole province of New Netherlands, James had claimed the right to levy an import and export tax upon all articles entering or leaving its ports. So long as James retained the land as well as the seignorial right, this claim was not disputed; consequently traders carrying goods to or from New Jersey paid to his agents a duty of ten per cent. When Billing got the land, this tax was felt to be a wrong; the colonists invited Penn to act for them; and, having considered the justice of their case, Penn proceeded against his royal guardian in the law courts. Sir William Jones decided the case in favour of Penn and the colonists; the Duke at once submitted; but it is impossible to believe that he would not feel sore at his defeat. To the coldness of the prince was added the active hostility of Lord Baltimore, whose ill-defined possessions were supposed to be invaded by the new boundary-line. Baltimore was one of those who stood in Oates's black list; he was not in the country; but he had friends at court, who watched his interests; and Penn's petition was no sooner laid before the council, than a copy of it was sent to his agent, Burke, who took such measures as he thought most likely to defeat it. All the dilatory forms of the Royal Council were used; the Lord Commissioners of Trade and Plantation wrote long letters about trifles to the Attorney-general, and the Attorney-general wrote with similar tact to the Lords Commissioners. Penn's time and hopes were wasting. Sunderland was an active friend; and Hyde, Chief Justice

North, and the Earl of Halifax, were also on his side. These prudent friends advised him to be silent as to his Free Colony until his patent had been signed. The name of Freedom was offensive at Whitehall.

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CHAPTER XXII.

PENNSYLVANIA (1680–81).

AT first, the Duke of York was not in favour of the grant; and the Attorney-general, Sir Joseph Warden, was instructed to oppose it in his name. James thought the boundary line too loose, the rights of seigniory too large. But Sunderland kept the King's attention fixed on the alternative mode of paying off the score. A peerage and a sum of sixteen thousand pounds were due. If Penn were willing to accept a lordship on the Deleware in lieu of a barony on the Wey, a patch of waste woodland in lieu of sixteen thousand pounds in money, Sunderland thought the King would make a very good bargain for the crown. Sir Thomas Thynne was hankering after Weymouth; the royal treasury was empty; and the King could hardly make another man Viscount Weymouth while the Admiral's dues were still unpaid.

This argument in favour of the grant decided Charles. Had there been money in the coffers, Penn would not have gained his prayer, and Pennsylvania would have been reclaimed and planted by

another race of men. petition was sent in, Sir Joseph wrote to inform Secretary Blathwayte that the Duke of York consented to Penn's request. What now remained, was the arrangement of details. But this task occupied a second five months. The chief questions which came up for discussion had reference to boundaries and constitutions. Agents of the Duke of York were heard by the Privy Council; Burke appeared for Lord Baltimore; and both parties laid down objections to the boundary-line as drawn by Penn, Penn's counsel made the best of their position; their client being anxious to obtain a well-marked line; but the parties could not come to terms. At length, the grant was made by the Council with no proper understanding of the question, in a vain hope that the proprietors would be able to arrange their differences among themselves. This omission led to much dispute in after-times. The terms of the charter then came on. Penn had forgotten some of our less liberal laws and usages; but the Attorney-general and the Lord Chief Justice remedied his defects by adding clauses to the charter. They reserved all royal privileges. They provided for the authority of Parliament in questions of trade and commerce. Acts of the colonial legislature were to be submitted to the King. Above all, they reserved to the mother country the right to levy rates. The Bishop of London got a clause inserted claiming security for the English Church.

Five months after Penn's

All these preliminaries being arranged, the Lords