and politically Stirling's friends. The fall of Bute was especially unfortunate. Prime-minister at the time, a Scotchman himself, and according to popular reproach the favorer of his countrymen, his great influence with the king, whose tutor he had been, and by whom he was greatly beloved, could not but have enabled him to give effect to his friendship to Stirling, by procuring a favorable issue to his claim. With the change of ministry that followed, it was doomed to languish and die. The last that was heard of it was its being postponed for consideration to a succeeding session of Parliament. Another claimant of the peerage subsequently arose, in the person of Alexander Humphreys, who claimed as descended from a daughter of the last earl, and produced a patent, extending the entail to heirs female. But on the production of this document, he was indicted for forgery, and the patent, with other papers on which he relied to prove his title, was found to be spurious; and in a subsequent suit, so late as 1833, after the heirs male of Lord Stirling had failed, it was judicially decided that Humphreys was not the lawful heir to the earldom.

Turning his attention to what was attainable, and of more immediate interest, Stirling now devoted himself with renewed zeal to the concerns of his native country. He became surveyor-general of New Jersey, which office had been held by his father, and busied himself in collecting materials for a new map of North America, having detected many inaccuracies in the maps already published. He announced to Lord Bute his intention to make a journey of exploration around all the great lakes, in furtherance of this project, and also to measure a degree of latitude on the Hudson, for which he was then making preparation. An evidence of his scientific pursuits at this period is preserved in the library of the New York Historical Society, in a manuscript account of an observation made by him of the transit of Venus, for the purpose of verifying the longitude of New York. He was at this time one of the governors of King's, now Columbia, College, in his native city, which was languishing for want of means to render it as useful as its friends desired. The governors determined to send an agent to England, to solicit aid from the benevolent patrons of education in that country. Dr. James Jay, a brother of John Jay, was selected for that purpose, and bore from Stirling urgent letters to Lord

VOL. LXIV.

No. 135.

38

Romney, Lord Bute, and other influential friends, in furtherance of his mission.*

On the return of Stirling to America, he had resumed his residence in New York. Soon after, he commenced building at Baskenridge in New Jersey, on an extensive estate which he possessed there, his father having been one of the proprietaries of East Jersey. On the completion of his house, he made it his summer residence, and eventually his permanent abode. Soon after his removal to New Jersey, he was chosen a member of the governor's council, and continued to hold the office without interruption until the period of the Revolution. In the political duties thus devolved upon him, in those of his station of surveyor-general, and in others which he appears to have assumed with the higher object of adding to what was then known of the geography of the country, for which purpose he had the aid of detachments from the king's troops in New York, his time was usefully employed; and any leisure that remained must have been occupied by the exertions required of him as a large landed proprietor, solicitous at once to raise the value of his estates and to promote the prosperity of his tenants, by the exercise of an extensive hospitality, and by the correspondence which he continued to maintain at home and abroad. A letter which he wrote at this period to Lord Shelburne, afterwards Marquis of Lansdown, possesses no little interest from the account that it gives of his occupations, and his enlightened views respecting the measures to be pursued for promoting the welfare of the Colonies, both for their own sake, and as the best means of advancing the prosperity of the mother country.

"New York, August 6, 1763.

"My dear Lord,- Nothing could have given me greater satisfaction, than hearing of your Lordship's appointment to preside

* Columbia College, thus fostered in its infancy by Stirling, has since become one of the most flourishing and efficient institutions, as far as its course of instruction extends, in this or in any country. For many years, and until the shattered state of his health occasioned his retirement, it was presided over with the greatest ability and entire success by the grandson of its early benefactor, to whom we are indebted for this volume. The discipline of Columbia College, which, from the independent character of our youth, is ever the chief difficulty in our institutions of learning, was perfect under the presidency of Mr. Duer, whose dignified yet courteous bearing, and happy union of suavity and force, always restrained even the approach of insubordination.

at the board which must have so great a share in the government of a country in which it is my lot to reside. Your Lordship's early inquiries, and strong desire of acquiring knowledge of this new world, must now be of great use to your country; for on a proper management of the colonies on this continent much of Great Britain's future greatness depends. The wants of its increasing population must at all events greatly increase the manufactures of the mother country. The suppression of such branches of trade as interfere with the importation of them from Great Britain, and the encouragement of such a cultivation of these colonies as will supply her with raw materials, for which she is now obliged to pay millions to foreign nations, is a work that must render the value of this continent to Great Britain inestimable. These things have, no doubt, occurred to your Lordship, as well as the proper mode of carrying them into execution. But if you can indulge me, I will, from time to time, send you such hints as occur to me, of measures suitable to this part of the continent; you may perhaps find something among them that has escaped your notice.

"The making of pig and bar iron, and the cultivation of hemp, are two articles that want encouragement greatly. We are capable of supplying Great Britain with both to a great extent; but the first requiring a large stock to begin with, people of moderate fortunes cannot engage in it; and those of large ones are yet very few, and their attention is generally given to the pursuit of other objects. Some few, indeed, in this province and in New Jersey, have lately erected excellent works, the success of which, I hope, will encourage others to follow their example, As to hemp, our farmers have got into a beaten track of raising grain and grazing cattle, and there is no persuading them out of it, unless by examples and premiums; and these it would be well for government to try. A few thousand pounds expended in that way might have a good effect.

"The making of wine, also, is worth the attention of government. Without its aid, the cultivation of the vine will be very slow; for of all the variety of vines in Europe, we do not yet know which will suit this climate; and until that is ascertained by experiment, our people will not plant vineyards. Few of us are able, and a much less number willing, to make the experiment. I have lately imported about twenty different sorts, and have planted two vineyards, one in this province, and one in New Jersey; but I find the experiment tedious, expensive, and uncertain; for after eight or ten years' cultivation, I shall perhaps be obliged to reject nine tenths of them as unfit for the climate, and then begin new vineyards from the remainder. But however tedious, I am

determined to go through with it. Yet I could wish to be assisted in it. I would then try it to a greater extent, and would the sooner be able to bring the cultivation of the grape into general use. "It is in these vineyards, my Lord, and in clearing a large body of rich swamp-lands in New Jersey, and fitting it for the cultivation of hemp, in settling a good farm in the wilderness, and bringing to it some of the productions and improvements of Europe, that are my present employments. They have taken place of the pleasures of London, and I sometimes persuade myself that this is the happier life of the two. Yet there are some hours I could wish to have repeated; those in which I was honored with your Lordship's conversation I shall ever recollect with the greatest pleasure."

The attempt to suppress those branches of trade which would check importation from the mother country was one of the grievances complained of at the Revolution. But this formed a part of the settled policy of England, and would not have been for a long time resisted, but for the more unreasonable pretensions which she afterwards attempted to enforce. In addition to his efforts to add to the productions of his country by the cultivation of the vine and of hemp, he soon after induced others to join him in establishing extensive ironworks in New Jersey, to which enterprise he devoted much of his time and attention.

The even tenor of his life, whilst engaged in these tranquil occupations, equally beneficial to the land of his birth, and to that other country which he, in common with his fellow-colonists, was accustomed to consider and speak of as "home," were ere long interrupted by the mad attempt of the Tory administration to tax the American Colonies without their consent. This pretension was in violation at once of their charters and of their intrinsic rights as British subjects, and when once before suggested, it had been rejected by Sir Robert Walpole, for reasons the wisdom of which has long since been confirmed by history.

"I will leave the taxation of America for some of my successors, who may have more courage than I have, and be less a friend to commerce than I am. It has been a maxim with me, during my administration, to encourage the trade of the American Colonies in the utmost latitude; nay, it has been necessary to pass over some irregularities in their trade with Europe; for by encouraging them to an extensive growing foreign commerce,

if they gain £500,000, I am convinced that £250,000 of their gain will be in his Majesty's exchequer, by the labor and prod uct of this kingdom; as immense quantities of every kind of our manufactures go thither; and, as they increase in their foreign American trade, more of our produce will be wanted. This is taxing them more agreeably to their own constitution and to ours."

One of his successors was found to possess the courage in which Walpole had declared himself deficient, and in March, 1765, Mr. Grenville, assisted by Charles Townshend, who had now changed his party and opinions, carried through Parliament the Stamp Act, for levying duties on certain documents used in the Colonies. History has recorded how this pretension was received in America. Stirling was among the most active of its opposers. He encouraged resistance to its execution by promoting the agreement to dispense with the stamped paper without prejudice to the validity of contracts in which the act required it to be used. He also exerted his influence to procure the removal of the parliamentary agent of New Jersey, who had not opposed the enactment of the obnoxious law, and in causing the eminent solicitor, who had acted for himself in London, to be appointed in his place. A letter from this gentleman, announcing the subsequent repeal of the odious act, expresses the views of Stirling as well as his own. "I entirely agree with your Lordship that we should be content with your commerce, which, indeed, is all that is valuable in the Colonies; and if this commerce will bring every farthing of your money to Britain, I agree with your Lordship that we can have no more."

It became apparent that arms alone were to vindicate the just rights of the Colonies. A Whig, not merely from education and early associations, but from the convictions of his mature judgment, Stirling had opposed the Stamp act, and used his influence to procure its repeal; he had opposed with equal determination the expedients by which, under another form, it was attempted to attain the same unlawful end of taxing the Colonies without their consent. When coercion was at length attempted in Massachusetts, and was followed by the resistance of its people and the shedding of their blood, Stirling was among the first in the other provinces to take up arms in defence of what he knew to be the