in the least family there is, generally, the best œconomy, so these towns will conduct the internal and domestic prudentials better than larger bodies, and give strength, soundness and solidity to the basis of the state.

Sir,-You have, in the foregoing, the outlines of the policy of the Connecticut government, in as concise a view as I could; the great and leading principles of which will, I conceive, apply to any new state; and the sooner they are applied the better it will be for the health and prosperity of the rising community.

An equal and certain security of life, liberty and property; an equal share in the rights of legislation, and an equal distribution of the benefits resulting from society; with an early attention to the principles, morals and manners of the whole, are the great first principles of a good government, and these well fixed, lesser matters will easily and advantageously adjust, as I may say, themselves. I am far from thinking our system is entirely fit for you, in every point. It has grown up and enlarged itself, as we have grown. Its principal features are worth your attending to; and, if I had leisure, would point out, more particularly, which part I think you might adopt immediately, what additions are necessary, and why some parts should be rejected. But I will, if possible, give you, after your perusal of this, the general heads of what, from my little reading and observation, I think to be the most simple, and, consequently, the best plan of government. I am, Sir, yours,

Thursday morning, 2d Nov. 1775.

S. DEANE.

Two laws, I see, I have run over without noting upon: the one is, for punishing vagabonds, by setting them to hard labour. The other, for the punishment of theft, which you may think too light, but I think too severe; or, in other words, I would avoid infamous punishments, such as cropping, branding, whipping, &c., and substistute hard labour in their stead.

Copy of a Letter to Patrick Henry, Esq.

Hillsborough, April 26th, 1775.

Sir,-The late meeting of the delegates, from the several counties, cities, and boroughs, in his majesty's antient Colony and Dominion of Virginia, at Richmond, was an event which raised the expectations and attracted the attention of the whole British America, as well on account of the acknowledged wisdom and public integrity of the delegates, as the important and interesting purposes of that numerous and respectable Convention. The copartners in the purchase of lands, on Louisa, from the Indians, neither intending by their distant and hazardous enterprize, to revolt from their allegiance to their sovereign, nor yet to desert the grand and common cause of their American brethren and fellow subjects, in their manly and glorious struggle for the full enjoyment of the natural rights of mankind, and the inestimable liberties and priviledges of our happy constitution, were anxious to know the result of the wise and mature deliberations of the Convention, and particular in their enquiries concerning the several matters which became the subject of

consideration in that august assembly. It was not long before we learnt the particulars from some of the members, and that the minute circumstances of our contract with the Cherokee Indians had occasionally been moved and debated. The true point of view in which, we are told, you, with several other gentlemen, conceived the nature of the contract, and the eloquence and good sense with which you defended, and the liberal principles on which you supported our claim to the benefit of our engagement with the Indians, in addition to the universal applause of the whole continent, for your noble and patriotick exertions, give you an especial claim to our particular acknowledgements, of which we take this earliest opportunity of begging your acceptance. It would, Sir, have afforded us the most singular satisfaction to have had it in our power to give you a more substantial evidence of our gratitude. Yet we conceive the generous disinterestedness of your principles and publick conduct to be such, that even our thanks may be more than you expected or wished for. We hope, however, that our wishes to make known our gratitude to you, will be considered as a sufficient apology for our having given you the trouble of this letter.

Convinced that our purchase is neither against the laws of our country, nor the principles of natural justice and equity, and conscious to ourselves of the uprightness of our intentions, we totally disregard the reproaches thrown out against us by ill informed or envious and interested persons; and now encouraged by the approbation of the respectable Provincial Congress of Virginia, we shall hereafter pursue with eagerness what we at first adopted with caution.

We beg that you will pardon the length of this letter, and that you will do us the honour to believe, that we are, with the highest sense of gratitude for the part you have taken in favour of our hazardous enterprize, and with the greatest respect and esteem for your eminent and distinguished character and reputation, among the vigilant guardians and illustrious patrons of American liberty, Sir, your most obliged and

Very mo. devoted h❜ble serv'ts,

Signed,

TO PATRICK HENRY, ESQR.

RICHD. HENDERSON,
THOS. HART,

JOHN WILLIAMS,

JAMES HOGG,

NATHL. HART,

DAVID HART,

LEND. H. BULLOCK,

JOHN LUTTREL,

WM. JOHNSTON.

Hanover County, Virginia.

N. B. A copy of the above letter sent to Thos. Jefferson, Esqr. Virginia.

To the Honourable the Convention of Virginia.

The petition of the inhabitants, and some of the intended settlers, of that part of North America now denominated Transylvania, humbly sheweth.

Whereas some of your petitioners became adventurers in that country from the advantageous reports of their

friends who first explored it, and others since allured by the specious shew of the easy terms on which the land was to be purchased from those who stile themselves proprietors, have, at a great expence and many hardships, settled there, under the faith of holding the lands by an indefeasible title, which those gentlemen assured them they were capable of making. But your petitioners have been greatly alarmed at the late conduct of those gentlemen, in advancing the price of the purchase money from twenty shillings to fifty shillings sterling per hundred acres, and at the same time have increased the fees of entry and surveying to a most exorbitant rate; and, by the short period prefixed for taking up the lands, even on those extravagant terms, they plainly evince their intentions of rising in their demands as the settlers increase, or their insatiable avarice shall dictate. And your petitioners have been more justly alarmed at such unaccountable and arbitrary proceedings, as they have lately learned, from a copy of the deed made by the Six Nations with Sir William Johnson, and the commissioners from this Colony, at Fort Stanwix, in the year 1768, that the said lands were included in the cession or grant of all that tract which lies on the south side of the river Ohio, beginning at the mouth of Cherokee or Hogohege river, and extending up the said river to Kettaning. And, as in the preamble of the said deed, the said confederate Indians declare the Cherokee river to be their true boundary with the southard Indians, your petitioners may, with great reason, doubt the validity of the purchase that those proprietors have made of the Cherokees,-the only title they set up to the lands for which they demand such extravagant sums from your petitioners, without any