70. CHAPTER LXX.
THE OLD CHURCH OF ST. JOHN.
It was the great and peculiar good fortune of Virginia to
have thus, for the last of her governors, when the storm
was first lowering on the horizon, a man whose whole
conduct revolted completely the popular mind—whose
malignant and treacherous disposition and action united all
the elements of revolution.
Had Fauquier or Botetourt held the reins, they would,
either of them, been the last whom the Virginians would
have struck at.
Lord Dunmore was now their first enemy—their prime
hatred.
With the spring of '75, all the fruits of the long opposition
rapidly matured. In the electric atmosphere, as in a
hot-house, the bloody flower of revolution began rapidly to
expand into bloom; and its seeds were soon scattered far
and near, wafted on the sobbing wind which heralded the
approaching hurricane.
The general congress at Philadelphia had risen in October
of the preceding year—almost at the moment when
Dunmore was endeavoring to perfect his treachery on the
Sciota.
They had agreed on a petition to the king—an address
to the people of Great Britain—and a memorial to the inhabitants
of the colonies.
But the great result of this congress was the bond
which thenceforth united the North and the South. The
leaders of the two sections saw that they could now advance
with the certainty of coöperation.
The delegates of Virginia returned home, followed by
Dunmore from the frontier; and then they gave, viva voce,
an account of all things to the people.
Around one of these delegates, at the court house of his
county, the old neighbors gathered and made him describe
the whole proceeding. Then they asked about the men
who formed the congress.
Patrick Henry replied, “Colonel Washington was unquestionbly
the greatest man on that floor.”
The spring of '75 opened thus, as we have said, with a
threatening cloud, and that murmur which precedes the
rising of the masses, as it is the precursor of the storm.
In March, the second Virginia convention met at the old
church of St. John in Richmond town, crowning to-day, as
it then did, the summit of the hill, from which the eye
embraces the city below, the foaming falls, the glittering
current of the river, and the beautiful expanse of field and
forest.
Up even to this moment, the best patriots cast a longing
look behind them at the peaceful fields of the past, and tried
to close their eyes to the events rushing forward to fulfillment.
They wished to avoid that terrible conflict which
would stain the earth with so much precious blood. They
hesitated and doubted—resolving, indeed, that the general
congress had done well—that the warmest thanks of
Virginia were justly due to her delegates for their services
—but also resolving that the greatest desire, the most
ardent aspiration of all men should be, for the “speedy
return of those halcyon days” when England had not yet
molested them.
Patrick Henry listened in silence to these resolutions,
bearing the stamp of the doubt and indecision of every one.
He said nothing—waiting for the proper moment. When
that time had come, he rose and moved that “a wellregulated
militia, composed of gentlemen and yeomen, was
the natural strength and only security of a free government.”
That “the establishment of such militia was at
that time peculiarly necessary.” And that “the colony be
immediately put in a state of defense.”
The resolutions fell like a thunderbolt. After the first
silence of astonishment, a dozen members of the convention
sprung to their feet and vehemently opposed them. The
burden of the flood of impassioned oratory was that the
resolutions were premature and impolitic—that the time
had not come, if it ever was to come.
It was then that the great prophet of revolution, rising
slowly and solemnly from his seat, delivered that speech
which is a part of the classics of America.
In its burning sentences, as we read it even to-day, the
stormy voice of the orator again resounds; its solemn and
august periods seem to blaze and flash with the hidden fires
of an immense genius, a gigantic resolution. It strips the
husk from events, and defines with a finger of iron the
exact issue. The invisible spirit of the Revolution informs
it; like an avalanche it rolls onward, sweeping away all
obstacles to the comprehension of the issue, and roaring
like the ocean in its passage.
With the measured step of a giant, moving slowly, the
orator advanced at last to the dividing line—the gulf between
submission and revolution:
“If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late
to retreat from the contest! There is no retreat but in
submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their
clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war
is inevitable! and let it come!”
Then with both arms extended aloft, and burning eyes,
“I know not,” he said, “what course others may take;
but as for me—give me liberty or give me death!”
The resolutions were adopted without a dissenting voice,
their policy embraced, and the convention rose.
Its action sent a thrill of satisfaction through the whole
of Virginia, and in three weeks the popular mind was
braced for the contest.
Everywhere old arms were hunted up, swords burnished,
the militia was organized, and only a match to fire the train
was required.
Lord Dunmore applied this match on the 20th of April,
by removing the powder from the old magazine in Williamsburg.
But let us not anticipate.
