Unhappily the opposition, united in the desire to conciliate America, was divided on questions of home policy. Chatham would have met the new danger by parliamentary reform, giving increased voting power to the freeholders of the counties. Burke from principle, and his noble patrons mainly from lower motives, were opposed to any such change. As Burke had wished the British parliament to be supreme over the colonies, in confidence that this supremacy would not be abused, so he wished the great landowning connexion resting on the rotten boroughs to rule over the unrepresented people, in confidence that this power would not be abused. Amid these distractions the king had an easy game to play. He had all the patronage of the government in his hands, and beyond the circle which was influenced by gifts of patronage, he could appeal to the ignorance and self-seeking of the nation, with which, though he knew it not, he was himself in the closest sympathy. The American War of Independence. No wonder resistance grew more vigorous in America. In 1773 the inhabitants of Boston threw ship-loads of tea into the harbour rather than pay the obnoxious duty. In 1774 the Boston Port Bill deprived Boston of its commercial rights, whilst the Massachusetts Government Bill took away from that colony the ordinary political liberties of Englishmen. The first skirmish of the inevitable war was fought at Lexington in 1775. In 1776 the thirteen colonies united in the continental congress issued their Declaration of Independence. England put forth all its strength to beat down resistance; but the task, which seemed easy at a distance, proved impossible. It might have been so even had the war been conducted on the British side with greater military skill and with more insight into the conditions of the struggle, which was essentially a civil contest between men of the same race. But the initial difficulties of the vast field of operations were greatly increased by the want of skill of the British leaders in adapting themselves to new conditions, while even loyalist sentiment was shocked by the employment of German mercenaries and Red Indian savages against men of English blood. Even so, the issue of the struggle was for long doubtful, and there were moments when it might have ended by a policy of wise concession; but the Americans, though reduced at times to desperate straits, had the advantage of fighting in their own country, and above all they found in George Washington a leader after the model of the English country gentleman who had upheld the standard of liberty against the Stuarts, and worthy of the great cause for which they fought. In 1777 a British army under Burgoyne capitulated at Saratoga; and early in 1778 France, eager to revenge the disasters of the Seven Years' War, formed an alliance with the revolted colonies as free and independent states, and was soon joined by Spain.