{265}progress of on-coming despotism, and yearned for union to give themselves strength commensurate to the task. Leading minds in every colony perceived the necessity for a general council, and in the spring of 1774, the great heart of Anglo-America seemed to beat as with one pulsation with this sublime idea. That idea found voice and expression almost simultaneously throughout the land. Rhode Island has the distinguished honor of first speaking out publicly on the subject. A general Congress was proposed at a town meeting in Providence on the 17th of May, 1774. A committee of a town meeting held in Philadelphia on the 21st, four days afterward, also recommended such a measure; and on the 23d, a town meeting in New York city uttered the same sentiment. The House of Burgesses of Virginia, dissolved by Lord Dunmore, assembled at the Raleigh Tavern, * in Williams-burgh, on the 27th, and on that day warmly recommended the assembling of a national council; and Baltimore, in county meeting, also took action in favor of it on the 31st. On the 6th of June, a town meeting at Norwich. Connecticut, proposed a general Congress; on the 11th, a county meeting at Newark, New Jersey, did the same; on the 17th, the Massachusetts Assembly, and, at the same time, a town meeting in Faneuil Hall, in Boston, strenuously recommended the measure; and a county meeting at New Castle, Delaware, approved of it on the 29th. On the 6th of July, the committee of correspondence at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, expressed its approbation of the measure. A general province meeting, held at Charleston, South Carolina, on the 6th, 7th, and 8th of that month, urged the necessity of such a Congress; and a district meeting at Wilmington, North Carolina, held on the 21st, heartily responded affirmatively. Thus we perceive that, within the space of sixty-four days, twelve of the thirteen colonies spoke out decidedly in favor of a Continental Congress, Georgia alone remaining silent. ** The Massachusetts Assembly designated the 1st of September, 1774, as the time, and Philadelphia as the place for the meeting of the Congress. *** Other colonies acquiesced, and at Philadelphia the delegates convened.= ```"Now meet the fathers of this western clime, ````Nor names more noble graced the roll of Fame. ```When Spartan firmness braved the wrecks of time. ````Or Rome's bold virtues fann'd the heroic flame.= ```"Not deeper thought th' immortal sage inspired ````On Solon's lips, when Grecian senates hung; ```Nor manlier eloquence the bosom fired, ````When genius thunder'd from the Athenian tongue." `````Trumbull.**** = On Monday, the 5th of September, fifty-four delegates, from twelve colonies, assembled in Carpenters' Hall. (v) It was a congregation of men, viewed in every important aspect, * A drawing of the Raleigh Tavern, and also of the Apollo Room, in whieh the Assembly met, will be found in another part of this work.