the lot of nations in war time. Hence, as the struggle went on, the drafts upon France increased; and while every ship brought private orders for tea, ribbons, silks, velvet, feathers, and trinkets, the doleful theme of half the public letters that arrived was the emptiness of the Congressional treasury. The ladies and the dandies, thought Franklin, are loaded with French finery, while the soldiers, who fight for them, are naked in their huts. At length came a request from Mrs. Bache for some decorative article. He thus replied to her application:

"When I began to read your account of the high prices of goods, 'a pair of gloves seven dollars, a yard of common gauze twentyfour dollars, and that it now required a fortune to maintain a family in a very plain way,' I expected you would conclude by telling me that everybody, as well as yourself, was grown frugal and industrious; and I could scarce believe my eyes in reading forward, that there never was so much pleasure and dressing going on ;' and that you yourself wanted black pins and feathers from France, to appear, I suppose, in the mode! This leads me to imagine, that, perhaps, it is not so much that the goods are grown dear, as that the money has grown cheap, as every thing else will do when excessively plenty; and that people are still as easy, nearly, in their circumstances, as when a pair of gloves might be had for half a crown. The war, indeed, may in some degree raise the prices of goods, and the high taxes, which are necessary to support the war, may make our frugality necessary; and, as I am always preaching that doctrine, I cannot in conscience or in decency encourage the contrary, by my example, in furnishing my children with foolish modes and luxuries. I therefore send all the articles you desire, that are useful and necessary, and omit the rest; for, as you say you should have great pride in wearing any thing I send, and showing it as your father's taste,' I must avoid giving you an opportunity of doing that with either lace or feathers. If you wear your cambric ruffles as I do, and take care not to mend the holes, they will come in time to be lace; and feathers, my dear girl, may be had in America from every cock's tail."

In the same letter he said: "I was charmed with the account you gave me of your industry, the tablecloths of your own spinning, &c.; but the latter part of the paragraph, that you had sent for linen from France because weaving and flax were grown dear,

alas! that dissolved the charm; and your sending for long black pins, and lace, and feathers! disgusted me as much as if you had put salt into my strawberries. The spinning, I see, is laid aside, and you are to be dressed for the ball! You seem not to know, my dear daughter, that, of all the dear things in this world, idleness is the dearest, except mischief.”

The lady did not submit in silence to this reproof. She replied: "How could my dear papa give me so severe a reprimand for wishing a little finery. He would not, I am sure, if he knew how much I have felt it. Last winter (in consequence of the surrender of General Burgoyne) was a season of triumph to the whigs, and they spent it gayly; you would not have had me, I am sure, stay away from the Embassadors' or Gerard's entertainments, nor when I was invited to spend a day with General Washington and his lady; and you would have been the last person, I am sure, to have wished to see me dressed with singularity. Though I never loved dress so much as to wish to be particularly fine, yet I never will go out when I cannot appear so as to do credit to my family and husband. The Assembly we went to, as Mr. Bache was particularly chosen to regulate them; the subscription was fifteen pounds; but to a subscription ball, of which there were numbers, we never went to one, though always asked. I can assure my dear papa that industry in this house is by no means laid aside; but as to spinning linen, we cannot think of that till we have got that wove which we spun three years ago. Mr. Duffield has bribed a weaver that lives on his farm to weave me eighteen yards, by making him three or four shuttles for nothing, and keeping it a secret from the country people, who will not suffer them to weave for those in town. This is the third weaver's it has been at, and many fair promises I have had about it. 'Tis now done and whitening, but forty yards of the best remains at Litiz yet, that I was to have had home a twelvemonth last month. Mrs. Keppele, who is gone to Lancaster, is to try to get it done there for me, but not a thread will they weave but for hard money. My maid is now spinning wool for winter stockings for the whole family, which will be no difficulty in the manufacturing, as I knit them myself. I only mention these things that you may see that the balls are not the only reason that the wheel is laid aside."*

"Letters to Franklin," p. 106.

Let us hope that she was consoled in her father's next letter. He had the pleasure, in 1781, of hearing that she was at the head of the band of Philadelphia ladies who were employed in making shirts for the soldiers of General Washington's army. The French embassador wrote to him, that in raising money for this purpose, "she showed the most indefatigable zeal, and the most unwearied perseverance, and a courage in asking, which surpassed even the obstinate reluctance of the Quakers in refusing. Rivington tried to turn her zeal into ridicule. Her patriotism, he called superstition and foolish fanaticism; he pretended, that her officiousness went beyond all bounds. In a word, she could not have been praised more skillfully."

The first boy borne by Mrs. Bache after the conclusion of the French alliance, she named Louis. Before its birth she had asked her father which of the queen's numerous names she should bestow upon the coming girl. But the coming girl proved to be a boy.

Franklin was far from forgetting his good old sister, Jane Mecom, the being who, of all the friends he ever had from youth to hoary age, loved him most. I cannot help giving a few sentences from her letters to him during his long residence abroad, there is something so sweet and touching in her admiring fondness. July, 1779, she acknowledges the receipt of a letter from him: "wherein you, like yourself, do all for me that the most affectionate brother can be desired or expected to do; and though I feel myself full of gratitude for your generosity, the conclusion of your letter affects me more, where you say you wish we may spend our last days together. O my dear brother, if this could be accomplished, it would give me more joy than any thing on this side of Heaven could possibly do. I feel the want of a suitable conversation-I have but little here. I think I could assume more freedom with you now, and convince you of my affection for you. I have had time to reflect and see my error in that respect. I suffered my diffidence and the awe of your superiority to prevent the familiarity I might have taken with you, and ought, and [which] your kindness to me might have convinced me would be acceptable; but it is hard overcoming a natural propensity, and diffidence is mine. Friends flock around me when I receive a letter, and are much disappointed that they contain no politics. I tell them you dare not trust a woman with politics, and perhaps that is the truth; but if there is any thing we

* * *

could not possibly misconstrue or do mischief by knowing from you, it will gratify us mightily if you add a little to your future kind letters."

Again, in September of the same year: "Your very affectionate and tender care of me all along in life excites my warmest gratitude, which I cannot even think on without tears. What manifold blessings I enjoy beyond many of my worthy acquaintance, who have been driven from their home, lost their interest, and some have the addition of lost health, and one the grievous torment of a cancer, and no kind brother to support her, while I am kindly treated by all about me, and ample provision made for me when I have occasion. * * * When shall I have any foundation for the hope that we shall again meet and spend our last days together? America knows your consequence too well to permit your return, if they can possibly prevent it; and your care for the public good will not suffer you to desert them till peace is established, and the dismal sound of fifteen years from the commencement of the war dwells on my mind, which I once heard you say it might last. If it does, it is not likely I shall last so long."

And in 1783: "Believe me, my dear brother, your writing to me gives me so much pleasure that the great, the very great presents you have sent me are but a secondary joy. I have been very sick this winter at my daughter's; kept my chamber six weeks, but had a sufficiency for my supply of every thing that could be a comfort to me of my own, before I received any intimation of the great bounty from your hand, which your letter has conveyed to me, for I have not been lavish of what I before possessed, knowing sickness and misfortunes might happen, and certainly old age; but I shall now be so rich that I may indulge in a small degree a propensity to help some poor creatures who have not the blessing I enjoy. My good fortune came to me all together to comfort me in my weak state; for as I had been so unlucky as not to receive the letter you sent me through your son Bache's hands, though he informs me he forwarded it immediately. His letter with a draft for twenty-five guineas came to my hand just before yours, which I have received, and cannot find expression suitable to acknowledge my gratitude how I am by my dear brother enabled to live at ease in my old age (after a life of care, labor, and anxiety), without which I must have been miserable."

It is when we read such passages as these, that we know what Dr. Samuel Cooper meant when he wrote to Dr. Franklin in one of these years: "Your friendship has united two things in my bosom that seldom meet, pride and consolation: it has been the honor and the balm of my life."

CHAPTER XIII.

DAWN OF PEACE.

AUGUST 30th, 1781. A high day in Philadelphia. The City Light-Horse and the uniformed militia were out, and the whole city was astir. General Washington was coming, and he was to be accompanied by the Count de Rochambeau, by the Chevalier Chasfellux, by General Knox, by General Moultrie, and a great troop of cavaliers, French and American, the retinue of those generals. From the banks of the Hudson they had swiftly marched, the whole army following swiftly, and they were going southward to join General Lafayette near Yorktown, where they hoped, with the assistance of Admiral de Grasse, if he should arrive in time, to hem in, and, perhaps, capture Lord Cornwallis. At one o'clock, the Generals reached the suburbs. The city soldiery and a great number of gentlemen on horseback received them there, and gave them honorable escort through the streets to the City Tavern, where the General-in-chief gave audience to the principal citizens. Thence, to the residence of Mr. Robert Morris, the Superintendent of Finance, who entertained all the generals and a large party of civilians at dinner; and while they were drinking, in full bumpers and with sedate enthusiasm, the United States, the King of France, the King of Spain, the United Provinces, and the Speedy Arrival of Count de Grasse, the ships that lay at anchor in the river thundered to the Jersey shore "the triumph of their pledge." In the evening the city was illuminated, and General Washington walked forth to view the spectacle, followed by a concourse of people "eagerly pressing to see their beloved General."