pendence, written by Dr. Ephraim Brevard, chairman of said committee, and read by him to the delegation; the by-laws and regulations were read by John McKnitt Alexander. It was then announced from the chair, are you all agreed? There was not a dissenting voice. Finally the whole proceedings were read distinctly and audibly at the court house door, by Colonel Thomas Polk, to a large, respectable and approving assembly of citizens, who were present and gave sanction to the business of the day. A copy of these transactions was drawn up, and given in charge of Captain James Jack of Charlotte, that he should present them to Congress, then in session in Philadelphia. On that memorable day, I was twenty years and eleven days of age, a very deeply interested spectator. On the return of Captain Jack, he reported that Congress individually, manifested their entire approbation of the conduct of the Mecklenburg citizens; but deemed it premature to lay them officially before the house."

The evidence above cited is positive and direct, given by respectable parties, all of whom were present, and had personal knowledge of what they certified. Following the promulgation of the report of the proceedings of the legislature, as published in the pamphlet by Governor Stokes, historians referred to the Mecklenburg declaration of independence as an established fact.

Judge Martin, in his history of North Carolina, gives the Mecklenburg declaration, but instead of five gives six resolves, the last or sixth, directs that a copy of the declaration be sent to the continental congress. He refers to Captain Jack being sent to Philadelphia bearing the resolutions, and says: "The subject of the resolutions were deemed to be too premature to be laid before congress," and "Caswell, Hooper and Hewes forwarded a joint letter to the citizens of Mecklenburg."

In Hildreth, we find, "that the citizens of Mecklenburg county, North Carolina, carried their zeal so far as to resolve at a public meeting to throw off the British connection, and they framed a formal declaration of independence."

Washington Irving, in his life of Washington, says: "Above all it should never be forgotten, that at Mecklenburg, in the heart of North Carolina, was fulminated the first declaration of independence of the British crown, upwards of a year before a like declaration of congress."

Stephens, Jones, and Wheeler-the last two being North Carolina men-all refer to the declaration of May 20th, 1775, as a fixed fact. We also quote from the "Public Domain," a large volume published by authority of congress (1875) on page 52: "At Charlotte, Mecklenburg county,

May 20th, 1775, a convention of delegates from the county adopted the now famous Mecklenburg declaration of independence."

Other noted histories and many orations delivered by prominent citizens, might be quoted to still farther attest the truth in regard to the Mecklenburg declaration; but it is believed that the testimony already given is sufficient, and ought to be conclusive in regard to the authenticity of the "paper" which was so harshly called in question by ex-President Jefferson. It seems, however, that some minds are incapable of comprehending the possibility that anything similar to the Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson, and signed by the members of the Continental Congress, on the fourth of July, 1776, could have emanated from a convention representing the citizens of a county of one of the colonial provinces of Great Britain. The political atmosphere of the times preceding the formal declaration made July 4th, 1776, was saturated with the idea of independence. It is stated on good authority that, "Christopher Gadsden, of South Carolina, in a speech delivered in Charleston, in 1766 advocated the independence of the colonies, and he was the first American to proclaim that thought." It is believed that this is not disputed. The letter of William Hooper of North Carolina, in 1774, has already been referred to. The "Bill of Rights," adopted by Virginia and other colonies previous to the formal declaration on the 4th of July, 1776, breathes the same spirit of independence, and in words strikingly similar to those used by Jefferson in the Declaration that was signed by the members of the Continental Congress. That declaration was the culminating fruition of germs of thought, feeling, and expression that had for years permeated the best minds of the Colonies.

Revolutionary action was early developed in North Carolina. In the year 1765, on the arrival of the British sloop-of-war Diligence, in the Cape Fear River, a body of citizens frightened the captain of the sloop so that he did not attempt to land the "stamped paper" he brought out-then proceeded to the governor's house-demanded that he should desist from all attempts to execute the Stamp Act-forced him to deliver up the stamp master-carried the latter to the market house and there made him. take an oath never to attempt to execute the duties of his office. On the 16th of May, 1771, in the battle of Alamance, the citizens of North Carolina poured out the first blood of the Revolution in resistance to British tyranny. On the 20th of May, 1775, the citizens of Mecklenburg county, North Carolina, made a declaration of independence, and submitted it for presentation to the continental congress, and on the 12th of April, 1776, the provincial congress of North Carolina took the lead of other states in

instructing their delegates in the continential congress to vote for resolutions of independence.

The Mecklenburg declaration of May 20, 1775, having been deemed "premature" by the continental congress and by the provincial congress of North Carolina, it would probably have received no special attention, in the history of those times, but for the fact that the proceedings of the Mecklenburg convention, published by the Raleigh Register in 1819, were discredited, in severe terms, by the author of the 4th of July declaration of the independence of United States of America. Jefferson's letter brought out incontestable evidence of the authenticity of the documents which he believed to be "spurious." It will be borne in mind that he did "not affirm positively" that the "paper" in question was "a fabrication," but he did say " I shall believe it such until most positive and solemn proof of its authenticity shall be produced." That proof was produced, and it might reasonably be supposed that this would have ended a discussion which probably never would have had any great prominence but for the letter written by ex-President Thomas Jefferson to ex-President John Adams.

But in the face of the preceding evidence, brought out soon after the publication of that letter in regard to the "paper" published by the Raleigh Register in 1819, an elaborate article of thirty-six pages appeared in the April number of the North American Review in 1874, in which an attempt was made to demonstrate that no declaration of independence emanated from a convention of citizens of Mecklenburg county, in the town of Chariotte, North Carolina, on the 20th of May, 1775. The position held by Dr. James C. Welling-the author of that article entitles it to a special notice. He has been professor, and is now president of Columbia College in the city of Washington, has a facile pen, pleasing style, and shows familiarity with the subject in all its phases. He is, in addition, a skilled rhetorician, with a classic vocabulary at easy command, but his logic is faulty, he is inaccurate in his statements; his presentation of the evidence is misleading, and with all his learning and reputed ability, he reaches false conclusions in regard to the authenticity of the "paper" which Jefferson himself could not have doubted after the presentation of the proof demanded. All of that proof was before Dr. Welling when he proposed, in 1874 to show that no declaration of independence was made in Charlotte, on the 20th of May, 1775. In order to make this demonstration possible, he boldly asserts that all the witnesses, who certified such a declaration was made at that time, and place—that they were present during the debate -heard the declaration read-knew that it was transmitted to the North

Carolina delegates in the continental congress-and that these delegates replied that the presentation of the declaration to the general congress at that time would be premature-were all mistaken. Nothing short of the high standing of the person who made that assertion and that of the Review, in which the assertion was published makes it worthy of refutation. It is not proposed to follow Dr. Welling through the thirty-six pages of his article, nor to show how he reasoned himself into the real or pretended belief, that the so-called Mecklenburg declaration is a “canard” "a fabrication" and a "fraud." The erudite scholar is the one who is mistaken. This is proved by the foregoing facts and testimony.

WASHINGTON, D. C.

il

est

A TRIP FROM NEW YORK TO NIAGARA IN 1829

UNPUBLISHED DIARY OF COLONEL WILLIAM STONE

[Concluded from Page 494.]

The town of Canandaigua is chiefly built on one street upwards of two miles long. The easternmost half-mile of it is the business part of the place. Then comes the hotels, the public squares, the county-buildings, etc. Above these are the residences of the citizens, nearly all of which are handsome, many spacious and elegant, and some splendid dwellings. These houses are not crowded together in imitation of city blocks, but stand at goodly distance apart, with pleasure grounds, and gardens, delightfully shaded and varied with fruit and ornamental trees and flowering shrubs. I met a number of my friends here, but Mr Granger, who occupies the princely mansion erected by his late eminent father, was absent. For retirement and a life of elegant leisure, Canandaigua presents more attractions than any other place in the circuit of our travels. The principal citizens are wealthy, there is much refined society, and several eminent professional gentlemen are located here.

Wednesday, October 14. After breakfast took a walk through the main street of the village, as far as the Academy, a rude, old-fashioned, large, and tasteful edifice, and visited the church in company with my queer friend, Mr Wood, who has recently caused the windows of this edifice to be painted in imitation of the stained glass of former ages. Mr Wood is a gentleman of leisure, yet always busy. Are charities wanted for public or private objects, he is always the first to know the fact, and solicit the contributions, and in establishing apprentices and mercantile libraries he has done more than any man in the United States. Mrs Gorham, the wife of N. Gorham, Esq, one of the founders of the village, is a sister of this eccentric gentleman, with whom he has passed his summers for more than twenty years, and I am told that it has been chiefly through his influence and good taste that the village has been beautified in many important respects.

At 10 o'clock we left Canandaigua with regret for Geneva. In the coach was a Scotch gentleman by the name of Gibson, whom I had met the evening before as the guest of Mr Gregg. He proved a very intelligent, well-bred traveling companion. We found Geneva much larger and