bent upon getting that body to
assume the expense, or, as the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts
naively put it, "we have the greatest Confidence in the Wisdom and Ability
of the Continent to support us."

The other colonies saw this in a different light. Massachusetts, without
our advice, has begun a war and embodied an army; let Massachusetts pay
her own bills, was their point of view. "I have found this Congress like
the last," wrote John Adams. "When we first came together, I found a
strong jealousy of us from New England, and the Massachusettes in
particular, suspicions entertained of designs of independency, an American
republic, Presbyterian principles, and twenty other things. Our sentiments
were heard in Congress with great caution, and seemed to make but little
impression." Yet "every post brought me letters from my friends ... urging
in pathetic terms the impossibility of keeping their men together without
the assistance of Congress." "I was daily urging all these things, but we
were embarrassed with more than one difficulty, not only with the party in
favor of the petition to the King, and the party who were zealous of
independence, but a third party, which was a southern party against a
Northern, and a jealousy against a New England army under the command of a
New England General."

Under these circumstances a political deal was resorted to, and Virginia
was offered by John and Samuel Adams, as the price of an adoption and
support of the New England army, the appointment of commander-in-chief,
though the offer was not made with over-good grace, and only because "we
could carry nothing without conceding it." There was some dissension
among the Virginia delegates as to who should receive the appointment,
Washington himself recommending an old companion in arms, General Andrew
Lewis, and "more than one," Adams says of the Virginia delegates, were
"very cool about the appointment of Washington, and particularly Mr.
Pendleton was very clear and full against it" Washington himself said the
appointment was due to "partiality of the Congress, joined to a political
motive;" and, hard as it is to realize, it was only the grinding political
necessity of the New England colonies which secured to Washington the
place for which in the light of to-day he seems to have been created.

As a matter of course, there was not the strongest liking felt for the
General thus chosen by the New England delegates, and this was ste