1750, who could remember the past sixty
years, could thus look back over at least four-and-twenty years of open
war; and even in the intervals of professed peace there was a good deal
of disturbance on the frontiers. A most frightful sort of warfare it
was, ghastly with torture of prisoners and the ruthless murder of women
and children. The expense of raising and arming troops for defence was
great enough to subject several of the colonies to a heavy burden of
debt. In 1750 Massachusetts was just throwing off the load of debt under
which she had staggered since 1693; and most of this debt was incurred
for expeditions against the French and Algonquins.

[Sidenote: Difficulty of getting the English colonies to act in
concert.]

Under these circumstances it was natural that the colonial governments
should find it hard to raise enough money for war expenses, and that the
governors should think the legislatures too slow in acting. They were
slow; for, as is apt to be the case when money is to be borrowed without
the best security, there were a good many things to be considered. All
this was made worse by the fact that there were so many separate
governments, so that each one was inclined to hold back and wait for the
others. On the other hand, the French viceroy in Canada had despotic
power; the colony which he governed never pretended to be
self-supporting; and so, if he could not squeeze money enough out of the
people in Canada, he just sent to France for it and got it; for the
government of Louis XV. regarded Canada as one of the brightest jewels
in its crown, and was always ready to spend money for damaging the
English. Accordingly the Frenchman could plan his campaign, call his red
men together, and set the whole frontier in a blaze, while the
legislatures in Boston or New York were talking about what had better be
done in case of invasion. No wonder the royal governors fretted and
fumed, and sent home to England dismal accounts of the perverseness of
these Americans! Many people in England thought that the colonies were
allowed to govern themselves altogether too much, and that for their own
good the British government ought to tax them. Once while Sir Robert
Walpole was prime minister (1721-1742) some one is said to have advised
him to lay a direct tax upon the Americans; but that wise old statesman
shook his head. It was bad enough, he said, to be scolded and abused by
half the people in the old country; he