In not
more than two or three counties do the negroes appear to have numbered more
than one fifth of the population; and by reason of being distributed
in detail they were more nearly assimilated to the civilization of the
dominant race than in southerly latitudes where they were held in gross.
They nevertheless continued to be regarded as strangers within the gates,
by some welcomed because they were slaves, by others not welcomed even
though they were in bondage. By many they were somewhat unreasonably
feared; by few were they even reasonably loved. The spirit not of love but
of justice and the public advantage was destined to bring the end of their
bondage.
CHAPTER VII
REVOLUTION AND REACTION
After the whole group of colonies had long been left in salutary neglect
by the British authorities, George III and his ministers undertook the
creation of an imperial control; and Parliament was too much at the king's
command for opposing statesmen to stop the project. The Americans wakened
resentfully to the new conditions. The revived navigation laws, the stamp
act, the tea duty, and the dispatch of redcoats to coerce Massachusetts
were a cumulation of grievances not to be borne by high-spirited people.
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