The New Englanders are fitting out privateers, with which they expect to be able to scour the seas and bays of every thing below ships-of-war, and may probably go to the European coasts to distress the British trade there.2 The enterprising genius and intrepedity of these people are amazing. They are now intent on burning Boston, in order to oust the regulars; and none are more eager for it than those who have escaped out, and who have left their own property in it; so that their rage has got the better of every interested principle.
1. Force, comp., American Archives, 4th, II, 1573.
2. This unfounded report probably was based upon the fact that a resolution calling for armed vessels had been introduced in the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. It had not been approved.
