It will be remembered, also, that the Icad.'rs of the liidielliou a.ssumed the right of determining when and in what manner religious services sluuild be conducted by the (Ihurches, in the Colonies, and those for whom Churches anil individuals should and should not offer their prayers to Almighty God. In Cimnecticiit, every Kjiiscopalian Church, except one, was closed, because the Clergy would not sidunit to the requirements concerning their prayers to CJod ; and in that single exception, the courageous preacher maintained his relations with his Master, notwithstanding the opposition ; and the cowards did not seriously disturb him.

or three instances which occurred in Westchestercounty.

It appears that it had become the practise of several of the local Committees -- those in Westchestercounty, in some instances, having been of the number-- of sending those who were offensive to them, without the slightest authority, revolutionary or conservative, to the Forts in the Highlands, which were then garrisoned with Continental troops, "with orders "to the commanding Officers to keep them at hard "labor, until further orders,'' no matter what the disability of the victims to sustain such hard.ships may have been -- a process concerning the propriety of which even Gencrnl Putnam, who was then the Officer in command of the Army, in the absence of General Washington, entertained some very reasonable and very clearly expressed doubts ; ^ and the Provincial Congress, in consequence of those doubts and of other considerations was constrained to countermand thf)so portions of the commitments to those Forts, which had imposed hard labor on the i)risoners.*