"Others declare that if they leave their business, " their families must starve, as they have all their " Corn and Buckwheat to secure, and have been so "called off, during the Summer, by the public "troubles, as not to have been able to put in the "ground, any Winter Grain, and would, therefore, as " leave die by the sword as by famine. A third set, " and the most numerous, declare that the Congress " have rejected all overtures for a reconciliation, inconsistent with Independency; that all they desire " is peace, liberty, and safety ; and that if they can " procure that, they are contented." 1

It will be seen, from this official statement, that there were other Militia than that of Westchestercounty on whom "no reliance at all could be placed," in that hour of extreme danger; and, when taken into consideration, in connection with the facts that the Counties of Richmond, Kings, Queens, and Suffolk had returned to their allegiance to the King; that Duchess-county was in open and armed opposition to the Convention, and was kept in subjection only by the occupation of the County and the support of the few friends of the Convention who lived there, by five hundred armed men, drawn from Connecticut; and that the Manorof Livingston, including the whole of the lower portion of Albany-county, was almost entirely " disaffected," Colonel Hay's exposition of the temper of the farmers of Orange-county very clearly established the fact that ■' disaffection " was not peculiar to the farmers of Westchester-county; and that the Declaration of Independence had not been received with any favor, by the greater number of the inhabitants of New York.