Your Lordp may rest assured that of all the N. Hampshire Grants interfering with Patents under N. York, there are none considerable for their improvements, except that part of Hindsdale which was granted under the Royall Mandamus to Coll. Howard, and the Township of Bennington and one or two more in that vicinity ; & I am persuaded, that the main difficulty will Jay in satisfying the settlers in these Townships, and that His Majesty's Grace to the other N. Hampshire Grantees will be most gratefully accepted.

840 CONTROVERSY RESPECTING THE

To guard against any improper advantage that may- be taken of his Majty's instructions in favour of possessions and improyements, Terms used in the Report of the Lords of Trade, I must not omit mentioning to your Lordp that with the Inhabitants of America, they are not restrained to Houses, and Barns and Lands inclosed, and prepared for the Scythe and Plough, but applied often to a Tract of girdled Trees, surrounded by dry loose brush, and a square Hutt, made of unhewn Logs, and covered with Bark.

I am sensible, My Lord, that agreeable to these Hints, the peace of the Provee is to be purchased at His Majty's expence, but there seems to be an inevitable necessity for the sacrifice.

If it be thought to be most eligible for His Majty to take the work into his own hands, without the Legislative aid, which, I fear, cannot be had in the Colonies, I hope your Lordp will pardon my importunity in repeating the intimation that its success will depend upon the proper measures being immediately prosecuted. The parties concerned, who, in the present Infant State.of this controversy, may now listen to the Royal Voice and overtures, will in a very short time, look only to the Law, for a settlement of their disputes, and when strengthened by numbers, impoverished by Law suits and animated by a concourse of Banditti, whose interest it is to flock to such troubled quarters, the Law itself will loose the authority, and the whole Country become a scene of the wildest confusion, equally destructive to the felicity of the subject, and the interest of the Crown.