 Chapter 19 of the autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin. Chapter 19. Agent of Pennsylvania in London. Our new governor, Captain Denny, brought over for me the beforehand mentioned medal from the Royal Society, which he presented to me at an entertainment given him by the city. He accompanied it with very polite expressions of his esteem for me having, as he said, been long acquainted with my character after dinner when the company, as was customary at that time, were engaged in drinking. He took me aside into another room, and acquainted me that he had been advised by his friends in England to cultivate a friendship with me, as one who was capable of giving him the best advice, and of contributing most effectually to the making his administration easy, that he therefore desired of all things to have a good understanding with me, and he begged me to be assured of his readiness on all occasions to render me every service that might be in his power. He said much to me, also, of the proprietors' good disposition towards the province, and of the advantage it might be to us all, and to me in particular, if the opposition that had been so long continued to his measures was drop, and harmony restored between him and the people, in effecting which, it was thought no one could be more serviceable than myself, and I might depend on adequate acknowledgments and recompenses, etc., etc. The drinkers, finding we did not return immediately to the table, sent us a decanter of Madeira, which the Governor made liberal use of, and in proportion became more profuse of his solicitations and promises. My answers were to this purpose, that my circumstances, thanks to God, were such as to make proprietary favors unnecessary to me, and that, being a member of the assembly, I could not possibly accept of any. That, however, had no personal enmity to the proprietary, and that, whenever the public measures he proposed should appear to be for the good of the people, no one should espouse and forward them more zealously than myself. My past opposition, having been founded on this, that the measures which had been urged were evidently intended to serve the proprietary interest, with great prejudice to that of the people, that I was much obliged to him, the Governor, for his professions of regard to me, and that he might rely on everything in my power to make his administration as easy as possible, hoping at the same time that he had not brought with him the same unfortunate instruction his predecessor had been hampered with. On this he did not then explain himself, but when he afterwards came to do business with the assembly, they appeared again, the disputes were renewed, and I was as active as ever in the opposition, being the pen man, first, of the request to have a communication of the instructions, and then of the remarks upon them, which may be found in the votes of the time, and in the historical review I afterward published, but between us personally no enmity arose. We were often together. He was a man of letters, had seen much of the world, and was very entertaining and pleasing in conversation. He gave me the first information that my old friend, James Relf, was still alive, that he was esteemed one of the best political writers in England, had been employed in the dispute. Footnote. Coral between George II and his son, Frederick, Prince of Wales, who died before his father, and footnote, between Prince Frederick and the King, and had obtained a pension of three hundred a year, that his reputation was indeed small as a poet, Pope, having damned his poetry in the Dansead. Footnote. A satirical poem by Alexander Pope, directed against various contemporary writers. End. Footnote. But his prose was thought as good as any man's. The assembly, finally finding the proprietary obstinately persisted in manacling their deputies with instructions inconsistent, not only with the privileges of the people, but with the service of the crown, resolved to petition the king against the king against them, and appointed me their agent to go over to England to present and support the petition. The house had sent up a bill to the governor, granting a sum of sixty thousand pounds for the king's use, ten thousand pounds of which was subjected to the orders of the then-general, Lord Luton, which the governor absolutely refused to pass, in compliance with his instructions. I had agreed with Captain Morris of the packet at New York, for my passage and my stores were put on board, when Lord Luton arrived at Philadelphia, expressively, as he told me, to endeavor an accommodation between the governor and assembly, that his Majesty's service might not be obstructed by their dissensions. Accordingly, he desired, the governor, and myself, to meet him, that he might hear what was to be said on both sides. We met and discussed the business. In behalf of the assembly, I urged all the various arguments that may be found in the public papers of that time, which were of my writing, and are printed with the minutes of the assembly, and the governor pleaded his instructions, the bond he had given to observe them, and his ruin if he disobeyed, yet seemed not unwilling to hazard himself if Lord Luton would advise it. This his lordship did not choose to do, though I once thought I had nearly prevailed with him to do it. But finally he rather chose to urge the compliance of the assembly, and he entreated me to use my endeavors with them for that purpose, declaring that he would spare none of the king's troops for the defense of our frontiers, and that, if we did not continue to provide for that defense ourselves, they must remain exposed to the enemy. I acquainted the house with what had passed, and presenting them with a set of resolutions I had drawn up, declaring our rights, and that we did not relinquish our claim to those rights, but only suspended the exercise of them on this occasion through force against which we protested. They, at length, agreed to drop that bill, and frame another comfortable to the proprietary instructions. This, of course, the governor passed, and I was then at liberty to proceed on my voyage, but, in the meantime, the packet had sailed with my sea stores, which was some loss to me, and my only recompense was his lordship's thanks for my service, all the credit of obtaining the accommodation. Falling to his share, he set out for New York before me, and, as the time for dispatching the packet boats was at his disposition, and there were two then remaining there, one of which, he said, was to sail very soon, I requested to know the precise time, that I might not miss her by any delay of mine. His answer was, I have given out that she is to sail on Saturday, next. But I may let you know, on thray new, that if you are there by Monday morning, you will be in time, but do not delay longer. By some accidental hindrance at a ferry, it was Monday noon before I arrived, and I was much afraid she might have sailed, as the wind was fair, but I was soon made easy by the information that she was still in the harbour, and would not move till the next day. One would imagine, that I was now, on the very point of departing for Europe. I thought so, but I was not then, so well acquainted with his lordship's character, of which, in decision, was one of the strongest features. I shall give some instances. It was about the beginning of April, that I came to New York, and I think it was near the end of June, before we sailed. There were then two of the packet boats, which had been long in port, but were detained for the general's letters, which were always to be ready tomorrow. Another packet arrived. She too was detained. And, before we sailed, a fourth was expected, ours was the first to be dispatched, as having been their longest. Passengers were engaged in all, and some extremely impatient to be gone, and the merchants uneasy about their letters, and the orders they had given for insurance, it being wartime, for fall goods. But their anxiety availed nothing. His lordship's letters were not ready, and yet whoever waited on him found him always at his desk, pen in hand, and concluded he must needs right abundantly. Going myself one morning to pay my respects, I found in his antechamber one Innis, a messenger of Philadelphia, who had come from Danse Express, with a packet from Governor Denny for the general. He delivered to me some letters from my friends there, which occasioned my inquiring when he was to return, and where he lodged, that I might send some letters by him. He told me he was ordered to call to tomorrow at nine for the general's answer to the governor, and should set off immediately. I put my letters into his hands the same day, a fortnight after I met him again in the same place. So, you are soon returned, Innis? Returned? No, I am not. Gone yet. How so? I have called here by order every morning these two weeks past for his lordship's letter, and it is not yet ready. Is it possible, when he is so great a writer? For I see him constantly at his Esquitoire. Yes, says Innis, but he is like St. George on the signs, always on horseback, and never rides on. This observation of the messenger was, it seems, well founded. For, when in England, I understood that Mr. Pitt. Footnote. William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, 1708 to 1778, a great English statesman in Orator. Under his able administration, England won Canada from France. He was a friend of America at the time of our revolution. End. Footnote. Gave it as one reason for removing this general, and sending generals Amherst and Wolfe, that the minister never heard from him, and could not know what he was doing. This daily expectation of sailing, and all the three packets going down to Sandy Hook, to join the fleet there, the passengers thought it best to be on board, lest, by a sudden order, the ships should sail. And they be left behind. There, if I remember right, we were about six weeks, consuming our sea stores, and obliged to procure more. At length, the fleet sailed, the general and all his army on board, bound to Lewisburg, with the intent to besiege and take that fortress, all the packet boats and company ordered to attend the general's ship, ready to receive his dispatches when they should be ready. We were out five days before we got a letter with leave to part. And then our ship quitted the fleet and steered for England. The other two packets he still detained, carried them with him to Halifax, where he stayed some time to exercise the men in sham attacks upon sham forts, then altered his mind as to besieging Lewisburg, and returned to New York with all his troops, together with the two packets above mentioned. And all their passengers. During his absence the French and Savages had taken for George, on the frontier of that province, and the Savages had massacred many of the garrison after capitulation. I saw afterwards in London Captain Bonnell, who commanded one of those packets, he told me that, when he had been detained a month, he acquainted his lordship that his ship was grown foul. To a degree that must necessarily hinder her fast sailing. A point of consequence for a packet boat, and requested an allowance of time to heave her down and clean her bottom. He was asked how long time that would require. He answered, three days, the general replied, if you can do it in one day, I give leave, otherwise not, for you must certainly sail the day after tomorrow, so he never obtained leave, though detained afterwards from day to day during full three months. I saw also in London one of Bonnell's passengers, who was so enraged against his lordship for deceiving and detaining him so long at New York, and then carrying him to Halifax and back again, that he swore he would sue him for damages, whether he did or not, I never heard, but as he represented the injury to his affairs it was very considerable. On the whole, I wondered much how such a man came to be entrusted. Footnote, this relation illustrates the corruption that characterized English public life in the 18th century. See page 308. It was gradually overcome in the early part of the next century. And footnote, with so important a business as the conduct of a great army. But having since seen more of the great world, and the means of obtaining and motives for giving places, my wonder is diminished. General Shirley, on whom the command of the army devolved from the death of Braddock, would, in my opinion, if continued in place, have made a much better campaign than that of Luton in 1757. Which was frivolous, expensive, and disgraceful to our nation beyond conception, for, though Shirley was not a bred soldier, he was sensible and sagacious in himself, and attentive to good advice from others, capable of forming judicious plans, and quick and active in carrying them into execution. Luton, instead of defending the colonies with his great army, left them totally exposed, while he paraded idly at Halifax, by which means, for, George was lost. Besides, he deranged all our mercantile operations, and distressed our trade, by a long embargo on the exportation of provisions, on pretense of keeping supplies from being obtained by the enemy. But in reality, for beating down their price in favor of the contractors, in whose profits, it was said, perhaps from suspicion only, he had a share, and, when at length, the embargo was taken off, by neglecting to send notice of it to Charles Town, the Carolina fleet was detained near three months longer, whereby their bottoms were so much damaged by the worm that a great part of them foundered in their passage home, Shirley was, I believe, sincerely glad of being relieved from so burdensome a charge as the conduct of an army must be to a man unacquainted with military business. I was at the entertainment given by the city of New York to Lord Luton, on his taking upon him the command. Shirley, though thereby superseded, was present also, there was a great company of officers, citizens, and strangers, and, some chairs having been borrowed in the neighborhood, there was one among them very low, which fell to the lot of Mr. Shirley. Perceiving it as I set by him, I said, they have given you, sir, too low a seat. No matter, says he, Mr. Franklin, I find a low seat the easiest. While I was, as aforementioned, detained at New York, I received all the accounts of the provisions, etc., that I had furnished to Braddock, some of which accounts could not sooner be obtained from the different persons I had employed to assist in the business. I presented them to Lord Luton, desiring to be paid the balance. He caused them to be, regularly examined by the proper officer, who, after comparing every article with its voucher, certified them to be right, and the balance due for which his lordship promised to give me an order on the Paymaster. This was, however, put off from time to time, and though I called often for it by appointment, I did not get it. At length, just before my departure, he told me he had, on better consideration, concluded not to mix his accounts with those of his predecessors, and you, says he, when in England, have only to exhibit your accounts at the Treasury, and you will be paid immediately. I mentioned, but without effect, the great and unexpected expense I had been put to by being detained so long at New York, as a reason for my desiring to be presently paid, and on my observing that it was not right I should be put to any further trouble or delay in obtaining the money I had advanced. As I charged no commission for my service. Oh, sir, says he, you must not think of persuading us that you are no gainer. We understand better those affairs, and know that everyone concerned in supplying the army finds means in the doing it. To fill his own pockets, I assured him that was not my case, and that I had not pocketed a farthing, but he appeared clearly not to believe me. And, indeed, I have since learned that immense fortunes are often made in such employments. As to my balance, I am not paid it to this day, of which more hereafter. Our captain of the packet had boasted much before we sailed of the swiftness of his ship. Unfortunately, when we came to see, she proved the dullest of ninety-six sail to his no small mortification. After many conjectures respecting the cause, when we were near another ship almost as dull as ours, which, however, gained upon us, the captain ordered all hands to come af, and stand as near the ensign staff as possible. We were, passengers included, about forty persons. While we stood there, the ship mended her pace and soon left her neighbor far behind, which proved clearly what our captain suspected, that she was loaded too much by the head. The casks of water, it seems, had been all placed forward. These he therefore ordered to be moved further af, on which the ship recovered her character, and proved the best sailor in the fleet. The captain said she had once gone at the rate of thirteen knots, which is accounted thirteen miles per hour. We had, on board, as a passenger, Captain Kennedy, of the Navy, who contended that it was impossible, and that no ship ever sailed so fast, and that there must have been some error in the division of the log line, or some mistake in heaving the log. Footnote. A piece of wood shaped and weighted, so as to keep it stable when in the water. To this is attached a line knotted at regular distances. By these devices it is possible to tell the speed of a ship. And footnote. A wager ensued between the two captains, to be decided when there should be sufficient wind. Kennedy, thereupon, examined rigorously the log line, and, being satisfied with that, he determined to throw the log himself. Accordingly, some days after, when the wind blew very fair and fresh, and the captain of the packet, Lutwidge, said he believed she then went at the rate of thirteen knots, Kennedy made the experiment, and owned his wager lost. The above fact, I give, for the sake of the following observation, it has been remarked, as an imperfection in the art of shipbuilding, that it can never be known till she has tried, whether a new ship will or will not be a good sailor. For that the model of a good sailing ship had been exactly followed in a new one, which has proved, on the contrary, remarkably dull. I apprehend that this partly be occasioned by the different opinions of seamen respecting the modes of lading, rigging, and sailing of a ship, each has his system, and the same vessel, laden by the judgment and orders of one captain, shall sail better or worse than when by the orders of another. Besides, its scarce ever happens that a ship is formed, fitted for the sea, and sailed by the same person. One man builds the hull, another rigs her, a third lades, and sails her. No one of these has the advantage of knowing all the ideas and experience of the others, and, therefore, cannot draw just conclusions from a combination of the whole. Even in the simple operation of sailing when at sea, I have often observed different judgments in the officers who commanded the success of watches, the when being the same. One would have the sails trimmed, sharper or flatter than another, so that they seemed to have no certain rule to govern by. Yet I think a set of experiments might be instituted, first, to determine the most proper form of the hull for swift sailing. Next, the best dimensions and properest place for the masts, then the form and quantity of sails, and their position, as the wind may be. And, lastly, the disposition of the lading. This is an age of experiments, and I think a set accurately made and combined would be of great use. I am persuaded, therefore, that ere long some ingenious philosopher will undertake it, to whom I wish success. We were several times chased in our passage, but out sailed everything, and in thirty days had soundings. We had a good observation, and the captain judged himself so near our port, Valmoth, that if we made a good run in the night, we might be off the mouth of that harbor in the morning. And by running in the night might escape the notice of the enemy's privateers, who often cruised near the entrance of the channel. Accordingly, all the sail was set that we could possibly make, and the wind being very fresh and fair. We went right before it, and made great way. The captain, after his observation, shaped his course as he thought, so to pass wide of the Sicily Isles. But it seems there is sometimes a strong endraft setting up St. George's channel, which deceives Seaman and caused the loss of Sir Cloudesley Shovel's squadron. This endraft was probably the cause of what happened to us. We had a watchman placed in the bow, to whom they often called, look well out before there, and he as often answered, I, I, but perhaps had his eyes shut, and was half asleep at the time, they sometimes answering, as is said, mechanically. For he did not see a light just before us, which had been hid by the studying sails from the man at the helm, and from the rest of the watch, but by an accidental yaw of the ship was discovered, and occasioned a great alarm. We being very near it, the light appearing to me as big as a cartwheel, it was midnight, and our captain fast asleep, but Captain Kennedy jumping upon deck, and seeing the danger ordered the ship to wear round, all sails standing, an operation dangerous to the masts. But it carried us clear, and we escaped shipwreck, for we were running right upon the rocks on which the lighthouse was erected. This deliverance impressed me strongly with the utility of lighthouses, and made me resolve to encourage the building more of them in America if I should live to return there. In the morning it was found by the soundings, etc., that we were near our port, but a thick fog hid the land from our sight. About nine o'clock the fog began to rise, and seemed to be lifted up from the water like the curtain at a playhouse, discovering underneath the town of Falmouth, the vessels in its harbor, and the fields that surrounded it. This was a most pleasing spectacle to those who had been so long without any other prospects than the uniform view of a vacant ocean, and it gave us the more pleasure as we were now free from the anxieties which the state of war occasioned. I set out immediately with my son for London, and we were only stopped a little by the way to view Stone Hinge. Footnote. A celebrated prehistoric ruin, probably of a temple built by the early Britons near Salisbury, England. It consists of inner and outer circles of enormous stones, some of which are connected by stone slabs. In Footnote. On Salisbury Plain and Lord Pymbrokes House and Gardens, and his very curious antiquities at Wilton, we arrived in London the 27th of July, 1757. Footnote. Here terminates the autobiography, as published by William Temple Franklin and his successors. What follows was written in the last year of Dr. Franklin's life, and was never before printed in English. Mr. Bigelow's note in his edition of 1868. In Footnote. As soon as I was settled in a lodging Mr. Charles had provided for me, I went to visit Dr. Father Gill, to whom I was strongly recommended, and whose counsel respecting my proceedings I was advised to obtain. He was against an immediate complaint to government, and thought the proprietaries should first be personally applied to, whom I possibly be induced by the interposition and persuasion of some private friends to accommodate matters amicably. I then waited on my old friend and correspondent, Mr. Peter Collison, who told me that John Hanbury, the great Virginian merchant, had requested to be informed when I should arrive, that he might carry me to Lord Granville's. Footnote. George Granville, or Grinville, 1712 to 1770, as English Premier from 1763 to 1765, he introduced the direct taxation of the American colonies, and has sometimes been called the immediate cause of the revolution. In Footnote. Who was then President of the Council and wished to see me as soon as possible? I agreed to go with him the next morning. Accordingly, Mr. Hanbury called for me and took me in his carriage to that noble man's, who received me with great civility, and after some questions respecting the present state of affairs in America and discourse thereupon, he said to me, You Americans have wrong ideas of the nature of your Constitution. You contend that the King's instructions to his governors are not laws, and think yourselves at liberty to regard or disregard them at your own discretion. But those instructions are not like the pocket instructions given to a minister going abroad for regulating his conduct in some trifling point of ceremony. They are first drawn up by judges learned in the laws. They are then considered, debated, and perhaps amended in counsel, after which they are signed by the King. They are then, so far as they relate to you, the law of the land for the King is the legislator of the colonies. Footnote. This whole passage shows how hopelessly divergent were the English and American views on the relations between the mother country and her colonies. Grinville here made clear that the Americans were to have no voice in making or amending their laws. Parliament and the King were to have absolute power over the colonies. No wonder Franklin was alarmed by this new doctrine. And footnote. I told his lordship this was new doctrine to me. I had always understood from our charters that our laws were to be made by our assemblies, to be presented indeed to the King for his royal assent. But that being once given the King could not repeal or alter them. And as the assemblies could not make permanent laws without his assent, so neither could he make a law for them without theirs. He assured me I was totally mistaken. I did not think so, however. And his lordship's conversation having a little alarmed me as to what might be the sentiments of the court concerning us. I wrote it down as soon as I returned to my lodgings. I recollected that about 20 years before a clause in a bill brought into Parliament by the Ministry had proposed to make the King's instructions laws in the colonies. But the clause was thrown out by the Commons for which we adored them as our friends and friends of liberty till by their conduct towards us in 1765. It seemed that they had refused that point of sovereignty to the King only that they might reserve it for themselves. With his keen insight into human nature and his consequent knowledge of American character, he foresaw the inevitable result of such an attitude on the part of England. This conversation with Grenville makes these last pages of the autobiography one of its most important parts. After some days, Dr. Father Gill, having spoken to the proprietaries, they agreed to a meeting with me at Mr. T. Penn's house in Spring Garden. The conversation at its first consisted of mutual declarations of disposition to reasonable accommodations. But I suppose each party had its own ideas of what should be meant by reasonable. We then went into consideration of our several points of complaint, which I enumerated. The proprietaries justified their conduct as well as they could, and I, the assemblies, we now appeared very wide and so far from each other in our opinions as to discourage all hope of agreement. However, it was concluded that I should give them the heads of our complaints in writing, and they promised then to consider them. I did so soon after, but they put the paper into the hands of their solicitor, Ferdinand John Paris, who managed for them all their law business in their great suit with the neighboring proprietary of Maryland, Lord Baltimore, which had subsisted 70 years, and wrote for them all their papers and messages in their dispute with the assembly. He was a proud, angry man, and as I had occasionally in the answers of the assembly, treated his papers with some severity, they being really weak in point of argument and haughty in expression, he had conceived a mortal enmity to me, which discovering itself whenever we met, I declined the proprietaries proposal that he and I should discuss the heads of complaint between our two selves, and refused, treating with anyone but them. They then, by his advice, put the paper into the hands of the attorney and solicitor general for their opinion and counsel upon it, where it lay unanswered a year wanting eight days, during which time I made frequent demands of an answer from the proprietaries. But without obtaining any other than that, they had not yet received the opinion of the attorney and solicitor general. What it was when they did receive it, I never learned, for they did not communicate it to me, but sent a long message to the assembly drawn and signed by Paris, reciting my paper, complaining of its want of formality, as a rudeness on my part, and giving a flimsy justification of their conduct, adding that they should be willing to accommodate matters if the assembly would send out some person of candor to treat with them for that purpose, intimating thereby that I was not such. The want of formality or rudeness was, probably, my not having addressed the paper to them with their assumed titles of true and absolute proprietaries of the province of Pennsylvania, which I omitted is not thinking it necessary in a paper, the intention of which was only to reduce to a certainty by writing what in conversation I had delivered Viva voice. But during this delay, the assembly having prevailed with cover any to pass an act taxing the proprietary estate in common with the estates of the people, which was the grand point in dispute, they omitted answering the message. When this act, however, came over, the proprietaries, counseled by Paris, determined to oppose its receiving the royal assent. Accordingly, they petitioned the king and counsel, and a hearing was appointed in which two lawyers were employed by them against the act. And two by me in support of it, they alleged that the act was intended to load the proprietary estate in order to spare those of the people. And that if it were suffered to continue in force, and the proprietaries, who were an odium with the people, left to their mercy in proportioning the taxes, they would inevitably be ruined. We replied that the act had no such intention, and would have no such effect, that the assessors were honest and discreet men under an oath to assess fairly and equitably, and that any advantage each of them might expect in lessening his own tax by augmenting that of the proprietaries was too trifling to induce them to perjure themselves. This is the purport of what I remember as urged by both sides, except that we insisted strongly on the mischievous consequences that must attend a repeal, for that the money, one hundred thousand pounds, be printed and given to the king's use, expended in his service, and now spread among the people. The repeal would strike a dead in their hands to the ruin of many, and the total discouragement of future grants, and the selfishness of the proprietors in soliciting such a general catastrophe, merely from a groundless fear of their estate being taxed too highly, was insisted on in the strongest terms. On this, Lord Mansfield, one of the council, rose and beckoning me, took me into the clerk's chamber, while the lawyers were pleading, and asked me if I was really of opinion that no injury would be done, the proprietary estate in the execution of the act. I said certainly, then, says he, you can have little objection to enter into an engagement to assure that point, I answered, none at all, he then called in Paris, and after some discourse, his lordship's proposition was accepted on both sides. A paper to the purpose was drawn up by the clerk of the council, which I signed with Mr. Charles, who was also an agent of the province for their ordinary affairs. When Lord Mansfield returned to the council chamber, where finally the law was allowed to pass, some changes were however recommended, and we also engaged, they should be made by a subsequent law. But the assembly did not think them necessary, for one year's tax having been levied by the act before the order of council arrived, they appointed a committee to examine the proceedings of the assessors, and on this committee they put several particular friends of the proprietaries. After a full inquiry, they unanimously signed a report that they found the tax had been assessed with perfect equity. The assembly looked into my entering into the first part of the engagement as an essential service to the province. Since it secured the credit of the paper money then spread over all the country, they gave me their thanks in form when I returned, but the proprietaries were enraged at Governor Denney for having passed the act, and turned him out with threats of suing him for breach of instructions, which he had given bond to observe, he, however, having done it at the instance of the general, and for his majesty's service, and having some powerful interest at court, despised the threats, and they were never put in execution, unfinished. End of Chapter 19 The Appendix of the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin By Benjamin Franklin The Appendix Electrical Clite to Peter Collinson, Philadelphia, October 19, 1752 Sir, as frequent mention is made in public papers from Europe of the success of the Philadelphia experiment for drawing the electrical fire from clouds by means of pointed rods of iron erected on high buildings, and etc. It may be agreeable to the curious to be informed that the same experiment has succeeded in Philadelphia, though made in a different and more easy manner, which is as follows. Make a small cross of two light strips of cedar, the arm so long as to reach to the four corners of a large thin silk handkerchief. When extended, tie the corners of the handkerchief to the extremities of the cross, so you have the body of a kite, which, being properly accommodated with a tail loop and string, will rise in the air, like those made of paper. But this, being of silk, is fitted to bear the wet and wind of a thunder gust without tearing. To the top of the upright sick of the cross is to be fixed a very sharp pointed wire, rising a foot or more above the wood. To the end of the twine, next the hand is to be tied a silk ribbon, and where the silk and twine join, a keem must be fastened. This kite is to be raised when a thunder gust appears to be coming on, and the person who holds the string must stand within a door or window, or under some cover, so that the silk ribbon may not be wet, and care must be taken that the twine does not touch the frame of the door or window. As soon as any of the thunder clouds come over the kite, the pointed wire will draw the electrical fire from them, and the kite, with all of the twine, will be electrified, and those loose filaments of the twine will stand out every way and be attracted by the approaching finger. And when the rain has wet the kite and twine, so that it can conduct to the electrical fire freely, you'll find it stream out plentifully from the key on the approach of your knuckle. At this key the file may be charged, and from the electric fire thus obtained, my spirits may be kindled, and all the electric experiments be performed, which are usually done by the help of a rubbed glass globe or tube, and thereby the sameness of the electric matter without of lighting completely demonstrated. Benjamin Franklin End of the appendix Red by Elijah Fisher End of the autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin