Benjamin Franklin [2775 
‘““that these colonies had been planted and estab- 
lished without any expense to the state.” * 
New York is the only colony in the founding of 
which England can pretend to have been at any ex- 
pense; and that was only the charge of a small ar- 
mament to take it from the Dutch, who planted it. 
But to retain this colony at the peace, another at that 
time full as valuable, planted by private countrymen 
of ours, was given up by the crown to the Dutch in 
exchange, viz., Surinam, now a wealthy sugar colony 
in Guiana, and which, but for that cession, might 
still have remained in our possession. Of late, in- 
deed, Britain has been at some expense in planting 
two colonies, Georgia and Nova Scotia; but those 
are not in our confederacy ?; and the expense she has 
been at in their name has chiefly been in grants of 
sums unnecessarily large, by way of salaries to of- 
ficers sent from England, and in jobs to friends, 
whereby dependants might be provided for; those 
excessive grants not being requisite to the welfare 
and good government of the colonies, which good 
government (as experience in many instances of 
other colonies has taught us) may be much more fru- 
* “ Veneris, March 10, 1642.—Whereas, the plantations in New Eng- 
land have, by the blessing of the Almighty, had good and prosperous 
success, without any public charge to this state, and are now likely to 
prove very happy for the propagation of the Gospel in those parts, and 
very beneficial and commodious to this kingdom and nation; the Commons 
now assembled in Parliament, etc., etc., etc.” 
2 Georgia joined the other colonies soon afterwards. On the 20th of 
July, 1775, a letter was read in Congress from the convention of Georgia, 
giving notice that delegates had been appointed in that colony to attend 
the Continental Congress. 
190 TRF