better fortune for his country than had usually attended its arms heretofore.
"I have not, sir; I ride but little now, and have not been in Dorchester for a week. Of what intelligence do you speak, sir?"
"The proclamation of Sir Henry Clinton, sir—his proclamation on the subject of protections granted to the militia of the province, those excepted made prisoners in Charleston."
Colonel Walton looked dubious, but still coldly, and without a word, awaited the conclusion of Proctor's statement. But the speaker paused for a moment, and when he again spoke, the subject seemed to have been somewhat changed.
"I am truly sorry, Colonel Walton, that it has not been heretofore in your power to sympathize more freely and openly with his majesty's arms in this warfare against his rebellious subjects."
"Stay, sir, if you please: these subjects, of whom your phrase is rather unscrupulous, are my relatives and countrymen; and their sentiments on this rebellion have been and are my own, though I have adopted the expedient of a stern necessity, and in this have suspended the active demonstration of principles which I am nevertheless in no haste to forget, and do not suppress."
"Pardon me, sir; you will do me the justice to believe I mean nothing of offence. However erring your thought, I must respect it as honest; but this respect does not forbid that I should lament such a misfortune—a misfortune, scarcely less so to his majesty than to you. It is my sincere regret that you have heretofore found it less than agreeable to unite your arms with those of our army in the arrest of this unnatural struggle. The commission proffered you by Sir Henry—"
"Was rejected, Major Proctor, and my opinions then fairly avowed and seemingly respected. No reference now to that subject need be made by either of us."
"Yet am I called upon to make it now, Colonel Walton; and I do so with a hope that what is my duty will not lose me, by its performance, the regard of him to whom I speak. I am counselled to remind you, sir, of that proposition by the present commander-in-chief of his majesty's forces in the South, Earl Cornwallis. The proclamation of Sir Henry Clinton to which I have alluded,
