provision procured by the friendship of my respected friend Judge Sewall. I received an order on the bank ; accompanied by him and Mr. Thomas Danforth, I took a note at the cashier s office for seventy pounds payable to myself on demand, and thirty pounds in cash, departing very joyous and I hope grateful to that Being who has, by friends, been pleased in the midst of gloomy prospects to set my feet on firm ground and establish my goings : may I wisely improve this gracious indulgence. . . .
Dec. 31. The lenity shown to General Burgoyne and his army is allowed on all hands to do more honor to America, than the laurels, reaped by the Howes, can bring to this distracted country. God knows what is for the best, but I fear our perpetual banishment from America is written in the book of fate ; nothing but the hopes of once more revisiting my native soil, enjoying my old friends within my own little domain, has hitherto supported my drooping courage ; but that prop taken away leaves me in a condition too distressing to think of; however, amidst the increasing evils of old age I have this consolation, that, mortifying as my lot is, severe as my sufferings may be, their continuance cannot be lasting. . . .
Exeter, Sept. 6 [1779]. Am informed that I am suspected to be an American spy, disaffected to government ; this was reported by one Calhier, a violent hater of the inhabitants of the American continent and of all its friends and well-wishers : his malice I despise, and his power to injure me with government I defy. Exeter has become the seat of scandal, pride, inhospitality, foppery ; an awkward imitation of London manners, to their folly, prevails.
Samuel Curwen, Journal and Letters (edited by George Atkinson Ward, New York, etc., 1842), 30-221 passim.
