an amiable young lady of Boston, and second daughter of Mr. Ellis Gray, a merchant of that city. By this marriage he had one son, Henry, who died in infancy. This lady survived her husband, and after his death was united in marriage to Dr. Thomas Bartlett, of Boston: she died in London, in 1807, whither she had accompanied her husband.

Mr. Wilson was about six feet in height; very erect. His person was dignified and respectable; and his manner a little constrained, but not ungraceful. His features could not be called handsome, although they were far from disagreeable; and they sometimes bore the appearance of sternness, owing to his extreme nearness of sight. His voice was powerful, but its cadence perfectly modulated.

He died on the twenty-eighth of August, 1798, in the house of his colleague, judge Iredell, at Edenton, North Carolina, in about the fifty-sixth year of his age, while on a circuit in his judicial character, and was interred at that place.

GEORGE ROSS.

GEORGE Ross of Lancaster, in Pennsylvania, one of the delegates from that province in the revolutionary congress, was the son of the reverend George Ross, pastor of the episcopal church, at New Castle, in the state of Delaware, and was born in that town' in the year 1730. In his early youth he displayed a cheerful and affable disposition, and gave proof of promising talents; these his father attentively cultivated, and made him especially a good scholar in the ancient languages. At the age of eighteen he commenced the study of the law, and prosecuted it under the instructions of his elder brother John, a lawyer of good standing in the city of Philadelphia; when he had finished the regular course of reading, he was called to the bar. Finding the ranks of the profession well filled in the city, he determined to try his fortunes in the interior country, and settled at Lancaster, then near the western limits of civilization, about the year 1751. He had not been long a resident of that place before he married Miss Ann Lawler, a lady of a respectable family; and devoting himself zealously to his profession, obtained a lucrative and increasing practice, with the honourable office of prosecutor for the king.

1

Actively engaged in his profession, he does not appear to have taken any part in politics for some years, so that the

first public notice we obtain of him, is his election as a representative in the assembly of Pennsylvania, in which he took his seat in the month of October, 1768. He remained a member of the same body until he was called to higher offices at a subsequent period, and during the whole time merited and obtained the utmost confidence, both from his colleagues and his constituents. Whilst in the legislature, he seems to have paid particular attention to the situation of our intercourse with the various Indian tribes settled within the state, or wandering near its borders. This had always been a subject of constant anxiety to the people of the province, and very frequently of difference between the assembly and several of the governors; the latter were indeed too fond of interfering in Indian affairs, and often excited feelings, by so doing, which it was rather their intention to prevent and allay. In one instance Mr. Ross was called on to display his sentiments, by being appointed to draught a reply to a message from the governor, which urged on the assembly an increase of the garrison at Fort Pitt, as a protection against the neighbouring savages."When we considered your message," says the reply of the assembly to the governor, "recommending the support of a garrison at Fort Pitt, we thought it our duty to inquire into the reason and grounds, if any, for those apprehensions. We were therefore induced to apply to government for information, whether there appeared a disposition in the natives to violate those treaties, and from your last message we cannot find there is the least cause for such a suspicion, otherwise we have no doubt you would, on our request, have communicated it. From whence we are led to conclude, that the uneasiness of the back settlers is without foundation, and by no means a sufficient reason for a measure, which we fear may be productive of the very mischiefs it is intended to

avert.

"We well know, that from the first settlement of the province down to the late French and Indian war, the most perfect good understanding and friendship were preserved between this government and those people, by a conduct uniformly just and kind towards them, that since the late Indian war, the like happy effects have been produced by the like policy, and that, on the contrary, the maintaining of garrisons in or near their country, has been frequently an object of their jealousy and complaints. To this we may add, that it appears by intelligence now before us, from the deputy superintendent of Indian affairs in that quarter, that having, in. pursuance of his majesty's orders, communicated to the western Indians the evacuation of Fort Pitt, that measure is so entirely agreeable to them, that it is likely to effect a removal of their jealousies, and a conciliation of their affections, to this province.

"We might offer other reasons for not concurring in sentiment with your honour, on the propriety of supporting a garrison at Fort Pitt, but being of opinion that any warlike preparations, even within our own frontiers, at a time of prevailing harmony between us and the natives, may be attended with more ill than good consequences, we shall wave them as unnecessary, and content ourselves with assuring you, that we shall, and we have no doubt but all future assemblies will, be very ready, when there shall be real occasion, to afford every kind of protection to the back inhabitants the circumstances of the province will allow."

But Mr. Ross was soon destined to act as the organ of the assembly, in more important affairs than the quarrels about the maintenance of a petty garrison, or the aggression of a few Indian tribes. He had looked with all the indignation natural to a freeman, on the arbitrary proceedings of the British government, and had been for some time convinced, VOL. III.-Q q