“Is it not true that every one who touches the King gets some of that tar on him?” Jack queried.

“It would seem so and yet we must be fair to him.  We are not to think that the King is the only black pot on the fire.  He is probably the best of kings but I can not think of one king who would be respectable in Boston or Philadelphia.  Their expenses have been great, their taxes robbery, so they have had to study the magic arts of seeming to be just and righteous.  They have been a lot of conjurers trained to create illusions.”

“I suppose that Britain is no worse than other kingdoms,” said the young man.

“On the whole she is the best of them.  Under the surface here I find the love of liberty and all good things.  Chatham, Burke and Fox are their voices.  We are not to wonder that Lord North puts a price on every man.  His is the soul of a past in which most men have had their price.  It was the old way of removing difficulties in the management of a state.  It succeeded.  A new day is at hand.  Its forerunners are here.  He has not seen the signs in the sky or heard the cocks crowing.  He is still asleep.  I know many men in England whom he could not buy.”

Only three days before the philosopher had had a talk with North at the urgent request of Howe, who, to his credit, was eager for reconciliation.  The King’s friend and minister was contemptuous.

“I am quite indifferent to war,” he had cynically declared at last.  “The confiscations it would produce will provide for many of our friends.”

It was an astonishing bit of frankness.

“I take this opportunity of assuring Your Lordship that for all the property you seize or destroy in America, you will pay to the last farthing,” said Franklin.

This treatment was like that he had received from other members of the government since the unfortunate publication of the Hutchinson, Rogers and Oliver letters.  They seemed to entertain the notion that he had forfeited the respect due a gentleman.

A few days after Franklin had given air to his suspicion that the government party would try to tow him into port three stout British ships had broken their cables on him.  An invitation not likely to be received by one who had really forfeited the respect of gentlemen was in his hands.  The shrewd philosopher did not think twice about it.  He knew that here was the first step in a change of tactics.  He could not properly decline to accept it and so he went to dine and spend the night with a most distinguished company at the country seat of Lord Howe.