“There has been in town a conspiracy of the negroes.  At present it is kept pretty private, and was discovered by one who endeavored to dissuade them from it.  He being threatened with his life, applied to Justice Quincy for protection.  They conducted in this way, got an Irishman to draw up a petition to the Governor [Gage], telling him they would fight for him provided he would arm them, and engage to liberate them if he conquered.  And it is said that he attended so much to it, as to consult Percy upon it, and one Lieutenant Small has been very busy and active.  There is but little said, and what steps they will take in consequence of it I know not.  I wish most sincerely there was not a slave in the province; it always appeared a most iniquitous scheme to me to fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a right to freedom as we have.  You know my mind upon this subject."[391]

The Negroes of Massachusetts were not mere passive observers of the benevolent conduct of their white friends.  They were actively interested in the agitation going on in their behalf.  Here, as in no other colony, the Negroes showed themselves equal to the emergencies that arose, and capable of appreciating the opportunities to strike for their own rights.  The Negroes in the colony at length struck a blow for their liberty.  And it was not the wild, indiscriminate blow of Turner, nor the military measure of Gabriel; not the remorseless logic of bludgeon and torch,—­but the sober, sensible efforts of men and women who believed their condition abnormal, and slavery prejudicial to the largest growth of the human intellect.  The eloquence of Otis, the impassioned appeals of Sewall, and the zeal of Eliot had rallied the languishing energies of the Negroes, and charged their hearts with the divine passion for liberty.  They had learned to spell out the letters of freedom, and the meaning of the word had quite ravished their fainting souls.  They had heard that the royal charter declared all the colonists British subjects; they had devoured the arguments of their white friends, and were now prepared to act on their own behalf.  The slaves of Greece and Rome, it is true, petitioned the authorities for a relaxation of the severe laws that crushed their manhood; but they were captives from other nations, noted for government and a knowledge of the science of warfare.  But it was left to the Negroes of Massachusetts to force their way into counts created only for white men, and win their cause!

On Wednesday, Nov. 5, 1766, John Adams makes the following record in his diary:—­