From http://www.ushistory.org/franklin/temple

Temple's Diary
A Tale of Benjamin Franklin's Family

A Tale of Benjamin Franklin's Family
In the Days Leading up to The American Revolution

Launched November 2005

Meet the Benjamin Franklin that only his relatives knew: his stubborn son, his frivolous daughter-in-law, his warm-hearted daughter, his prickly sister — all of them through the eyes of a 15-year-old boy suddenly transplanted from London to Philadelphia.

Sign the Guestbook Tell us what you think!

Listen to the Author

Claude-Anne Lopez read from "Temple's Diary" on November 16, 2005, at Christ Church in Philadelphia to launch the completion of this project, written exclusively for this website. She is the author of several books on Franklin and we are proud to host this wonderful story.

Contents

Dedication

In loving memory of Deane Murray Sherman.

I have just received a big, fat diary, with instructions to write down what is happening in my life. Because, it seems, I am about to witness historic events and some day it will be of great interest to myself, my descendants, and perhaps others to learn about those events through the eyes of a fifteen-year-old boy.

Come to think of it, that is the only thing I know about myself, that I turned fifteen a few days ago. At least the headmaster of my boarding school in London said so, and the old gentleman who just gave me this diary also said it. We have been at sea, on the Pennsylvania Packet for twelve days now, the old gentleman and I, three of which I spent being seasick while he was happily up on deck measuring the temperature of the water, his favorite occupation, and writing page after page of a mysterious something, his next favorite occupation.

Strange to say, I know much more about him than I do about myself. I have never seen my father, or my mother, or my brothers and sisters, if I have any. Nobody has ever written to me. At school they call me Billy. Only the headmaster, Mr. Elphinston, calls me William Temple, but the boys snicker when he does that. They say that it is a made-up name, not my real name, and that I don't have a real name because my father never married my mother. So that I am illegitimate, what is known as a natural child, in plain English — a bastard.

Maybe all my kin are dead, which would make me both an orphan and a bastard. I don't quite believe that because my school is expensive, so that somebody has to send money for my tuition. Would I happen to be a rich orphan bastard? My best friend, Caldwell, maintains I am an Oriental prince — but then, Caldwell is a dreamer.

I used to mind all that terribly when I was small, especially the mother part, when the other boys spoke about the way their mothers would tuck them into bed at night. From the way they talked it must have been quite something, that tucking in. When lights were out I used to cry in bed, praying my mother would appear, but now I hardly care anymore and the boys have stopped teasing me. There is no point in asking Mr. Elphinston who I am because he would just pat me on the head and say, "All in good time, my dear boy."

But the old gentleman, my traveling companion, do I ever know about him! The first time he appeared at the school, — I must have been around six — there was a special kind of hubbub. The headmaster, delirious with pride and joy, showed us off as so many "young geniuses" as he puts it. My old gentleman's name is Franklin. Benjamin Franklin. Doctor Benjamin Franklin. And I still don't understand why he always came to see me in particular.

I say I know him, but he is mysterious in many ways. Take his title of Doctor for instance. I asked him once if, being a doctor, he would please take care of my sore throat. "Oh no," he said, that was not the kind of doctor he was, not a medical doctor. He bore the title of Doctor because the University of St. Andrews in Scotland had made him an honorary Doctor of Law. Oh, he was a lawyer, then? No, not at all. I have passed the age, now, of asking question after question, but at that time I must have been about nine and I could not resist. "Of what are you a doctor, Sir?" He said the title was meant to honor the accomplishments of his whole life, and then he proceeded to tell me about plenty of those accomplishments.

We were walking along the streets of London and I was hoping for the little bag of sweets that he sometimes bought me after those expeditions, so I trotted alongside him, two of my steps for every one of his, as polite as I could be. First of all, he reminded me yet again that I was such a lucky boy to be receiving a good education without having to struggle for it. How different it had been in his case!

He had been born across the sea, in Boston, in our colony of Massachusetts Bay, the fifteenth of seventeen children, the tenth and last boy. Sixteen brothers and sisters, thought I, what fun that must have been! His father was a hard-working soap- and candle-maker and there wasn't much money to go around, so that he was taken out of school at the age of ten. Better and better! I would be almost out of school by now, I figured, free to sleep late, roam, do as I pleased. No wonder he is almost always in a good mood. He was the lucky one.

By the time I pulled out of those pleasant daydreams, my companion was saying: "At twelve I was apprenticed to my older brother James, a printer. Hard work, heavy work, and James was a bully, quick to hand out a slap or worse. On the other hand, James had gone to London and brought back lively books and magazines, all very different from the religious tracts that were the only reading matter in our Boston home. And you know what I did, Temple? I taught myself how to write good English by memorizing parts of those books. Then I had another idea. I begged my brother to give me the money to buy my own food. By eating very little and turning vegetarian I could buy more books to read! I stayed up late into the night, and loved it."

I was amazed as I listened to old Dr. Franklin, not a bit vegetarian and quite plump, tell me about young Ben Franklin. Never would I dream of doing what he did. And that was just the beginning.

When he reached sixteen, he continued, "I felt that I could write well enough to fool my brother and the group of young men who helped James bring out a newspaper. I invented a character, that of a middle- aged widow called, of all things, Silence Dogood, a very outspoken woman of broad-minded views. She became my pen-name. Once a week, at dawn, I would slip an essay under the printshop's door and have a wonderful time listening to James and his friends puzzling over the identity of such a clever and witty writer. I kept my secret. After fourteen essays, Mrs. Dogood and I ran out of ideas. James would have been terribly angry if he had found out who she really was."

"And what did this Silence Dogood write about, Sir?" I asked, while trotting full speed beside him. "She wrote about giving girls an education," he said. "Most girls were not even sent to school in my day and that was a great pity. And I also made fun of, or rather Mrs. Dogood made fun of our famous college in Boston, called Harvard. You see, Billy, I was dying to go there myself but I was far too poor ever to attend, so the next best thing was to make those students look silly, unfit for real life."

How happy, how young the old gentleman looked when he told me all this! During our walks he was generally trying to teach me things about the natural world — thunder, rivers, fish, whatever. I could not always grasp what he meant. But that day it was so much fun to hear him tell the story of his life that I forgot all about the sweets. He remembered, though, and bought me a larger bag than usual.

We're still at sea, on our way to Philadelphia. Not the slightest event of historic importance for me to witness or record, only some leaping dolphins and idle chatter with our fellow passengers and the crew. My mysterious elderly companion is still scribbling furiously. He was happy to hear that I, too, was scribbling in my diary, and he promised never to read it without my permission. Still, he wondered if I would tell him, in a very general way, what I was writing about.

"About you, Sir," I said, "since I don't know anything about myself." He smiled at that and looked at me for a while, in that peculiar way he sometimes has of examining my face. "In a few days, Temple," he finally said, "you and I are going to have an interesting conversation that will give you plenty to write about. Just be patient."

Meanwhile, I'm going to relate another story that he told me during another of our London walks. I think it is the best one of all. "What did you do after those fourteen Silence Dogood essays?" I asked. What followed, he said, was a tumultuous year, because his brother's paper ran into serious trouble. The authorities in Boston were enraged because James Franklin often made fun of them.

— "Boston, you see, was very puritanical, very narrow-minded and humorless," he began. "Eventually James was thrown in jail, and to save his newspaper he had to pretend that I, the younger brother, was now the publisher. Our apprenticeship contract was supposedly annulled, but I knew well enough that James would never agree to such a thing once he was freed. Anyway, all of sixteen at the time, I enjoyed my new title, did my best, and managed to keep the New-England Courant afloat."

— "And when James came out of jail?"

— "Instead of thanking me for the good work I had done, he roughly reminded me that I was nothing more than his humble apprentice. The tension between us became unbearable. I must admit, Temple, that I was very uppity. I even managed to irritate the city authorities so much by my impertinent attitude that I decided to flee. In those days, for an apprentice to run away before the end of his contract was an extremely serious offense, but I wanted to take my chance anyway. I sold my books, did not mention my plan to anybody and embarked on a boat for New York where I hoped to find work, but I was disappointed. The only printer in town did not need any more help than he already had. He advised me to go way down South, all the way to Philadelphia where there might be a chance for employment, Philadelphia being the largest city in the colonies."

— "But isn't Philadelphia very far from New York?"

— "Very. And I was almost out of money. But I got back on another boat only to be caught in a light squall right in New York Harbor — this was late September, hurricane season. Luckily for me there was a Dutchman among the passengers, so drunk that he fell overboard and was about to drown. I managed to fish him out and received a few coins for my pains. Before falling asleep, this Dutchman took a book out of his pocket and asked me to dry it for him. Imagine my amazement and delight when I saw it was a translation into Dutch of the first book I had ever bought with my first few pennies: John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress."

Dr. Franklin interrupted his story to tell me how well printed this Dutch edition was, on nice paper with copper engravings. He will never stop surprising me, this man. In the midst of a squall, hungry, almost penniless, soaking wet, turned down for a job in New York, he ignores his surroundings to admire that book — and after so many years, he still remembers that moment with glee and takes the time to inform me that Bunyan was the first author to mix story-telling with dialogue. Incredible! We did read Bunyan in my school some years ago. To me it was an old book, by a Puritan preacher, published in 1678 or thereabouts, but for Dr. Franklin, no. For him it was a lifelong friend, suddenly found in the midst of a catastrophe.

— "Did you dry off during the night?" I asked.

— "We began sailing down the New Jersey coast, but the weather turned so awful that the boat could not even approach the shore. So we lay at anchor all night pelted by a furious rain. The next morning the wind was against us, making it impossible to sail further south. I had a high fever that I took care of by drinking a lot of water, as my mother used to advise. I decided to proceed on foot, leaving my things on the boat, to be picked up, I hoped, when it reached Philadelphia. Brought to shore in a rowboat, I began heading west. I walked and walked. I wished more than once that I could be back home with my family, but there was no turning back. My main concern was not to attract attention by looking too untidy, too much like a runaway. That would have led me straight to jail."

— "Straight to jail...?"

— He nodded. "Yes. It took me three days, that walking across New Jersey. Finally, I arrived at a place called Burlington, on the Delaware river. I called to some people passing in a rowboat, and asked where they were going. 'Philadelphia,' they said. I offered to help with the rowing, and hopped on board. We went ashore as soon as it got dark, for fear of going too far and missing the city."

I could not help thinking, though I did not tell him so, that nobody would bypass London in the dark. It must be no more than a sleepy village, this "large" Philadelphia he talks so much about.

— "It was a cold night," he continued. "Luckily we were able to make a fire out of the rails of an old fence. The next morning we landed at the Market Street wharf. This was Sunday, October 6, 1723."

Peter Cooper, The Southeast Prospect of the City of Philadelphia. Oil on canvas, ca. 1720

Arriving in Philadelphia was the best thing that ever happened to him, he said. From the first, he breathed the air of tolerance and freedom. At seventeen, he was a new man, and on the very day of his arrival he caught a glimpse of the girl he would marry a few years later. She was standing on her doorstep as he passed, and she told him later that she had giggled because he looked awkward with his pockets full of socks. As I am writing down this story the way he told it to me, I remember what I was thinking at the time — that I would never know how to survive three days in London by myself, let alone cover so many miles while hiding from the police. I was thinking that all I had studied in my fancy boarding school was of no use in real life and that I did not possess any skill worth a shilling. A chilling thought. I was also horrified to learn that for many months he never let his family know whether he was dead or alive. He who was so lucky to have a family!

But now that I am fifteen, my thoughts are quite different and I see my friend Dr. Franklin in a different light. He is no longer just a clever, clever boy who always manages to get his way, but a man who repeatedly rebels against authority when he believes authority is wrong. He rebelled at great risk against his brother James, his master at the time.

When he found out that lightning is really made of electricity — this at a time when it was believed that lightning was God's punishment for men's misdeeds — he invented the lightning rod to protect houses. Before him, the only recourse that people thought they had was to ring church bells during thunderstorms which, needless to say, did not help at all. I won't go as far as to assert that his experiments were a rebellion against God, but he certainly defied the forces of nature. And now I fear he is defying our King and Parliament, no less, because he is the agent of four of our colonies in North America and they are most dissatisfied with the way we Englishmen rule them.

But this time, I fear, he is going too far.

Why do I believe he has gone too far? I have been feeling that way for the past fifteen months, ever since that awesome day in January 1774 when he was summoned to the Cockpit to answer troubling political questions. The Cockpit, as I learned at the time, is a London building across the street from Whitehall, our Foreign Ministry. They used to hold bloody cockfights there but now it serves as a meeting place for the Privy Council. "What's the Privy Council?" I asked our headmaster who was urging me to attend the momentous event. He explained that it is a group of advisers chosen by the King among the lords, the high clergy, and other luminaries of the realm. "I'm afraid they're going to excoriate our dear friend," he sighed. "He will need you there." Flattered by the prospect of being needed, but puzzled by the word excoriate, I promptly looked it up and learned that it means to "take off a person's skin."

Well, that is what it turned out to be, not literally, of course. Mrs. Stevenson, who sat next to me, cried quietly throughout that long, long ordeal.

How could I have written so much without mentioning Mrs. Stevenson? Her house on Craven Street near the Strand has become my home when I'm not at school. She always has a kind word for me and something tasty to carry away. Come to think about it, there's another puzzle: Mrs. Margaret Stevenson and Dr. Benjamin Franklin.

She owns the house that he has been living in for years, but I'm sure they are much closer than landlady and tenant. She acts like a loving wife, always trying to please him. That's fine, but he has a real wife back in Philadelphia. In all the plays and poems we read in school, the wife gets angry when her husband even looks at another woman, but those two ladies, who have never met, seem to be really good friends.

Mrs. Franklin sends barrels of apples from America, especially of a kind called Newton Pippins, that the Doctor raves about. She also ships delicious red berries that they call cranberries over there. And squirrels when he asks for them, lovely tame squirrels for English children to keep as pets. Bacon, too, and other good things. And she thanks Mrs. Stevenson for taking such good care of her Pappy, as she calls him. Not to be outdone, Mrs. Stevenson sends the latest fashion in London clothes and bonnets, fine china that I help her pack, yards of silk, and lace for the Franklin daughter, Sally.

Mrs. Stevenson, too, has a daughter called Mary but everybody calls her Polly. I think that Polly is Dr. Franklin's favorite person in the whole world. Polly's father died many years ago and the Doctor seems to be a substitute father. He even gave her away on her wedding day. I was invited to that wedding and, as usual, was trying to find some clue as to how I fitted in with all those people. No luck. I was introduced as the American's young protégé, a fancy French word to say he took me under his wing, but why me of all people? Any time I suddenly burst into the Stevenson kitchen as the maids are gossiping, the minute they see me, they fall silent.

But I must get back to that dramatic morning in the Cockpit. The room was packed with lords and ladies, as excited and bloodthirsty as if they had come to a real cockfight. They laughed and applauded wildly when the Solicitor General, Alexander Wedderburn, denounced — should I say excoriated? — my old friend. The atmosphere was still more hostile than expected because news had reached London the previous week that a bunch of savages had dumped a whole cargo of East India tea into the Boston Bay. Dumping expensive tea into cold, salty water! Not heating the teapot! That is the ultimate crime in the eyes of the English. Why would they do such a thing in Boston? As I lingered near a coffee house on my way back to school, I heard a man declare that of course the perpetrators were not real Redskins, but cowardly Bostonians disguising themselves as Indians by painting their skin a reddish brown. However that may be, it did not help the public's mood and the Solicitor ranted on for well over an hour.

What I think I understood was that Dr. Franklin had received from a mysterious source certain letters that put the Royal Governor of Massachusetts and the Lieutenant-Governor in a very bad light. Instead of keeping those letters to himself as he had been asked to do, he had made them known by sending them back to Boston where they were allowed to circulate, provoking the population to acts of violence against the Governor's house. The Governor, whose name is Hutchinson, is now in England, and very, very angry.

Just as angry, the Bostonians have entrusted Dr. Franklin to present a petition to the King in order to obtain Hutchinson's removal. As I say, I did not understand much of what was going on, but thanks to the many hours of Latin I endured, I did understand one thing. That when Solicitor Wedderburn accused Dr. Franklin of being "a man of three letters," those three letters being "f-u-r," I figured that he was not comparing him to an animal's skin, but labeling him a thief. That's what FUR means in Latin. (From which FURtive derives, as my Latin teacher would say.)

Dr. Franklin was extraordinary! He stood there all that time, erect, silent, not a muscle moving, a statue. I could not take my eyes off him. He looked handsome in a golden-brown velvet coat I had never seen before. He seemed detached, serene. My heart was beating wildly for him, as the tears were rolling down Mrs. Stevenson's cheeks, but at the same time I could not agree with what he had done and with those ever- dissatisfied colonists he represents. Didn't they take any pride in the British Empire? I felt torn.

When his friends rallied around him at the end of the ordeal, he did not speak to them. When we sat down to dinner — easy to guess, Mrs. Stevenson was serving his favorite dish — he did not eat a thing, his jaws still clamped in silent rage. This was such a far cry from the jolly figure I had known, who enchanted us all at the boarding school with his magic tricks, his magic cane containing drops of oil to calm the waves, his clever mathematical magic squares. This was another man.

Everything changed after that day. He lost his position as deputy postmaster-general for North America. The petition from Massachusetts to remove the governor was rejected, of course. Dr. Franklin seemed to be totally in disgrace. We thought he would sail right back to America — and he talked about that — but he stayed in England and spent his time visiting various lords and high-placed people, writing proposals, dashing from place to place. Mrs. Stevenson's eyes were often red. I was hardly taken out on walks, though he did continue to take an interest in my studies and to praise me for my sketching ability. The big blow in the spring was the sudden death of Polly's husband at thirty-four. They had two little boys and a few months later she gave birth to a baby girl.

Tension between our Parliament and the American colonies grew worse and, while we didn't dare say it, we had the impression that Dr. Franklin's efforts toward a reconciliation were fruitless.

The year 1775 brought no relief. In late February he heard that his wife had died the previous December. He kept his grief to himself. I wondered if he would now marry Mrs. Stevenson and I'm sure she wondered about that too, but the only decision he made was to summon me from school in late March. He told me to join him as soon as possible with no more than my most important possessions, and not to breathe a word to my schoolmates. And that is why I am here, in mid-Ocean, floating between two worlds.

I asked Dr. Franklin why he kept measuring the sea's temperature. He was delighted by my question and gave me a whole lecture on that warm current, a kind of river within the sea, that is called the Gulf Stream. For various reasons, it is extremely important for sea captains to map its course. One reason is that if a merchant ship manages to sail on it, it will move along much more quickly, at less expense, and be able to deliver its cargo sooner. The reason some ships take so much longer to cross the Ocean is that they are sailing against the Gulf Stream's current and have to struggle against its strength.

Charting it properly, he told me, is also essential for another economic reason, since whales, in order to keep comfortable in the frigid waters, swim along the edges of the Gulf Stream. Having an accurate chart thus makes it easier for the whaling captains to capture them and extract their precious oil so useful for lighting and a whole lot of other purposes. The existence of this current has been known for a long time but precise information about it is kept secret by the few who are in the know.

The big whaling center, he said, is the island of Nantucket, and since his mother came from Nantucket, he has many relatives over there who are just as eager as he is to learn more about the Gulf Stream.

Would I care to help him? Of course I would. I am becoming so bored that I even miss my French classes with all their tricky genders and irregular verbs. Apart from taking the sea's temperature at various times of day and evening, to verify that Gulf Stream water is really warmer than the sea it runs through, I have to look out for what he calls "Gulf weed" and also take notice of whether or not the water sparkles in the night. Gulf Stream water, says the Doctor, does not sparkle in the dark. And he handed me the chart which I am reproducing here. This is great fun.

	Date	Hour	Temp of air	Temp of Wats.	Wind	Course	Distance	Latitude N	Latitude W	Remarks
April	10			62
	11			61
	12			64
	13			65
	14			65				°     ′	°     ′
	26		60	70				37 39	60 38	Much gulph weed; saw a whale.
	27		60	70	S S E	W b S		37 13	62 29	Colour of water changed.
	28	8 A.M.	70	64	S W	W N W		37 48	64 35	No gulph weed.
	---	6 P.M.	67	60			34			Sounded, no bottom.
	29	8 A.M.	63	71	N	W	44	37 26	66 0	Much light in the water last night.
	---	5 P.M.	65	72	N E		57			Water again of the usual deep sea colour, little or no light in it at night.
	---	11 dit.	66	66	N WbN	W b S
	30	8 A.M.	64	70	N E	W b N	69
	---	12	62	70		E b S	24	37 20	68 53	Frequent gulph weed, water continues of sea colour, little light.
	---	6 P.M.	64	72	E S E	W b N	43
	---	10 dit.	65	65	S		25			Much light.
May	1	7 A.M.	68	63			60			Much light all last night.
	---	12	65	56	S S W	W N W	44	38 13	72 23	Colour of water changed.
	---	4 P.M.	64	56		W b N	21
	---	10 dit.	64	57	S W	W N W	31			Much light.
	2	8 A.M.	62	53			18	38 43	74 3	Much light. Thunder-gust.
	---	12	60	53	W S W	N W	18
	---	6 P.M.	64	55	N W	W S W	15
	---	10 dit.	65	55	N b W	W b N	10
	3	7 A.M.	62	54			30	38 30	75 0

What a day! We have had at last, what Dr. Franklin called our "interesting conversation." Interesting! How could he call it just that? It was phenomenal! It was earthshaking! I'm still shaking as I write. But I want to set it down while I remember every word.

— "Sit down, Temple," he began. "I have the impression these last few days that you want to ask me something but can't quite bring yourself to do it. Am I right?"

— "Yes, Sir."

— "What is it?"

— "Could you tell me, Sir, why I am on this packetboat with you? You always said how important it is for me to finish my studies, but here we are in the middle of the school year and in the middle of the sea. Why take me to the colonies? I don't understand, Sir ..."

— "Tempy," he said — he sometimes called me that — "you don't have to call me Sir anymore." A long pause. "Just call me Grandfather." Another pause. "I am your grandfather, my boy."

What was I supposed to say now? Or do? Throw myself into his arms? I was petrified. I said nothing. I did nothing. I stared at my shoes.

"You are the son of my son William, the Royal Governor of New Jersey." More stupefied silence from the son of the governor. "You remember me mentioning my son, don't you?"

Of course, I remember. Sometimes he sounded very proud of his son and sometimes he grumbled about his son's spending habits. Extravagant spending, he would tell Mrs. Stevenson, who nodded. He was not always in a good mood after receiving a letter from his son the governor.

— "Have you lost your tongue, Billy?"

Not only my tongue, all of me was lost in a haze. The governor, I knew, had a wife named Elizabeth. She had to be my mother. Would she once, just once, tuck me in bed? So I would know what it feels like and stop thinking about it. Would she bend over and kiss me?

— "And my mother, Sir, does she live in New Jersey?"

— "No, Billy. If she is alive she must be in England. I don't know. It's up to your father to tell you about that. I'll only say that your mother, unfortunately, was not the kind of woman that one marries."

I know he saw my disappointment, but he just continued.

— "Now let me tell you about all the relatives you are going to meet once we land. Lucky boy that you are, not only will you become a Franklin, William Temple Franklin, but you will be the only young man in the entire family to bear the name. Your father and his wife, you see, have not had a child of their own all these years, and they want you as their lawful heir..."

I stopped listening. I know what he means by the kind of woman one does not marry. When Caldwell and I slipped out of school by a back window in the evening and walked the streets of London, we would see those women standing under lampposts. There was so much fog at times that you could not even see them but you could hear their voices, raspy, warm and tempting. We hastened to walk on and looked the other way, but I remember the voices and how these women coughed. My mother may have been one of them, wrapped in fog.

— "You look sad, my boy," said the old gentleman who is my grandfather. "You have no reason to be sad. Your father is most impatient to see you. Your stepmother, Elizabeth, will smother you in endearments and pastries. My daughter, your aunt Sally, will be her warm and joyous self, I'm sure, and her boys Benny and Willy, your little cousins, can you imagine how they will look up to you?"

All I could do in response was sigh. Was she alive or dead, my mother? I would never know. Would anyone care beside myself?

— "You're almost a man, Billy" he said. "It is time to look to the future. You've had an excellent education so far, and your future, if you apply yourself, is brilliant. As brilliant as that of the country we are sailing to, if the colonies have the foresight to pull together and forge their own destiny. You may ask me one more question, Temple, and then we both go to bed.

— "Who else knows about who I am, and who does not?"

— "That's simple. Your father, the headmaster and myself, we know. Nobody else. Not even Mrs. Stevenson and Polly."

— "And my grandmother, your wife Deborah, who just died? She knew, of course?"

— "No, she did not."

— "How is that possible?"

— "Because I never told her."

— "You never told her about me? Why not?"

— "Not to upset her. Family life, Billy, is not always as simple as you might imagine. Some day you'll understand all that. All I want to say now is that ever since I have come to know you, you have been a crucial part of my life. Walking beside the little boy that you were, looking down at your upturned face that reminded me of William's at your age, feeling your tiny hand resting trustfully in my big hand, that's what gave me the courage to keep working at the arduous mission I have been entrusted with."

"How else could I have endured the accusation in America, of being too British and in England, of being too American? How else could I have endured, in my solitude, the charming descriptions my Deborah gave of our other grandson, the Philadelphia one, the one she called Kingbird, the Benny, whom I have never seen? Without you at my side I would have returned home, a defeated man. With you at my side I return home, defeated, to be sure, my hopes for accommodation with England dashed, but still full of hope. You are my flesh and blood, and my strength."

After that, how could I refuse to read the heavy manuscript he thrust into my hands with a request for comments?

He was not exaggerating, my illustrious grandfather, when he warned me that this would be a long and difficult document to absorb. Long and difficult indeed! It is almost two hundred pages long, his Journal of Negotiations in London, written in the form of a letter to my father the governor. From some overheard conversations I remember, I vaguely understood that my grandfather was displeased with his son who not only spent too much, but was too obedient to the King and Parliament.

But, of course. What does he expect from a Royal Governor? What is he there for, if not to carry out instructions from London? Maybe my father is not the kind of man who rebels against authority the way grandfather has done all of his life? Is that so wrong?

When I told Dr. Franklin that I had difficulty in understanding his allusions to a whole lot of Acts I had never heard about (Tea Act, Townshend Acts, Navigation Act, Coercive Acts, Quebec Act and so on), he said not to worry.

He had learned that the Americans bunch many of them under the name of Intolerable Acts.

— "Do they really find them intolerable?"

— "More and more of them do," he replied.

He explained that the British government persisted in believing that he had been given the power to negotiate an agreement, whereas in reality all he was allowed to do was to present the grievances of the colonies whose agent he was (New Jersey, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts) and to suggest the measures he thought would be acceptable to redress them. But London remained convinced that he was a kind of minister plenipotentiary, meaning one with full powers to negotiate, and they tried to bribe him, even offering a title of nobility. His anger was still so great that he turned red in the face while telling me about this offer. Just as I was pleasantly thinking: my grandfather the Baronet, my father the Governor, isn't that a nice change in my status?

I told him honestly that, of course, I would be reading his journal from the point of view of the Englishman I am. He just looked at me, shook his head, and said, "Keep an open mind."

Slowly and painfully, I'm beginning to make a little headway in that complicated Journal of Negotiations. The basic point of disagreement, I guess, is that grandfather and those restless colonies maintain that our Parliament does not have authority to legislate in their internal affairs or to alter their Charters. London feels that this is nonsense. What an idea! Those overseas people wanting to curtail the powers of Parliament!

I'm beginning to understand that grandfather is thinking the unthinkable. Since he needs me and loves me so much, I must at least try to follow his trend of thought.

Let's take the tea story, for instance. At least I know a little about the dumping of tea in the Boston Harbor. Grandfather argues that Britain had a choice: either a right to reparation — and he initially offered to pay for the damage out of his own pocket — or a right to return an equal injury, but not both. The injury Britain inflicted in response — blocking up the port of Boston — was not equal to, but ten or twenty times worse, financially speaking, than the offense.

The Boston Tea Party. Engraving by W.D. Cooper

Maybe Grandfather has a point there, but he doesn't stop at that. He wants the Tea Act, that is the imposition of duties on the importation of tea, to be repealed because the Americans, as they now call themselves, consider it unconstitutional.

They consider that the money levied on tea has been wrongfully extorted from them, and they want it given back. Out of that money they would reimburse Britain for the tea they dumped into the harbor.

I should add here that my grandfather was not planning to discuss those demands himself with the British Government, but was acting through two close friends of his, both well connected with important people. These friends are Quakers who are trying to avoid war, since the Quakers prize peace above all. Grandfather's own name was to be kept out of the negotiation at all times.

But of course his intermediaries discussed his proposals with him, one by one. In the case of the tea, they agreed that the repeal of the Tea Act might be obtained, but not the refunding he wants. They advised him to strike it out of the proposal, but grandfather would not hear of that. Not an easy man to budge, my grandfather.

Every night, now, before going to bed, I practice ten times saying "grandfather" because it does not yet roll off my tongue and he looks pained when I forget and call him "Sir." Enough for today. I'm sleepy.

If you read it a couple of times, the problem created by one of those "Intolerable Acts," the Navigation Act, is not too hard to figure out. The colonists, believe it or not, are happy with a part of it, the part that forbids the transportation of any goods on foreign ships. They want goods to be carried only on ships belonging to British subjects and manned by three quarters British or colony seamen. Since, despite their complaints, Americans are considered "British," the colonists like that part.

What they don't like is that they are not allowed to trade with foreign countries without passing through England and paying duties. The wine and fruit they buy in Spain and Portugal cannot come directly to the colonies, but have to go to England first where the duty must be paid. This makes foreign trade so expensive for American ships that they cannot compete with English ships. So far the colonists have accepted the situation as the price to pay for British protection in case of war, but now they would prefer to have the duties collected by their own officers, appointed and paid by their own governments.

My grandfather's Quaker friends thought this sounded reasonable enough, but they were alarmed by his next proposal: that the colonies be allowed to manufacture goods from what he called their "natural advantages," meaning, I suppose, their local resources. I did not know that they were forbidden to do that, and it does not seem very fair to prohibit them some industry of their own, but the advisers felt that this was a very touchy subject and that there should be no talk of repeal but only of reconsidering the situation.

And so on, and so on. The colonies don't want any English troops to be quartered in their territory without the consent of their legislatures.

Massachusetts doesn't want a certain Fort William, built at great expense to defend their port of Boston, to be used by British troops as a citadel.

The colonists want to have something to say in the affairs of Canada since they helped conquer it from the French.

They don't want their judges appointed by the King while being paid by their own assemblies. No, they want to appoint the judges themselves.

Same story with the governors of the colonies. They want the right both to choose their governors and to pay their salaries. Would my father like that, I wonder?

What I have to do, now that I have figured out the general drift of the American complaints, is to drum up my courage and tell grandfather what I really think. Because what I think is that he is too stubborn, too intransigent. He hardly leaves any space for conciliation or compromise. But how can I tell him that without hurting his feelings?

My own feelings toward him are not easy to explain, even to myself. I have grown very fond of the old gentleman since he told me how much he needed me and cared for me, yet at the same time I am in awe of him. He is so intelligent, so passionate in his convictions that he carries me along somehow, even when I want to remain myself, with my own ideas.

Our conversation went off very well! Before I could say anything, Grandfather told me that he understood my pro-English feelings. How could it be otherwise, since I was born and raised in London? He too, he said, had fallen in love with England during his visit there with my father some fifteen years ago. He loved the people, the beauty of the towns, the literature, the music. In those days he was a fervent admirer of the British Empire. Every province of the British Empire at that time was well governed because it was trusted, in a large measure, with governing itself.

I asked, "what do you think has gone wrong now?" "Now," he said, "the Empire, which I used to compare to a beautiful China vase, is governed by a set of blundering ministers open to bribes and corruption. The King has fallen totally under their influence. We gladly accepted to be the King's subjects, but why, I ask you, should we be the subjects of other subjects? Why should we accept the dictates of a Parliament that does not understand our problems, does not even pay attention to the petitions we send, but insists on treating us as rebels who have to be punished — which is the best way to turn us into real rebels. Believe me, Temple, I have worked extremely hard this past year to keep the Empire from breaking up, but now I am convinced that it is beyond saving."

He then listened to my comments without interrupting me, paying great attention, and that pleased me so much that I decided to end my little speech in a friendly manner, by quoting from his own writing. He had answered, in what I thought was a witty way, a question put to him by an English nobleman: "What would it take to satisfy the Americans?"

Using only words beginning with "RE — ," he put it this way:

RE

call your forces, store Castle William, pair the Damage done to Boston, peal your unconstitutional Acts, nounce your pretensions to tax us, fund the duties you have extorted; after this quire, and ceive payment for the destroyed Tea, with the voluntary grants of the colonies, And then joice in a happy conciliation.

To which I added: "RE-ward poor Temple who has struggled through this Journal. He burst out laughing. "Billy," he said, "you have the makings of a lawyer. I have thought about it for quite some time. I even wrote so to your father last summer. And here, right in my pocket, is his answer, sent the day before Christmas. "Do you want to read it?"

I could hardly believe my ears. There I had been, feeling sorry that nobody in the world was thinking about me, just as those two busy, important men were discussing my future. For the first time in my life I saw my father's writing and read: "I am anxious to have Temple bred to the law, and wish to have him sent for a year or two to the New York College."

Bred to the law ... what a funny expression. I guess it just means to study law. I have heard about breeding dogs or horses, but breeding me? Am I a dog to be sent across the ocean in order to be bred? What if I don't care for the law?

As Grandfather excused himself for a minute, I quickly had a look at the rest of my father's letter. It was troubling. After telling Grandfather about Deborah's funeral, he practically accused him of having neglected his wife in her final illness and ignored her pleas to come home. He informed Grandfather in no uncertain terms that he, Doctor Franklin, is "looked upon with an evil eye" in England and that there is no point in tarrying there any longer at a time when his return is ardently wished for in America. My father also wrote that, whatever the madness of the English ministry, there is equal madness in America, or "On this side of the water," as he put it.

All of this, however, was expressed in such a polite way that it did not sound insulting. But I have the feeling, and I don't like this feeling, that Father really disapproves of Grandfather's conduct.

If all goes well, we should reach Philadelphia tomorrow. Grandfather is very excited. He talks and talks. Mostly about his house, a house he started to build eleven years ago, but never saw when it was finished. If I remember correctly, he decided to build it upon his return from England after the first of his two missions there.

— "When did you come back from England after your first political mission, Grandfather?"

— "In 1762" he replied.

So I was two years old when he and my father left me behind in London, to be taken care of by ... someone. I see the picture now. Father fell in love with a proper English woman, the kind one does marry, and they sailed off to their glamorous life in New Jersey, unencumbered by this unwanted baby. Like the late Deborah, my father's very proper bride may not even have been told of my existence. Father and Elizabeth would raise a proper family of their own on the other side of the Ocean, with proper little American children.

But then no child ever appeared, and the only chance to carry on the famous name was to import the little Londoner, me.

As I was figuring this out, Grandfather, ever so talkative, had been going on: "I wanted a modern house, Billy, a good house 'contrived to my mind,' as I used to say. It was going to be protected by the lightning rod that I had devised. It was going to be heated by my other brainchild, the Pennsylvania fireplace that would keep us warm during our glacial winters. For the kitchen I thought up a clever way to dispose of steam, smoke, and odors. Deborah, who had worked so hard during our years of poverty, would now have the best kitchen in Philadelphia to bake her cakes and muffins, such a good baker she is — was, my Deborah."

— "And her energy, Billy! She ran the shop where we sold every kind of dry goods you can imagine, plus our own Crown Soap, made from a recipe kept secret in the Franklin family. With her mother, Debbie concocted an ointment against the itch. Don't ask me how it worked, but it sold well. She kept the accounts, she bought old rags from which to make new paper, she stitched sheets of paper together to make notebooks, she wove and knitted all our clothes.

"The word helpmate could have been invented for her. She wanted so much for us to go up in the world that for my birthday, once, she bought me a far too expensive silver spoon to eat my porridge. I had been quite satisfied with my old wooden spoon — but no! She did not want to see her husband inferior to the neighbors..."

"And so it went on for eighteen years, Billy, us two working hard hand in hand, raising William, then little Frankie whom we lost to smallpox when he was four, and then Sally."

It seemed to me that Grandfather was dreaming as he spoke. "By our early forties, thanks to the general store, my printing shop, the newspaper and my Poor Richard's Almanack, we had plenty to live on and I decided to quit business and spend time doing what I had wanted to do all along: find out more about nature's secrets and become more involved in public life."

— "I did not think about it at the time," he sighed, "but that must have been hard on Debbie. All at once she lost her big role in my life as well as our constant companionship. She started pining for a real house, not the lodgings we had occupied here and there, and I kept promising to build her a house in which to live out our old age in contentment. She got her house, finally, but we never lived together in it, not a day ... I had to leave for London once again before it was finished."

He looked sad, he looked old. I wonder whether Mrs. Stevenson ever heard him warmly praising his Debbie who had once been so vibrant and so young. The maids in the London kitchen used to whisper that Mrs. Stevenson was patiently waiting for Debbie to die before she made a play for the Doctor. Who knows? Mrs. Stevenson asked him once, while I was in the room, what he had heard in Debbie's last letter. He sighed and said that it was full of the same old complaints and that Deborah was becoming confused. Mrs. Stevenson said nothing, she just patted his hand.

Is that the way in families, I wonder. Do they all go from being so close to being almost total strangers? I know some Latin, some French, some history, but what do I know about families, about real life? Nothing. Not a thing.

When I looked up, Grandfather had recovered his spirits in that quick, deliberate way he uses to recompose himself. "I can't wait to show you our house, Billy. It even has a music room papered in blue with an elegant flowered border. From London I explained to Deborah exactly the way I wanted it done, and of course, that's just what she did. You'll never guess all the things you'll see in that music room: a glass armonica — my favorite instrument — a spinet, a harpsichord, a glassichord, and a viola da gamba with bells. Between your aunt Sally and her husband, they can play all these instruments and I'm not bad with some. We'll have family trios, and quartets after you join us."

He does not notice, does he, that I'm not answering. I have been nervous all day, my heart is heavy. All I can do is rehearse my relatives' names, so as not to look stupid when I meet them. My future family ... how will they behave? Will they look at me in amazement and ask me who I am? Will they hug me? Will they snub me? How should I address my stepmother Elizabeth? Madam? Not mother, surely. My real mother may have died of poverty or coughed herself to death but I won't give her title to anybody else. I will not.

The truth is, I am scared. But I have no choice. London is over for me. Now comes America.

No choice.

I cannot sleep. So many scenes swirling in my head at the end of this first day. Where am I to begin? Begin at the beginning, Temple.

Scene One

The crush of people surrounding Grandfather. Hugs, smiles, tears, joy, huge rejoicing at seeing him again after ten years. I knew he had friends, of course, but this many, this wild! And he, over and over: "Meet my grandson Billy who grew up in London and has now come home with me." Hugs for me, handshakes, backslaps, "How are you, Billy? How was the crossing? Oh, you are going to love it here, Billy," as if they had known me all along. As if we were already the best of friends. We are surely a long way from London, where it takes years to become acquainted, and even longer to become friends.

Scene Two

Where is my father? I try to spot him in the crowd, tall, handsome, well dressed, looking like the governor of a colony. For the past two days I have been drilled for this moment by Grandfather. "When you meet your father, Billy, hold yourself straight, your shoulders back, head up. Don't look at your feet Billy, look him straight in the eye. Extend your hand, say 'Happy to meet you, Father'."

— "Should I not call him Sir?"

— "Sir? Maybe the first time ... No, Father is better. The main thing is to stand very straight so he sees how tall you are, he is sure to like that."

Here I am, erect as a statue, eyes straight ahead, but no father to impress. "Where is my father?"

— "I don't see him, Billy. He lives in New Jersey, not Philadelphia. He may not know we have arrived."

I slouch and contemplate my shoes.

Scene Three

Franklin Court, the family house, my future home. It is not set on High Street but way back in the middle of a spacious courtyard. It has so many windows, so many rooms, nothing like the narrow, high lodgings on Mrs. Stevenson's Craven Street. One would have to be awfully rich in London to own a house like this.

This is where Father will meet us, surely. He does not want to mix with the mob on the dock. But no, the people waiting on the doorstep are Aunt Sally, her pink, round face shiny with tears, Uncle Richard standing stiffly, and two little boys in their Sunday best.

We go in. Grandfather rushes upstairs, probably to that music room he is so keen about. Aunt Sally turns toward me and now starts ...

Scene Four

the most unforgettable of the day ...

Aunt Sally's hug.

A momentous experience, surpassing any hug I've ever known. A hug well worth those six long weeks on the ocean. Crunched from head to toe inside her plump arms, against her ample bosom, I know bliss. She suddenly releases me and pushes me back, the better to examine my face. "Look at that jutting chin," she squeals ... "You are a Franklin, a real Franklin, my dear boy! Let me kiss you!" And we embrace again.

Benny Bache meanwhile, the former Kingbird, is doing his valiant best to climb up my leg while Willy, the two-year-old, has a firm grip on my ankle. That I should be called Billy while he is Willy is an unending source of babble to him: Billy, Willy, Willy, Billy.

Oh, family joys! Why was I so flustered? It is wonderful to belong, even more wonderful than the hot bath we were allowed once a month in boarding school.

Amidst all that good fellowship, yesterday, I missed the real news, which is that Philadelphia is preparing for war. At breakfast, Aunt Sally told me about the big events that happened while we were still at sea. What happened was the first battle — or the first two skirmishes — I don't know yet what to call them — between the Americans and the British. Blood was spilled and people were killed on both sides.

Here is how Aunt Sally explained it: "The colony of Massachusetts held its first provincial congress last fall in the little town of Concord a few miles from Boston, and decided in April, just a few weeks ago, to store military supplies in secret places. Learning this, the British military commander in Boston sent 700 of the 3,000 troops encamped in the city to reconnoiter the countryside and find the weapons."

— "And did he find them?"

— "No. A silversmith by the name of Paul Revere became aware of this move and, as was prearranged, he spread the alarm. He jumped on his horse near midnight and soon reached the town of Lexington, 11 miles away, where he found Sam Adams, the head of the Sons of Liberty, and the Boston merchant John Hancock. On his journey, Revere roused others, who in turn awakened even more."

"The colonies have been organizing their own militias of late and a part of the militias, roughly one third, call themselves Minutemen — ready to fight in a minute. When the British arrived at Lexington, they found nearly 80 of the militia standing on the village green with orders not to fire on the British unless they were fired on first."

"When the British officer saw them there," said Aunt Sally, "he shouted: 'Lay down your arms, you damned rebels!' but someone fired a shot."

— "Someone on which side?"

— "I don't know," she replied. "That shot may well be the starting point of a war, people say. Eight Minutemen were killed and one British soldier wounded in the ensuing fighting but things got much worse when the British pushed on to nearby Concord. An engagement that had started on the bridge became a running battle nineteen miles long. Finally, the British had to retreat, and a bloody retreat it was, with four thousand Americans firing from every direction, from every hidden spot in the land they know so well. Seventy-three English soldiers perished in that operation."

"Those poor fellows," sighed Aunt Sally who, it seems, cannot bear the thought of anyone suffering, friend or foe. "There they were in their red parade uniforms, an easy target, and wearing the wrong shoes for our muddy swamps — don't their commanders know anything?" Uncle Richard remains silent. He, like me, is an Englishman, after all. He arrived here only a few years ago. I have already observed that he is very careful not to offend Grandfather.

As for Grandfather, he is glum this morning. He took me on a tour of the house and while I was recognizing the furniture, curtains, rugs, dishes, and glasses that had been chosen by Mrs. Stevenson and sent from London, he grumbled that everything looked shopworn already, faded and soiled. What does he expect, my dear grandfather, after ten years and two little children have used the new things he sent? Luckily there soon is such a flow of visitors that they absorb all his attention.

Me? I'm struck that this battle took place on April 19, the very day that I finally learned who I was, who I am. The day that marks perhaps — who knows? — the birth of an independent America and the birth of William Temple Franklin, formerly known as Billy the Bastard.

I go for a walk in the afternoon. There is no doubt that Philadelphia feels like a city at war. The residents heard about Lexington five days after it happened and rushed by the thousands to the State House where they adopted a resolution to defend their property, liberty, and lives against all attempts to deprive them of those rights. So the cobbler who lives down our street tells me. Everywhere I turn, I see men drilling with more enthusiasm than discipline. They wear a great variety of outfits, some carry firearms, some just exercise. But still, my feeling is that, ardent as they may be, they are no match for the British Army, if it should get here in full force.

Eavesdropping as best I can on their conversations (they have a funny pronunciation in Philadelphia), I hear some of them complain that Britain is strangling them economically with all her demands and restrictions. Others talk loftily of freedom and don't seem to worry about their pocketbooks. Others still are irritated by all the agitation, arguing that things should remain as they were, that differences should be quietly talked out and that all Englishmen are brothers. Others look as if they couldn't be bothered at all.

I who felt so elated last night feel sad tonight. I think of those 70-odd English lads barely older than myself, who will never play cricket again, or go to a pub for a pint of beer. I wonder if some day I shall bear arms against England in defense of my new family. I don't know where I stand. I just don't know.

While I was brooding yesterday, Grandfather was unanimously elected one of the delegates from Pennsylvania to the Congress soon to convene here. They waste no time in this country. He came back to supper tonight, looking exhausted. After he had finished eating, Aunt Sally asked timidly: "Father, what is it the upcoming Congress plans to do?"

"Oh, so much, Sally," he answered slowly. "We have to create a government, a brand new government with laws, and do it quickly. And at the same time, of course, we have to create an army. We don't have any soldiers at present. That army has to be organized; it has to be clothed, fed, supplied with war weapons that we don't have yet. We also don't have any warships. We'll have to build some. All these things take money — another thing we don't have."

After a long silence Uncle Richard ventured to ask: "You really believe it will come to that, Sir?"

And now I shall quote exactly what Grandfather said, because I remember it word for word. He said: "The greatest revolution the world will ever see is likely to be effected in a few years." And this man, who will turn 70 in a few months, seems ready to give every ounce of energy in his body and soul to that revolution.

And my father in all this? Not a sign of him, not a word from him. All I hear is that he is preparing a crucial speech to be delivered to the New Jersey Assembly on the 15th of May. I don't even know if he is aware of my presence in Philadelphia. If he is, he must be avoiding me. Is he ashamed of me?

Aunt Sally has a proposal to make. "Since we are soon going to hear so much about the second Continental Congress," she says, "let me show you where the first one took place. Carpenters' Hall has a really interesting history."

And so, on this beautiful day, we walk over to a two-story brick building that has none of London's grime or grandeur about it.

— "English patriot that you are," she teases, "you'll be glad to learn that the Carpenters' Company traces its heritage back to the Worshipful Company of Carpenters of London that was founded in the early 1300's. Do you know anything about guilds, Billy?"

— "I know that they gained legal rights as time went along, that they restricted their membership and would not allow people from the outside to exercise their craft."

— "Well, what was true in England has been true here in Pennsylvania. The Carpenters' Company of Philadelphia has been in existence since 1724 — that was one year after your runaway grandfather arrived in Philadelphia from Boston. Some of the early craftsmen had learned their trade in England; they were highly skilled, and you still see their work all around you: the State House, Christ Church, and their own meeting place, the lovely Carpenters' Hall we are looking at. By the way, Temple, our house, our Franklin Court was built by the same man who built Carpenters' Hall — Robert Smith, the best builder in Pennsylvania ... but slow! He drove your grandfather to distraction with his delays."

— "When was Carpenters' Hall built?"

— "It was completed just two years ago, and guess who were the first occupants ... ?"

— "Surely people who had something to do with Grandfather. From what I hear on all sides, he seems to have started everything around here: the street lamps, the hospital, the fire company, the insurance company — even the garbage collection."

— "You missed one, Billy — the Library Company." They were the first tenants of Carpenters' Hall.

— "Poor old William Penn! I wonder how he feels about Grandfather outshining him at every turn."

Aunt Sally is taken aback. There is no mockery in her soul.

— "They were not competing, you know. William Penn died five years before your grandfather's arrival ..."

— "I was only joking, Aunt Sally. Tell me about the first Continental Congress."

— "It took place last September and October. Its purpose was simply to consult about the situation in the colonies in view of the Intolerable Acts. Everybody was very upset after the British closed off the port of Boston, and that feeling helped bring the colonies closer to each other. Nobody was talking about independence at that time — even today it is rare to hear talk of independence. The idea was only to work out a formula by which the colonies would recover what they considered their rights and liberties, civil and religious, in order to restore harmony with the Mother Country."

— "Were all thirteen colonies represented?" I ask, eager to show off that I know there are thirteen of them.

— "All but Georgia. Pennsylvania was represented by seven delegates. You should try to remember the name of one of them, Joseph Galloway, who was the Speaker of our Assembly. I don't want to go into it now but I think we are going to hear much more about him pretty soon — I mean we, the family."

— "Why we, the family?"

— "Because he is such a close friend of your father. But I really don't want to discuss that now, Billy. Your uncle will explain it to you one of these days."

— "Soon?"

— "Soon. The beauty of that Congress, as I have been telling you, is that people from New England in the North, from New York in the middle, and from Virginia in the South started drawing closer. That great orator, Patrick Henry, who came from Virginia, proclaimed: 'Government is now dissolved. The differences between us are no more. I am not a Virginian, not a New Yorker, not a Pennsylvanian, but an American.' That sounded wonderful, but there were still deep divisions between the conservative delegates and the more radical ones."

— "And who won out?"

— "The radicals, I'd say."

— "I knew it! Grandfather sounds like a radical to me and he is always on the winning side."

— "Easy, Billy. Things are not as simple as that. You know better than I do how much your grandfather struggled for a dignified reconciliation with England but was constantly stifled by a bunch of close-minded or corrupt politicians over in London."

— "Well ..."

— "Let me tell you what else I know about the First Continental Congress. Those 56 delegates worked for almost two months in Carpenters' Hall and at the end they drafted various addresses: one to the King, one to the British people, one to the people of Quebec, if I remember correctly, and one to all the American colonists. These addresses served as background for what they called a Declaration of Rights and Grievances in which they asserted their exclusive right to legislate their own affairs and their entitlement to the same sacred rights and privileges as other Englishmen." I recognized most of this, of course, from my laborious reading, while on board, of Grandfather's Journal of Negotiations.

— "And now," concluded Aunt Sally, "we must hurry home to give the boys their lunch, after which I shall make a pie for dinner. You may help me cut up the fruit if you'd like."

A note to my future self, if I ever re-read this, or to anyone who might stumble upon my diary someday: If I am writing such long entries these days it is because I have nothing else to do. It is too late in the year to be enrolled in school (that will have to wait until next fall), and I don't know anybody in the city except my aunt and uncle. I have no boy my age to talk with. Grandfather warned us that he is planning to be busy twelve hours a day for an indefinite period. This leaves a lot of time for me which is filled by homesickness for London, for my schoolmates, Caldwell in particular, even for my teachers. I don't dare write anyone because our departure was so hasty that I did not even say goodbye. I just stole away like a thief, and God knows what they are saying about me.

****

But now let's go help Aunt Sally with her pie! Maybe I'll find the courage to ask her a very important question.

There is so much flour over Aunt Sally that she looks like a jolly, fat ghost. Her pies, I am told, are always born from a tornado of motion and good stuff. I peel and I slice, peel and slice, and suddenly: "Aunt Sally, may I ask you a question?"

— "Of course, Billy. Haven't you been asking questions since you arrived?"

— "This one is different. Do you think that the reason for my father's not showing up is that he is ashamed of me for being illegitimate?" I thought "illegitimate" was a better word to use than "bastard" when addressing my aunt. But my aunt, not a bit shocked, bursts into such wild laughter that even the dough all around her is shaking.

— "What are you talking about, Billy? That he of all people should mind your being born out of wedlock, just like himself?"

— "Just like himself?"

Now Aunt Sally stops dead and even through the flour I can see her face turn red. She is panting.

— "Oh my God, Temple. You didn't know?"

— "Know what?"

— "About your father. Didn't your grandfather tell you?"

— "He only told me my father was Royal Governor of New Jersey.

— "Yes, of course. Temple, if you give me your word of honor not to say a word about this, ever, to anybody, I'll tell you, since I have made this stupid mistake. Promise me, Temple."

— "I promise. Tell me first, who was my mother?"

— "I have no idea. If you know what is good for you, don't ask your father, just let it go."

— "Who was HIS mother? Was it Deborah, before she and Grandfather were married?"

— "If you will stop asking questions, I will tell you the whole story, at least as much of it as I know. Keep in mind that I am 13 years younger than your father and there are some things I don't know. And please, Temple, keep in mind, too, that people make mistakes, especially when they are young, that one should not judge harshly."

Aunt Sally's hands are still in the dough but she is not kneading anymore and the dough has an abandoned look. What if tonight's pie is a failure? I am worried about the pie, but I am more worried about the origins of William Temple.

And here is what she told me.

Aunt Sally's Account of the Family Story

Some years later, Deborah gave birth to another boy, Francis Folger, who unfortunately died at the age of four. After a long interval, seven years I believe, they had me. Legally speaking, William is only my half- brother, but we have always been very close and I consider him my full brother.

I see sadness on your face, Temple. I imagine you are wondering why you were not treated in the same way and kept in the family. I was never told why, but I want to tell you that, for all the care and good education he received, William did not have an easy time as a child. Once again, we humans have our flaws, and my mother, Deborah, could never bring herself to like William. Your grandfather, on the other hand, adored him, and that may have been quite a problem since my mother felt, especially after they had lost Francis, that her husband lavished too much time and attention on this boy who was not hers.

One more point, dear nephew. Public life is a rough arena, and in politics anything goes. A dreadful campaign was mounted against your grandfather once, as he was running for office back in 1764, and his enemies thought nothing of insulting him by calling his son "a base-born brat." William is a proud man, Temple, keen on doing his absolute best, and that slur hurt him deeply. This is why I beg you to let bygones be bygones and not bring up the topic of illegitimacy. You are a Franklin now. Open your heart to your father."

— "Your pie is not as flaky as usual, Sally," grumbled Uncle Richard at supper.

Sally gave me a quick look and whispered: "We'll do better the next time."

The Pennsylvania State House (Independence Hall) in 1777

This is the big day, the day the second Continental Congress is to assemble in Philadelphia. They will meet at the Pennsylvania State House this time, where the legislative Assembly of the province convenes.

The building has a large, majestic chamber in which the congressional sessions will take place. Now that the Americans are not afraid to speak out publicly against the British, they feel confident enough to hold their meeting at the more spacious State House, which is British property, after all, instead of the more cramped Carpenters' Hall.

I learned yesterday that Philadelphia is the third-largest English-speaking city in the world after London and Edinburgh. And I had believed it to be some sleepy village! Its population is around 40,000 — with some surrounding districts taken into account. Still, it is no match for London. It has no theater, no concert hall, no ballet, not many of the pleasures of life.

We had a very early breakfast which gave Grandfather the time to ask Uncle Richard a few questions. He is particularly interested in the non-importation agreement that concluded the first Continental Congress. The desire for self-sufficiency is a powerful drive in Grandfather. Woe to those who disagree with him. "I don't need you. See if I care," is what the other party is likely to hear when speaking with the resolute old man.

I remember the relish with which he told me that at the time of the Stamp Act — the first of those Acts that would bring the colonists so much discontent — he had informed the House of Commons in London that America could do without English tea, without English wool, without English anything. He knew how much the British merchants counted on the American market and was certain that they would put pressure on their government to abolish the hated tax. It worked then, in 1765. I'm not sure, though, that it would work today.

Anyway, Grandfather wanted Uncle Richard to tell him how far Pennsylvania had gone on the road to economic self-sufficiency. "Well," announced Richard, "a steelworks has started in town and they produce good tools."

— "Is that the only local business?"

— "Well, to increase the output of wool, no sheep under four years old can be slaughtered anymore, and the butchers have agreed not to sell lambs coming from Britain until October, to encourage domestic production."

— "Anything else being encouraged?"

— "Yes. The cultivation of flax and hemp, the manufacture of gunpowder, woolen goods, nails, wire, steel, glass, copper in sheets, tin plates, malt liquors, paper made from rags, all of these activities are encouraged, notably by your brainchild, the American Philosophical Society." (Oh yes, another of Grandfather's grand ideas, when he brought together the best brains in town and beyond to cooperate on clever schemes and write scholarly papers, making Philadelphia, I'm told, the intellectual center of America.)

Still, all of those homegrown efforts must have seemed inadequate to our Dr. Franklin. He shrugged his shoulders sadly as he left the table and prepared to march in his freshly pressed suit with the other delegates.

"Let's hurry, Temple," says Uncle Richard, as soon as Grandfather leaves the room. "We want to be near the front of the crowd when the delegates arrive."

I like to be called Temple — I think it's more manly than Billy. And I like my uncle's accent, still so English. His accent is from the north of England. In school we used to make fun of a Yorkshire boy who had a similar twang, but now I rejoice to hear it. And then, like me, Uncle Richard sometimes says "we" when he means the British and "they" for the colonists, but he quickly catches himself and I have to repress a smile.

All this encourages me to ask him suddenly, as we are walking along, "Uncle Richard, which side are you on, deep in your heart?" He stops short and looks at me, pained and puzzled. Slowly he says:

— "That awful question. My mother and sisters, you know, still live in England. My brother who emigrated a little before me and is now a merchant in New York, is an ardent loyalist. As for me, since I entered the Franklin family, I am for the patriots, as the discontented colonists call themselves, but I hope they won't push too, too far. Your grandfather is the most intelligent man I have ever met, and also the most clear-sighted. I am deeply impressed by his fervor and I feel I should follow his lead. To tell you the truth, Temple, I am also somewhat in awe of him ..."

— "I noticed he calls you Son. Doesn't that mean he is fond of you?"

— "That was not always the case. He was extremely upset when Sally and I decided to marry. You might even say that we were married against his will."

— "How can anybody do something against his will?"

— "Well, we did. Do you want to hear the story?"

— "Of course!"

— "I was engaged to a lovely girl called Peggy Ross who was Sally's closest friend. When Peggy fell dangerously ill, I often met Sally at her bedside. When nothing could save Peggy we were both grief- stricken. We turned to each other for comfort, and gradually developed an intense affection that led me to proposing marriage. Sally's father had been in England for years by that time, and left the decision to his wife. Deborah's happiness was to see her daughter happy and she quickly consented. Unfortunately, William, as Sally's older brother, felt that he had to look into my financial situation, and what he discovered was not to his satisfaction. He related to Dr. Franklin that in his opinion I was a mere fortune hunter."

"Your grandfather promptly let us know that marriage was out of the question. Sally fell into such despair that Deborah decided, for the first time in her life, to defy her husband's wishes. The wedding took place on a beautiful October day, with all the ships in Philadelphia's harbor flying their flags in our honor. What a sight that was!"

We had been walking fast and Uncle Richard stopped to catch his breath.

— "For more than a year Dr. Franklin never so much as mentioned Sally in his letters. We named our baby Benjamin Franklin Bache in the hope of pleasing him, but it did not help. Sally must have been the most tearful young wife ever."

I tried to imagine Aunt Sally crying so much, but I couldn't.

— "Only when I went over to England to visit my family in 1771, did I meet Dr. Franklin. His attitude began to soften, and he even lent me some money for a new start in business — along with giving me prudent advice."

I don't know how successful Uncle Richard has been in his new business, but now that Grandfather is back in Philadelphia, Richard certainly tries hard to please him. Grandfather is captivated by the antics of Benny and Willy. That man is surely enchanted by children. Willy-the-Bold is the one who enchants him the most, I'd say. Grandfather compares Willy to Hercules who, while still in his crib as the legend has it, strangled two serpents sent to kill him. I think he sees the American colonies in Willy, getting ready to defy the mighty British Empire one day. When it comes to Benny, Grandfather tries to teach him things. Benny is a serious little boy, anxious to please the grown-ups.

We're in front of the State House now, ready for the spectacle. And what a spectacle!

The City Cavalry of Philadelphia, all two-hundred of them, rode six miles out of town to greet the distinguished guests and escort them to meet the excited crowd. The delegates arrive in all different types of carriages. In the first carriage, an open one, ride two of them, one short and plump, the other tall and thin. Uncle Richard whispers that the short one is Sam Adams, the famous radical from Boston whose followers call themselves the Sons of Liberty — a noisy group — and the other is John Hancock, the richest merchant in New England. He does look full of himself. Those two are the men aroused by Paul Revere during his midnight ride. In the second carriage, my uncle points out John Adams, a distinguished lawyer in Boston and one of the leaders of the patriots. This Adams, who looks deep in thought, is the second cousin of that troublemaker Sam Adams.

And so it goes. Dozens of carriages rolling along while all the bells in the city ring out, drums and fifes sing their song, and the crowd cheers its favorites — Grandfather, I think, more than anybody else. As always, I am torn between two emotions: pride in being the grandson of such an admired character, and panic when I wonder what on earth is expected from me now that the family reminds me three times a day that I am a Franklin.

Soon after Grandfather goes past, there appears a tall, very tall man in uniform, a man who truly cuts a fine figure and elicits even more thunderous cheers than Dr. Franklin — especially high-pitched huzzahs from the women. I feel almost offended.

— "And who could he be?" I ask Uncle Richard.

"A rich Virginian," he tells me, "by the name of George Washington. He owns large plantations down there, and was also a land surveyor who bought up much property. Plus, as you see, he is an officer, a veteran of the French and Indian War. And do you have any idea how he came to be so wealthy, Temple? He married the richest widow in the county. Keep that in mind my boy."

As if a rich widow would marry me!

After an announcement that all Congressional deliberations will be kept secret, the doors of the State House are closed, the crowd disperses, and we have a chance to look at the building. It is truly impressive. Glowing red bricks, a façade that must be at least a hundred feet long with arcades on each side leading to smaller wings, and beyond the wings a little shed on the left and the right. A staircase and belfry, and a large bell. In the center, a cupola that I like and shall draw some day. (Perhaps I'll be a master builder like those fellows from Carpenters' Hall.)

This edifice, where they have been conducting the affairs of the province for the last 40 years, would not look out of place in London. It has majesty, and will likely acquire still more by the time the Americans start counting in centuries, as we English do, and not in years.

But that is not their fault. William Penn arrived here less than a century ago — in 1682 I think — and what did he find? A forest. Penn-sylvania, Penn's forest. Maybe that's why so many streets bear the names of trees?

Barely arrived, I have already been pressed into action today. In view of Grandfather's return to town, the College of Philadelphia, which I am supposed to attend in the fall, decided to hold its Commencement with particular splendor in honor of the return of its founder, we-know-who. It happens that I shall be the first Franklin to attend this school — and possibly the last since I am the only young Franklin male alive.

The governor of Pennsylvania, John Penn, was there, as well as some delegates from the Continental Congress. A formal procession of town and gown, made up of the Trustees and the rich and powerful citizens of the town, slowly walked along Fourth Street until they reached the College gate, where the College's Provost, the Reverend Mr. William Smith, was waiting to greet them. I turned toward Grandfather, expecting him to introduce me, but he was in deep conversation with a friend, his back turned to us. As I stood still, not knowing what to do, the other boys propelled me forward and there I was, face to face with the local version of my faraway Mr. Elphinston.

— "And who could you be, young man?" he asked.

— "William Temple Franklin, Sir."

— "A relative of our celebrated Doctor?"

— "His grandson, Sir."

I was looking him straight in the eye, as I had been told to do, and saw him break into a grin. Not a friendly smile of welcome, it seemed. It was a sardonic smile, almost a grimace.

— "We are honored," he said, as if he meant the opposite. He did not extend his hand as he had done for the other boys. I felt ill at ease all through the ceremony. Had I done something wrong? Was it because of my "low" birth?

I have not yet related the conversation I had with Uncle Richard after we left the State House on May 10. To my surprise, he had suggested that instead of going home we repair to the City Tavern for a little refreshment. Grandfather, sorry to have so little time for me, had given Uncle Richard some money to treat me to a good time.

Quite a place, this City Tavern. My well informed companion explained that when it opened, about two years ago, it offered a combination of "club and pub." Club, because it was financed by selling shares to the upper class Philadelphians yearning for a genteel meeting place, and pub, because the atmosphere and fare were modeled on London. It is already famous for being the finest tavern in the colonies, equipped with a spacious room for balls and banquets, or even for concerts and operas. So much for my earlier remark that Philadelphia has no concert hall! This city, I must admit, is much more exciting than I expected.

We sat down and, without consulting me, my uncle ordered two everlasting syllabubs.

— "Two what?"

— "Syllabubs, the favorite treat of Philadelphians."

— "Lucky you!" interjected the waitress, a girl about my age, pretty and blonde under her frilly bonnet. "A syllabub is the best drink in the world."

— "What's in it?"

— "Everything. Lots of thick cream and Rhine wine and sack — that's white wine from Spain — and the juice of Seville oranges and the grated rinds of lemon and quantities of double-refined sugar and a spoonful of orange-flower water." She caught her breath and prepared to tell us how this marvel is put together, preferably in advance, but I stopped listening because she had dimples when she smiled, and suddenly I could think of nothing but those dimples.

She saw me gawking, looked amused, and disappeared.

— "Let's talk," said my uncle. "Is there anything you would like to know?"

— "Yes. Once again, what's happening with my father? Doesn't he want to meet me?"

— "Temple, it is time you understood that men in public life like to moan and groan that their duties keep them from their families, which is their terrible, terrible fate. But, as soon as circumstances let them go back to those beloved families, all they aspire to do is get themselves once again in the limelight while pretending to pine, of course, for the sweetness of family life. Your father is to deliver a speech on May 15 to the New Jersey Assembly, and then he has to meet with his Council for a few days, after which he will surely come for you and take you away for the summer. You will have the whole summer to get acquainted."

Although Uncle Richard spoke calmly, I thought there was a touch of bitterness in his voice. He will never be a public man; he is a merchant, and not a very successful one at that, if one is to judge by the penny-pinching practices of Aunt Sally.

— "Do you have any idea," I ask, "what my father is going to talk about when he speaks to the Assembly?"

— "He will sing the same old song about his prowess in managing to serve both the King and the Colony at the same time. He will preach reconciliation with the British Empire and probably push the Plan of Union advocated by his friend and ally, Joseph Galloway."

The girl reappeared at that moment with two large bowls and gave me the fuller one, after which she stood there, watching me. How could I bring back the dimples? What should I do? I had to make her laugh. With exaggerated expressions of surprise and delight, I inhaled the frothy top of my syllabub and emitted groans of bliss while she giggled and the dimples returned, more alluring than ever. But alas, she was promptly summoned to another table and we went back to Mr. Galloway.

My uncle explained that Galloway was born into a prominent and well-to-do family. He had met my father when they were both in their twenties. It seems that my father, who had distinguished himself in the French and Indian War and planned a military career, was in danger of becoming an idle and frivolous young man after the peace treaty was signed, a prospect that Grandfather could not stand to contemplate. Galloway, who had studied law, was entrusted with teaching its basics to William in preparation for further studies at one of the Inns of Court in London.

— "Galloway and your father remained close friends and became, so to say, the legal team employed by your grandfather in the course of his political life. They helped the older man in his fight to have the Crown take control of Pennsylvania, thus taking power away from the descendants of William Penn, those Proprietors whom Dr. Franklin had come to detest. Even though Galloway is devoid of interest in scientific matters and has a cold and haughty personality, your grandfather feels that he brought important assets to the partnership: his seriousness, his impeccable social credentials, his knowledge, and his talent as an orator. For many years, while Dr. Franklin was in England, Galloway served him well as a trusted lieutenant across the Ocean, but now..."

"But now?" Uncle Richard was searching for the right words. "But now, he is the victim of his unbending nature. He has done very well, politically speaking: member of the Pennsylvania Assembly for 20 years, its Speaker for nine — and that is a position of great power. He headed the Pennsylvania delegation to the first Continental Congress. While he recognized that the colonies had some reason to resent the restrictions imposed by England on American commerce, and also to resent the taxes imposed by Parliament, his solution for reconciliation was rejected. He is a man who cannot accept defeat, and my hunch is that any day now he may walk out of the current Congress."

(Uncle Richard was right when he predicted this on May 10; Galloway stalked out two days ago, on the 12th.)

— "And my father?"

— "In your father's eyes, both last year's Continental Congress and the one which we saw convene today are illegal. What your father would like to see is American representation in Parliament right in London. It is an attractive idea but unlikely to be adopted. Well-trained lawyers that they are, your father and Galloway see everything in legalistic terms. They are no longer in touch with the feelings of a growing part of the population; they live in a world of theory."

— "And Grandfather?"

— "I think that in his mind he understood long ago that reconciliation is a hopeless cause, but in his heart he still nurtures a tiny hope, because he has loved England so much. Unlike many other people, he believes that only stiff resistance can produce a compromise. I remember him quoting an Italian proverb: `He who turns himself into a sheep is eaten by the wolf.' And that is why all his energy these days goes into preparing the nation for war. He wants the British to understand that time is running out and that they had better wake up and negotiate in good faith. But what your grandfather has not yet grasped is how far his beloved son and his beloved Galloway have diverged from him, they who used to follow all his instructions unquestioningly. I am afraid, Temple, that he is in for a terrible disappointment."

My uncle then stood up, shook my hand, and said he had enjoyed talking to me, man to man. The thought of my grandfather possibly being so badly hurt in the near future gave me a heavy heart, but then I started thinking of ways to see the dimpled girl again, and I felt better. I am only 15, after all.

Great excitement in Philadelphia. Somewhere near the Canadian border, Fort Ticonderoga, which was in the hands of the British, has been captured without a fight by American irregulars. They are called the Green Mountain Boys, and are led by a certain Ethan Allen and a certain Benedict Arnold. Uncle Richard wrote down those names for me, because he thinks they will be much talked about.

I don't know how important this action will turn out to be, but a quantity of lead and a great number of cannon were seized there, so morale here is high now.

Benny and Willy, those great strategists, are more bellicose than ever. And me? I'm not taking sides. I'll just report what's going on.

And so, I'm reporting that this Fort Ticonderoga occupies a strategically important position on the outlet of Lake George; that is, on the line of water communication between Canada and the English colonies. There is much talk about inviting Canada to join the American provinces in their struggle, but I would be surprised if they accepted. The Canadians still view themselves as loyal British subjects. They have been suspicious of the Americans ever since the French and Indian War. Congress is pursuing its effort to organize an army — defensive, of course. Reconciliation is still the big word.

Ethan Allen and Captain de la Place. May 1775. The capture of Fort Ticonderoga, New York. Copy of engraving after Alonzo Chappel.

To get back to this Ethan Allen, I read somewhere (but where?) that he is "a backwoods strategist untrammeled by military pedantry." What a great way to put it!

I am now enrolled in the College for the fall. When they asked for the date of my birth, I hesitated and they left a blank. When they asked for my mother's name, I remained silent and they left another blank. Not a brilliant beginning! I had a quick look at the names of some other boys: Griffith, Witherspoon, Fox, Drummer, Mayo ... Will I find a Caldwell among them, a real good friend who likes me just as I am? Well, I have until October 4 to worry about that.

Life is funny. I thought there would be pages to write after finally meeting my father, but no. After all my imagining of the scene, after all my inner rehearsals and Grandfather's warnings, our reunion took place almost in silence, darkness, sleepiness, and embarrassment.

Supper was gloomy the night before because we were waiting for Grandfather to return from a visit to Mr. Galloway's country estate, a place named Trevose. The Baches were tense, the children grew cranky, and we finally had a quick meal and went to bed.

Aunt Sally awakened me before dawn to say that breakfast was ready and to hurry downstairs where there was a surprise for me. But she did not say it in her usual jolly way. By the light of her candle, I could see that her nose was red and her cheeks wet and shiny. Grandfather had arrived only a few hours ago, she told me, and he had gone straight to bed, too tired to talk.

The "surprise" turned out to be a man eating eggs in the semi-darkness. He stood up and shook my hand quite formally. "It's true, you really are a tall boy," he declared.

Did I look at my shoes? Did I manage to blurt out a "Good morning Father, I'm glad to meet you"? I don't remember. I remember being told again to hurry. After I gulped down some breakfast, Aunt Sally handed me the suitcase she had packed and, sniffling, gave me a quick hug, not the kind she is famous for. In my ear she also whispered something, but I was so swept up in the moment that it didn't really sink in.

Just as we settled in the carriage, the sky turned pink and I looked at my traveling companion, a handsome man, well dressed, and exhausted looking. After a few minutes, I ventured to ask: "Where are we going, Father?"

"To my new residence in Perth Amboy, New Jersey," he answered. "It's a journey of about 75 miles," he added and promptly fell asleep. I curled up in my corner and did the same.

"How long have you been there Father?" "Not very long, we moved from Burlington in October of last year, after repairs and improvements had been made." "Mrs. Franklin has exquisite taste and knew exactly what was to be done in the way of painting and wallpapering. It is called the Proprietary House because it was built on the initiative of the Board of Proprietors, back in 1761." Whereupon Father promptly fell back to sleep."

A couple of hours later the coach pulls into a small town of brick houses. The coachman calls out "Bristol. The King George Inn. One hour for breakfast." Father joins me at the river's edge and points to a rather large brick town. "That's Burlington," he says. "Do you see the big house just to the right of the wharf? That's the governor's mansion. Elizabeth and I lived there until last Autumn."

Inside the King George, as we are waiting for our food, Father explains that until 1702 New Jersey was divided into East Jersey and West Jersey. Burlington is the capital in the West, and Perth Amboy, somewhere in the vicinity of New York, the capital in the East. And why, after ten years in Burlington, did Father move to the eastern capital? I wonder, but do not ask.

As if guessing my thought, my father volunteers that his wife often has difficulty in breathing and that he hopes the change of air will do her good. Also, the governor's mansion in Perth Amboy is much nicer than the one in Burlington. Furthermore, he says, politically speaking, it is time for a change, but he does not explain why. He only informs me that Amboy is the Indian name of the place and that Perth has been added by the colonists in honor of the Earl of Perth. One of my schoolmates came from Perth in Scotland, I tell him, just to hold up my end of the conversation. I keep hoping that our talk will take a personal turn at some point, but no. Back in the carriage, Father falls asleep again.

Left to my own thoughts, I wonder if he is disappointed in me. Do I perhaps remind him of my mother? Did I use the wrong fork? Closing my eyes, I try to remember every moment of our meeting at dawn and suddenly, out of nowhere, the words Aunt Sally whispered in my ear just before we left Philadelphia come back to my mind: "There will be a new cousin for you when you return." A new cousin? A baby! So that's why she has been getting so fat! Aunt Sally wants masses of children, she says, to make up for Grandfather having had so few when he would have liked many. How dumb of me not to have understood! I hope it will be a baby girl. I would love to see a little girl growing up; maybe she will have dimples like the girl at the City Tavern. Maybe I'll learn what it is that girls like to talk about.

Hours pass in silence, I don't know how many. Father suddenly sits up and announces that we are about to arrive at Perth Amboy. I stare intently but see nothing that looks remotely like a town. There are rather nice houses scattered here and there, lots of greenery, a river called the Raritan — but no real streets, no bustle, no marketplace. Maybe we are still in the outskirts of the capital? But no, we have arrived, and the house in front of which we stop, the Proprietary House as it is called, is truly impressive.

I should change style at this point, use superlatives, noble words, all the things our headmaster Mr. Elphinston pushed us reluctant boys to do. A slender woman steps out the front door and stands there, dazzling in a rust-colored gown. Father rushes up to her, kisses her hand, and looks anxiously into her face: "How are you, dearest? Are you feeling a little better?"

— "Not too bad," she says, "but you, my dear, how tired you look."

Having glimpsed this exchange of mutual anxiety, I return to the contemplation of my muddy shoes. Father beckons me to join them: "Elizabeth my love, this is my son, Temple." A pause. Her dress is glittering in the late afternoon sun. As though correcting himself, Father says: "This is our son, Elizabeth — William Temple Franklin."

She takes a step towards me, extends both hands, holds mine in hers, and kisses me on the forehead. "Welcome to our family, Temple." I feel as if I am at the Court of St. James, or at the high altar, being anointed or inducted or something.

— "Thank you," is all I can think to say.

This morning, when I join my parents for breakfast, the first topic they raise is that I desperately need new clothes. The rest of the day is taken up with preparations for a proper wardrobe to be worn by me, now that I inhabit such splendid surroundings. Splendid they are: festooned draperies perfectly matched with the damask on the chairs, ravishing wallpaper showing the falls of a river called the Passaic, highly polished sconces, a grand painting of King George III and one of his Queen. Four floors, sixteen fireplaces, large rooms. Everything looks perfect.

When the tailor has gathered all the measurements he needs, my stepmother, who has closely supervised the operation, says cheerfully: "You'll see, Temple. We'll make a gentleman out of you."

A gentleman? Me?

Well, it's not bad, being a gentleman. I am now equipped with, among other things, a riding outfit, and this morning I went riding with my father. He is an accomplished, elegant horseman who would fit perfectly in Hyde Park, back in London. As for me, I must admit that all I can do is to sit on the animal and let him go, but Father promises to teach me all he knows. He is warming up to me, I think. After an hour I have learned to hold my back straight and my knees tight. Father thinks that in due course I'll do very well because I have the right build, his build. What a dream it would be to spend the summer this way and not hear a thing about current events!

But current events have a way of happening, whether you want them to or not. News has been seeping in from the port that British Army reinforcements are on the high seas on their way to Boston. That seems likely because the British made such a poor showing at Lexington and Concord that General Gage, their commander, wants more troops in case there should be another showdown.

What can the inexperienced, poorly armed Americans do against the disciplined men I so often watched drilling in London? Why do I pity them? Just because I have found so many Americans obliging and kind- hearted, is it possible that after only one month in this country I should feel such anguish on behalf of the rebellious colonists?

A letter from Grandfather! He is glad to learn, he says, that I am happy in my new situation. I'm not sure he is all that glad. I believe he is quite worried that my father is going to gain influence over me and maybe bring me around to his Loyalist way of thinking. Or worse, give me a taste for luxury and easy living. Don't fret about politics, Grandfather, your son never discusses any of it with me. But the easy living is another story. I love the comfort of this house, the good food, the good clothes, the good horse, the good books, the time for myself.

So what does my grandfather write about?

"You are now in that time of life which is the properest to store your mind with such knowledge as is hereafter to be ornamental and useful to you. I confide that you have too much sense to let the season slip. The ancients painted Opportunity as an old man with wings to his feet and shoulders, a great lock of hair on the fore part of his head, but bald behind; whence comes our old saying, Take Time by the Forelock as much as to say, when it is past, there is no means of pulling it back again, as there is no lock behind to take hold of for that purpose."

What I would like to tell him — but of course I won't — is something like this: Don't preach to me, please, Grandfather. I know one should not waste one's opportunity, but I am having such a good time with my father. We go out riding almost every day. We both love drawing and we sit and sketch the landscape, side by side, then we compare our handiwork. He tells me stories about his youth and they are all centered on you. What great companions you were and how much you indulged him. How he, Father, stepped into your shoes every time you left a given position for a better one, both at the post office and at the Pennsylvania Assembly. And how you two served side by side during the French and Indian War. How you traveled together when in England, looking up ancestors' tombstones or receiving honorary degrees — a big one for you, a smaller one for my father — at St. Andrews University in Scotland.

Still, all those stories leave me sad. When I hear how warm the relationship has been between my father and his father, I realize how much I have missed and I feel envious. I wonder why Father, so intent on telling me about that closeness, often looks so melancholy at the end of his story. I would be happy, in his place, if I had such memories.

But then, I tell myself, all that is in the past. What counts is that we have made a good beginning, the governor and I. He even seems proud of me — who would have believed it? Grandfather may well be right to worry, I am slipping deliciously into this new life. I must take care in my next letter to him to make it sound a little less pleasant than it is. And I don't want to sound ungrateful for my time with Aunt Sally. In fact, her pies are infinitely better than any I've had in New Jersey.

It was our best gallop so far and when we stopped to let the horses catch their breath, we sat in the sun, my father and I, in the middle of a meadow. Father, who usually keeps silent during these pauses — at least until I start pestering him with questions — opens the conversation.

— "Temple," he says, "I know you like to hear about my past expeditions with your grandfather. There is one adventure — no, I should say a dream — I have not told you about. It was our boldest idea ever, quite a joint project that would both bring more glory to the British Empire, and quite a fortune to the Franklin family for generations to come ...

— "Tell me, tell me!" (The generations to come, that's me!)

— "We were to be equal partners, he and I, joining forces with a few prosperous, enterprising Philadelphia merchants, we would go into beautiful, fabulous new territories and settle them ..."

— "But where are they, those fabulous new territories?"

— "In the West. This project started just ten years ago but I had been West long before that. When I was just a few years older than you are now, I crossed the Allegheny Mountains and entered what was called the Ohio Territory, where most of our neighbors — and they weren't very close — were Indians. My traveling companion was a German, Conrad Weiser, a man well acquainted with Indian languages and habits. He served as interpreter.

The overwhelming wish to settle there never left me after that, but there were many obstacles. No purchase of Indian land could be made without the consent of the tribal chief and approval from the Court in England. Nothing, theoretically, could be acquired west of what was called the Proclamation Line though, in fact, there were exceptions."

— "When was that Proclamation Line proclaimed and where was it?

— "It was proclaimed, as you