our latter years, like a wild dream, give place to the blessed quietude
of royal sway, with the king's name in every ordinance, his prayer in the
church, his health at the board, and his love in the people's heart.
Meantime, our old age finds little honor. Hustled have we been, till
driven from town-meetings; dirty water has been cast upon our ruffles by
a Whig chambermaid; John Hancock's coachman seizes every opportunity to
bespatter us with mud; daily are we hooted by the unbreeched rebel brats;
and narrowly, once, did our gray hairs escape the ignominy of tar and
feathers. Alas! only that we cannot bear to die till the next royal
governor comes over, we would fain be in our quiet grave.

Such an old man among new things are we who now hold at arm's-length the
rebel newspaper of the day. The very figure-head, for the thousandth
time, elicits it groan of spiteful lamentation. Where are the united
heart and crown, the loyal emblem, that used to hallow the sheet on which
it was impressed, in our younger days? In its stead we find a
continental officer, with the Declaration of Independence in one hand, a
drawn sword in the other, and above his head a scroll, bearing the motto,
"WE APPEAL TO HEAVEN." Then say we, with a prospective triumph, let
Heaven judge, in its own good time! The material of the sheet attracts
our scorn. It is a fair specimen of rebel manufacture, thick and coarse,
like wrapping-paper, all overspread with little knobs; and of such a
deep, dingy blue color, that we wipe our spectacles thrice before we can
distinguish a letter of the wretched print. Thus, in all points, the
newspaper is a type of the times, far more fit for the rough hands of a
democratic mob, than for our own delicate, though bony fingers. Nay we
will not handle it without our gloves!

Glancing down the page, our eyes are greeted everywhere by the offer of
lands at auction, for sale or to be leased, not by the rightful owners,