me a watcher over unfinished records. All exercise was suspended, recreation avoided, and repose interrupted. In less than ten months such severe labours broke me down, and I have never recovered from their fatal consequences. At this time, I discovered what hundreds have before me, that the confinement and continuation of labour which is incompatible with intellectual excitement, is the most destructive to health of all other labour. For instance, the poor wretch who picks oakum in his cell can think, and therefore he, in some degree, preserves his health. The novelist, like Bulwer, can shut himself up for a fortnight, and produce a work which shall delight the world, and come forth afterwards sound in body and in mind. But he who posts Books or copies Records, which requires continual attention, without permitting any other intellectual effort, would be a dead man at the expiration of that period. How often during those sleepless nights have I repeated the lines which are the motto of this chapter! How often have I directed a glance of memory to my once free, happy, and life-stirring occupation in the country, and cursed the folly which made me a slave! My very dreams, as I snatched a hurried repose, were coloured with this longing after freedom. I was mounted on the back of a fiery steed, spurning with his heels the pathless desert alone, with unmeasured space before me, and far beyond the restraints of civilization, and the power of man; or standing on the highest Andes, and looking down in triumphant scorn, on the miserable struggles of the world beneath; or a solitary, but free inhabitant of some island in the Pacific, walking thoughtful on the shore, and contemplating the Ocean, as it washed its murmuring sands; "Dark-heaving; boundless, endless, and sublime, When in April I left Dedham, (where I had resided many years among a generous, friendly and intelligent people,) I was hale and vigorous, able to confine myself to my desk without exercise, for five days in succession, and on the morning of the sixth to plunge into a trout stream, and trace its course till night, without suffering any inconvenience. In less than a year's residence in Boston, as a Custom House officer, I was an invalid, incapable of enduring manly exercise, and liable on any sudden exertion, or even on the receipt of agitating intelligence, to be attacked with violent palpi tations of the heart. And the constant dread of such paroxysms, left me few moments of enjoyment. For a time, the business throughout the Custom House was carried on smoothly and harmoniously. The Collector felt and enjoyed his new power and dignity; and as Bonaparte declared that "He was the State," so he looked and acted as if he was the Custom House. I made occasional visits to the Statesman office, and whenever I could snatch a moment of leisure, wrote communications for the papers. It was not long, however, before I discovered that General McNeil's appointment was not agreeable to "the party," and that it had probably eclipsed the brilliant expectations of some member of their confederacy. And in a conversation at the Statesman office, I learnt with contempt and indignation, that my allegiance was due to them, and not to my patron. I instantly remarked, that the General's interests would always claim my first care, and that I should maintain them against every other interest. On now looking back to this period of my official life, I am convinced that I derived my appointment, either through instructions given to Gen. McNeil at Washington, (as some equivalent for broken promises,) or through the influence of the "Statesman leaders," exerted with the design that I should act as a spy on the General's movements, and keep him in subjection to their authority. They justly supposed, that the General was not the sort of man to serve under such officers, when he had been in the habit of leading in contests rather more perilous than party warfare. Accordingly, he was never admitted into their political consultations, but pointedly excluded; and on every inviting occasion was treated with neglect, and subjected to mortification. At the 4th July dinner of the Washington Society, (in 1830,) at Concert Hall, the General was left to find a seat at the bottom of the table, while Henshaw, Simpson, Dunlap, Brodhead, Greene, and even some petty Custom House officers, took possession of the "chief seats," at the head. But these newspaper patriots did not perceive, that the place occupied by a gentleman, who had proved his patriotism by real services to his country, and carried about with him the evidence of it, and of his valour, viz: his wounds, was the actual head of the table. On this occasion, while we waited in the anti-room the announcement of dinner, I noticed a little man, to whom the general attention was directed. His countenance was peculiar. There was a strange attraction about it; if I looked in another direction my eyes involuntarily turned to survey it again. It recalled to recollection faces I had seen in dreams, (when suffering with indigestion,) which in spite of all my exertions kept close to mine, and were dreadful to look upon. I thought of Asmodeus, in "the devil on two sticks," and of Mephistopheles in Faustus." Who is that man," I exclaimed to a gentleman on my right hand. Why? he answered, dont you know him? That is Isaac Hill, of New Hampshire! After the feast, Mr. Hill favoured the company by reading a a written speech, wholly incomprehensible to every guest except the initiated, who sat near him. It intimated in dark and mysterious terms, the existence of a plot at Washington, originating with certain great men of the South, and having for its object the overthrow of the President, and Van Buren, and himself! To me, it was as an an unknown tongue," but I observed that the "Statesman leaders" smiled and nodded approbation and intelligence. A few months afterwards disclosed its meaning. 66 "Wash At this dinner, I gave the following abominable toast. ington and Jackson, the first and the last of our Revolutionary Presidents, the founder, and the restorer of the Republic,-the Elijah and the Elisha, of the same political faith." For two years past, I have never thought of this awful desecration of the memory of Washington, without an inclination to smite my breast like the publican, and cry, "God be merciful to me, a sinner." If the Washington Society will be merciful enough to expunge this sentiment from its records, I promise my lasting gratitude, and I trust future reward, by a gratuity of five dollars,-in Jackson Gold. Some months before this time, Collector Henshaw had been confirmed by the Senate, in his honors and dignities; and Mr. Brodhead, (by a majority of "one") had been permitted to exchange his shears, (one of the emblems of his craft,) for the quill, as Navy Agent. The other emblem, the goose, he carried with him, in his translation to a more elevated station, and probably will part with it only when life is extinct. About the time his success was announced, happening in at the Statesman office, one of the confederates told me that he was at Washington while Brodhead's nomination lingered before the Senate. It seems that Mr. John Roberts had communicated to the Senate certain statements in relation to Brodhead, which threatened to defeat his hopes; and that Mr. Roberts had been assured, the next nominee in that event should be himself. "Well," said the confederate, "finding this to be the state of matters, and that Brodhead was in trouble, what do you think I did? Why, I just stepped into a Justice's of the Peace office, and made an affidavit, that John Roberts's reputation for truth in Boston, was bad; which affidavit I handed in to the Senate." Was his reputation for truth bad, I enquired. "Why," he replied," You know we don't stand for the wear and tear of conscience on such occasions!" Poor John! he is dead now! He got an inkling of this attack on his reputation and came to me for information; but I refused to state any thing unless summoned before a tribunal of Justice, when I would declare all I knew. And this arrow was secretly thrust into his heart by one of his best friends, in honor of whom, at the 8th of January festival, a few months before, he had given the following toast. By John Roberts, Esq. and fearless -, Esq.-The talented Though violent partisans may vilify and worthless public officers cheat him, he has the confidence and support of all his political friends. The "Cabal" had, therefore, in 1830, succeeded in securing all the important offices to themselves. Henshaw's patronage, alone, was over 75,000 dollars per annum. And he and his associates lorded it over their dependants, with a despotism demanding the most lowly and debasing submission, such as no nobleman in Russia exercises over his serfs. I have read that in Tartary, when the nobles assemble for a "general drunk," they occupy some hall, in the second story of the building which is the scene of their revels. That from this hall pipes descend on the outside; and when the aristocracy are "full of the god," and part with the superfluous fluid through the pipes, the ignoble multitude, (the democracy,) on the out side, eagerly catch it, at second hand, and in time become as magnificent" as their masters! Such was the operation of official power in Boston! 66 CHAPTER IX. The Tax. "In the corrupted currents of this world, THE Statesman leaders being confirmed in their official possessions, next turned their power and avarice against their own humble dependants. They had grasped all the lucrative offices in Boston in the gift of the Government, but were not satisfied. Alexander wept for new worlds to conquer; and while a single dollar was to be had the Statesman leaders thirsted to pocket it. There was in the project I am about to unfold a meanness and extortion wholly unexampled, and almost beyond belief, could it not be substantiated by many respectable witnesses before any tribunal possessing the power to compel their attendance. I know that the Post and Statesman in the most emphatic language have repeatedly declared its falsity. Nevertheless, it is true. I know too that the Portland Argus and Augusta Age, both recently under the superintendence of F. O. J. Smith, were summoned to the assistance of the Statesman leaders when the project leaked out, and reiterated the denial of its existence, in the coarse and unmannerly terms for which those papers were distinguished. But it is true. F. O. J. Smith! What an Iceland fog must have enveloped the minds of the enlightened people of Cumberland County, when such an excrescence of party was plucked out of the political cauldron, and made their Representative to Congress! I claim an interest in Cumberland County, for I was graduated at Bowdoin under the paternal instructions of President Appleton, a pure and holy man, and of Professer Cleveland, the most eminent chemist and mineralogist in the country. We revered the President, but all of us loved the Professor, the fascination of whose familiar conversation is irresistible. He is the lever which has upheld the Institution from its beginning; the most splendid offers |