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on the table, exclaiming triumphantly, "Two bullets and a bragger!" and swept all the money into his pocket. He has discovered a key to the hieroglyphics, thought I-happy mortal! no doubt, his name shall be immortalized. Willing, however, to be satisfied, I looked round on my companion with an inquiring eye; he understood me, and informed me that these were a company of friends, who had met together to win each other's money and be agreeable. "Is that all?" exclaimed I; "why then, I pray you, make way, and let me escape from this temple of abominations, who knows but these people, who meet together to toil, worry, and fatigue them. selves to death, and give it the name of pleasureand who win each other's money by way of being agreeable-may some one of them take a liking to me, and pick my pocket, or break my head in a paroxysm of hearty good-will!"

Thy friend,

MUSTAPHA.

JAMES I. OF SCOTLAND.

JAMES flourished nearly about the time of Chaucer and Gower, and was evidently an admirer and studier of their writings. Indeed, in one of his stanzas, he acknowledges them as his masters; and, in some parts of his poem, we find traces of similarity to their productions, more especially to those of Chaucer. There are always, however, general features of resemblance in the works of contemporary authors, which are not so much borrowed from each other as from the times. Writers, like bees, toil their sweets in the wide world; they incorporate with their own conceptions the anecdotes and thoughts which are current in society; and thus each generation has some feature in common, characteristic of the age in which it lived.

James, in fact, belongs to one of the most brilliant eras of our literary history, and establishes the claims of his country to a participation in its primitive honours. Whilst a small cluster of English writers are constantly cited as the fathers of our verse, the name of their great Scottish compeer is apt to be passed over in silence; but he is evidently worthy of being enrolled in that little constellation of remote but never-failing luminaries, who shine in the highest firmament of literature, and who, like morning stars, sang together at the bright dawning of British poesy.

How Peter Stuyvesant relieved the Sovereign People from the Burden of taking Cure of the Nationwith sundry Particulars of his Conduct in Time of

Peace.

THE history of the reign of Peter Stuyvesant furnishes a melancholy picture of the incessant cares and vexations inseparable from government; and may serve as a solemn warning to all who are ambitious of attaining the seat of power. Though crowned with victory, enriched by conquest, and returning in triumph to his metropolis, his exultation was checked by beholding the sad abuses that had taken place during the short interval of his absence.

The populace, unfortunately for their own comfort, had taken a deep draught of the intoxicating cup of power, during the reign of William the Testy; and though, upon the accession of Peter Stuyvesant, they felt, with a certain instinctive perception, which mobs as well as cattle possess, that the reins of government had passed into stronger hands; yet they could not help fretting, and chafing, and champing on the bit, in restiff silence.

It seems by some strange and inscrutable fatality,

to be the destiny of most countries (and more especially of your enlightened republics,) always to be governed by the most incompetent man in the nation; so that you will scarcely find an individual throughout the whole community, but who will detect to you innumerable errors in administration, and convince you in the end, that had he been at the head of affairs, matters would have gone on a thousand times more prosperously. Strange! that that government, which seems to be so generally understood, should invariably be so erroneously administered-strange, that the talent of legislation, so prodigally bestowed, should be denied to the only man in the nation to whose station it is requisite.

Thus it was in the present instance; not a man of all the herd of pseudo-politicians in New-Amsterdam, but was an oracle on topics of state, and could have directed public affairs incomparably better than Peter Stuyvesant. But so severe was the old governor in his disposition, that he would never suffer one of the multitude of able counsellors by whom he was surrounded, to intrude his advice, and save the country from destruction.

Scarcely, therefore, had he departed on his expedition against the Swedes, than the old factions of William Kieft's reign began to thrust their heads above water, and to gather together in political meetings, to discuss "the state of the nation." At these assemblages the busy burgomasters and their officious schepens made a very considerable figure. These worthy dignitaries were no longer the fat, well-fed tranquil magistrates, that presided in the peaceful days of Wouter Van Twiller. On the contrary, being elected by the people, they formed in a manner a sturdy bulwark between the mob and the administration. They were great candidates for popularity, and strenuous advocates for the rights of the rabble; resembling in disinterested zeal the widemouthed tribunes of ancient Rome, or those virtuous

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patriots of modern days, emphatically denominated "the friends of the people."

Under the tuition of these profound politicians, it is astonishing how suddenly enlightened the swinish multitude became, in matters above their comprehensions. Cobblers, tinkers, and tailors, all at once felt themselves inspired, like those religious idiots, in the glorious times of monkish illumination; and, without any previous study or experience, became instantly capable of directing all the movements of government. Nor must I neglect to mention a number of superannuated, wrong-headed old burghers, who had come over when boys, in the crew of the Goede Vrouw, and were held up as infallible oracles by the enlightened mob. To suppose that a man who had helped to discover a country did not know how it ought to be governed, was preposterous in the extreme. It would have been deemed as much a heresy as, at the present day, to question the political talents and universal infallibility of our old "heroes of '76"-and to doubt that he who had fought for a government, however stupid he might naturally be, was not competent to fill any station under it.

But as Peter Stuyvesant had a singular inclination to govern his province without the assistance of his subjects, he felt highly incensed on his return to find the factious appearance they had assumed during his absence. His first measure, therefore, was to restore perfect order, by prostrating the dignity of the sovereign people..

He accordingly watched his opportunity, and one evening when the enlightened mob was gathered together, listening to a patriotic speech from an inspired cobbler, the intrepid Peter, like his great namesake of all the Russias, all at once appeared among them, with a countenance sufficient to petrify a mill-stone. The whole meeting was thrown into consternation-the orator seemed to have received a paralytic stroke in the very middle of a sublime sentence, and stood aghast with open mouth and

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trembling knees, whilst the words horror! tyranny! liberty! rights! taxes! death! destruction! and a deluge of other patriotic phrases came roaring from his throat, before he had power to close his lips. The shrewd Peter took no notice of the skulking throng around him, but advancing to the brawling bully ruffian, and drawing out a huge silver watch, which might have served in times of yore as a town clock, and which is still retained by his descendants as a family curiosity, requested the orator to mend it and set it going. The orator humbly confessed it was utterly out of his power, as he was unacquainted with the nature of its construction. Nay, but," said Peter, "try your ingenuity, man; you see all the springs and wheels, and how easily the clumsiest hand may stop it, and pull it to pieces; and why should it not be equally easy to regulate as to stop it?" The orator declared that his trade was wholly different, he was a poor cobbler, and had never meddled with a watch in his life. That there were men skilled in the art, whose business it was to attend to those matters; but for his part he should only mar the workmanship, and put the whole in confusion. "Why, harkee, master of mine," cried Peter, turning suddenly upon him, with a countenance that almost petrified the patcher of shoes into a perfect lapstone "dost thou pretend to meddle with the movements of government-to regulate and correct, and patch, and cobble, a complicated machine, the principles of which are above thy comprehension, and its simplest operation too subtle for thy understanding, when thou canst not correct a trifling error in a common piece of mechanism, the whole mystery of which is open to thy inspection? Hence with thee to the leather and stone, which are emblems of thy head; cobble thy shoes, and confine thyself to the vocation for which Heaven has fitted thee. But," elevating his voice until it made the welkin ring, "if ever I catch thee, or any of thy tribe, meddling again with the affairs of government

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