The Poems of Philip Freneau Volume II Part 18

NEW-YORK, _Feb. 20, 1782_.

[131] Published in the _Freeman's Journal_, February 27, 1782. One week earlier it was advertised for sale as a broadside. I have followed the 1786 version.

James Rivington, an Englishman, was a bookseller and printer in New York from 1761 until the close of the Revolution. In 1773 he published the first number of _The New York Gazetteer, or the Connecticut, New Jersey, Hudson's River and Quebec Weekly Advertiser_. At the opening of the war he became a violent British partisan. His office was destroyed by the Whigs in 1775. Two years later he established _Rivington's New York Loyal Gazette_, which became the official British newspaper in America.

On December 13 of the same year, he changed the name to the _Royal Gazette_. In the last years of the Revolution, when British success seemed more and more uncertain, Rivington began to lean toward the Whig side, but he was never trusted by the patriots, and he pa.s.sed his last years in loneliness and poverty.

[132] Omitted in later editions.

[133] Baron Wilhelm von Knyphausen, in command of the Hessian troops.

[134] "Tremendous."--_Ed. 1809._

[135] David Mathews, Mayor of New York during the British occupancy.

LINES

Occasioned by Mr. Rivington's new t.i.tular Types to his _Royal Gazette_, of February 27, 1782[136]

Well--now (said the devil) it looks something better!

Your t.i.tle is struck on a charming new Letter: Last night in the dark, as I gave it a squint, I saw my dear partner had taken the hint.

I ever surmised (though 'twas doubted by some) That the old types were shadows of substance to come: But if the new Letter is pregnant with charms, It grieves me to think of those cursed King's Arms!

The _Dieu et mon droit_ (his G.o.d and his right) Is so dim, that I hardly know what is meant by't; The paws of the Lion can scarcely be seen, And the Unicorn's guts are most shamefully lean!

The Crown is so worn of your master the Despot, That I hardly know whether 'tis a crown or a p.i.s.spot: When I rub up my day-lights, and look very sharp I just can distinguish the Irishman's Harp: Another device appears rather silly, Alas! it is only the shade of the Lilly!

For the honour of George, and the fame of our nation, Pray give his escutcheons a rectification-- Or I know what I know, (and I'm a queer shaver) Of Him and his Arms I'll be the In-grave-r.

[136] Published in the _Freeman's Journal_, March 13, 1782.

LINES

On Mr. Rivington's new engraved King's Arms to his _Royal Gazette_[137]

From the regions of night, with his head in a sack, Ascended a person accoutred in black, And upward directing his circular eye whites; (Like the Jure-divino political Levites) And leaning his elbow on Rivington's shelf, While the printer was busy, thus mus'd with himself: "My mandates are fully complied with at last, "New arms are engrav'd, and new letters are cast: "I therefore determine and freely accord, "This servant of mine shall receive his reward."

Then turning about, to the printer he said, "Who late was my servant shall now be my Aid; "Since under my banners so bravely you fight, "Kneel down!--for your merits I dubb you a knight, "From a pa.s.sive subaltern I bid you to rise "The Inventor as well as the Printer of lies."

[137] _Freeman's Journal_, March 27, 1782. The _Gazette_, among the Whigs at least, was the synonym for falsity and unfairness. It was generally alluded to as the _Lying Gazette_.

A PROPHECY[138]

Written 1782

When a certain great king, whose initial is G, Shall force stamps upon paper, and folks to drink tea; When these folks burn his tea, and stampt paper, like stubble, You may guess that this king is then coming to trouble.

But when a pet.i.tion he treads under his feet, And sends over the ocean an army and fleet; When that army, half-starved, and frantic with rage, Shall be coop'd up with a leader whose name rhymes to cage, When that leader goes home, dejected and sad, You may then be a.s.sur'd the king's prospects are bad: But when B and C with their armies are taken, This king will do well if he saves his own bacon.

In the year seventeen hundred and eighty and two, A stroke he shall get that will make him look blue; In the years eighty-three, eighty-four, eighty-five, You hardly shall know that the king is alive;[139]

In the year eighty-six[140] the affair will be over, And he shall eat turnips that grow in Hanover.

The face of the lion then shall become pale, He shall yield fifteen teeth, and be sheer'd of his tail.

O king, my dear king, you shall be very sore, The Stars and the Lilly shall run you on sh.o.r.e, And your lion shall growl, but never bite more.

[138] Published in the _Freeman's Journal_, March 27, 1782, with the following introduction:

"Mr. Printer: The people of England at this time seem persuaded or rather deluded into the opinion that the American revolt will be quashed in the year 1786, and under that idea it is likely will prosecute the war with vigour for some time to come. This infatuation chiefly owes its birth to a prophecy of one John Cosins, who lived in the reign of the Second Charles, importing that a certain transatlantic insurrection, and the Kirk of Scotland, will both fall to the ground in the year above mentioned. Cosins's predictions are as follows, taken from the _Royal Gazette_ of the 18th ult.:

'When a branch of the thistle gets over the Atlantic, And in a new world the root shall be planted, And when it doth arrive at a degree of perfection It surely will breed a great insurrection.

In the year seventy and four the root will be polished, And in eighty and six it will be quite abolished.

The lily and the thistle in that year will unite, But the lion and the dun cow will put them to flight.

The eagle will eagerly join in the fray, But luna will clip both their wings in a day.

O thistle, O thistle, thy wounds will be sore.

Kirk and kirk government will be no more, And you'll be abridg'd of all civil power.'

To show that America has not been wholly dest.i.tute of oracular sages in past times, I send you the following choice words or prophetical hints of an illiterate fisherman, who died about thirty years ago at his habitation, a few miles above the mouth of the Susquehanna. I discovered the paper containing them by mere accident in tumbling over the leaves of an old book at an inn near that place. If you think the lines worth inserting in your paper, they are at your service."

Reprinted without change in the edition of 1786, the text of which I have followed above. In later editions the prophecy was changed somewhat to conform to historical facts.

[139] In the later editions these two lines are made to read:

"And soon, very soon, shall the season arrive When _Nebuchadnezzar_ to pasture shall drive."

[140] "In the year eighty-three."--_Ed. 1795._

THE ARGONAUT

OR, LOST ADVENTURER[141]

True to his trade--the slave of fortune still-- In a sweet isle, where never winter reigns, I found him at the foot of a tall hill, Mending old sails, and chewing sugar canes: Pale ivy round him grew, and mingled vines, Plaintains, bananas ripe, and yellow pines.

And flowering night-shade, with its dismal green, Ash-coloured iris, painted by the sun, And fair-haired hyacinth was near him seen, And China pinks by marygolds o'er-run:-- "But what (said he) have men that sail the seas, "Ah, what have they to do with things like these!

"I did not wish to leave those shades, not I, "Where Amoranda turns her spinning-wheel; "Charmed with the shallow stream, that murmured by, "I felt as blest as any swain could feel, "Who, seeking nothing that the world admires, "On one poor valley fixed his whole desires.

"With masts so trim, and sails as white as snow, "The painted barque deceived me from the land, "Pleased, on her sea-beat decks I wished to go, "Mingling my labours with her hardy band; "To reef the sail, to guide the foaming prow "As far as winds can waft, or oceans flow.