Voted, That it is the Sense of this Body that Capt Bruce shall on his Arrival strictly conform to the Votes passed respecting Capt. Hall's Vessel, as tho' they had been all passed in Referrence to Capt. Bruce's Ship.

Mr. Timmins appeared and informed that Capt. Coffin's Brig expected with Tea was owned in Nantucket, he gave his Word of Honor that no Tea should be landed while she was under his Care, nor touched by any one untill the Owner's Arrival.

It was then Voted, That what Mr. Rowe and Mr. Timmins had offered was satisfactory to the Body.

Mr. Copley returned and acquainted the Body, that as he had been obliged to go to the Castle, he hoped that if he had exceeded the Time allowed him they would consider the Difficulty of a Passage by Water at this Season as his Apology; He then further acquainted the Body, that he had seen all the Consignees, and tho' he had convinced them that they might attend this Meeting with safety, and had used his utmost Endeavours to prevail upon them to give Satisfaction to the Body; they acquainted him, that believing nothing would be satisfactory short of re-shipping the Tea, which was out of their power, they thought it best not to appear, but would renew their Proposal of storing the Tea, and submitting the same to the inspection of a Committee, and that they could go no further, without incurring their own Ruin; but as they had not been active in introducing the Tea, they should do nothing to obstruct the People in their Procedure with the same. It was then Moved, and the Question put, Whether the return made by Mr. Copley from the Consignees, be in the Least Degree satisfactory to this Body, and passed in the Negative. Nem. Con.

Whereas, a Number of Merchants in this Province have inadvertently imported Tea from Great Britain, while it is subject to the Payment of a Duty imposed upon it by an Act of the British Parliament for the Purpose of raising a Revenue in America, and appropriating the same without the consent of those who are required to pay it ;

Resolved, That in thus importing said Tea, they have justly incurr'd the Displeasure of our Brethren in the other Colonies.

And resolved further, That if any Person or Persons shall hereafter import Tea from Great Britain, or if any Master or Masters of any Vessel or Vessels in Great Britain shall take the same on board to be imported to this Place until the said unrighteous Act shall be repeal'd he or they shall be deem'd by this Body an Enemy to his country, and we will prevent the Landing and Sale of the same, and the payment of any Duty thereon. And we will effect the Return thereof to the Place from whence it shall come.

RESOLVED, That the foregoing Vote be printed and sent to England, and all the Sea Ports in this Province.

Upon a Motion made, Voted, That fair Copies be taken of the whole Proceedings of this meeting, and transmitted to New York and Philadelphia. And that

MR. SAMUEL ADAMS,
Hon. JOHN HANCOCK, Esq.,
WILLIAM PHILLIPS, Esq.,
JOHN ROWE, Esq.,

JONATHAN WILLIAMS, Esq.,

Be a Committee to transmit the same.

Voted, That it is the Determination of this Body, to carry their Votes and Resolutions into Execution, at the Risque of their Lives and Property.

Voted, That the Committee of Correspondence for this Town, be desired to take Care that every other Vessel with Tea that arrives in this Harbour, have a proper Watch appointed for her. Also Voted, That those Persons who are desirous of making a Part of these Nightly Watches be desired to give in their Names at Messieurs Edes and Gill's Printing Office.

Voted, That our Brethren in the Country be desired to afford their Assistance upon the first Notice given; especially if such Notice be given upon the Arrival of Captain Loring, in Messieurs Clarke's Brigantine.

Voted, That those of this Body who belong to the Town of Boston do return their Thanks to their Brethren who have come from the Neighbouring Towns, for their Countenance and Union with this Body in this Exigence of our Affairs.

Voted, That the Thanks of this Meeting be given to JONATHAN WILLIAMS, Esq.; for his good services as Moderator.

Voted, That this Meetiug be Dissolved - And it was accordingly Dissolved.

A sketch of the subsequent events we copy from the Boston Gazette, printed at the time:

Just before the dissolution of the meeting, a number of brave and resolute men, dressed in the Indian manner, approached near the door of the assembly, and gave the warhoop, which rang through the house, and was answered by some in the galleries, but

silence was commanded, and a peaceable deportment again enjoined till the dissolution. The Indians as they were then called, repaired to the wharf where the ships lay that had the tea on board, and were followed by hundreds of people, to see the event of the transactions of those who made so grotesque an appearance. They, the Indians, immediately repaired on board Capt. Hall's ship where they hoisted out the chests of tea, and when on deck, stove the chests and hove the tea overboard. Having cleared this ship, they proceeded to Captain Bruce's, and then to Captain Coffin's brig. They applied themselves so dexterously to the destruction of this commodity, that in the space of three hours they broke up 342 chests, which was the whole number in those vessels, and discharged their contents into the dock. When the tide rose it floated the broken chests and the tea, insomuch that the surface of the water was filled therewith a considerable way from the south part of the town to Dorchester Neck, and lodged on the shores. There was the greatest care taken to prevent the tea from being purloined by the populace. One or two being detected in endeavoring to pocket a small quantity, were stripped of their acquisitions and very roughly handled. *** The town was very quiet during the whole evening and the night following. Those who were from the country went home, and the next day joy appeared in almost every countenance-some on occasion of the destruction of the tea, others on account of the quietness with which it was effected-One of the Monday's papers says, that the masters and owners are well pleased that the ships are thus cleared."

LETTERS OF GEN. WASHINGTON.

General Washington's Letter, dated June 20th,1775, at Philadelphia, to the Independant Companies of Fairfax, Prince Williams, Fauquier, Spotsylvania and Richmond. GENTLEMEN,

I am now about to bid adieu to the Companies under your respective commands, at least for a while. I have launched into a wide and extensive field, too boundless formy abilities, and far, very far, beyond my experience. I am called, by the unanimous voice of the colonies, to the command of the Continential Army; an honor I did not aspire to, an honor I was solicitious to avoid, upon a full conviction of my inadequacy to the importance of the service. The partiality of the Congress, however, assisted by a political motive, rendered my reasons unavailing; and I shall to-morrow, set out for the camp near Boston. I have only to beg of you, therefore, before I go (especially as you did me the honor to put your Companies under my direction, and know not how soon you may be called upon in Virginia for an exertion of your military skill,) by no means to relax in the discipline of your respective Companies.

'SIR,

Head Quarters, Cambridge, August 11th, 1775.

I understand that the Officers engaged in the cause of Liberty and their Country, who by the fortune of war have fallen into your hands, have been thrown indiscriminately into a common Jail, appropriated for felons, that no consideration has been had for those of the most respectable rank, when languishing with wounds and sickness-that some of them have been even amputated in this unworthy situation. Let your opinion, Sir, of the principle which actuates them to be what it may, they suppose they act from the noblest of all principles, a love of freedom and their country. But political opinions, I conceive, are foreign to this point. The obligations arising from the rights of humanity, and claims of rank, are universally binding and extensive, except in case of retaliation. These I should have hoped, would have dictated a more tender treatment of those individuals, whom chance of war had put in your power. Nor can I forbear suggesting its fatal tendency to widen that unhappy breach, which you, and those ministers under whom you act, have repeatedly declared you wish to see forever closed.

My duty now makes it necessary to apprize you, that for the future I shall regulate my conduct towards those gentlemen, who are or may be in our possession, exactly by the rule you shall observe towards those of ours, now in your custody.

If severity and hardship mark the line of your conduct (painful as it may be to me) your prisoners will feel its effects, but if kindness and humanity are shown to ours, I shall with pleasure consider those in our hands only as unfortunate, and they shall receive from me that treatment, to which the unfortunate are ever entitled.

I beg to be favored with an answer, as soon as possible, and am,
Sir, your very humble servant,

His Excellency, Gen. GAGE.

G. WASHINGTON.

SIR,

Boston, August 13th, 1775.

To the glory of civilized nations, humanity and war have been compatible; and com. passion to the subdued is become almost a general system.

Britons, ever pre-eminent in mercy, have out-gone common examples and overlooked the criminal in the captive. Upon these principles your prisoners, whose lives by the laws of the land are destined to the cord, have hitherto been treated with care and kindness, and more comfortably lodged than the King's troops in the hospitals; indiscriminately it is true, for I acknowledge no rank, that is not derived from the King.

My intelligence from your Army would justify severe recrimination. I understand there are of the king's faithful subjects, taken some time since by the rebels, labouring like negro-slaves to gain their daily subsistence, or reduced to the wretched alternative, to perish by famine, or take arms against their king and country. Those who have made the treatment of the prisoners in my hands or of your other friends in Boston, a pretence for such measures, found barbarity upon falsehood.

I would willingly hope, Sir, that the sentiments of liberality, which I have always believed you to posses, will be exerted to correct these misdoings. Be temperate in political disquisition; give free operation to truth, and punish those who deceive and misrepresent, and not only the effects, but the causes of this unhappy conflict will be removed.

Should those under whose usurped authority you act, control such a disposition, and dare to call severity retaliation, to God who knows all hearts, be the appeal for the dreadful consequences. I trust that British soldiers, asserting the rights of the state, the laws of the land, the being of the constitution, will meet all events with becoming fortitude. They will court victory, with the spirit their cause inspires, and from the same motive will find the patience of martyrs under misfortune.

Till I read your insinuations in regard to ministers, I conceived that I had acted under the King; whose wishes, it is true, as well as those of his ministers, and of every honest man, have been to see this unhappy breach forever closed; but unfortunately for both countries, those who long since projected the present crisis, and influence the councils of America, have views very distant from accommodation.

I am, Sir, your most Obedient, humble Servant, GEORGE WASHINGTON, Esq.

SIR,

THOMAS GAGE.

Cambridge, (Head Quarters,) August 19, 1775.

I addressed you on the eleventh instant, in terms which gave the fairest scope for the exercise of that humanity and politeness, which were supposed to form a part of your character. I remonstrated with you on the unworthy treatment shown to the officers and citizens of America, whom the fortune of war, chance, or a mistaken confidence, had thrown into your hands.

Whether British or American mercy, fortitude, and patience, are most pre-eminent→ whether our virtuous citizens, whom the hand of tyranny has forced into arms, to defend their wives, their children and their property, or the mercenary instruments of lawless domination, avarice and revenge, best deserve the appellation of rebels, and the punishment of that cord, which your affected clemency has forborne to inflict; whether the authority under which I act, is usurped, or founded upon the genuine principles of Liberty, were altogether foreign to the subject.

I purposely avoided all political disquisition; nor shall I now avail myself of those advantages, which the sacred cause of my country, of liberty, and human nature give me over you, much less shall I stoop to retort and invective. But the intelligence you say you have received from our army requires a reply. I have taken time, Sir, to make a strict inquiry, and find it has not the least foundation in truth. Not only your officers and soldiers have been treated with a tenderness due to fellow citizens and brethren, but even those execrable parricides, whose councils and aid have deluged their country with blood, have been protected from the fury of a justly enraged people. Far from compelling or permitting their assistance, I am embarrassed with the numbers who crowd to our camp, animated with the purest principles of virtue, and love of their country. You advise me to give free operation to truth, to punish misrepresentation and falsehood.

If experience stamps value upon counsel, yours must have a weight which few can claim. You best can tell how far the convulsion, which has brought such ruin on both countries, and shaken the mighty empire of Britain to its foundation, may be traced to these malignant causes. You affect, Sir, to despise all rank, not derived from the same source with your own. I cannot eonceive one more honorable than that, which flows from the uncorrupted choice of a brave and free people, the purest source and original fountain of all pow.

er. Far from making it a plea for cruelty, a mind of true magnanimity and enlarged ideas would comprehend and respect it.

What may have been the ministerial views, which have precipitated the present crisis, Lexington, Concord, and Charlestown can best declare. May that God, to whom you then appeal, judge between America and you. Under his providence, those who influence the councils of America, and all the other inhabitants of the United Colonies, at the hazard of their lives, are determined to hand down to posterity those just and invaluable privileges which they received from their ancestors.

I shall now, Sir, close my correspondence with you; perhaps forever. If your officers, our prisoners, receive a treatment different from what I wished to show them, they and you will remember the occasion of it.

GENERAL GAGE.

1 am Sir, your very humble Servant,

G. WASHINGTON.

A Copy of General Lee's letter declining the interview proposed by General Burgoyne. Cambridge, (Head Quarters,) July 11, 1775. General Lee's Compliments to General Burgoyne. Would be extremely happy in the interview he so kindly proposed. But as he perceives that General Burgoyne has already made up his mind on this great subject; and as it is impossible that he (Gen. Lee) should ever alter his opinion, he is apprehensive that the interview might create those Jealousies and Suspicions, so natural to a people struggling in the dearest of all causes, that of their Liberty, Property, Wives, Children, and their future Generations. He must therefore defer the happiness of embracing a man whom he most sincerely loves, until the subversion of the present tyrannical ministry and system, which he is persuaded must be in a few months, as he knows Great-Britain cannot stand the contest. He begs General Burgoyne will send the letters which his Aid-de-Camp has for him. If Gardner is his Aid-de-Camp, he desires his love to him.

Anecdote of General Putnam.

During the late war, when Gen. Amherst was marching across the country of Canada, the Army coming to one of the lakes, which they were obliged to pass, found the French had a vessel of 12 guns upon it. He was in great distress; his boats were no match for her; and she alone was capable of sinking his whole army in that situation. While he was pondering what to be done, Putnam came up to him, and said, "General, that ship must be taken." "Aye!" says Amherst, "I would give the world if she was taken." "I'll take her," says Putnam. Amherst smiled, and asked how? "Give me some wedges, a beetle (a large wooden hammer or maul used for driving wedges,) and a few men of my own choice." Amherst could not conceive how an armed vessel was to be taken by four or five men, a beetle and wedges. However, he granted Putnam's request. When night came, Putnam, with his materials and men, went in a boat under the vessel's stern, and in an instant drove in the wedges behind the rudder, in the little cavity between the rudder and ship, and left her. In the morning, the sails were seen fluttering about; she was adrift in the middle of the lake; and being presently blown ashore, she was easily taken.

An Officer in Boston writes thus to his Father in London.

"Why should I complain of hard fate; Gen. Gage and all his family have for this, month past lived upon salt provisions. Last Saturday Gen. Putnam in the true style of military complaisance, which abolishes all personal resentment, and smooths the horrors of war when discipline will permit, sent a present to the General's Lady, of a fine fresh quarter of veal, which was very acceptable, and received the return of a very polite card of thanks."

The Enemies to Liberty and America, headed by Thomas Gage, lately gave a noble specimen of their hatred to the very name of Liberty. A Party of them, of whom one Job Williams was Ringleader, a few days since repaired to a tree at the south end of Boston, known by the name of Liberty-Tree, and armed with axes, &c., made a furious attack upon it.

After a long spell of laughing and grinning, sweating, swearing, and foaming, with malice diabolical, they cut down a tree, because it bore the name of Liberty. But be it known to this infamous band of Traitors that the GRAND AMERICAN TREE OF LIBERTY, planted in the centre of the United Colonies of North America, now flourishes with unrivalled, increasing beauty, and bids fair in a short time, to afford, under its wide spreading branches, a safe and happy retreat for all the sons of Liberty, however numerous and dispersed.

This once hated ground is now covered by a splendid block of stores, (which is nearly opposite Boylston Market,) erected by the Hon. D. Sears, of this city.

Ꭼ Ꭱ Ꭱ Ꭺ Ꭲ Ꭺ .

In our statistics of the Legistature there are a few errors and omissions which we here rectify.

Page 4, J. T. Buckingham, of Cambridge;-occupation: Printer.

Page 5, A. B. Munroe, of Boston;-date of birth: Jan. 23, 1801.

Page 7, Gardner Parker, of Billerica ;-date of birth: Sept. 19, 1808.

Page 7, Joseph Breck, of Brighton;-native place: Medfield.

Page 8, Charles King, of Barre;-date of birth: Jan. 18, 1813; native place: Rutland; occupation: Merchant; first Legislative year: 1850.

Page 9, Myron Lawrence, of Belchertown ;-date of birth: May 18, 1799.

Page 10, Joseph W. Howe, of New Marlboro';-date of birth: Sept. 24, 1802; native place: Brookfield; occupation: gun powder manufacturer; first Legislative year :

1839.

Page 11, Noah Vining, of Weymouth.

Page 12, Ebenezer Freeman, of Wellfleet;-first Legislative year: 1833.

Page 13, The first section of the Table of Recapitulation should read as follows:Farmers, 84; Merchants and Traders, 49; Lawyers, 34; making a difference of 1 in the total of that section; viz. 279 instead of 280. In the third section, gunpowder manufacturer is omitted, making a difference of 1 in the total; viz. 35 instead of 36.