"Because I have no intention to do so, either first or last."

"Villain!" resumed the fellow, holding a long pointed knife to his throat," have you now a mind to discover ?"

"Not the least in the world," replied Boss, with the utmost seeming indifference.

"Cut out his stubborn tongue !" exclaimed another of the mob.

"Do!" said Boss.

"I shall be more likely to tell you then :" and as he said this, he slowly puffed a mouthful of smoke into the face of this new assailant.

"Curse the fellow!" continued the same party, "he seems to mind his pipe more than our threats."

"A good deal more," replied Boss, favouring him with another whiff, which so provoked the recipient that he violently dashed the pipe out of his mouth.

Boss had endured, with patience, the scurrilous terms applied to his master and himself; but an insult to his pipe was beyond the limitations assigned to his phlegm. His eyes began to wink and sparkle with rapid corruscations, and though the rest of his face was as imperturbable as if it had been cut out of wood, his limbs appeared to sympathize with his optics; for he suddenly raised his muscular arm, and, with one blow, laid the destroyer of his pipe sprawling upon the ground, amidst its fragments.

This was the signal for a general tumult and assault: knives were drawn and flourished, fists began to rain blows upon the broad shoulders of Boss, and it would probably have gone hard with him, had not the leader of the rabble, in a loud and authoritative voice, ordered them to desist; reminding them that the prisoner was, perhaps, the only person who could guide them to the traitorous Burgomaster's retreat, and that the torture would presently wring the secret from him. "I will state nothing," cried Winky Boss, "to an angry mob, which may pervert every thing I utter into a crime; but if you will take me before the Justiciary Vanderhoof, I will make a deposition of all that I know."

"To the Justiciary! Away with him to the Justiciary!" cried the many-headed monster; and they forthwith began hauling him to the opposite extremity of the town, where that functionary dwelt; and which was the sole reason why his name had been mentioned by the prisoner. Considerable time was gained for his fugitive master, by his thus diverting the attention of the mob; nor was he a whit more disposed to give them the information they sought, when they at length reached the magistrate's residence. No sooner did that personage understand the object of this unexpected visit, than he seated himself with all due ceremony in his hall of justice, bidding his clerk prepare to take down the deposition of the prison

VOL. III.

er; but Winky Boss declared he would save him that trouble, as he had changed his mind for the present; adding, however, that if his worthy friends, the mob, would do him the favour to call at the same hour, on the following day, he should have no objection to tell them all he knew, as he calculated that by that time the object of their search would be completely beyond their reach.

The previous wrath of the populace, was a halcyon serenity, compared to the fury with which they were seized, at being thus defiled and cajoled. Again were their long knives brandished in the air, as they demanded the prisoner with loud cries in vain did the magistrate implore them not to sully the hall of justice with murder. They rushed impetuously towards their intended victim when the justiciary, who feared that he might be rendered, in some way, responsible for an assassination committed in his presence, opened a private door that communicated with his dwellinghouse; pushed the prisoner in, closed it again, and placing himself before it declared that he would allow no one to pass, but that he would hold himself accountable for the production of the supposed delinquent, whenever his examination could be safely resumed.

At this moment, two or three voices cried out, "To the Boompies! to the Boompies! Let us attack the Burgomaster's house!" and the versatile mob attracted by the hope of plunder, instant

ly echoed the cry, and sallied forth to wreak that vengeance upon the property of the master, which they had been prevented from inflicting upon the person of the servant. Miss Vanspaacken, who had, at her own request, been left in charge of the mansion, having received some obscure intimations of the meditated attack, had already ordered all the doors to be closed; and no popular assault would have easily forced a massy structure, originally built for defence, had due preparations been made for repelling it. Nothing of this sort was meditated, Miss Vanspaacken relying sufficiently upon the effects of her oratory, to believe that she could tame the savageness of the mob, and induce them to spare the house which she inhabited, as religiously as the Spartans respected the abode of Pindar, when they sacked the city of Thebes.

To give this experiment a fair trial, she betook herself to a lower gallery, whence she harangued them in a speech as neat as her own formal habiliments. Every syllable was distinctly articulated; the double a's were expanded to their full breadth, and she had never been more happy in the strict grammatical use of the subjunctive mood. But the mob, unfortunately, were in the imperative mood; they commanded her to open the doors, and their mandate not being obeyed, they proceeded to pelt her with objectionable missiles, and to batter the principal entrance with the beam of a crane, which they tore down for that purpose. Soon obtaining

admittance, by this rough expedient, they rushed into the house with loud cries of triumph, exhibiting the same blind and brutal rage in the work of pillage and demolition, that led them, at a subsequent period, to assault and massacre their best. friend, and the last remaining champion of their liberties, the illustrious De Witt.

Such of the costly furniture as could not be conveniently carried off, was broken and destroyed; the rare exotics and rich roots were thrown from the balconies and windows; the museum, with all its curiosities and quaint devices of clock-work and mechanism, was scattered and trampled under foot; the matchless marbles, and exquisite statues of the gallery, were barbarously cast down and mutilated. In the progress of this work of devastation, a party of the rioters approached a door, before which Miss Vanspaacken was keeping guard. During her long domiciliation with the Burgomaster, his generosity had enabled this lady to amass a considerable sum, which he had repeatedly urged her to lay out in some secure investment; but she knew so much better than any body else the best disposition to make of her property, and, moreover, was so perfectly well acquainted with the insecurity of all the methods recommended to her for its profitable employment, that she preferred hoarding, and suffering it to lie unproductive, to incurring the smallest risk. This over-caution, as is not uncustomary in such cases, defeated its own object :