their dear wives and fmiling babes, and ignominiously scourged for afferting their privileges as citizens! The country to which they looked for relief has regarded their fufferings with apathy and indifference. Three long, long years we have beheld their whippings and heard their lamentable cries; yet, for three long, long years we have been filent fpectators of the difgraceful fcene! We have begun a compact with their oppreffors, in which these poor dear fellows look with longing eyes in vain for one little tiny article, one ray of hope! I blush, that an American Minifter could be guilty of this difgraceful omiffion! Peter Porcupine.-Mr. Chairman, the Gentleman who spoke laft, has described the fufferings of our injured fellow-citizens in a manner that does infinite honour to his feelings. He talks about blushing and guilty difgraceful omiffions with a warmth peculiar to himself, and admirably calculated to produce what the players call ftage effect. Indeed, Sir, I cannot help looking on ourselves as engaged in the performance of a tragedy here: the Gentleman has gone back 2203 years, even to the days of Euripides, for his model. The piece will certainly do us honour; but it seems to be incomplete without a chorus to throw light on fome parts of it, that in particular where he speaks of blushing; and, as I have a few verses in my hand, which are not quite foreign to the subject, I beg leave to read them. "In fhort, to run the Livingstonian round, * See Democratiad. « Who "Who long have tried, by arts and measures bafe, "So weak, fo haughty, pompous, proud, and mean, Charity begins at home, fays the old proverb; and fo ought blushing, Mr. Chairman. One would think that a man to whom lines like thefe apply, need lend his cheek to blush for nobody, and particularly for the Governor of New-York, one of the brighteft characters in this or any country. There is more wisdom, more honefty, more real patriotism in one curl, nay in one fingle hair of Mr. Jay's wig, than in all the fkulls of all the Livingstons, from the days of St. Patrick down to the present hour. Mr. Livingfon.-The Gentleman feems to be paying me off in my own way. I am Peter Porcupine.-No, Sir, by no means; paying you at the rate of twenty fhillings in the pound. Mr. Livingfton.-I fee the Gentleman is a little nettled. The Houfe know too well the value of what he advances to form a wrong eftimate of it. I fhall let him fling his dirt; thank Heaven, it cannot foil my character. Peter Porcupine.-True, Sir; nor is it fo malicious to fling dirt as to fling ftones. I defy any one to fay, that I or any of my family or friends, ever flung ftones in order to knock out the brains of a man, whofe arguments I was afraid to hear, because I knew them to be irrefiftible. The treatment of Mr. Hamilton is a ftain, an everlasting ftain, on the city of New-York. I do not fcruple to fay, without difparagement to a crowd of worthily celebrated men of whom this country may boaft, that, after General Washington, this man has rendered it the moft moft effential fervices; this very man whom a gang of foreign ruffians were hired to dispatch. Had one of the miffiles hurled from their infamous hands ftruck him on the temple, you might have had the pleasure of feeing him expire at your feet, while we fhould have mourned the irreparable lofs. Were I to draw your character, Sir, and place it by the fide of that of Mr. Hamilton; then you would have reafon to blush indeed; a die ten thousand times deeper than crimfon would become your jaundiced cheek. Mr. Swanwick.-The Gentleman laft up feems to have loft fight of the queftion altogether. One would think he was contemplating protection to Mr. Hamilton instead of American feamen. I fhall endeavour to bring him back to the subject before the Committee, reminding him, at the fame time, that fuch perfonalities as he deals about him are very derogatory to the dignity of this House. I am aftonished that proofs of impreffments are called for. When we heard of American feamen being prifoners in Algiers, no evidence was required with refpect to numbers. The united exertions of the whole American people feemed to cry out for their releasement. Let us not be too nice about evidence. Thefe men are ignorant, and cannot give the neceffary information. Peter Porcupine.-Mr. Chairman, I thank the Gentleman for his hint about perfonalities;. but he will allow, that I am as excufable as Mr. Living. fton, who talked about the shameful, guilty, and difgraceful conduct of a moft upright public Minifter. I may not have the mellifluent eloquence of the Gentleman laft up: I know I am a rough-hewn mortal; but, as I am fpeaking to men, and not to an affembly of little mijes, the want of that Gentleman's filver lifp may not amount to a total difqualification. I fhall I fhall now turn to what the Gentleman has advanced on the fubject before us. He begs us" not "to be too nice about evidence." This is going a ftep beyond the Revolutionary Tribunal of Paris. There the accufer is heard, and if the jury are fatiffied of the guilt of the prifoner, no evidence is heard in his defence. This is not being over-nice; but we are required to be ftill lefs nice. The merciful French hear the witneffes against the prifoner at any rate; but we are called upon to give our verdict, without hearing any at all. Poor unfortunate Great Britain is to be condemned upon the bare indictment. One comes forward and accufes her; fhe holds up her feeble emaciated hand, and pleads, NOT GUILTY, my Lords. Some of us wifh to hear what can be urged against her; but the Gentleman tells us not to be too nice about evidence; that she is a notorious offender; that " every man knows it, though no one can give regular information of it;" and, in fhort, that the ought to have been annihilated long ago. In vain do we, like Pontius Pilate, afk, For what? Still they cry with one voice, Let her be crucified! Let her be crucified !-And is it thus we treat our poor old mother in the hour of her diftrefs? The Gentleman produces, as a fufficient reafon for our not being too nice, the great" ignorance of "the citizens impreffed." And do I hear this language from Mr. Swanwick? Is it poffible for the people to be ignorant, while under the rays of this focus of fcience? Do I live, Mr. Chairman, to hear the words ignorance and citizens articulated in the fame breath? How long, Sir, have our ears been dinned with, an informed people, an enlightened people; with the deftruction of fuperftition and prejudice, and the luminous clofe of the eighteenth century? And fhall we now be told, that our citizens are ignorant? that they are fuch stupid brutes brutes as not to be able to give an account of what has befallen them? not even of their imprisonments and their stripes? But Mr. Swanwick, after two or three days diligent fearch, brings us fomething like an account of fome men impreffed from a veffel of his own; and this, he infifts, is evidence enough for any reafonable man. Thus, when a failor can be brought to fay, that he has been impreffed and fcourged, he is an enlightened citizen; but when he cannot, he is a poor ignorant devil," not capable of giving the ne". ceffary information." The Gentleman told us fomething about Algiers; and, though I cannot for my foul perceive why Algiers was dragged into the debate, I look upon myself as entitled to fay a word or two in reply. "The united exertions," fays he, "of the whole "American people feemed to cry out for the release ment of the prifoners in Algiers." I believe, Sir, that the people in general were much affected with the fate of those unfortunate men, and that, had proper measures been taken to call their feelings into action, the prisoners would long ago have been reftored to their families and country, without the interpofition of Government; but no one will deny, that these measures fhould have originated with the merchants; that the example should have been given, and, indeed, the greatest part of the money beftowed, by themselves. Was this the cafe? They did, indeed, cry out;" they might, for ought I know, make fervent applications to Heaven; but the applications to their purfes, which had been filled by the toil and hardships of these poor fellows, were very faint and ineffectual. A fubfcription was opened in this city; Mr. Swanwick was himself one of the receivers; and I now call upon him to fay, how much his brethren fubfcribed, and how much he fubfcribed himself. I call upon him to fay, whe 66 |