** Otis's Botta, i., 124.
*** There were many persons of some significance who were willing, at this stage of the controversy, to offer conciliatory measures, and they even gave encouragement to General Gage and his government. One hundred and twenty merchants and others of Boston signed an address to General Gage, expressing a willingness to pay for the tea destroyed. It is averred, also, that some of the wealthiest people of Boston actually endeavored to raise money to pay the East India Company for the tea, but the attempt failed. There were some others who protested against the course of the Committee of Correspondence and the action of a large portion of the ministers of the Gospel, who, they averred, were unduly exciting the people, and urging them headlong toward ruin. But these movements were productive only of mischief. They made the colonists more determined, and deluded the home government with the false idea that the most respectable portion of the people were averse to change or revolution. The following is a copy of the recantation, signed by a large number of the addressors: "Whereas we, the subscribers, did some time since sign an address to Governor Hutchinson, which, though prompted to by the best intentions, has, nevertheless, given great, offense to our country; We do now declare, that we desire, so far from designing, by that action, to show our acquiescence in those acts of Parliament so universally and justly odious to all America, that, on the contrary, we hoped we might, in that way, contribute to their repeal; though now, to our sorrow, we find ourselves mistaken. And we do now further declare, that we never intended the offense which this address has occasioned; that, if we had foreseen such an event, we should never have signed it; as it always has been and now is our wish to live in harmony with our neighbors, and our serious determination is to promote, to the utmost of our power, the liberty, the welfare, and happiness of our country, which Is inseparably connected with our own." The Committee of Correspondence declared the recantation satisfactory, and recommended the signers of it as true friends to America.
Spirit of the American Press.—Zeal of the Committees of Correspondence.—Their importance.—Fortification of Boston Neck.
first received Hutchinson's letters from Franklin) were very active in promoting hostility to the rulers, and the press exerted its power with great industry and effect. *
The Massachusetts Spy and the Boston Gazette were the principal Whig journals, and through the latter, Otis, Adams, Quincy, Warren, and others communed with the public, in articles suited to the comprehension of all. Epigrams, parables, sonnets, dialogues, and every form of literary expression remarkable for point and terseness, filled these journals. The following is a fair specimen of logic in rhyme, so frequently employed at that day. I copied it from Anderson's Constitutional Gazette, ** published in New York in 1775. That paper was the uncompromising opponent of Rivington's (Tory) Gazette, published in the same city.
"The Quarrel with America fairly Stated.
"Rudely forced to drink tea, Massachusetts in anger
Spills the tea on John Bull—John falls on to bang her;
Massachusetts, enraged, calls her neighbors to aid,
And give Master John a severe bastinade.