Thomas FitzSimons replied that if any member of the House had forced the gentleman from the determination to absent himself, such member's conduct met the disapprobation of the House. But Mr. McCalmont was now here and the business of the State cannot be accomplished if any one is suffered to withdraw.
When Mr. McCalmont attempted to leave he was restrained by the citizens who had "dragged" him into the Assembly. The House resumed the fixing a time for the Convention to act on the Constitution. The date was fixed. The people cheered. Christ Church chimes rang and Captain Barry, we may be sure, was happy. By his action within twenty-three hours of the adoption of the Constitution by the Federal Convention, Pennsylvania had ordered a State Convention to consider it. Verses relative to the "dragging" were soon published. One extract recited:
"It seems to me I yet see Barry
Drag out McCalmont."
But McCalmont undertook the "dragging" of Barry into Court. On October 13, 1787, he applied to the Supreme Executive Council and the Council directed the Attorney-General to commence a prosecution against "Captain John Barry and such other persons as shall be found to have been principally active in seizing James McCalmont or otherwise concerned in the riotous proceedings." Ben Franklin, President, was one of the eight who voted for the resolution. The Attorney-General began suit but at the Council meeting, February 16, 1788, he requested the advice of the Council "relative to the suit carried on by their order against Captain John Barry." The Council informed him it did not wish to interfere, but left the matter with him to do as he judged best.
So nothing more was done about the suit. By this time Captain Barry was on the high seas on his way to China in the merchant ship "Asia," in which he had sailed on January 7, 1787. It returned to Philadelphia, June 4, 1789. So Captain Barry had been away over two years. Eight years afterwards, on July 7, 1797, the "Asia," commanded by Captain Yard, when returning from Bengal, was captured in sight of Cape May, New Jersey, by the Spanish privateer "Julia," commanded by Don Baptista Mahon, a name indicating Irish descent. She was valued at $800,000. But the next month she was recaptured by an American privateer off Havana.
Columbia claims her soldier love and Ireland joys to own
The boy who sailed from his Wexford home undaunted if unknown;
Columbia guards his latest sleep—hers was his manhood's noon.
Ireland's the vigorous cradling arms and tender cradle croon;
For Ireland paints the dreaming boy on the lonely Wexford shore,
In 'customed clasp may meet the hands of mother and foster-mother
Above his grave, who was loyal to each as each unto the other.
—Margaret M. Halvey.
CHAPTER XVII.
Captain Barry Offers His Services to President Washington in Case of War Against the Algerines.