"Yet things, perhaps, are not so bad—
Perhaps, a respite may be had:
The vilest rogues that cut our throats,
Or knaves that counterfeit our notes,
When, by the judge their sentence passed,
The gallows proves their doom at last,
Swindlers and pests of every kind,
For weeks and months a respite find;
And shall such nuisances as they,
Who make all honest men their prey—
Shall they for months avoid their doom,
And you, my trees, in all your bloom,
Who never injured small or great,
Be murdered at so short a date!

"Ye men of law, the occasion seize,
And name a counsel for the trees—
Arrest of judgment, sirs, I pray;
Excuse them till some future day:
These trees that such a nuisance are,
Next New-Year we can better spare,
To warm our shins, or boil the pot—
The Law, by then, will be forgot."

[44] This was published in the National Gazette of March 8, 1792, with this introduction: "Legislatures and city corporations have ever been inimical to trees in cities.—About nine years ago the attempt was made in Philadelphia to cut down all the trees—The public, however, demurred to the decree, which, together with Mr. Hopkinson's Columnal Orator, saved the lives of these useful and amusing companions.

"In a neighboring city, a similar attempt was made about a year ago by its corporation. A universal extirpation was ordered, without respect to age or quality, by the 10th of June, 1791.—The public interfered in this, as in the other case, and the trees were saved,[a] except a few, which having been injudiciously placed, above a century ago, had nearly grown into the inhabitants' houses; and consequently suffered the sentence of the law....

[a] A copy of verses, on this occasion, were as follow: THE LANDLORD'S SOLILOQUY, etc."

TO THE PUBLIC[45]

This age is so fertile of mighty events,
That people complain, with some reason, no doubt,
Besides the time lost, and besides the expence,
With reading the papers they're fairly worn out;
The past is no longer an object of care,
The present consumes all the time they can spare.

Thus grumbles the reader, but still he reads on
With his pence and his paper unwilling to part:
He sees the world passing, men going and gone,
Some riding in coaches, and some in a cart:
For a peep at the farce a subscription he'll give,—
Revolutions must happen, and printers must live:

For a share of your favour we aim with the rest:
To enliven the scene we'll exert all our skill,
What we have to impart shall be some of the best,
And Multum in Parvo our text, if you will;
Since we never admitted a clause in our creed,
That the greatest employment of life is—to read.