ime of the reduction of that place in 1745, and given
to the church by the officers of the New Hampshire troops.

The Old South Meeting-House is not to be passed without mention. It is
among the most aged survivals of pre-revolutionary days. Neither its
architecture not its age, however, is its chief warrant for our notice.
The absurd number of windows in this battered old structure is what
strikes the passer-by. The church was erected by subscription, and
these closely set large windows are due to Henry Sherburne, one of the
wealthiest citizens of the period, who agreed to pay for whatever glass
was used. If the building could have been composed entirely of glass it
would have been done by the thrifty parishioners.

Portsmouth is rich in graveyards--they seem to be a New England
specialty--ancient and modern. Among the old burial-places the one
attached to St. John's Church is perhaps the most interesting. It has
not been permitted to fall into ruin, like the old cemetery at the Point
of Graves. When a headstone here topples over it is kindly lifted up
and set on its pins again, and encouraged to do its duty. If it utterly
refuses, and is not shamming decrepitude, it has its face sponged, and
is allowed to rest and sun itself against the wall of the church with a
row of other exempts. The trees are kept pruned, the grass trimmed,
and here and there is a rosebush drooping with a weight of pensive pale
roses, as becomes a rosebush in a churchyard.

The place has about it an indescribable soothing atmosphere of
respectability and comfort. Here rest the remains of the principal and
loftiest in rank in their generation of the citizens of Portsmouth prior
to the Revolution--stanch, royalty-loving governors, counselors, and
secretaries of the Providence of New Hampshire, all snugly gathered
under the motherly wing of the Church of England. It is almost
impossible to walk anywhere without stepping on a governor. You grow
haughty in spirit after a while, and scorn to tread on anything less
than one of His Majesty's colonels or secretary under the Crown. Here
are the tombs of the Atkinsons, the Jaffreys, the Sherburnes, the
Sheafes, the Marshes, the Mannings, the Gardners, and others of the
quality. All around you underfoot are tumbled-in coffins, with here and
there a rusty sword atop, and faded escutcheons, and crumbling armorial
devices. You are moving in the very best society.

This, however, is not the earliest cemetery