ment,
after nine years of the saddest haggling and baffling to and fro, under
Constitutional stress of weather, and such east-winds and west-winds
of Parliamentary eloquence as seldom were, has made up its mind, That
America shall pay duty on these Teas before infusing them: and America,
Boston more especially, is tacitly determined that it will not; and
that, to avoid mistakes, these Teas shall never be landed at all. Such
is Boston's private intention, more or less fixed;--to say nothing of
the Philadelphias, Charlestons, New Yorks, who are watching Boston, and
will follow suit of it.

"Sunday, November 26th,--that is, nineteen days ago,--the first of
these Tea Ships, the DARTMOUTH, Captain Hall, moored itself in Griffin's
Wharf: Owner and Consignee is a broad-brimmed Boston gentleman called
Rotch, more attentive to profits of trade than to the groans of
Boston:--but already on that Sunday, much more on the Monday following,
there had a meeting of Citizens run together,--(on Monday, Faneuil Hall
won't hold them, and they adjourn to the Old South Meeting-house),--who
make it apparent to Rotch that it will much behoove him, for the sake
both of tea and skin, not to 'enter' (or officially announce) this
Ship DARTMOUTH at the Custom-house in any wise; but to pledge his
broad-brimmed word, equivalent to his oath, that she shall lie dormant
there in Griffin's Wharf, till we see. Which, accordingly, she has
been doing ever since; she and two others that arrived some days later;
dormant all three of them, side by side, three crews totally idle; a
'Committee of Ten' supervising Rotch's procedures; and the Boston world
much expectant. Thursday, December 16th: this is the 20th day since
Rotch's DARTMOUTH arrived here; if not 'entered' at Custom-house in the
course of this day, Custom-house cannot give her a 'clearance' either
(a leave to depart),--she becomes a smuggler, an outlaw, and her fate is
mysterious to Rotch and us.

"This Thursday accordingly, by 10 in the morning, in the Old South
Meeting-house, Boston is assembled, and country-people to the number of
2,000;--and Rotch never was in such a company of human Friends before.
They are not uncivil to him (cautious people, heedful of the verge of
the Law); but they are peremptory, to the extent of--Rotch may shudder
to think what. "I went to the Custom-house yesterday,' said Rotch, 'your
Committee of Ten can bear me witness; and demanded clearance and leave
to depart; but