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collection, especially as you are on good terms. Suppose you should mention it to him, while he feels grateful, and get something from under his hand now, which may be useful in futuro.

I do not remember to have ever heard of Judge Symmes's writing upon the subjects you mention, nor do I think him qualified for it.

The continuation of Eliot, which has been so long interrupted, shall be attended to, and I will see if I can assist you respecting R. Williams.

We sincerely sympathize with Mrs. Belknap and yourself in your severe trial, and begin to be apprehensive for the consequence with respect to your son. May you have strength proportioned to your trials; and may this, and every other dispensation of Providence, work for your good. We hope Mrs. B.'s health may not be injured by her close confinement. Give our love to her.

The Legislature of this State have managed matters so that we shall have no voice in the election of a President and Vice-President of the Union; and, if they are not careful, we shall have no Senators. It will be well if we do not drive Congress from us.

Our city has been much infested with robbers; but, as some of them have been taken, we hope an end will be put to their depredations ere long. I am, dear sir,

Yours affectionately,

EBEN. HAZARD.

P. S. Since writing the above, I have finished my extracts about Eliot, and now send them.

You will find a good deal about Roger Williams in Governour Hopkins's History of Providence.

BELKNAP TO HAZARD.

BOSTON, January 24, 1789.

DEAR SIR, The Monarch called upon me last Monday evening, when I was abroad, and left word that he should come again next day at noon, upon business. The real business was to fish out what I had heard from you. I had then received only your short letter, and told him that I had heard nothing. He talked about the Magazine, and about my being a partner, and about the business of an editor, and about his being a lawyer (which, by the way, was new to me), and about the value of a share, which, as he then estimated it, would be from £50 to 100 per annum, &c., &c., but expected to hear from you and the proprietors more particularly by the next post, and then we were to have a farther conference. The next post brought me your long letter, and he has not made his appearance since. I suppose, by what you say in confidence to me, that he finds he cannot be directorgeneral, and possibly suspects that he may have very little to do. I find myself under some embarrassment with regard to this personage. However, as he is going to marry into a family with some branches of which I have long had a very agreeable connection, I must suffer myself to be in a degree of acquaintance with him, especially if (as he threatens) he should make this place his future residence. If I cannot esteem him as a friend, I do not wish to make him an enemy; and I am very awkward in the art of Chesterfield. Hence arises my embarrassment. What he has told Thomas, I know not; but I must do him the justice to say that he did not tell me the names of any of the proprietors, excepting yourself and himself; nor do I know who the others are.

Just as I finished the past page, yours of the 17th is brought in, inclosing a letter from Mr. Carey. And now

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I must make an episode. You said, in one of your late letters to me, that probably Charlestown people would soon have to build a house for Mr. Morse. I let this drop, in a conversation with a daughter of Mr. Carey, who is one of my congregation; and "know one woman by these presents was never more completely exemplified. In a day or two, it was all over Charlestown; and the girls who had been setting their caps for him are chagrined, while some of the elders of the land are really enquiring how, when, and where the house shall be got. I suppose it would be something to Mr. Morse's advantage, in point of bands and handkerchiefs, if this report could be contradicted; but, if it cannot, O how heavy will be the disappointment! When a young clergyman settles in such a town as Charlestown, there is as much looking out for him as there is for a 1000 dollar prize in a lottery; and, though they know that but one can have him, yet who knows but I may be that one. A part of Payne's popularity there arose from this circumstance. I say a part, for he was really an amiable character. A Mr. Andrews, who is lately ordained at Newburyport, is just such an object; and I am told that the linen comes in largely from the female part of the parish. I could tell you more, but it would be only exposing the weakness of some good folks. Do tell Morse, if he is not too far gone, that it will be much in favour of his popularity, and something in his pocket, if he can come to Charlestown with his neck clear of that fatal noose; but, if he cannot, I shall tremble for him, unless he should bring a yoke-fellow whom they must worship as much as they do him.

But, to return to the subject I was upon, or rather which I intended to be upon, for I do not mean to say any thing more of the Monarch. If your Magazine is to go on without a connection with Thomas, why will it not do to take Trenchard for an engraver, and make an union

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of interest with him? The advantage to him may be the saving the expence of printing, and the pay of an editor to you, if you adopt his title. It may be the supplying all the customers of the Columbian in all parts of the Continent; and certainly the distance and risque between New York and Philadelphia is not to be named as an objection. You cannot get a better engraver than he; and, if he should publish a January magazine on his present plan, and even a February one, you may strike in so as to carry it on after that under the same name, and your Register go along with it, at least as far as there was any probability on your first plan. Now, my friend, think of this. I am disposed to be connected where you are connected; and, if I can keep my old connection, and keep with you too, it will be a double gratification to me.

At present, I am unengaged by promise, though I cannot say I am by inclination. To be an editor, in this place, is what I deprecate. The integrity and the firmness of a Cato would scarcely make a man proof against the envy and obloquy to which he would be exposed. All that I would wish to do would be to write. something in my own way, at my own time, and on my own terms, which would be to have a present compensation, and yet a property in the work, if I should see fit to make use of it in another form afterward. My other engagements forbid my entering on an employment which would straiten me for time, and make me neglect what is already my duty.

I thank you for the extracts relating to Eliot, and shall make use of them by and by. I have some Providence papers, containing what Governour Hopkins published; but the work is imperfect. I shall probably go upon William Penn next, because the Quaker of whom I borrowed his works some months ago for this purpose has called for the book, and I must return it soon.

Can you procure for me in New York a book entitled

Uor M

"The Moral and Religious Miscellany, or Sixty-one Aphoretical Essays, by Hugh Knox, D.D., in St. Croix, printed at New York, by Hodge & Shober, 1775." If you can, please to send it, cum pretio.

My son remains very weak, much emaciated, his ulcers. continually discharging, and no hope of his recovery. Mrs. B. has been confined to his chamber 8 weeks, and has scarcely been out of it a quarter of an hour, at once, night or day.

Our best love to Mrs. Hazard, and I am

Your very affectionate friend,

JEREMY BELKNAP.

P. S. Please to forward the enclosed to Dr. Duffield. Do you know any thing of the man mentioned in it? He was treated with neglect here, but has grossly imposed on our honest friend Buckminster, at Portsmouth, and the last I heard of him was at Exeter. Ebrius et mendax.

HAZARD TO BELKNAP.

NEW YORK, January 25, 1789.

DEAR SIR, — Having a packet to forward you from my friend Morse, I write a line, just to let you know we are well. Has the Monarch been with you lately? Be cautious lest, like your friend, you believe too much. Poor Morse has been disappointed again; his printer uses him cruelly; he will succeed better in another line. Mr. Muir (who, you remember, was his competitor in our church) was appointed by Synod to supply our vacant pulpit four Sabbaths. This is the last; and I suppose he is now preaching his ultimatum. The last Sabbath but one that he preached for us, he gave out the 120th Psalm of Watts's Version. Considering the circumstances of his case, there was a degree of impiety in it that shocked, and of impudence that

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