She is the only injured party. America may,
perhaps, call her the aggressor; but if she were so, America has
not only repelled the injury, but done a greater. As to the rest, if
perfidy, treachery, avarice, and ambition can prove their cause to
have been a rotten one, those proofs are found upon them. I think,
therefore, that whatever scourge may be prepared for England, on some
future day, her ruin is not yet to be expected. Acknowledge, now, that
I am worthy of a place under the shed I described, and that I should
make no small figure among the _quidnuncs_ of Olney....
TO THE SAME
_Village justice_
17 _Nov_. 1783.
MY DEAR FRIEND,
... The country around us is much alarmed with apprehensions of fire.
Two have happened since that of Olney. One at Hitchin, where the
damage is said to amount to eleven thousand pounds, and another, at
a place not far from Hitchin, of which I have not learnt the name.
Letters have been dropped at Bedford, threatening to burn the town;
and the inhabitants have been so intimidated, as to have placed a
guard in many parts of it, several nights past. Some madman or some
devil has broke loose, who it is to be hoped will pay dear for these
effusions of his malignity. Since our conflagration here, we have sent
two women and a boy to the justice, for depredation; Sue Riviss, for
stealing a piece of beef, which, in her excuse, she said she intended
to take care of. This lady, whom you will remember, escaped for want
of evidence; not that evidence was indeed wanting, but our men of
Gotham judged it unnecessary to send it.
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