paper-money is thus every day weakened, by the creation of new banks, authorized and unauthorized -some of these banking institutions will dissolve, and fade away, and nobody will know where to go and get the money for their notes. Others will be sued for every five-dollar bill; the lawyers will have plenty of business, and no fees, except in papermoney; and instead of getting the money for a bill by asking for it in the good old way, we shall be obliged to go to law with a shadow, and purchase the assistance of those redoubtable fellows, John Doe and Richard Roe, who always make people pay dearly for their alliance.

"The issue of the trial was such as might be expected, in a district where fourteen banks and three corporations were hard at work making papermoney. It was dangerous to establish the precedent, that people who issued bank-notes without funds to redeem them, were swindlers; and so the worthy president was acquitted. His well-stored saddle-bags were restored, and he set forth, reassured and gay, to take in the flats of the south with his bank-notes, 'chartered by the State.' If the jury was warranted in the acquittal of this man, it would seem to imply, that there is no law either to prevent or punish such infamous impositions on the public credulity. It seems equally to follow, that it is high time for the legislatures to do their duty; and by passing a statute for that purpose, redeem themselves from a suspicion by no means uncommon, that some of them, at least, have more than once sold their consciences, and

sacrificed the public interests, to become accomplices in the roguery and gains of these swindlers of the nation. Though legislators, as we all know, are much above common men-though they are, as we all know, exempt from the usual frailties of our-I mean human nature; and elevated far above the temptations of self-interest; still, there is too much reason to suspect, that the bonus usually given on these occasions for public purposes, was not the only bribe offered and received on these occasions. However this may be, certain it is, that either by their folly, or knavery, their blindness or participation, a paper aristocracy has sprung up among the people, oppressive in the highest degree, and equally dangerous to their freedom as their morals. Not only in the cities, but in the country south of Connecticut river, are people losing their habits of industry, to become dependants on banks, and speculators in something or other; but what is perhaps still worse, men are daily more and more acquiring a habit of extravagance, supported by borrowing of the banks, and not by the regular profits of their estates, or their business. But the time is not far distant, when the landholder, and the possessor of real estate, will resume their proper station and influence in society, and no longer shrink into comparative insignificance before the momentary magnificence of some upstart, unreal pageant."

How long the sage and learned owl would have gone on with his reflections I know not; for in ummaging my pocket for a pencil to note down some

of his remarks, which I thought rather apt, I happened to bring out a half-eagle, which I had preserved as a last refuge against poverty. Sir Owl was nearly frightened out of his wits at this unexpected apparition, and began to whoop and flap his wings at such a rate, that I awoke with the terrible screeching he made, as he flew up the chimney. Adieu.

DEAR FRANK,

LETTER XXXVI.

INQUIRING at the post-office here, I got your letter, which, I honestly confess, made me laugh like a whole swarm of flies. Remembering what a hero you have always been at tea-parties, it diverted me out of measure to hear your complaints at being cut out by the little captain in the red coat, if coat it may be called, being, according to your description, destitute of skirts. This is the first time, it seems, the truth has been brought home to you, that the people of this country, and especially the genteeler sort, and most especially the fashionable belles, are still in a colonial state, and cherish pretty much the same notions as did their beautiful grandmothers, who figured at the little courts of the little governors of the little North American colonies.

The good city ladies who were belles some forty years ago, instil into the minds of their aspiring granddaughters the most romantic ideas respecting the beaux, who figured in regimentals, about his excellency the governor's drawing-room; and who, they insist upon it, were a different race of beings from those of the present day. It is to be observed, that ladies who have once been belles, attribute the absence of those attentions paid them when they were

VOL. II-N

young and beautiful, to a change in the nature of man, instead of the loss of their youthful attractions.

Hence it is that you hear them dwelling with such complacency upon the parties given at the government-house, before the war-of the politeness of his excellency, Sir what-d'ye-call-um-the polished man ners of the Honourable Major this, and the chivalrous gallantry of Lord that. Think of that, Frank,—a lord! I once met one of these ladies, who preserved, as relics, a pair of gloves, which she wore in dancing a minuet with Lord Dunmore, the revolutionary Cockburn. When, in addition to this influence, it is considered that the perceptions of the young misses are inflated with the habitual perusal of novels, the heroes of which are all foreigners, and, of course, gifted with superhuman excellence, it is no such mighty matter of wonder, that you, and your honest city beaux, should fare so ill, when unexpectedly brought into competition with a little red coat without any skirts; or that the young ladies should all run to the windows, when it passes, like the little white-headed urchins of the woods, when they hear the rattling of a carriage.

Still less is it to be wondered at, that so many of them have such an invincible propensity to become strollers about the European world; or that, in their insatiate desires to figure abroad, they often become victims to their own vanity, and marry swindlers or adventurers, under the temptation of being carried to Europe. Many of these have fallen under my observation, who thus chose to themselves a lot of