incorporation measures were adopted were adopted for the great expansion and "honorable support" of the public schools. Thirty years later Newburyport could boast of two more public schools than Boston. Here was tried more than sixty years ago, and successfully too, the experiment of Lancasterian schools. Here at the same time was an African school, before the colored children had, as now, all the educational privileges of the place. No town has been earlier or more honorably distinguished by special provisions for the education of its daughters; and nobly have its daughters responded to their opportunities. Some of them, like Hannah Gould, Lucy Hooper, Hannah Lee, have spoken to the ear and heart of the great public; some, like Jane Greenleaf and Mary Crocker, have shone in beneficent and missionary work; and a great and goodly company of them have lived, and still live, to grace the scenes and fill the joys of social life.

The highest education has found here a liberal and constant patronage. Benjamin Woodbridge was of the first class, and probably was the first man to receive a degree at Harvard college. From that time to this Newbury graduates from New England colleges are

1 This statement, which has been criticized by a writer in The Boston Transcript o June 15, 1885, is simply and literally a quotation from The Essex Journal of 1793, as cited in Mrs. Smith's History of Newburyport, p. 149. The Journal affirms that there were then "nine public schools," containing" about nine hundred children now educating at the public expense. Notwithstanding the smallness of this town, when compared with Boston, there are two more public schools here than in that place." The Transcript writer confirms this statement by saying that in Boston in 1794 there were seven public schools, so described,” and “the number of pupils was nearly 900," that is, two public schools less than those or Newburyport, and about the same number of pupils in them. As to the grade of character of the schools, the speaker made no comparison. The italics are found in the citation by Mrs. Smith.

counted by hundreds.

It is a list of men useful and honored, and many of them eminent, in the public walks of life. More than a hundred have been ministers of the gospel, among them men of renown, both living and dead. We have given to Bowdoin and to Hobart colleges each an accomplished president, Woods and Hale, and to Harvard two, Webber and Felton, besides such eminent professors as Pearson and Noyes. In the legal profession what brighter lights, in their several spheres, has New England seen than Theophilus Parsons, Caleb Cushing, and Simon Greenleaf? Who can call the roll of the distinguished teachers, the able editors, the skillful physicians, of whom it can be said, "This man was born here"? Hither came Isaiah Thomas, three years before the Revolution, to publish The Essex Journal and Merrimack Packet. In the early part of the present century Newburyport was peculiarly a bookish town. Eight journals established in as many years, half a dozen "social" libraries in operation at the same time, and somewhat later a public debating society, a Linnæan Society, Mozart Society, Horticultural Society, and Lyceum, and a lively book trade of high order, all indicate the intellect, refinement, and culture that tinged the bright social life of the town, and invested it with attractions for scholarly men second only to those of New England's metropolis.

Patriotism also has found a chosen home in this

ancient town. In every military movement, from the first Indian war to the last battles of the rebellion, she

has borne her part. Less than two years from the first settlement eight citizens marched under Stoughton to suppress the murderous Pequots in Connecticut. Sixty-seven soldiers went to the war against King Philip, and in the decisive fight at Narraganset they furnished one third of the wounded and slain. The men of Newburyport hastened to share in the overthrow of Andros; and one of them arrived in season, his dangling sword, as you well know, leaving "a stream of fire all the way from here to Boston” — and, we may add, from that day to this. In the next year soldiers were sent for the defense of Amesbury and Salisbury; and sixteen volunteers took part in the unfortunate expedition of Phips against Quebec. In the French and Indian war our Captain John March received fifty pounds from the General Court for his "brave defense" and his wounds at Casco fort. A large number of our troops bore a part in the reduction of Louisburg, and again in the expedition to Crown Point, and in the battle of Lake George, where our gallant Colonel Titcomb fell. Our troops shared in the taking of Louisburg and the capture of forts Frontenac and Du Quesne. The town was ripe for the Revolution long before it came. In 1754 it voted the excise bill to be "an infringement of the natural rights of Englishmen." In 1768 the young ladies were drinking their "liberty tea" made of ribwort; and about this time Newbury and Newburyport were denouncing the stamp act, joining the non-importation agreement, thanking Boston for its "vigilance and patriotic zeal,"

and in '73 pledging assistance "at the risque of our lives and fortunes." When the midnight news came. from the fight at Lexington four companies from Newbury and Newburyport hurried to the field of action. During the investment of Boston these towns sent six hundred pounds to that suffering city. At Bunker Hill the company of Captain Perkins fought to the last by the "rail fence," where the bullets were "thick as peas," and the company of Captain Lunt gallantly covered the retreat. Our soldiers joined Arnold's expedition to Quebec in the days of his glory, and on the night of his treachery our John Brown and Samuel Pillsbury were in vain tempted by the traitor to follow him to the deck of the Vulture. Our troops were at Long Island and White Plains and at the surrender of Burgoyne. This port was very nearly, if not quite, first as well as foremost in the privateering of the war. The cruisers of Nathaniel Tracy alone captured one hundred vessels and twentytwo hundred prisoners. But what havoc was wrought in these homes! "Seventy-two vessels, with crews. numbering more than a thousand men, sailed from Newburyport and were never heard of again." To the war of 1812 Newbury shared the general opposition of New England, and from it she sustained, as she feared, irreparable loss. In the war of the rebellion our troops responded to the first call, and throughout the struggle Newburyport exceeded her quota both in money and in men.

But the crowning trait of this ancient township has.

been her religion. Around this, it may be truly said, all else has centered. A church was her earliest institution, and churches have been her maturest fruits, as a dozen bells emphatically told us at sunrise this morning. Upon the workings of the first church for a quarter of a century was concentrated the interest, not only of the town, but of the colony; and the affairs of the several churches have absorbed to a remarkable degree the attention of this community through its whole history. The discussions and, if you please, the controversies they have aroused show the tenacity with which the men held the religion and the religion held the men. Some of their scruples have long lost significance.

import.

But most of them were matters of

Nor can it be for a moment doubted that religion was the primal source of their life and power. But for their religion they would not have been here, nor would they have been what they were. The settlement of the town and of its parts was gauged by the location of the meetinghouse, and its social life has been largely tinged by its parochial life. The very soldiers on their way to fight the Pequots halted to settle the question whether they were under a covenant of grace or of works. And the catechism left by Pastor Noyes shows also that the original type of that religion was the type of which Froude the historian speaks thus: "When all else has failed when patriotism has covered its face, and human courage has broken down when intellect has yielded, as Gibbon says, with a smile or a sigh, content to philosophize in