making one cup of hot coffee, and I thought I could not better improve my "leisure hour" during this halt than by putting the usefulness of this article to the test. When I came out of my palkee, the natives busy at the bazaar flocked round me to gaze at the stranger saheb. I looked around for a place of shelter from the burning rays of the noonday sun, and saw an old, empty, dilapidated native hut, walls and roof transparent, no door or window of course, and the floor in keeping with the rest of the tottering structure. Thither I went, and there I proposed to prepare my coffee. When the group of natives around saw me advance to take possession of this miserable hovel, one of them very considerately and kindly ran for a broom, and swept tolerably clean as much of it as he thought I might need or use. I tried to sit down on the mud floor, but could not without considerable discomfort. I therefore said to the gaping crowd, in Bengalee, "Choukee assé ki na?"—" Have you got a seat of any kind?" One immediately said, "Ha, saheb," and ran and fetched a mora, a low seat made of wickerwork, which I very thankfully received, evidently to the great enjoyment of the whole company. I then produced and fitted up my apparatus, set fire to my spirit-lamp, and after a very short time capital coffee began to distill into my cup. At my request, another native brought me some milk, and with my biscuits I fared well, and enjoyed my repast much.

Ere long my bearers were all ready, and I started again. The day was peculiarly hot and trying, cooped up as I was in my palkee, and the sun beating on its slender cover; but a strong breeze helped me somewhat. Many were my musings, many my short naps, during the day, for the jolting of the bearers was such that I never could read with comfort when journeying by palkee dâk. Nothing particular transpired till my bearers set me down again in the midst of another large market. We came to a dead halt in the very heart of the bazaar. There I was on the ground, lying stretched in my palkee, among hundreds of wondering natives of Bengal, men, women, and children. They gazed with such amazement at me as showed that Europeans were very rarely seen traveling thus in this part of the country. The usual mode is to go all the way from Dacca to Chittagong by water;

to save time I went by land. I arose, came out, stood erect; then said to them in their own tongue, “Come, see; here I am; look at me! come, look as much as you please." They smiled, and drew near. They brought me some beautiful plantains for sale, a very pleasant fruit, somewhat like an over-ripe pear; I bought the whole, and distributed them among the children around, greatly to the delight of all, especially the boys. A few pice, a small copper coin, were given me back as change when I paid for the plantains; the whole of these pice, amounting only to a few pence, I scattered among the crowd; their wonder knew no bounds. A little kindness to the natives I always found to go a great way; thus I gained their confidence, and left a good impression behind me.

In the afternoon we had to cross a river called the Fenny; palkee, bearers, myself, baggage, and all were obliged to do it in a canoe made of the trunk of a tree. The river was broad, but smooth as a pond; and we got over beautifully, narrow and frail though our barge undoubtedly was. While crossing, as was my wont, I conversed with my native bearers. "What mountains are these ?" said I, pointing to the left. They gave me a name I did not catch; but one said, Tigers and elephants are there, and wild men, too, who eat men." “Ah!" said I, "why do you tell me that? Will they come and eat me, a lonely stranger in your strange land? Have I cause to fear?" O no, saheb," they all cried out; fear not." And to lay my anxiety completely at rest, one said, "They never come into the Company Sirdar's territory." Having thus secured their attention I talked with them on matters likely to do them good.

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66

After crossing the Fenny I walked a good way for exercise, talking with my bearers. They told me there was a very holy place near, called Seetakoond, where thousands and thousands of pilgrims assembled at their great Hindoo festivals. I asked why these crowds of pilgrims met there? "O!" they said, "there is a thackoor at Seetakoond, a muhadeo, a great god. "A great god!" I said; "what is he like? Has he hands?" "No," they said. Eyes?" No." like?" I asked. answered.

"Feet?" "No." "What, then, is he "Pathur," a stone, they "A stone!" I said; 66 a stone

A REVOLUTIONARY PATRIOT.

THE

HE Revolutionary war is a mine of inexhaustible historical wealth. After all that has been done to develop its resources, new and rich veins are almost constantly being opened. Though the more prominent actors in that glorious struggle have already been more or less largely noticed by the pen of the historian, there are still other names equally worthy of historic record, which are unknown beyond a very limited circle. To rescue these names from oblivion, and to trace their connection with events of the deepest interest to the American people, so far | as the thing can be done, should be regarded as a Christian no less than a patriotic duty. And if this duty be ever done at all, now is the time to do it. In a short period their memorial will have perished, or, more properly, the means of perpetuating it will have passed away.

The subject of this paper, KIRTLAND GRIFFIN, Esq., died a few years since in Paris, Oneida County, New-York, at a good old age, and with a reputation as untarnished as virtue itself. He was born in Guilford, Connecticut; and, on approaching the years of manhood, gave himself to the service of his country, and was posted as a private at Ticonderoga. The duties and privations of the place soon broke down his health, so that after about six months he was obliged to return home. Not content to remain there, however, while his assailed country was calling for help, and hoping that service at sea might operate favorably upon his exhausted energies, he enlisted on board of a privateer, then being fitted out at Marblehead. The cruise was successful, and several prizes of considerable value were taken and brought into port. Young Griffin now finding his health materially improved, and the time for which he enlisted having expired, proposed to return home again. But his services having been found valuable, he was urged to remain, and consented to do so. His vessel again put to sea in quest of prizes; but, instead of accomplishing its object, was itself taken. As it was moving before a slight breeze, night came on, attended by a dense fog. When morning dawned, and the fog had passed away, the crew were surprised to find themselves in dangerous proximity to a British man-of-war, the "None-Such,"

carrying ninety guns! Their only hope, a very slight one, was in escape. They made the attempt, but failed. The enemy saw them; and, as a summons to surrender, discharged first one gun before, and then one gun behind them. But, as they did not stop, another shot was fired into their rigging. Seeing now escape quite out of the question, and resistance entirely hopeless, they sorrowfully surrendered. They were accordingly taken on board the man-of-war and carried to England. While the None-Such was lying at anchor in Plymouth Sound, Griffin was a personal spectator of one of the most painful casualties that ever happened to the British Navy, the sinking of the Royal George.

Still on board the None-Such, Griffin and several of his fellow-prisoners were seized with small-pox, and, in consequence, taken on shore and put into a hospital. One of them, a young man from Massachusetts, in a state of mental derangement, brought on by the violence of the disease, jumped out of a window in the second story of the building; but was so little injured by the fall, that he walked into the house again ere he had been missed! He survived, however, only a few hours after this singular event. A tender incident connects itself with the history of this unfortunate young man. When he became a party to the privateering expedition just named, he left a special object of affection near the city of Boston; no doubt with the confident expectation of soon seeing her again. But, alas, here the poor fellow is, sick unto death, among strangers, in the land of his enemies; destined never again to look upon one whose love was so precious a boon! But his heart was true to the last; for, availing himself of the ready pen of his friend Griffin, who was now nearly restored to health, he bequeathed to the young lady in question his earthly all; and Griffin had the great pleasure, after his release from prison and return to the land of his fathers, of seeing the provisions of the will fully carried out.

As soon as young Griffin and his fellowcaptives were in a condition to be removed, they were taken to " Mill Prison," situated somewhere in the interior, the precise locale of which it is, now and here, difficult to determine. The number of prisoners, embracing almost every intermediate age from fifteen up to forty, averaged

about three hundred and twenty. Their personal sufferings can hardly be imagined. Regarded rather as rebels than as prisoners of war, they were treated accordingly. For full one year and a half they were furnished with neither fuel nor light; while their bodies had no other clothing, either by day or by night, than such scanty apparel as they had chanced to bring with them. They slept upon a bed of straw. Even when sick they had nothing better. Their rations, often of the most despicable kind, were served to them only once a day, and in sufficient quantity for a single meal, which was generally taken about eleven o'clock, A.M. Poor as it was, their food was devoured with a relish which none but the starving will be able to comprehend. In after years our subject often remarked, that his sense of hunger really seemed to him to be more acute after he had eaten what was given him than it was before. No wonder, then, that the prisoners often resorted to what our readers will doubtless regard as nauseating expedients to satisfy the cravings of appetite. Their hunting grounds were the basis of their prison walls, and the under side of old bits of boards and pieces of decayed woods. Scouring the former they were, now and then, fortunate enough to circumvent and capture a stray rat, which they instantly dressed and devoured as a precious morsel. From the other they occasionally drew a snail, which they at once put upon such little fire as they were able to prepare for the purpose; and having in this way killed and cooked the hapless victim, they applied their lips to his shelly habitation, and sucked him thence with a gusto unknown to the pampered epicure, even when regaling himself upon the most palatable viands. In one instance their fortune was admirable; it amounted to a sort of triumph. A neighboring gentleman seemed to take great pleasure in making them frequent visits, for the purpose, as they thought, of tantalizing them. But even these unwelcome visits were turned to good culinary account. He was always accompanied by a remarkably fat little dog, to which he was apparently much attached; at least the dog was evidently much attached to him. The prisoners took pains to pet the little fellow, from time to time, as they had chance, until he began to be much pleased with their

friendly attentions. At length they contrived to detain him till his master was gone, when he instantly fell a victim to the executioner's blade! The roast would have been capital, so Griffin was often heard to affirm, only the head and jaws would remind them, even in the midst of the otherwise dainty feast, that they were dining upon an odious, "unclean" quadruped.

But if some came to tantalize, others came to comfort them. Personal enemies they certainly were not, and it is not wonderful that they often had the most satisfactory proof that their sufferings elicited the tenderest sympathies of those who came to see them. Of one man in particular, Mr. G. was in the habit of speaking, even to the close of life, in terms of the deepest respect, affection, and gratitude. It was the Rev. ROBERT HEATH, understood to be in connection with Mr. Wesley. This gentleman visited them regulary, did all he could to alleviate their sufferings, supplied them with useful reading, and, above all, ministered to their spiritual necessities. The following is a list of books he gave them, which we copy from a memorandum kept by young Griffin at the time: "A Bible; Hervey's Meditations, in 2 vols.; Mrs. Rowe's Devout Exercises; Watts's Lyric Poems; Milton's Paradise Lost; The British Youth's Instructor; The Letter Writer Instructed; A Guide for the Young; Burkitt's Help and Guide to Christian Families; Shower's Reflections on Time and Eternity." Certainly a very respectable library. Some of these books are still preserved in branches of the Griffin family. To the poor prisoners they were more precious than silver or gold; to some of them, indeed, more precious than even food, starving though they were. Griffin had a little more learning than most of his fellow-captives, and was, withal, a fine reader, in which character he was made very useful to them. Seated upon a naked beam a little above their heads, at one end of the prison, he read from these books for successive hours, to as attentive an audience as ever man had. In this way the entire Bible was read through more than once during the period of their imprisonment.

As they had no lights they hardly knew how to dispose of themselves during the long evenings of winter. Yankee ingenu