I have nothing new to entertain you with, unless it be an account of a
new set of mobility, which has lately taken the lead in Boston. You must
know that there is a great scarcity of sugar and coffee, articles which
the female part of the State is very loath to give up, especially whilst
they consider the scarcity occasioned by the merchants having secreted a
large quantity. There had been much rout and noise in the town for
several weeks. Some stores had been opened by a number of people, and
the coffee and sugar carried into the market and dealt out by pounds. It
was rumored that an eminent, wealthy, stingy merchant[177] (who is a
bachelor) had a hogshead of coffee in his store, which he refused to
sell to the committee under six shillings per pound. A number of
females, some say a hundred, some say more, assembled with a cart and
trucks, marched down to the warehouse, and demanded the keys, which he
refused to deliver. Upon which one of them seized him by his neck, and
tossed him into the cart. Upon his finding no quarter, he delivered the
keys, when they tipped up the cart and discharged him; then opened the
warehouse, hoisted out the coffee themselves, put it into the trucks,
and drove off.
It was reported that he had personal chastisement among them; but this,
I believe, was not true. A large concourse of men stood amazed, silent
spectators of the whole transaction.
Adieu. Your good mother is just come; she desires to be remembered to
you; so do my father and sister, who have just left me, and so does she
whose greatest happiness consists in being tenderly beloved by her
absent friend, and who subscribes herself ever his