is probably an overdrawn picture-giving the act of a few under the name of " many."

In the same year. Governor Thomas having required of the Assembly measures for protection and defence, made some excitement there among the Friends, then members. On this occasion John Churchman, a public Friend, deemed himself called to visit that body and to set forth his testimony against war measures. It perhaps shows the kind feelings of that day, and the influence which Friends then enjoyed in the House, to say, that on making his wish known to speak, through the Speaker, he was allowed to go in and deliver his religious counsel. The sum of what he then said at considerable length is preserved in his Journal. "Beware (said he) of acting to oppress tender consciences, for many whom you now represent would be greatly grieved to see warlike preparations carried on by a law, consented to by their brethren in profession, contrary to the charter, for it is concluded that a reverent and true fear of God, the ancient arm of power, would be our greatest defence and safety," &c. I have elsewhere spoken more at large on some other facts showing the embarrassments which Friends found in the exercise of civil government, evil as they found it.

A writer, of the year 1755, (Samuel Wharton's MS.) writing on the political influence of the Friends, and wishing to see them excluded, tells the opinion of his day, as held by him and his party, saying, "But if it be asked by what means the Quakers, whose measures (against war) are so unpopular, get continually chosen into our Assemblies, I answer-they enter into cabals in their Yearly Meetings, which is convened just before the Election, and being composed of deputies from all the Monthly Meetings, provides a fit place for conducting political intrigues under the mask of religion." I presume few of the present day will credit this scandal; but, as the feature of that day, it may now amuse a modern Friend thus to see such a novel use of their religious meetings! They are also accused of procuring great influence in the Elections among the Germans through the aid of C. Sower's German paper, which always advocated Friend's principles. Sower himself was a very good man, and therefore had a deserved influence over his countrymen. In 1759, four Friends, then members of Assembly, vacated their seats at the desire of the Council of the Crown, because it was a time of war.

I have seen in the possession of Mr. Henry Pemberton of Philadelphia, among other letters of William Penn of about the year 1677, one of them, having a Postscript to which is the signature of the celebrated George Fox. He used, like Penn and other writers of that day, two small effs, in lieu of one capital, as thus-"G-ff.” Another autograph of Fox and of Barclay I have seen with R. Haines.

The Friends were long accustomed to hold night meetings on the

Sabbath; their house on the Bank Hill, in Front near Arch street, was at first called Evening Meeting, because chiefly made for such a convenience when that at the Centre Square was too far off. They continued the Evening Meetings till after the Revolution, when they were constrained, by their sense of "not letting their good being evil spoken of," to disuse them, because their young women (as at some other Meetings almost ever since,) were mobbed by rude young men, who assembled in long lines of idlers, generating and cherishing more evil without the walls, than the good peo ple could counterbalance within. The change met the approbation of the discreet-of those who virtually aim by every means "to suppress vice and immorality."

My friend Lang Syne, who has good feelings for those kind of reminiscences, has left some picturesque traces of some of the old preaching Friends, and of some of their school teachers, calculated to revive pleasing images of the past to those who love the associations of their early days. He thus speaks of his recollections of the preachers, saying, "James Pemberton, Nicholas Waln, Daniel Offley, Arthur Howell, William Savery and Thomas Scattergood were the then "burning and shining lights." From the preacher's gallery, as beheld through the "mist of years," James Pemberton sat at the head of the gallery—an immovable figure, very erect, and resting with both hands crossed on the top of his cane. Nicholas Waln appeared at all times with a smile of sunshine upon his countenance. An imperturbable severity rested on the dark features of Thomas Scattergood. Arthur Howell always sat shrouded beneath his hat drawn down over his face, and the upper part of his outside coat elevated to meet it-like unto a prophet "in his mantle wrapt,” and isolated in thought from all sublunary things. William Savery possessed a mild solemnity of voice and feature, which distinguished him as a preacher above other men; his softer and solemn tones and words in preaching, like those which may be imagined of the Eolean harp rudely touched by the wind, sunk through the ears down into the heart as the dew of heaven" falling gently to the earth. The voice of Daniel Offley was as a sound produced by the falling of a bar of his own iron on the brick pavement before his furnace door. Among his dozen hammermen he was always accustomed to raise his piercing voice distinctly above their pattering sounds.

Of the teachers, more will be said in another place under the article "Education." Friends' academy then consisted of four different masters :-Robert Proud, Latin master; William Waring, teacher of astronomy and mathematics; Jeremiah Paul; "The Master of Scholars" was John Todd.

PERSONS AND CHARACTERS.

"A mingled groupe-of good or ill."

"The charm of biography consists of minor truths neglected
by graver history."

THE following facts concerning the persons severally named, are not intended as their proper biography, but as slight notices of individual character, which might be usefully preserved. As a general list, it will embrace alike, noble or ignoble-not a roll of merit, but of notoriety, to wit:

The First Born-John Key.

John Key, "the first-born" of our city, of English parentage, was born in 1682, in a cave at "Penny-pot landing," i. e. at the north west corner of Vine and Water street. William Penn was pleased to distinguish the person and the circumstance, by the gift of a city lot; the original patent of which is in my possession through the politeness of George Vaux, Esq. The tradition of the spot granted was utterly lost to common fame; but this patent shows its location to have been on the south side of Sassafras street, nearly opposite to Crown street, say vis a vis to Pennington's sugar house.

The parchment and seal are in fine preservation.-The seal is flat, circular, four inches wide, of brown wax, appended by a green ribbon. It may be curious to preserve the following abstract. to wit: William Penn, Proprietary and Chief of Pennsylvania, sends greeting, &c. that a certain lot of ground between the Fourth and Fifth streets, bounded on the north by Sassafras street, &c.—in breadth 494 feet and in length 306 feet; first granted by warrant from myself bearing date the 26th day of 3 mo. 1683, unto John Key, then an infant, being the first-born in the said city of Philadelphia," &c. The patent to confirm the warrant aforesaid, is dated the 20th of July, 1713; the first-born being then a man of $1 years of age. The lot it appears he sold at the age of SS years (say on the 24th of May, 1715,) to Clement Plumstead; and the latter in 2 years afterwards, sold it to Richard Hill for only twelve pounds! This he joined to many other lots, and made of it " Hill's Farm." Further particulars may be read in my MS. Annals in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, page 50.

This notable first-born lived to good old age at his home in Chester county, and was accustomed to come occasionally to the city, always walking the streets with an unusually active step, although necessarily wondering at the changing scenes he constantly witnessed. Considering that he only died, in his 85th year, as late as the year 1767, (July) persons must be still alive who must have heard him talk of those things! When the hospital was founded in 1755, he was present by request, to lay the corner stone !

It was remarkable that the same year (August 10th, 1767,) was also the year of the death of "the first born" child in the province of English parents, born in 1681, one year before John Key, in a cave by the side of the Delaware river.-This venerable man of 86 died at Brandywine Hundred, Emanuel Grubb by name. He was active and vigorous to the last, and actually rode to Philadelphia and back on horseback, equal to 40 miles-only a few months before his death. His habits were temperate, never drinking any ardent spirits.

As those two venerable "first-borns" lived both near Chester, they had means of intercourse; and strange must have been their several emotions in talking over the years of improvement which they had witnessed down to the year 1767! What a feast they might have afforded to younger minds!

But another and a still earlier first-born, than either of the preceding, dwelt also in their neighbourhood, in the person of Richard Buffington, (son of Richard) he being "the first born Englishman in Pennsylvania," having been born in what was afterwards "the province," in the year 1679. The facts in his case were peculiarly commemorated in the parish of Chester on the 30th of May, 1739; on that day the father, Richard, having attained his 85th year, had a great assemblage of his proper descendants, to the number of 115 persons, convened in his own house, consisting of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren—the first-born being then present in his sixtieth year.

These affections and respects to "first-borns" were alike commendable and natural. They possessed a peculiarity of character, and a relationship to things around them, which none others could enjoy, or even share with them. They were beings by themselves— alone! Others also have had and signalized their first-born! The New Yorkers had their first-born, in the person of Sarah Rapaelje, born in 1625, and the maternal ancestor of the Bogerts and Hansens. When she became the widow Forey, Governor Stuyvesant, in consideration of her birth, granted her a valley of land near the city. The Virginians had theirs, and such was their respect to him, that in the case of his rebellion, his life was spared to him, and he lived to be 80 years of age.* Our sister city of Baltimore

* Vide Samuel Bownas' Journal.

honoured their first-born, in the person of Mrs. Ellen Moale, whe died in that city in 1825, in her 84th year-she having been the first born white woman in that place. Strange it was, that she in her own person could say of such a city as Baltimore, that she had seen it first covered with woods, then become a field, next a village, and last a city of 70,000 souls!

Edward Drinker.

Edward Drinker was born on the 24th of December, 1680, in a small cabin, near the present corner of Walnut and Second streets, in the city of Philadelphia. His parents came from a place called Beverly, in the State of Massachusetts. The banks of the Delaware, on which the city of Philadelphia now stands, were inhabited, at the time of his birth, by Indians, and a few Swedes and Hollanders. He often talked to his companions of picking whortleberries and catching rabbits, on spots now the most improved and populous in the city. He recollected about the time William Penn came to Pennsylvania, and used to point to the place where the cabin stood, in which he, and his friends that accompanied him, were accommodated upon their first arrival. At twelve years of age, he went to Boston, where he served his apprenticeship to a cabinet maker. In the year 1745, he returned to Philadelphia with his family, where he lived until the time of his death. He was four times married, and had eighteen children, all of whom were by his first wife. At one time of his life, he sat down, at his own table, with fourteen children. Not long before his death he heard of the birth of a grandchild, to one of his grandchildren, the fifth in succession to himself.

He retained all his faculties till the last year of his life. Even his memory, so generally diminished by age, was but little impaired. He not only remembered the incidents of his childhood and youth, but the events of latter years; and so faithful was his memory to him, that his son has informed that he never heard. him tell the same story twice, but to different persons, and in different companies. His eye-sight failed him many years before his death, but his hearing was uniformly perfect and unimpaired. His appetite was good till within a few days before his death. He generally ate a hearty breakfast of a pint of tea or coffee, as soon as he got out of his bed, with bread and butter in proportion. He ate likewise at eleven o'clock, and never failed to eat plentifully at dinner of the grossest solid food. He drank tea in the evening. but never ate any supper; he had lost all his teeth thirty years before his death, which was occasioned, his son said, by drawing excessive hot smoke of tobacco into his mouth: but the want of suitable mastication of his food, did not prevent its speedy digestion, nor impair his health. Whether the gums, hardened by age, supplied the place of his teeth in a certain degree, or whether the