ed out of the hold and flung into the sea.
The patriotic citizen who had asked significantly if tea could be made
with salt water was satisfactorily answered by the Mohawks when they
cast overboard the last of their three hundred and forty-two chests,
and prepared to disappear as rapidly and as mysteriously as they had
come. During the whole adventure only one man was hurt, who tried to
secrete some of the tea about his person, and who was given a drubbing
for his pains. The Mohawks {161} scattered and disappeared, washed
their faces, rolled up their blankets, concealed their pistols and
axes, and as many reputable Boston citizens returned to their homes.
It is related that some of them on their way home passed by a house in
which Admiral Montague was spending the evening. Montague heard the
noise of the trampling feet, opened the window and looked out upon the
fantastic procession. No doubt some news of what had happened had
reached him, for he is reported to have called out: "Well, boys, you
have had a fine night for your Indian caper. But mind, you've got to
pay the fiddler yet." One of the Mohawk leaders looked up and answered
promptly: "Oh, never mind, squire. Just come out here, if you please,
and we'll settle the bill in two minutes." The admiral considered the
odds were against him, that the joke had gone far enough. He closed
the window, leaving the bill to be settled by whoso thought fit, and
the laughing savages swept on to their respectable wigwams. If some
very reputable citizens found a few leaves of tea in their shoes when
they took them off that night, they said nothing about it, and nobody
was the wiser. So ended the adventure of the Boston Tea-party, which
was but the prologue to adventures more memorable and more momentous.
We learn that at least one of these masquerading Indians survived to so
late a date as the March of 1846. Men now living may have clasped
hands with Henry Purkitt and David Kinnison and heard from their own
lips the story of a deed that enraged a King, offended Chatham, was
disapproved of by George Washington, and was not disapproved of by
Burke.

[Sidenote: 1773--After the Boston "Tea-party"]

The news of the Boston Tea-party reached London on January 19, 1774,
and was public property on the 21st. Other news little less unpleasant
soon followed. At Charleston tea was only landed to lie rotting in
damp cellars, not an ounce of it to be bought or sold. In Philadelphi