with profane ruffians and curious
spectators--the women, however, holding their meetings in the hall all
day, till towards evening. It was given out by the mob that the hall
would be burnt to the ground that night. We were to have a meeting in
the evening, but it was impossible to execute our purpose. The mayor
induced the manager to give the keys of the building into his hands. He
then locked the doors, and made a brief speech to the mob, assuring them
that he had the keys, and that there would be no meeting, and requesting
them to retire. He then went home, but the mob were bent on the
destruction of the hall. They had now increased to several thousands,
and soon got into the hall by dashing open the doors with their axes.
They then set fire to this huge building, and in the course of an hour
it was a solid mass of flame. The bells of the city were rung, and
several engines rallied; but no water was permitted to be thrown upon
the building. The light of the fire must have been seen a great
distance."

At midnight Garrison was spirited out of the city, and conveyed in a
covered carriage by a friend to Bristol, about twenty miles, where in
the morning he took the steamboat for Boston. The light of that fire was
visible a great distance in more senses than one. The burning of
Pennsylvania Hall proved a public enlightener. After that occurrence the
gentlemen of property scattered through the free States devoted
themselves less to the violent suppression of Abolitionism and more to
the forcible suppression, upon occasion, of the alarming manifestations
of popular lawlessness, which found significant demonstration just a
week later in the city of Boston.

Mr. Garrison has preserved for us an instructive account of this affair,
too, and here is the story as told by him to his brother-in-law, George
W. Benson, in a letter dated May 25th: "The spirit of mobocracy, like
the pestilence, is contagious; and Boston is once more ready to reenact
the riotous scenes of 1835. The Marlboro' Chapel, having just been
completed, and standing in relation to our cause just as did
Pennsylvania Hall, is an object of pro-slavery malevolence. Ever since
my return, threats have been given out that the chapel should share the
fate of the hall. Last evening was the time for its dedication; and, so
threatening was the aspect of things, four companies of light infantry
were ordered to be in readiness, each being provided with 100 _ball_
cartridges