e king did not attach
any importance to the statement until Tongue referred to Titus Oates
as his authority. The latter proved himself a most arrant liar while
on the stand: but the people were in a credulous state of mind, and
Oates became the hero of the hour;[242] and under his wicked influence
many souls were hurried into eternity. Read Hume's account of the
Popish Plot, and then follow the bloody narrative of the Negro plot of
New York, and see how the one resembles the other.

"Some mysterious design was still suspected in every
enterprise and profession: arbitrary power and Popery were
apprehended as the scope of all projects: each breath or
rumor made the people start with anxiety: their enemies,
they thought, were in their very bosom, and had gotten
possession of their sovereign's confidence. While in this
timorous, jealous disposition, the cry of a _plot_ all on a
sudden struck their ears: they were wakened from their
slumber, and like men affrightened and in the dark, took
every figure for a spectre. The terror of each man became
the source of terror to another. And a universal panic being
diffused, reason and argument, and common-sense and common
humanity, lost all influence over them. From this
disposition of men's minds we are to account for the
progress of the _Popish Plot_, and the credit given to it;
an event which would otherwise appear prodigious and
altogether inexplicable."[243]

On the 28th of February, 1741, the house of one Robert Hogg, Esq., of
New-York City, a merchant, was robbed of some fine linen, medals,
silver coin, etc. Mr. Hogg's house was situated on the corner of Broad
and Mill Streets, the latter sometimes being called Jew's Alley. The
case was given to the officers of the law to look up.

The population of New-York City was about ten thousand, about two
thousand of whom were slaves. On the 18th of March the chapel in the
fort took fire from some coals carelessly left by an artificer in a
gutter he had been soldering. The roof was of shingles; and a brisk
wind from the south-east started a fire, that was not observed until
it had made great headway. In those times the entire populace usually
turned out to assist in extinguishing fires; but this fire being in
the fort, the fear of an explosion of the magazine somewhat checked
their usual celerity on such occasions. The result was, that all the
gov