e not
examined in presence of each other. Much of the evidence was beyond
measure ludicrous and absurd. The scene at the theatre was described by
one witness after another in endless variety. The merits of "Yankee
Doodle" and "Hail Columbia," philologically and aesthetically, were made
the subjects of the gravest investigation. It appeared that with the
exception of Mr. John Beikie, Clerk of the Executive Council, and a very
few of the townspeople, the audience was entirely made up of members of
the Legislature. There were no ladies present, and, as it was New Year's
Eve, the audience generally felt a considerable freedom from restraint.
Many of the members had partaken freely of the cup that
cheers--assuredly not the cup indicated by Cowper--and were in the
blissful condition of Tam O'Shanter upon a certain memorable occasion to
which no more specific reference is necessary. In plain English, some of
them were so drunk as to be unable to recall anything that occurred. All
were full of mirth and jollity, and the scene enacted was of the most
uproarious description. Three grave legislators "danced while 'Yankee
Doodle' was played." Several others had reached the quarrelsome stage of
inebriety, and, in the language of one of the witnesses, "showed fight."
Mr. Philip Vankoughnet, one of the members for Stormont, was constrained
to admit that he had stripped off his coat, and threatened to knock
somebody down. Captain Matthews, among others, called for "Hail
Columbia" and "Yankee Doodle," but the general opinion among the more
sober of the party appeared to be that he had done so "in derision." It
was a bibulous age, and sobriety was the exception rather than the
rule. The whole affair was little better than a bar-room orgy, and
could properly be regarded in no other light.

When the Assembly's report made its appearance, early in 1827, Captain
Matthews was fully exonerated, so far as that body was concerned, from
everything savouring of disloyalty. "The circumstances of the
transaction"--thus ran the report--"as they are related without the
contradiction of a single witness, irresistibly bespeak the absence of
that disloyalty with which it has been basely attempted to sully the
character of a most honourable man." The report moreover read a sharp
lesson to the promoters of the accusation against him. It declared that
"If every effervescence of feeling upon every jovial or innocent
occasion is, in these Provinces, to be mag