a Correllius.
Well, go on, Roger, I long to hear the whole.

ROGER. When they came to Lexington, where a flock of our innocent sheep
and young lambs, as usual, were feeding and sporting on the plain, these
dogs of violence and rapine with haughty stride advanc'd, and berated
them in a new and unheard of language to us.

DICK. I suppose learn'd at their own fam'd universities--

ROGER. No doubt; they had teachers among them--two old wolves their
leaders, not unlike in features to Smith and Pitcairn, as striving to
outvie each other in the very dregs of brutal eloquence, and more than
Billingsgate jargon, howl'd in their ears such a peal of new-fangled
execrations, and hell-invented oratory, till that day unheard in
New-England, as struck the whole flock with horror, and made them for a
while stand aghast, as tho' all the wolves in the forest had broke loose
upon them.

DICK. Oh, shocking!--Roger, go on.

ROGER. Not content with this, their murdering leaders, with premeditated
malice, keen appetite, and without provocation, gave the howl for the
onset, when instantly the whole herd, as if the devil had entered into
them, ran violently down the hill, and fixed their talons and jaws upon
them, and as quick as lightning eight innocent young lambs fell a
sacrifice to their fury, and victims to their rapacity; the very houses
of our God were no longer a sanctuary; many they tore to pieces, and
some at the very foot of the altar; others were dragged out as in a
wanton, gamesome mood.

DICK. Barbarity inexpressible! more than savage cruelty! I hope you'll
make their master pay for 'em; there is a law of this province, Roger,
which obliges the owner of such dogs to pay for the mischief they do.

ROGER. I know it, Dick; he shall pay, never fear, and that handsomely
too; he has paid part of it already.

DICK. Who is their master, Roger?

ROGER. One Lord Paramount; they call him a free-booter; a fellow who
pretends to be proprietor of all America, and says he has a deed for it,
and chief ranger of all the flocks, and pretends to have a patent for
it; has been a long time in the practice of killing and stealing sheep
in England and Ireland, and had like to have been hang'd for it there,
but was reprieved by the means of his friend _George_--I forgot his
other name--not Grenville--not George the Second--but another George--

DICK. It's no matter, he'll be hang'd yet; he has sent his dogs to a
wrong place, and lugg'd the w