om the State House?"

"The king's arms are to be torn down from all the buildings, my aged
friend; from the inns, the shops, the houses, the State House, and all."

"Dame Bond, my limbs fail. I shall never go home again. Tell the family
as you pass that I shall not return to tea with them. Let me pass the
evening here, where Penn made his treaty with the Indians. To-night is
the last of Pennsylvania. I never wish to see another morning."

[Illustration: THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ROYAL ARMS.]

At seven o'clock in the long, fiery day the great bell rang. The bugle
sounded again. People ran hither and thither. A rocket flared across
the sky, and a great cry went up:

"Down with the arms!"

A procession headed with soldiers passed through the streets of the city
bearing with them a glittering sign. Military music filled the air.

The old man's daughter Mercy came to see him under the tree and to
persuade him to go home with her.

"Mercy--daughter--what are they carrying away?"

"The king's arms from the State House; that is all, father."

"All! all! Say you rather that it is the world!"

The roseate light faded from the high hills and the waters. The sea
birds screamed, and cool breezes made the multitudinous leaves of the
tree to quiver.

"Mercy--daughter--and what was that?"

"They are lighting a bonfire, father."

"What for?"

"To burn the king's arms."

"What will we do without a king?"

"They will have a Congress."

A great shout went up on a near hill.

"But, Mercy--daughter--a Congress is men. A Congress is not a power
ordained. Oh, that I should ever live to see a day like this! 'Twas
Franklin did it. I can see it all--it was he; it was the printer boy
from Boston."

Darkness fell. It was nine o'clock now. There was a discharge of
firearms, and a great flame mounted up from the pile on the hill, and
put out the stars and filled the heavens.

"Father, let us go home."

"No, let me stay here under the tree."

"Why, father?"

"The palsy is coming upon me--I can feel it coming, and here I would
die."

"Oh, father, return with me, for my sake!"

"Well, help me, then."

She lifted him, and they went back slowly to the street.

The city was deserted. The people were out to the hill. There was a
crackling of dry boards in the bonfire, and the flame grew redder and
redder, higher and higher.

They came to the State House. The old man looked up. The face of the
house was bare; the king's a