nite, according to the
published plan, thirty feet square at the base, two hundred and twenty
feet high, and fifteen feet square at the summit. After considerable
progress had been made in this most durable memorial, the funds ran out
and the work stood still; however, the reproach of its remaining
unfinished is now likely to be speedily removed, for during this last
year, I believe, the necessary sum has been raised, and the national
monument of Massachusetts put _en train_ for completion.

Below this celebrated hill lies one of the most complete and extensive
navy-yards in the States. At the period of my visit its dry dock was
occupied by a pet ship of the American navy, "the Constitution," or, as
this fine frigate is familiarly called, "Old Ironsides." She was
stripped down to her kelson outside and in, for the purpose of
undergoing a repair that will make her, to all intents, a new ship.

She is what would now be called a small frigate, but one of the
prettiest models possible as high as the bends; above, she tumbles in a
little too much to please the eye. Nor did her gun-deck appear to me
particularly roomy for her burthen.

She was logged nearly eleven feet during the whole of the period she was
last afloat, yet is said to have sailed faster than anything she met;
this defect the builders have now remedied, and expect that, on a
straight keel, she will prove the fastest ship afloat.

I also went on board a seventy-four, employed as a receiving ship; "a
whapper! of her size," low between decks, but with a floor like a barn,
and the greatest beam I ever saw in a two-decker. Here were also on the
stocks a three and a two decker, both to be rated as seventy-fours; the
latter a model of beauty.

From the roof of the house covering this ship I enjoyed the finest
panoramic view imaginable. Boston, its long bridges, and the great dam
connecting the blue hills of the main with the peninsulas of Boston, and
that on which the populous village of Charleston stands, all lay beneath
the eye on the land side; whilst looking seaward, the inner and outer
harbours, together with their numerous islands, stretched away far
beyond the ken; and, were these islands only wooded, no harbour in the
world would excel this in beauty: at present, though grand, from its
great extent it looks bleak and naked, so completely have the islands
and the surrounding heights been denuded of wood.

I like this view better than either the one from