It is highly probable that he possessed the spirit which now animates the ultras of the present day, who prefer to rule in h-l, than serve in heaven. On no other ground can we reconcile his banishment from the island.

In 1638, William Baulston was authorized to set up a house of entertainment for strangers, and also to brew beer, and sell wine and strong waters. Our fathers would be condemned, in this day of light and knowledge, by a class of fanatics, as being destitute of moral principle, in thus favoring the sale of an article which goes to destroy the bodies and the souls of men.

But it proves them to have been men of common sense, in regulating the sale of an article which they well knew would be used. And to the credit of Newport, there has been far less fanaticism and intolerance on this, as well as on other moral questions, than is to be found in any portion of New-England.

Newport has continued, down to the present day, the sale of spiritous liquors, and without flattery, we challenge the country to produce a more sober and moral community, with a popu lation of nearly ten thousand, than is to be found in the ancient metropolis. Jefferson's motto was, that "that government is best which governs least." But this motto was designed to apply to the attempts of legislators to cure the moral and intellectual evils of society. So far as these attempts are concerned, the less legislation the better.

FIRST INSOLVENCY.

John Luther, a carpenter, having absconded from the island, and being found indebted to several persons, it was ordered that "Mr. Brenton and Mr. Coggeshall, shall take possession of his effects, and shall satisfy his creditors as far as it shall go." They generally, at the present time, take their effects with them, or the proceeds, and thus leave their creditors minus. The age, however, is one of improvement.

"It was ordered that all the sea-banks is free for fishing to the town of Newport." This right was acknowledged to the people under the charter of king Charles II., and preserved in the constitution which is now the fundamental law of the State.

And no proprietor of land has the legal right to prohibit the inhabitants from the enjoyment of the privilege. It is a great public blessing.

June. It was ordered at a general meeting, that a house for a prison, twelve feet in length and ten in breadth, should be built. Would to God that its limited dimensions could have continued. But as population increased, selfishness became predominant, and as a natural consequence, immorality and crime succeeded, until it was found expedient to enlarge the prisons. In 1772, the present county jail in Newport, was built. It is a substantial brick edifice. The building committee was Oliver Ring Warner. It is pleasantly located in Malborough street. The inmates who are so unfortunate as to be found within its walls, as a general thing, have been treated kindly by the keeper. It is, however, to be lamented that the spirit of the Gospel has not more generally influenced the minds of men, which would have had a salutary tendency in preventing the increase of much evil in the world. As soon as the great law of doing to others as we would others should do to us, begins to be exemplified, the reign of wrong, and injury, and suffering, (leading as it often does to crime,) will rapidly come to an end. Instead of one Howard, one Mrs. Fry, and one Miss Dix, in a century, we should have thousands upon thousands in every department of charity. When we look at what these three individuals have accomplished, what might we not expect from millions laboring with united strength and intellect, in the great work of human welfare! It will be a glorious period when the "fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man," shall be recognized by all classes. Then will the reign of evil cease, and not before.

Every town was authorized to choose a council of six persons, to manage their town affairs, and to have the trial of small

cases.

June 4, 1647.-Cannonicus, the chief Indian Sachem, died this year in a good old age, honored by his tribe, and respected and beloved by the whites who had settled in his territories.

AQUEDNECK INDIANS.

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AQUEDNECK INDIANS.

The battle which decided the fate of the Aquedneck Indians, is believed to have been fought in a place about three miles and a quarter from the State House, in Newport, in the town of Middletown, in a swamp, or low ground, near the west road leading to Bristol ferry. The tradition is substantiated by the fact, that very many arrow heads, hatchets, &c., made of a hard stone, have frequently been dug up on the spot, designated in the tradition as the battle field. This was before the purchase of the island. They were subject to the Narragansetts. The seat of Miantunomu was at "Tomony Hill," near Newport. There was formerly a "block-house," built of brick, on this hill. The land fronting on the harbor, where Thames-street now is, was then an impenetrable swamp.

It is well to dwell on the reminiscences of the past, as they carry the mind back to the period when none but the natives were the inhabitants of the island. The sufferings of the abo- . rigines of this country are painful to contemplate, and while many pretend to have their sympathies strongly enlisted on the side of negro slavery, let them reflect, how much greater have been the sufferings of the poor Indian, arising, as it does, from his superior understanding.

Let me inquire of the reader, whether there was ever a nobler character than Philip, the King of the Wampanouages, and one whose sad fate has often been the theme of the poet? Accord ing to the prediction of the Panacos, that he should never fall by the hand of the white man was realized in his death. A renegade Indian shot him in a swamp, at the foot of Mount Haup.

Philip's war lasted more than a year, and was the most distressing period that New England had ever seen, and threatened the total extirpation of her colonies. About six hundred men, the flower of her strength, fell in battle, or were butchered by the savages. In Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Rhode Island, twelve or thirteen towns were utterly destroyed. About six bundred dwelling-houses were burnt, a heavy debt contracted, and a vast amount of property destroyed. There were few

families who did not lose some beloved relative in this calamitous war; and a general gloom spread through the country.

The Indians acted on the defensive; they felt jealous of their rights, and did not admit the justice and equity of the claim set up by the pale faces, to the soil which they had received as a grant from the Great Spirit,-and it is no way surprising that Philip and his tribe displayed a hostile attitude towards the enemy of their peace, when they perceived that their domain was passing into other hands, and that they would soon melt away before a superior force. This is a sufficient apology for the course which they pursued towards the colonists; and instead of our exulting and triumphing over their weakness, it should rather be a matter of grief and sorrow, that the possession of this continent was purchased at the expense of the destruction of the Indians.

PHILIP OF MOUNT HAUP.

(BY MISS CASS.)

Philip's head was sent to Plymouth, where it was exposed on a gibbet twenty years, and one of his hands to Boston, where it was exhibited in savage triumph, and his mangled body was denied the right of sepulture, it having been quartered, and hung upon four trees, where it was left, a monument of shocking barbarity.

"To say the least of Philip's humanity, it was as great towards captives, so far as we have any knowledge, as that of the English towards the captive Indians.”—Drake's Biography of Indians.

"Ye write the white man brave,

When on his native sod,

He lifts his sword to guard and save

His heritage of God.

And earth rings loud, with the deep startling cry—

Of patriots, warring for their liberty.

PHILIP OF MOUNT HAUP

Ye bid the marble rise,

To shrine his sacred fame;

And loud winds bear along the skies,

His high and holy name.

And ever your children's hearts beat full and strong,
All freedom shout, and glorious triumph sing.

The outrag'd Indian rears

His madden'd battle brand;

And tracks with flame, and blood, and tears,
The oppressors of his land.

And he is savage! and ye give his name

To wear his curse, and be a word for shame.

And even his soulless clay,

Finds not a quiet bed;

The storms may waste it, birds of prey

Feast on the helpless dead

As if the poor insensate dust could be

A thing for hate, and fiendish mockery.

The gentle Quaker came,

With justice in his hand;

And the whoop lay hush'd, the war-knife's flame
Gleam'd not within the land.

But spread the Calumet's soft incense wide,
And rose the olive of the wigwam's side.

Wo! for the red man's wail,

Sweeps o'er New England's hills;
It rides her haughty ocean gale,
And tunes her forest rills.

One jarring echo in the grand old strain,
That ne'er can die along her hallow'd plain."

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THE DEATH OF MIANTUNOMU.

As we have noticed the death of Cannonicus, we will also allude to the sad fate of Miantunomu, as they were the two Sachems who conveyed the island of Aquedneck to Mr. Coddington and his friends. Miantunomu was uncle to Cannonicus, and they exercised an important part in the government of the great nation of the Narragansetts.