NEW-HA

EW-HAVEN be my theme-nor mean the name

On the bright tablet of Columbia's fame;

For here did Freedom early cast the yoke,

And fell❜d the despot with the chains she broke;

Here Literature and Arts have since combin'd

To culture nature and enrich the mind;
Here fair Religion meekly lifts her eye,

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And gives her votaries realms beyond the sky;
Here moral worth and "Steady Habits" reign,

While Vice and Folly seek a place in vain!

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So boasts Report ;-but, are her vauntings true?

Come, virgin Truth, the muse appeals to you;
Bid Justice come, and trace with us the town,
Her balance bring, but throw her sabre down;

New-Haven.

One scale shall hold the praise to merit due,
And Satire's quiver keep the balance true;
"Laugh where we must-be candid where we can,"
Shall be the motto of our humble plan,

While varying objects teach the muse to steer,
"From grave to gay-from lively to severe."
'Tis worth and virtue-not the man, we prize—
'Tis vice and folly-not the wretch, that dies.

Hail, happy city !-hail, thrice happy state!
Connecticut! supremely wise and great!
Whose constitution cannot yet be broke,
Because you wear not such a cumbrous yoke;
Whose laws were framed upon the Jewish mode,
Till you had time to form a better code;

22d l. 'Tis vice and folly, &c.

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This idea is borrowed from a Cambridge Exercise." "Tis not the fool, but folly is our mark."

26th 1. Because you wear not such a cumbrous yoke.

It is a fact that the state of Connecticut has never yet been blessed with a constitution, unless the royal charter of king Charles can be so called.

28th 1. Till you had time, &c.

The first settlers of Connecticut passed a resolution, in a general convention, that they would "be governed by the laws of God, until they had time to make better ones."

New-Haven.

To which the sky's cerulean tint was given,
A proof sufficient that they came from Heaven.
Hail, famed Connecticut! where still we trace
The "steady habits" of your fathers' race;

29th 1. To which the sky's cerulean tint, &c.

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Many enquiries have been made respecting the signification of the term "Blue Laws," which has been, for many years, attached to the political character of the State of Connecticut. The Puritans, (as they were termed) who fled from religious persecutions in Europe, after landing on this Continent, still retained a portion of the "old leaven," and proceeded immediately to pass laws as singular as they were tyrannical, and as oppressive as they were superstitious. To this day have many of the progeny of the Puritans,' in the Eastern States, particularly in Connecticut, retained a portion of the follies of their forefathers. For an example of the composition of what is now termed Blue Laws, the following collection of a few of the many curious punishments, inflicted for various offences, is copied from the old court records, between 1630 and 1650:

"Sir Richard Saltonstall, fined four bushels of malt for his absence from Court.

"Josias Plastove shall (for stealing four baskets of corn from the Indians) return them eight baskets again, be fined 57. and hereafter to be called by the name of Josias, and not Mr. as formerly he used to be.

"Joyce Bradwick shall give unto Alexander Becks, 20s. for promising him marriage without her friends' consent, and now refusing to perform the same.

"William James, for incontinency, knowing his wife before marriage, was sentenced to be set in the bilboes, and bound in 201

New-Haven.

Where liberal minds have happy sway attained,
By priests unshackled, as by crime unstained!
Where genius meets a rich and sure reward,
Where speculation never meets with fraud !
Where female virtue fears no hapless flaw,
For chastity is here secured by law;

Where narrow Prejudice is hunted down,
And Superstition drove from every town!

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"Thomas Peter, for suspicion of slander, idleness and stubborness,

is to be severely whipt, and kept in hold.

"Richard Turner, for being notoriously drunk, was fined 21.

"John Haggs, for swearing God's foot, cursing his servant, and wishing a pox of God take you," was fined 51.

"Edward Palmer, for his extortion, taking 33s. 7d. for the plank and wood work of the stocks, is fined 51. and censured to be set an hour in the stocks.

"John White is bound in 107. to be of good behaviour, and not to come into the company of his neighbour Thomas Bull's wife, alone. "Sarah Hales was censured for her miscarriage, to be carried to the gallows with a rope about her neck, and set upon the ladder, the rope's end flung over the gallows, and after to be banished."

38th 1. For chastity, &c.

The punishment for female indiscretion was formerly cruelly severe in Connecticut. When an unfortunate fair one fell a victim to the arts and intrigues of the unfeeling votaries of seduction, the fatal consequences of her error were not deemed a sufficient punishment; a life embittered with tears and regret, not an adequate atonement! No.To the loss of peace and reputation was added corporeal torture-a public scourging on a disgraceful scaffold! To the honour of the state, this law is now laid aside; but I blush for my country while I record its former existence.

New-Haven.

Where Charity conceals each fault she can,
In servile beasts-if not in lordly man;
Where all so strictly do the laws maintain,
That litigation lifts its head in vain ;

Where all, in short, is bliss, unknown to vice,
Peace, virtue, innocence, and-Paradise!

New-Haven, hail! whose puritanic realm
No flood of heresy can ever whelm ;
Whose prisons, gibbet, pillory, or stocks,
(Those crucibles of tenets orthodox)
Have often taught the heretic to shun
The fatal course his ancestors had run.

42d l. In servile beasts, &c.

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The ironical muse perhaps here has an allusion to the finesse often practised by the dealers in horses, who generally find it politic to conceal the faults of the beasts which they wish to dispose of.

44th 1. That litigation, &c.

However strictly the laws are observed in Connecticut, but few states in the Union support such a numerous clan of attorneys as " the land of steady habits," who all grow rich by speculating on human depravity.

51st l. Have often taught the heretic, &c.

The general court of New-Haven, in 1658, passed a severe law against the quakers, which was introduced with the following preamble:

Whereas there is a cursed sect of heretics, lately sprung up in the world, commonly called quakers, who take upon them, that they are