into ridicule, was treated with contempt. He began, notwithstanding, his paper; and after continuing it for nine months having at most not more than ninety fubfcribers, he offered it me for a mere trifle. I had for fome time been ready for fuch an engagement; I therefore inftantly took it upon myself, and in a few years it proved extremely profitable to me.

I perceive that I am apt to speak in the first perfon, though our partnerfhip ftill continued. It is, perhaps, becaufe, in fact, the whole bufinefs devolved upon me. Meredith was no compofitor, and but an indifferent preffman; and it was rarely that he abstained from hard drinking. My friends were forry to see me connected with him; but I contrived to derive from it the utmoft advantage the cafe admitted.

Our firft number produced no other effect than any other paper which had appeared in the province, as to type and printing; but fome remarks, in my peculiar ftyle of writing, upon the difpute which then prevailed between governor Burnet and the Maffachufett affembly, ftruck fome perfons as above mediocrity, caufed the paper and its editors to be talked of, and in a few weeks induced them to become our fubfcribers. Many others followed their example; and our fubfcription continued to increase. This was one of the first good effects of the pains I had taken to learn, to put my ideas on paper. I derived this farther advantage from it, that the leading men of the place, feeing in the author of this publication a man fo well able to use his pen, thought it right to patronife and encourage me.

'The votes, laws, and other public pieces, were printed by Bradford. An addrefs of the house of affembly to the governor had been executed by him in a very coarfe and incorrect manner.

We

We reprinted it with accuracy and neatnefs, and fent a copy to every member. They perceived the difference; and it fo ftrengthened the influence of our friends in the affembly, that we were nominated its printer for the following year.

Among thefe friends I ought not to forget one member in particular, Mr. Hamilton, whom I have mentioned in a former part of my narrative, and who was now returned from England. He warmly interested himfelf for me on this occafi on, as he did likewise on many others afterwards; having continued his kindness to me till his death.

About this period Mr. Vernon reminded me of the debt I owed him, but without preffing me for payment. I wrote a handfome letter on the occafion, begging him to wait a little longer, to which he confented; and as foon as I was able T paid him, principal and intereft, with many expreffions of gratitude; fo that this error of my life was in a manner atoned for.

But another trouble now happened to me, which I had not the fmalleft reafon to expect. Meredith's father, who, according to our agreement, was to defray the whole expence of our printing materials, had only paid a hundred pounds. Another hundred was ftill due, and the merchant being tired of waiting, commenced a fuit against us. We bailed the action, but with the melancholy profpect, that, if the money was not forth-coming at the time fixed, the affair would come to iffue, judgment be put in execution, our delightful hopes be annihilated, and ourselves entirely ruined; as the type and prefs must be fold, perhaps at half their value, to pay the debt.

In this diftrefs, two real friends, whofe generous conduct I have never forgotten, and never fhall forget while I retain the remembrance of

any

any thing, came to me feparately, without the knowledge of each other, and without my having applied to either of them. Each offered me whatever money might be neceffary, to take the business into my own hands, if the thing was practicable, as they did not like I fhould continue in partnership with Meredith, who, they faid, was frequently feen drunk in the ftreets, and gambling at ale-houfes, which very much injured our credit. These friends were William Coleman and Robert Grace. I told them, that while there remained any probability that the Merediths would fulfil their part of the compact, I could not propofe a feparation; as I conceived myself to be under obligations to them for what they had done already, and were still difpofed to do if they had the power: but in the end fhould they fail in their engagement, and our partnerfhip be diffolved, I fhould then think myself at liberty to accept the kindness of my friends.

Things remained for fome time in this ftate. At laft I faid one day to my partner, " Your father is perhaps diffatisfied with your having a fhare only in the bufinefs, and is unwilling to do for two, what he would do for you alone. Tell me frankly if that be the cafe, and I will refign the whole to you, and do for myfelf as well as I can."-" No (faid he) my father has really been difappointed in his hopes; he is not able to pay, and I wish to put him to no farther inconvenience. I fee that I am not at all calculated for a printer; I was educated as a farmer, and it was abfurd in me to come here, at thirty years of age, and bind myself apprentice to a new trade. Many of my countrymen are going to fettle in North Carolina, where the foil is exceedingly favourable. I am tempted to go with them, and to refume my former occupation.

You

You will doubtlefs find friends who will affift you. If you will take upon yourself the debts of the partnership, return my father the hundred pounds he has advanced, pay my little perfonal debts, and give me thirty pounds and a new faddle, I will renounce the partnership, and confign over the whole ftock to you."

I accepted this propofal without hesitation. It was committed to paper, and figned and fealed without delay. I gave him what he demanded, and he departed foon after for Carolina, from whence he fent me, in the following year, two letters, containing the best accounts that had yet been given of that country, as to climate, foil, agriculture, &c.; for he was well verfed in thefe matters. I published them in my newspaper, and they were received with great fatisfaction.

As foon as he was gone I applied to my two friends, and not wifhing to give a difobliging preference to either of them, I accepted from each half of what he offered me, and which it was neceffary I fhould have. I paid the partnerfhip debts, and continued the bufinefs on my own account; taking care to inform the public, by advertisement, of the partnership being diffolved. This was, I think, in the year 1729, or thereabout.

Nearly at the fame period the people demanded a new emiflion of paper money; the exifting and only one that had taken place in the province, and which amounted to fifteen thousand pounds, being foon to expire. The wealthy inhabitants, prejudiced againft every fort of paper currency, from the fear of its depreciation, of which there had been an inftance in the province of New-England, to the injury of its holders, ftrongly oppofed the measure. We had difcuffed this affair in our junto, in which I was on the

fide

fide of the new emiffion; convinced that the firft fmall fum, fabricated in 1723, had done much good in the province, by favouring commerce, induftry and population, fince all the houses were now inhabited, and many others building; whereas I remembered to have seen, when I first paraded the streets of Philadelphia eating my roll, the majority of those in Walnut-street, Second-ftreet, Fourth-street, as well as a great number in Chefnut and other streets, with papers on them fignifying that they were to be let; which made me think at the time that the inhabitants of the town were deserting it one after another.

Our debates made me fo fully master of the fubject, that I wrote and published an anonymous pamphlet, entitled An Enquiry into the Nature and Neceffity of a Paper Currency. It was very well received by the lower and midling clafs of people; but it displeased the opulent, as it increafed the clamour in favour of the new emiffion. Having, however, no writer among them capable of anfwering it, their oppofition became lefs violent; and there being in the house of affembly a majority for the meafure, it paffed. The friends I had acquired in the house, perfuaded that I had done the country effential fervice on this occafion, rewarded me by giving me the printing of the bills. It was a lucrative employment, and proved a very seasonable help to me; another advantage which I derived from having habituated myself to write

Time and experience fo fully demonftrated the utility of paper currency, that it never after experienced any confiderable oppofition; so that it foon amounted to 55,000l. and in the year 1739 to 80,000l. It has fince rifen, during the laft war, to 350,000l. trade, buildings and population having in the interval continually increased:

but