PHILIP FRENEAU. PHILIP FRENEAU, an American sea-captain, journalist, and poet, born at New York in 1752; died near Freehold, N. J., in 1832. He studied at Princeton College, N. J., where he wrote his "Poetical History of the Prophet Jonah." During the war of the Revolution he wrote numerous burlesques in prose and verse, which were very popular at the time. In 1865 these were brought together and edited with a "Memoir and Notes," by Evert A. Duyckinck. Freneau had intended to study law, but instead of this he "followed the sea." In 1780 he was captured by a British vessel, and confined in the prison-ship at New York, an event which he commemorated in his poem "The British Prison Ship." In 1789 Freneau was given the place of French translator in the State department, and at the same time he was editor of the Na tional Gazette, a newspaper hostile to the administration of Washington. This journal was discontinued in 1793, and two years later he started a newspaper in New Jersey, and still later in New York, The Time Piece, a tri-weekly, in which appeared his cleverest prose essays. His newspaper undertakings were unsuccessful, and he again entered upon seafaring occupations. During the second war with Great Britain he wrote several spirited poems, glorifying the successes of the American arms. His mercantile undertakings were not prosperous, and he at length retired to a little farm which he owned in New Jersey. At the age of eighty he lost his way at night in a violent snow-storm, and was found next morning dead in a swamp near his residence. Freneau may fairly be styled the earliest American poet; and, apart from this, not a few of his poems deserve a permanent place in our literature. THE EARLY NEW ENGLANDERS. THESE exiles were formed in a whimsical mold, And were awed by their priests, like the Hebrews of old, Disclaimed all pretenses to jesting and laughter, And sighed their lives through to be happy hereafter. Did all things in hopes of a future reward, And worried mankind for the sake of the Lord. . Their bodies were warmed with the linings of love, And those they caught rambling, on business or pleasure, To clear off old scores, and to preach to their wives. THE DUTCH AND THE ENGLISH IN NEW YORK. THE first that attempted to enter this strait They modeled their streets from the horns of a ram: And the name that best pleased them was New Amsterdam. They purchased large tracts from the Indians for beads, Who (none knows for what) from their country had flown, To live here in peace, undisturbed and alone. New Belgia the Dutch called their province, be sure; But names never yet made possession secure, For Charley (the Second that honored the name) Sent over a squadron asserting his claim. Had his sword and his title been equally slender, Fate saw (though no wizard could tell them as much) THE BATTLE OF STONINGTON, CONN., AUGUST, 1814. FOUR gallant ships from England came And other things we need not name, |