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WILLIAM WEMMS AND SEVEN OTHERS. 477

were against you; that the people about you, thought you
eame to dragoon them into obedience to statutes, instructions,
mandates and ediets, which they thoroughly detested; that
many of these people were thoughtless and inconsiderate, old
and young, sailors and landmen, negroes and mulattos; that
the soldiers had no friends about them, the rest were in oppo-
sition to them; with all the bells ringing, to call the town
together to assist the people in King street, for they knew
by that time, that there was no fire; the people shouting,
huzzaing, and making the mob whistle, as they call it, which,
when a boy makes it in the street, is no formidable thing, but
when made by @ multitude, is a most hideous shriek, almost
as terrible as an Indian’s yell; the people crying, ‘‘kill
them,’’ ‘‘knoeck them over!’? heaving snow balls, oyster
shells, clubs, white bireh sticks three inches and an half in
diameter. Consider yourselves in this situation, and then
judge whether a reasonable man in the soldiers’ situation,
would not have coneluded they were going to kill him, I
believe, if I were to reverse the scene, I should bring it home
to our own bosoms; suppose Colonel Marshall, when he came
out of his own door, and saw these grenadiers coming down,
with swords, had thought it proper to have appointed a mili-
tary watch; suppose he had assembled Gray and Attacks
that were killed, or any other persons in town, and had
planted them in that station as a military watch, and there
had come from Murray’s barracks thirty or forty soldiers,
with no other arms than snow balls, cakes of ice, oyster shells,
einders and clubs, and attacked this military watch in this
manner, what do you suppose would have been the feelings
and reasonings of any of our householders? I confess I
believe they would not have borne the one-half of what the
witnesses have sworn the soldiers bore, till they had shot
down as many as were necessary to intimidate and disperse
the rest; beeause, the law does not oblige ua to bear insults
to the danger of our lives, to stand still with such a num-
ber of people round us, throwing such things at us, and
threatening our lives, until we are disabled to defend our-
selves.

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