Читать книгу Exploits and Adventures of a Soldier Ashore and Afloat онлайн

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The day having arrived for placing the vessel in commission, a galaxy of army and navy officers, civilians, and beautiful women assembled on the quarter-deck, which was inclosed and draped with flags of all nations. Orderlies were kept busy announcing the arrival of the guests to the admiral and captain, many of whose names included exclusive members of New York’s “Four Hundred,” whose ancestral genealogies, emblazoned with ensigns of heraldry, adorn their multitudinous—​what not?—​though ofttimes, let it be known, the power and honor behind the throne can be traced to the purchasing power of filthy lucre. Not unlike the “Sons and Daughters of the Revolution,” whose sacred heritage and portals have been defiled by the presence of incognizable descendants of ancestors who in reality were unloyal to the colonies, Tories of King George III., some of whom sat in that august body the “General Assembly” and cried Treason! Treason! as Patrick Henry introduced his famous resolutions in denunciation of the Stamp Act, and in a passionate burst of eloquence uttered those never-to-be-forgotten words, “Cæsar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the Third”—​pausing awhile during the interruption by Tories, calmly added—“may profit by their example.”

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