History of Westchester County, New York, Vol. I
Like the cruel ostrich, she has forsaken " her young ones ; with the fierceness of a tyger, she " lays waste our own fair inheritence, and dashes " her sons against the stones ! -- Shakspeare makes " Hamlet express himself thus ; ' But, I am pigeon " ' livered, and lack gall to make oppression bitter.' " Whether it is the lack of gall, or the lack of sensi- " bility, that makes you callous to that bitter op])res- " sion that now surrounds you, I will not determine ; " but for creatures, that are said to wear the image of " the Deity, to be so lost to every noble sentiment " that ornaments the man ; must bespeak the most " amazing apathy.-- Then let me conjure you, to rise " from your lethargy, assume the dignity of freemen ; " smite the serpents that have spread their poisons " round you ; burn your associations ; and with " dauntless intrepity, join the sons of freedom, who " are the only temporal guardians of the human race.
'• B. E."
No further attempt to answer this Address nor to counteract the effects of the Association appears to have been made until late in the Spring, a long time after the farmers throughout the Manor had com-
,menced their work of ploughing and sowing and planting, when the following letter, signed by "An "Inhabitant," was published in Gaine's New-York Gazette: or the Weekly Mercuri/, No. 1236, New- York, Monday, June 19, 1775.