We should have taken, perhaps, more satisfaction in the perusal of these newspapers, had they not been so excessively expensive. We took the _Statesman_, the _Star_, and _Bell's Weekly Messenger_; and some part of the time, the _Whig_. The expense of the Statesman was defrayed by the sale of green fish to the contractor. The Star was taken by the Frenchmen; the Whig and Bell's Weekly Messenger, by individuals. We paid twenty-eight shillings sterling per month, for the Statesman, which is twice the price of a newspaper in Boston, for a whole year. Besides it costs us sixteen shillings per month to get these papers conveyed on board. The reader will probably say, in the language of Dr. Franklin's allegory, that considering our destitute condition, "we paid dear for our whistle." These newspapers were smuggled, or pretended to be smuggled; our commander's pocket was not the lighter for New-England "_quidnuncism_." But every day afforded instances of meanness; scraping misery to the bone, for a few pence. The United States is the region of all regions of the earth for newspapers. _There are more newspapers printed in the United States, than in all the rest of the world besides._ We do not mean a greater number of copies of the same title, but a greater number of different titles; insomuch, that invention is nearly exhausted to afford them new names. In England, newspapers pay a very high tax; in America, they are perfectly free, and their transport by the mails is nearly so; and this is because our government, that is to say, the _people_, consider newspapers one of the necessaries of a Yankee's life. In the definition of a New-England man, you should always insert that he is "_a go to meeting animal_, and _a newspaper reading animal_!" The sums which we poor prisoners paid for one English newspaper a year, would have paid the annual board of a man in the interior of our own plentiful country. I am firmly of opinion, however, that Boston has and will have reason to curse her _federal_ newspapers. They, like, the "_Courier_" and "_Times_," of London have spread false principles, and scattered error amongst a people too violently prejudiced to read both sides of the question.