Then began the work of destruction. The carved and polished mahogany tables were shattered with heavy clubs and hewn to splinters with axes. The marble hearths and mantelpieces were broken. The volumes of Hutchinson's library, so precious to a studious man, were torn out of their covers and the leaves sent flying out of the windows. Manuscripts containing secrets of our country's history which are now lost forever were scattered to the winds. The old ancestral portraits whose fixed countenances looked down on the wild scene were rent from the walls. The mob triumphed in their downfall and destruction, as if these pictures of Hutchinson's forefathers had committed the same offenses as their descendants. A tall looking-glass which had hitherto presented a reflection of the enraged and drunken multitude was now smashed into a thousand fragments. We gladly dismiss the scene from the mirror of our fancy. Before morning dawned the walls of the house were all that remained. The interior was a dismal scene of ruin. A shower pattered in at the broken windows, and when Hutchinson and his family returned they stood shivering in the same room where the last evening had seen them so peaceful and happy. [Illustration: North Church Tower, Boston] THE BOSTON MASSACRE [Footnote: From _Grandfather's Chair_.] _By_ NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE It was now the 3d of March, 1770. The sunset music of the British regiments was heard as usual throughout the town. The shrill fife and rattling drum awoke the echoes in King Street while the last ray of sunshine was lingering on the cupola of the Town-house. And now all the sentinels were posted. One of them marched up and down before the custom-house, treading a short path through the snow and longing for the time when they would be dismissed to the warm fireside of the guard-room. Meanwhile, Captain Preston was perhaps sitting in our great chair before the hearth of the British Coffee-house. In the course of the evening there were two or three slight commotions which seemed to indicate that trouble was at hand. Small parties of young men stood at the corners of the streets or walked along the narrow pavements. Squads of soldiers who were dismissed from duty passed by them, shoulder to shoulder, with the regular step which they had learned at the drill. Whenever these encounters took place it appeared to be the object of the young men to treat the soldiers with as much incivility as possible. "Turn out, you lobster-backs!" one would say. "Crowd them off the sidewalks!" another would cry. "A red-coat has no right in Boston streets!" "Oh, you rebel rascals!" perhaps the soldiers would reply, glaring fiercely at the young men. "Some day or other we'll make our way through Boston streets at the point of the bayonet!" One or twice such disputes as these brought on a scuffle, which passed off, however, without attracting much notice. About eight o'clock, for some unknown cause, an alarm bell rang loudly and hurriedly.