Jacob Sheaffe, who in his day carried on a more extensive business than any other merchant in Portsmouth, became the successor of Langdon as Government agent. It is said he purchased the island where the Navy Yard now is. One of the six frigates ordered under Washington's administration was begun here. We had voted to build these vessels to punish the Algerine corsairs; we then countermanded them; afterward a treaty was made with these pirates by which they were to have a new frigate of thirty-two guns, which was laid down at Portsmouth. The family name of Sheaffe was once much more familiar in New England than now. It was of Peggy Sheaffe, a celebrated Boston beauty, that Baron Steuben perpetrated the following _mot_: When introduced to her at the house of Mrs. Livingstone, mother of the chancellor, the baron exclaimed, in his broken English, "I have been cautioned from my youth against _Mischief_, but had no idea her charms were so irresistible." Kittery is mentioned by Josselyn as the most populous of all the plantations in the Province of Maine. It engrosses the left bank of the Piscataqua from the great bridge at Portsmouth to the sea. The booming of guns at the Navy Yard often announces the presence of some dignitary, yet none, I fancy, more distinguished than Washington have set foot in Kittery. I regret he has not much to say of it, but more of the fishing-party of which he was, at the moment, a member. "Having lines," he says, "we proceeded to the fishing banks without the harbor, and fished for cod, but it not being a proper time of tide, we caught but two." The impregnable character of the President for truthfulness forbids the presumption that want of skill had aught to do with his ill-luck. It would be matter for general regret if the selectmen of Kittery should again, as long ago happened, be presented by a grand jury for not taking care that their children were taught their catechism, and educated according to law. The number of steeples and school-houses seen by the way indicates, in this respect, a healthy public opinion. Kittery church-yard contains many mute appeals to linger and glean its dead secrets. Mrs. Thaxter sweetly sings as she felt the story of one of these mildewed stones: "Crushing the scarlet strawberries in the grass, I kneel to read the slanting stone. Alas! How sharp a sorrow speaks! A hundred years And more have vanished, with their smiles and tears, Since here was laid, upon an April day, Sweet Mary Chauncey in the grave away, A hundred years since here her lover stood Beside her grave." * * *