The duty on tea, imposed five years before by Townshend, had been retained by the British government as a matter of principle, and in the autumn of 1773 the King determined to assert the obnoxious principle which the tax involved. Several ships loaded with tea were accordingly started for America. On Sunday, November 28, the first of these arrived at Boston, and two others came in a few days later. The town went wild, meeting after meeting was held, and on the night of Tuesday, December 16, 1773, a band of about twenty, disguised as Indians, boarded the ships, cut open the tea-chests and flung the contents into the water. A BALLAD OF THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY [December 16, 1773] No! never such a draught was poured Since Hebe served with nectar The bright Olympians and their Lord, Her over-kind protector,-- Since Father Noah squeezed the grape And took to such behaving As would have shamed our grandsire ape Before the days of shaving,-- No! ne'er was mingled such a draught In palace, hall, or arbor, As freemen brewed and tyrants quaffed That night in Boston Harbor! It kept King George so long awake His brain at last got addled, It made the nerves of Britain shake, With sevenscore millions saddled; Before that bitter cup was drained Amid the roar of cannon, The Western war-cloud's crimson stained The Thames, the Clyde, the Shannon; Full many a six-foot grenadier The flattened grass had measured, And many a mother many a year Her tearful memories treasured; Fast spread the tempest's darkening pall, The mighty realms were troubled, The storm broke loose, but first of all The Boston teapot bubbled! An evening party,--only that, No formal invitation, No gold-laced coat, no stiff cravat, No feast in contemplation, No silk-robed dames, no fiddling band, No flowers, no songs, no dancing,-- A tribe of red men, axe in hand,-- Behold the guests advancing! How fast the stragglers join the throng, From stall and workshop gathered! The lively barber skips along And leaves a chin half-lathered; The smith has flung his hammer down,-- The horseshoe still is glowing; The truant tapster at the Crown Has left a beer-cask flowing; The cooper's boys have dropped the adze, And trot behind their master; Up run the tarry ship-yard lads,-- The crowd is hurrying faster,-- Out from the Millpond's purlieus gush The streams of white-faced millers, And down their slippery alleys rush The lusty young Fort-Hillers; The ropewalk lends its 'prentice crew,-- The tories seize the omen: "Ay, boys, you'll soon have work to do For England's rebel foemen, 'King Hancock,' Adams, and their gang, That fire the mob with treason,-- When these we shoot and those we hang The town will come to reason."