Though a brute and a dunce, like the rest of the clan, I can govern as well as most Englishmen can; And if I'm a drunkard, I still am a man: I missed it some how in comparing my notes, Or six years ago I had joined with your votes; Not aided the negroes in cutting your throats.[126] Although with so many hard names I was branded, I hope you'll believe, (as you will if you're candid) That I only performed what my master commanded. Give me lands, whores and dice, and you still may be free; Let who will be master, we sha'nt disagree; If king or if Congress--no matter to me;-- I hope you will send me an answer straitway, For 'tis plain that at Charleston we cannot long stay-- And your humble petitioner ever shall pray. DUNMORE. CHARLESTON, _Jan. 6, 1782_. [124] First published in the _Freeman's Journal_, February 13, 1782, and printed almost without change in the various editions. Lord Dunmore was appointed Royal Governor of Virginia in 1770, but, after a stormy career was forced to flee from the colony after the news of Lexington had reached the Southern patriots. [125] "The last Royal Governors: Robert Eden of Maryland; Joseph Martin of North Carolina; William Franklin of New Jersey; William Tryon of New York."--_Duyckinck._ [126] After the second patriot convention assembled in Richmond, Va., in March, 1775, to take measures toward putting the colony in a state of defence, Dunmore, "To intimidate the Virginians, issued proclamations and circulated a rumor that he would incite an insurrection of their slaves.... 'The whole country,' said he, 'can easily be made a solitude; and by the living God! if any insult is offered to me or to those who have obeyed my orders, I will declare freedom to the slaves and lay the town in ashes.'"--_Bancroft._ EPIGRAM[127] Occasioned by the title of Mr. Rivington's[A] New York Royal Gazette being scarcely legible [A] Royal printer to his Britannic majesty while his forces held the city of New York, from 1776 to November 25, 1783.--_Freneau's note._ Says Satan to Jemmy, "I hold you a bet "That you mean to abandon our Royal Gazette, "Or, between you and me, you would manage things better "Than the Title to print on so sneaking a letter. "Now being connected so long in the art "It would not be prudent at present to part; "And people, perhaps, would be frightened, and fret "If the devil alone carried on the Gazette." Says Jemmy to Satan (by the way of a wipe), "Who gives me the matter should furnish the type; "And why you find fault, I can scarcely divine, "For the types, like the printer, are certainly thine. "'Tis yours to deceive with the semblance of truth, "Thou friend of my age, and thou guide of my youth! "But, to prosper, pray send me some further supplies, "A sett of new types, and a sett of new lies."