TWO:Landor and the adjutant came by, and she called to them. The adjutant backed the vinagrone with a bag of sutler's candy, and Felipa took the tarantula. It was mainly legless trunk, but still furious. Landor studied her. She was quiet, but her eyes had grown narrow, and they gleamed curiously at the sight of the torn legs and feelers scattering around the bottle, wriggling and writhing. She was at her very worst.
TWO:[282]
TWO:Cairness and Felipa were alone, and he leaned nearer to her. "Do you know," he asked in a low voice, "that there have been all sorts of rumors of trouble among the Indians for some time?"When such acts as the burning of the Gaspee had been done with impunity, and whilst the American mind was rankling with the Franklin poison of the purloined letters, three vessels arrived at Boston, laden with tea, under the conditions of Lord North's Bill. On the arrival of the ships the commotion was intense. The captains themselves would gladly have sailed away with their obnoxious cargoes in safety, but the governor very foolishly gave orders that they should not pass the ports without a permit from himself, and he sent Admiral Montague to guard the passages out of the harbour with two ships of war. As the evening grew dark, those who had quitted the meeting held on the 16th of December to demand that the ships should be sent home again, were met by mobs of men arrayed as wild Indians, who hurried down to Griffin's Wharf, where the tea ships lay. Rushing tumultuously on board, and hoisting out the tea chests, they emptied them into the sea amid much cheering and noise. Having thus destroyed teas to the amount of eighteen thousand pounds, the triumphant mob retreated to their houses.
TWO:Before this great measure had passed, Pitt had introduced his Budget. On the 30th of June he made his financial statement. He said that the resources of the country were in a very burthened and disordered state; but that was not his work, but the work of his predecessors. The outstanding arrears, owing to the late war, were already ascertained to amount at least to fourteen million pounds. These operated very injuriously on the public credit, being at a discount of from fifteen to twenty per cent.; and that without greatly[308] affecting the public securities, he should not be able to find more than six million six hundred thousand six hundred pounds of them at once. To meet the interest, he proposed to raise taxes to the amount of nine hundred thousand pounds a year. The impostssome entirely new, and some augmentedwere on hats, ribbons, gauzes, coals, saddle and pleasure horses, printed linens and calicoes, candles, paper, and hackney coaches; licences to deal in excisable commodities, bricks, and tiles; licences for shooting game.
