Note 209 — ERA OF THE FREEMAN'S JOURNAL (continued 2)

Published in the Freeman's Journal, December, 1782, in two installments and inserted without change in the edition of 1786. The first installment bore the motto "Inclusus pœnam expectat.—Virg.," and the second the motto "Incertus quo fata ferant, quo sistere detur.—Virg." Almost no change was made in the text for the later editions. Rivington bore this attack with coolness; he calmly inserted the first installment of the poem in his Royal Gazette for December 14, and gave to it the following introduction: "Mr. Rivington, having been applied to by many gentlemen for a pleasant publication respecting himself, exhibited in the Philadelphia Freeman's Journal, of December 4th, takes leave to copy it into this Day's Gazette, and assures the Author that a Column shall at any time be most cheerfully reserved to convey that Gentleman's lively Lucubrations to the Public."