In reply to these three formal propositions, it is only necessary to say, that the fact of the building of the vessel rests on as good authority as any historical statement relating to that colony; that there were sufficient men and full time to do it in; and that there can be no doubt it was intended to build a ship when the expedition left England, from the fact that they brought out a master ship-builder and workmen. That she was built of "green pine" is an assumption very improbable, when we know that the growth along that shore was mainly hardwood, while pine predominates in the interior. But his most severe tirades are poured out upon the poor colonists, calling them felons, knaves, cowards, and almost exhausting the vocabulary of Billingsgate. To this I will not attempt to reply, but merely remark, that his language, style and logic, is as far removed from the "pure well of English undefiled" as a _pool_ of stagnant water is from a perennial fountain.
A passing reader of his famous review would be at a loss to understand why this terrible onset is made on this small pamphlet,--nine-tenths of which he says does not refer to the Popham subject at all,--as though he expected to conquer them, Chinese-like, by only making a great noise. But a friend at my elbow says that this is a broadside in advance, or, rather, the fire of his skirmish line, and only preparatory to the advance of his big guns, which are to come in the shape of a preface to a reprint, in which he intended to entirely annihilate the Pophams, the Gorges, all their followers and biographers, great and small, rich and poor, so completely that our histories will have to be rewritten, and these old names that have been so prominent in our early annals obliterated entirely; and finally to destroy the granite walls of Fort Popham, memorial stone and all, and by further displays of his cut-and-thrust logic prove conclusively that it is all a myth, and nothing of the kind ever existed. _Nous verrons._
[_Boston Daily Advertiser, May 31, 1866._]
Our notice of Professor Patterson's Address, in the _Advertiser_ of the 11th of April, has drawn from "Sabino" an extended reply, which appeared ten days later. As our object in noticing the Address was not controversy; and as "Sabino," skirmishing here and there, has made no effective attack on any historical position taken in the criticism, we have doubted the propriety of making a rejoinder. The world is not in haste to become Pophamized. The memories and associations of more than two centuries, grounded on historic truth, are not to be pushed aside by the most absurd and baseless theory ever addressed to the human understanding.