But lost, dissolved in thy superior shade,
One tide of falsehood o'er the world be spread;
In wit's light robe shall gaudy fiction shine,
And all be lies, as in a work of thine.

The Echo was published in a series of twenty numbers in The American Mercury from 1791 to 1805. It was reissued in an abridged form by the surviving members of the group, “with curious illustrations painted by Tisdale, engraved by Levey," from the Porcupine Press in 1807. Numbers II and III were reprinted as originally written, but portions were omitted from the other numbers, "without essentially injuring the constituent parts." The original intention was to ridicule the bad literary taste of the time, but after the first number the work became largely political, directing its attack upon Republican leaders and the "prevalent infidel ideas of the French Revolution." It followed the plan of reprinting some absurd passage from a political speech or a newspaper article, and echoing it in a burlesque poem. It is often clever and far better humored than The Anarchiad, although some of the democratic leaders come in for rather severe handling, in particular John Hancock, whose pompous ways were a fair target, Samuel Adams, and Judge Hugh Henry Brackenridge, author of Modern Chivalry, a racy satire of frontier politics. With the exception of a few lines by Cogswell and Smith, and a part of one or two numbers by Hopkins, the entire work was the production of Alsop and Theodore Dwight. Kettell attributes the conception and the greater part of the whole to the former.

The portions of The Echo here reprinted, with the original notes, are from the edition of 1807.

THE ECHO

NUMBERI

[By Richard Alsop and Theodore Dwight]
Boston, July 14th, 1791.

"On Tuesday last, about 4 o'clock, P. M. came on a smart shower of rain attended with lightning and thunder, no ways remarkable. The clouds soon dissipated, and the appearance of the azure vault, left trivial hopes of further needful supplies from the uncorked bottles of heaven. In a few moments the horizon was again overshadowed, and an almost impenetrable gloom mantled the face of the skies. The wind frequently shifting from one point to another, wafted the clouds in various directions, until at last they united in one common centre and shrouded the visible globe in thick darkness. The attendant lightning, with the accompanying thunder, brought forth from the treasures that embattled elements to awful conflict, were extremely vivid, and amazing loud. Those buildings that were defended by electric rods, appeared to be wrapped in sheets of livid flame, and a flood of the pure fire rolled its burning torrents down them with alarming violence. The majestic roar of disploding thunders, now bursting with a sudden crash, and now wasting the rumbling Есно of their sounds in other lands, added indescribable grandeur to the sublime scene. The windows of the upper regions appeared as thrown wide open, and the trembling cataract poured impetuous down. More salutary showers, and more needed, have not been experienced this summer. Several previous weeks had exhibited a melancholy sight: the verdure of fields was nearly destroyed; and the patient husbandman almost experienced despair. Two beautiful rainbows, the one existing in its native glories, and the other a splendid reflection of primitive colours, closed the magnificent picture, and presented to the contemplative mind, the angel of mercy, cloathed with the brilliance of this irradiated arch, and dispensing felicity to assembled worlds.

"It is not unnatural to expect that the thunder storm would be attended with some damage. We hear a barn belonging to Mr. Wythe of Cambridge caught fire from the lightning, which entirely consumed the same, together with several tons of hay, &c."

Hartford, August 8, 1791.

"Those mighty tales which great events rehearse,
“To fame we consecrate in deathless verse."

On Tuesday last great Sol, with piercing eye,
Pursued his journey thro' the vaulted sky,
And in his car effulgent roll'd his way
Four hours beyond the burning zone of day;
When lo! a cloud, o'ershadowing all the plain,
From countless pores perspir'd a liquid rain,
While from its cracks the lightnings made a peep,
And chit-chat thunders rock'd our fears asleep.
But soon the vapoury fog dispers'd in air,
And left the azure blue-eyed concave bare:
Even the last drop of hope, which dripping skies
Gave for a moment to our straining eyes,
Like Boston Rum, from heaven's junk bottles broke,
Lost all the corks, and vanish'd into smoke.

But swift from worlds unknown, a fresh supply
Of vapour dimm'd the great horizon's eye;
The crazy clouds, by shifting zephyrs driven,
Wafted their courses through the high-arch'd heaven,
Till pil'd aloft in one stupendous heap,

The seen and unseen worlds grew dark, and nature 'gan to

weep.

Attendant lightnings stream'd their tails afar,

And social thunders wak'd ethereal war,

From dark deep pockets brought their treasur'd store,

Embattled elements increas'd the roar

Red crinkling fires expended all their force,

And tumbling rumblings steer'd their headlong course.

Those guarded frames by thunder poles* secur'd,
Tho' wrapp'd in sheets of flame, those sheets endur'd,
O'er their broad roofs the fiery torrents roll'd,
And every shingle seem'd of burning gold.
Majestic thunders, with disploding roar,

And sudden crashing, bounc'd along the shore,
Till, lost in other lands, the whispering sound
Fled from our ears and fainted on the ground.

Rain's houset on high its window sashes op'd,
And out the cataract impetuous hopp'd,
While the grand scene by far more grand appear'd
With lightnings never seen and thunders never heard.

More salutary showers have not been known,
To wash dame Nature's dirty homespun gown-
For several weeks the good old Joan's been seen,
With filth bespatter'd like a lazy quean.
The husbandman fast travelling to despair,
Laid down his hoe and took his rocking chair,
While his fat wife the well and cistern dried,
Her mop grown useless hung it up and cry'd.

Two rain-bows fair that Iris brought along,
Pick'd from the choicest of her colour'd throng;
The first-born deck'd in pristine hues of light,
In all its native glories glowing bright,
The next adorn'd with less refulgent rays,
But borrowing lustre from its brother's blaze;
Shone a bright reflex of those colours gay
That deck'd with light creation's primal day,
When infant Nature lisp'd her earliest notes,
And younker Adam crept in petticoats:
And to the people to reflection given,
"The sons of Boston, the elect of heaven."
Presented Mercy's Angel smiling fair,
Irradiate splendors frizzled in his hair,

* Vulgarly lightning rods.

† The old gentleman from whose cellar the junk bottles and demijohns were taken.