After sipping a glass of port-sangaree prepared by the skilful hands of Mr. Thomas Waite , I besought that worthy successor and representative of so many historic personages to conduct me over their time-honored mansion . He readily complied , but , to confess the truth , I was forced to draw strenuously upon my imagination in order to find aught that was interesting in a house which , without its historic associations , would have seemed merely such a tavern as is usually favored by the custom of decent city boarders and old-fashioned country gentlemen . The chambers , which were probably spacious in former times , are now cut up by partitions and subdivided into little nooks , each affording scanty room for the narrow bed and chair and dressing-table of a single lodger : The great staircase , however , may be termed , without much hyperbole , a feature of grandeur and magnificence . It winds through the midst of the house by flights of broad steps , each flight terminating in a square landing-place , whence the ascent is continued toward the cupola . A carved balustrade , freshly painted in the lower stories , but growing dingier as we ascend , borders the staircase with its quaintly twisted and intertwined pillars , from top to bottom . Up these stairs the military boots , or perchance the gouty shoes , of many a governor have trodden as the wearers mounted to the cupola which afforded them so wide a view over their metropolis and the surrounding country . The cupola is an octagon with several windows , and a door opening upon the roof . From this station , as I pleased myself with imagining , Gage may have beheld his disastrous victory on Bunker Hill -LRB- unless one of the tri-mountains intervened -RRB- , and Howe have marked the approaches of Washington 's besieging army , although the buildings since erected in the vicinity have shut out almost every object save the steeple of the Old South , which seems almost within arm 's length . Descending from the cupola , I paused in the garret to observe the ponderous white-oak framework , so much more massive than the frames of modern houses , and thereby resembling an antique skeleton . The brick walls , the materials of which were imported from Holland , and the timbers of the mansion , are still as sound as ever , but , the floors and other interior parts being greatly decayed , it is contemplated to gut the whole and build a new house within the ancient frame-and brickwork . Among other inconveniences of the present edifice , mine host mentioned that any jar or motion was apt to shake down the dust of ages out of the ceiling of one chamber upon the floor of that beneath it . We stepped forth from the great front window into the balcony where in old times it was doubtless the custom of the king 's representative to show himself to a loyal populace , requiting their huzzas and tossed-up hats with stately bendings of his dignified person . In those days the front of the Province House looked upon the street , and the whole site now occupied by the brick range of stores , as well as the present court-yard , was laid out in grass-plats overshadowed by trees and bordered by a wrought-iron fence . Now the old aristocratic edifice hides its time-worn visage behind an upstart modern building ; at one of the back windows I observed some pretty tailoresses sewing and chatting and laughing , with now and then a careless glance toward the balcony . Descending thence , we again entered the bar-room , where the elderly gentleman above mentioned -- the smack of whose lips had spoken so favorably for Mr. Waite 's good liquor -- was still lounging in his chair . He seemed to be , if not a lodger , at least a familiar visitor of the house who might be supposed to have his regular score at the bar , his summer seat at the open window and his prescriptive corner at the winter 's fireside . Being of a sociable aspect , I ventured to address him with a remark calculated to draw forth his historical reminiscences , if any such were in his mind , and it gratified me to discover that , between memory and tradition , the old gentleman was really possessed of some very pleasant gossip about the Province House . The portion of his talk which chiefly interested me was the outline of the following legend . He professed to have received it at one or two removes from an eye-witness , but this derivation , together with the lapse of time , must have afforded opportunities for many variations of the narrative ; so that , despairing of literal and absolute truth , I have not scrupled to make such further changes as seemed conducive to the reader 's profit and delight . * * * * * At one of the entertainments given at the province-house during the latter part of the siege of Boston there passed a scene which has never yet been satisfactorily explained .
The officers of the British army and the loyal gentry of the province , most of whom were collected within the beleaguered town , had been invited to a masqued ball , for it was the policy for Sir William XXXXX to hide the distress and danger of the period and the desperate aspect of the siege under an ostentation of festivity .
Holland Howe Washington bar-room brickwork eye-witness garret inconveniences province-house wearers