Monmouth Herald & Inquirer

Yankee Bragging. Here is a specimen of bragging, done in the best Yankee style. Richard H. Dana was called upon at Cambridge, Mass., a few nights since, to speak in behalf of the soldier's fund. He said he felt in a bragging mood, and "sailed in" after this fashion. Every one will admit that he didn't go outside of the record:

"On this continent, Massachusetts established the first school, incorporated the first academy, and endowed the first university. She set up the first printing press, printed the first book, and published the first newspaper. She launched the first ship, killed the first whale, and made the first discoveries in the Pacific and South seas. She digged the first canal, and built the first railroad; coined the first money, and unfurled the first national flag. She fired the first gun, shed the first blood, and gained the first victory in the war of the revolution. She drew the first lightning from heaven, performed the first painless operation in surgery, and invented the magnetic telegraph. She taught the first blind and deaf mute to read, and established the first school for the discipline of idiots. And now in the latter days, she came first to the relief of the capital, and fired the first gun and shed the first blood in a war for the Constitution. Shall the call of such a mother as this to her own children be met by another spirit than that of the sincerest admiration and love."