From the Preface: The following study aims to give a fairly comprehensive survey of the literary contributions in colonial newspapers from 1704 to 1750. Aside from the well-known essays of Benjamin Franklin in The New England Courant and in The Pennsylvania Gazette, the literary material in the colonial weeklies has been hitherto neglected. Especially is this true of the Southern papers. Quotations of some length from the essays and verse published in colonial journals have therefore been considered advisable in the present work. In most instances the originals of these extracts are accessible only in the collections of Historical Societies, or in the files of some especially favored library. The student who wishes to examine The South Carolina Gazette, for example, must go to the Charleston Library Society for the only file known to be extant. All quotations in the present volume follow literally the punctuation, spelling, and capitalization of the originals, no matter how inconsistent these may seem to the modern reader. The only exceptions to this rule are a few corrections of obvious printers' errors, the retention of which would add needless confusion.