Excerpt from Old Salem Scrap Book, Vol. 5: The Town Cryer; The Wizard of Electricity of 1771; Prices of the Gay Nineties and Miscellany "It is ordered that hee who is to cry things lost shall keepe a booke wherein he shall write down faithfully all such things with the marks, the parties named, and the days of crying it, for which he shall have 2 pence. "Hee is to cry at 3 severall times, and this order is to be observed in every towne." General Court of Massachusetts 1642. "Hear Ye! Hear Ye!" "The Town Cryer" has news to tell. The proclaimer of information to the populace - the successor to the king's herald. Of office as old as Bible days, so some say, and now succeeded by the voice of the radio. Dr. Bentley spelled it "Cryer," and he was school teacher, as well as minister, and knew languages 20. Yet moderns spell it "crier." In his diary Bentley told of some of the duties of "The Town Cryer." He walked about, ringing his bell, and shouting the news that a ship was that day to be launched, that Dr. Waterhouse was to speak in the evening and that the "theatrical mimies" were coming to town. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.