Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Desponding mortals, with officious care,
The concave drum and magic brass prepare ;
Implore him to sustain th' important fight,
And save depending worlds from endless night:
Fondly they hope their labour may avail
To ease his conflict, and assist his toil,
Whilst he, in beams of native splendour bright,
(Though dark his orb appear to human sight)
Shines to the gods with more diffusive light;
To distant stars with equal glory burns,
Inflames their lamps, and feeds their golden urns,
Sure to retain his known superior tract,
And proves the more illustrious by defect.'

*

This is a very lively image; but I must take the liberty to say, my kinsman drives the sun a little like Phaeton; he has all the warmth of Phœbus, but will not stay for his direction of it. Avail and toil, defect and tract, will never do for rhymes. But, however, he has the true spirit in him; for which reason I was willing to entertain any thing he pleased to send me. The subject which he writes upon, naturally raises great reflexions in the soul, and puts us in mind of the mixed condition which we mor

taken from his audience all manner of super-
stition, by the agitations of pretty Mrs. Bignell,
whom he has, with great subtilty, made a lay-
sister, as well as a prophetess; by which means
she carries on the affairs of both worlds with
great success. My friend designs to go on
with another work against winter, which he
Lintends to call, 'The Modern Poets,' a people
no less mistaken in their opinions of being in-
spired, than the other. In order to this, he
has by him seven songs, besides many ambi-
guities, which cannot be mistaken for any
thing but what he means them. Mr. Durfey
generally writes state-plays, and is wonderfully
useful to the world in such representations.
This method is the same that was used by the
old Athenians, to laugh out of countenance,
or promote, opinions among the people. My
friend has therefore, against this play is acted
for his own benefit, made two dances, which
may be also of an universal benefit. In the
first, he has represented absolute power in the
person of a tall man with a hat and feather,
who gives his first minister, that stands just
before him, an huge kick; the minister gives
the kick to the next before; and so to the
end of the stage. In this moral and practical
jest, you are made to understand, that there
is, in an absolute government, no gratifica-
tion but giving the kick you receive from
one above you to one below you. This is per-
formed to a grave and melancholy air; but on
a sudden the tune moves quicker, and the
whole company fall into a circle, and take
hands; and then, at a certain sharp note, they
move round, and kick as kick can. This lat-
ter performance he makes to be the represen-
tation of a free state; where, if you all mind

tals are to support; which, as it varies to good
or bad, adorns or defaces our actions to the
beholders; all which glory and shame must
end in, what we so much repine at, death.
But doctrines on this occasion, any other than
that of living well, are the most insignificant
and most empty of all the labours of men.
None but a tragedian can die by rule, and
wait till he discovers a plot, or says a fine
thing upon his exit. In real life, this is a
chimera; and by noble spirits it will be done
decently, without the ostentation of it. We
see men of all conditions and characters go
through it with equal resolution; and if we
consider the speeches of the mighty philoso-
phers, heroes, lawgivers, and great captains,
they can produce no more in a discerning spirit,
than rules to make a man a fop on his death-Your steps, you may go round and round very
bed. Commend me to that natural greatuess
of soul, expressed by an innocent, and conse-
quently resolute country-fellow, who said in
the pains of the cholic, If I once get this
breath out of my body, you shall hang me be-
fore you put it in again.' Honest Ned! and
so he died. +

But it is to be supposed, that from this place you may expect an account of such a thing as a new play is not to be omitted. That acted this night is the newest that ever was writ. The author is my ingenious friend Mr. Thomas

jollily, with a motion pleasant to yourselves
and those you dance with; nay, if you put
yourselves out, at the worst, you only kick
and are kicked, like friends and equals.

From my own Apartment, May 4. Of all the vanities under the sun, I confess that of being proud of one's birth is the greatest. At the same time, since in this unreasonable age, by the force of prevailing custom, things in which men have no hand are imputed to them; and that I am used by some people, as if Isaac Bickerstaff, though I write myself Esquire, was nobody; to set the world right in that particular, I shall give you my genealogy, as a kinsman of ours has sent it me from the herald's office. It is certain, and observed by the wisest writers, that there are women who are not nicely chaste, and men not severely honest, in all families; therefore let those who may be apt to raise aspersions upon ours, please to give us as impartial an account of their own, and we shall be satisfied. The business of mentions this saying of his in a letter to Swift-Swift's heralds is a matter of so great nicety, that, to

The

Durfey. This drama is called, 'The Modern
Prophets,' and is a most unanswerable satire
against the late spirit of enthusiasm.
writer had by long experience observed that,
in company, very grave discourses had been
followed by bawdry; and therefore has turned
the bumour that way with great success, and

Ovid, Metam. ii. 1.

+ This Ned was a farmer of Anthony Henley, Esq. who

Works, vol. xviii. p. 15.

[ocr errors]

avoid mistakes, I shall give you my cousin's letter verbatim, without altering a syllable.

· DEAR COUSIN,

There have been

very considerable places.
some of them of that strength and dexterity,
that five hundred of the ablest men in the

staff out of their hands. The Falstaff's are strangely given to whoring and drinking; there are abundance of them in and about London. One thing is very remarkable of this branch, and that is, there are just as many women as men in it. There was a wicked stick of wood of this name in Harry the Fourth's time, one sir John Falstaff. As for Tipstaff, the youngest son, he was an honest fellow; but his sons, and his sons' sons, have all of them been the veriest rogues living; it is this unlucky branch that has stocked the nation with that swarm of lawyers, attorneys, serjeants, and bailiffs, with which the nation is over-run. Tipstaff, being a seventh son, used to cure the king's-evil; but his rascally descendants are so far from having that healing quality, that, by a touch upon the shoulder, they give a man such an ill habit of body, that he can never come abroad afterwards. This is all I know of the line of Jacobstaff; his younger brother Isaacstaff, as I told you before, had five sons, and was married twice: his first wife was a Staff (for they did not stand upon false heraldry in those days) by whom he had one son, who, in process of time, being a schoolmaster and well read in the Greek, called himself Distaff or Twicechildren out to trades; and the Distaffs have He was not very rich, so he put his

staff.

Since you have been pleased to make your-kingdom have often tugged in vain to pull a self so famous of late, by your ingenious writings, and some time ago by your learned predictions; since Partridge, of immortal memory, is dead and gone, who, poetical as he was, could not understand his own poetry; and philomatical as he was, could not read his own destiny; since the pope, the king of France, and great part of his court, are either literally or metaphorically defunct; since, I say, these things (not foretold by any one but yourself) have come to pass after so surprising a manner; it is with no small concern I see the original of the Staffian race so little known in the world as it is at this time; for which reason, as you have employed your studies in astronomy, and the occult sciences, so I, my mother being a Welch woman, dedicated mine to genealogy, particularly that of our own family, which, for its antiquity and number, may challenge any in Great Britain. The Staffs are originally of Staffordshire, which took its name from them: the first that I find of the Staffs was one Jacobstaff, a famous and renowned astronomer, who, by Dorothy his wife had issue seven sons; viz. Bickerstaff, Longstaff, Wagstaff, Quarterstaff, Whitestaff, Falstaff, and Tipstaff. He also had a younger brother, who was twice married, and had five sons; viz. Distaff, Pikestaff, Mopstaff, Broomstaff, and Raggedstaff. As for the branch from whence you spring, I shall say very little of it, only that it is the chief of the Staffs, and called Bickerstaff, quasi Bigger-genealogist. Pikestaff, the eldest son by the staff; as much as to say, the Great Staff, or Staff of Staffs; and that it has applied itself to astronomy with great success, after the example of our aforesaid forefather. The descendants from Longstaff, the second son, were a rakish disorderly sort of people, and rambled from one place to another, until, in the time of Harry the Second, they settled in Kent, and were called Long-tails, from the long tails which were sent them as a punishment for the murder of Thomas a-Becket, as the legends say. They have always been sought after by the ladies; but whether it be to show their aversion to popery, or their love to miracles, I cannot say. The Wagstaffs are a merry thoughtless sort of people, who have always been opinionated of their own wit; they have turned themselves mostly to poetry. This is the most numerous branch of our family, and the poorest. The Quarterstaffs are most of them prize-fighters or deer-stealers; there have been so many of them hanged lately, that there are very few of that branch of our family left. The Whitestaffs are all courtiers, and have had

An allusion to the staff carried by the first lord of the treasury, afterwards hamonrously compared by Steele to "an emmet distinguished from his fellows by a white straw."

ever since been employed in the woollen and linen manufactures, except myself, who am a

Broom

second venter, was a man of business, a down-
right plodding fellow, and withal so plain, that
he became a proverb. Most of this family are
at present in the army. Raggedstaff was an
unlucky boy, and used to tear his cloaths
in getting birds nests, and was always playing
with a tame bear his father kept. Mopstaff
fell in love with one of his father's maids, and
used to help her to clean the house.
staff was a chimney-sweeper. The Mopstaffs
and Broomstaffs are naturally as civil people
as ever went out of doors; but alas! if they
once get into ill hands, they knock down all
before them. Pilgramstaff ran away from his
friends, and went strolling about the country;
and Pipestaff was a wine-cooper. These two
were the unlawful issue of Longstaff.

N. B. The Canes, the Clubs, the Cudgels,
the Wands, the Devil upon two Sticks, and one
Bread, that goes by the name of Staff of Life,
I am,
are none of our relations.

Dear Cousin,

'Your humble servant,

From the Herald's Office,
May 1. 1709.

'D. DISTAFF.

The House of Commons.

St. James's Coffee-house, May 4.

As political news is not the principal subject on which we treat, we are so happy as to have no occasion for that art of cookery which our brother newsmongers so much excel in; as appears by their excellent and inimitable manner of dressing up a second time for your taste the same dish which they gave you the day before, in case there come over no new pickles from Holland. Therefore, when we have nothing to say to you from courts and camps, we hope still to give you somewhat new and curious from ourselves: the women of our house, upon occasion, being capable of carrying on the business, according to the laudable custom of the wives in Holland; but, without farther preface, take what we have not mentioned in our former relations.

[blocks in formation]

WHEN a man has engaged to keep a stage coach, he is obliged, whether he has passengers or not, to set out; thus it fares with us weekly historians; but indeed, for my particular, I hope, I shall soon have little more to do in this work, than to publish what is sent me from such as have leisure and capacity for giving delight, and being pleased in an elegant manner. The present grandeur of the British nation might make us expect, that we should rise in our public diversions, and manner of enjoying life, in proportion to our advancement in glory and power. Instead of that, survey this town, and you will find rakes and debauchees are your men of pleasure; thoughtless atheists and illiterate drunkards call themselves freethinkers; and gamesters, banterers, biters, swearers, and twenty new-born insects more, are, in their several species, the modern men

Letters from Hanover of the thirtieth of the last month say, that the prince royal of Prussia arrived there on the fifteenth, and left that court on the second of this month, in pursuit of his journey to Flanders, where he makes the ensuing campaign. Those advices add, that the young prince Nassau, hereditary governor of Friesland, celebrated, on the twenty-of wit. Hence it is, that a man, who has been sixth of the last month, his marriage with the beauteous princess of Hesse-Cassel, with a pomp and magnificence suitable to their age and quality.

Letters from Paris say, his most Christian majesty retired to Marley on the first instant, N. S. and our last advices from Spain inform us, that the prince of Asturias had made his public entry into Madrid in great splendour. The duke of Anjou has given Don Joseph Hartado de Amaraga the government of Terra firma de Veragua, and the presidency of Panama in America. They add, that the forces commanded by the marquis de Bay have been reinforced by six battalions of Spanish Walloon guards. Letters from Lisbon advise, that the army of the king of Portugal was at Elvas on the twenty-second of the last mouth, and would decamp on the twenty-fourth, in order to march upon the enemy who lay at Badajos.

Yesterday, at four in the morning, his grace the duke of Marlborough set out for Margate, and embarked for Holland at eight this morning.

Yesterday also sir George Thorold was declared alderman of Cordwainers Ward, in the room of his brother sir Charles Thorold, deceased.

ADVERTISEMENT.

Any ladies who have any particular stories of their acquaintance, which they are willing privately to make public, may send them by the penny-post to Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq. inclosed to Mr. John Morphew, near Stationers' Hall.

out of town but one half year, has lost the language, and must have some friend to stand by him, and keep him in countenance for talking common sense. To-day I saw a short interlude at White's of this nature, which I took notes of, and put together as well as I could in a public place. The persons of the drama are Pip, the last gentleman that has been made so at cards; Trimmer, a person half undone at them, and who is now between a cheat and a gentleman; Acorn, an honest Englishman of good plain sense and meaning; and Mr. Friendly, a reasonable man of the town.

White's Chocolate-house, May 5.

Enter PIP, TRIMMER, and ACORN, Ac. What is the matter, gentlemen? what! take no notice of an old friend?

Pip. Pox on it! do not talk to me, I am voweled by the count, and cursedly out of uniour.

Ac. Voweled! pry'thee, Trimmer, what does he mean by that?

Trim. Have a care, Harry, speak softly; do not show your ignorance:-if you do, they will bite you wherever they meet you, they are such cursed curs-the present wits.

Ac. Bite me! what do you mean? Pip. Why! do not you know what biting is? nay, you are in the right on it. However, one would learn it only to defend one's self against men of wit, as one would know the tricks of play, to be secure against the cheats. But do not you hear, Acorn, that report, that some potentates of the alliance have taken care of themselves exclusively of us?

Ae. How! heaven forbid! after all our glorious victories; all the expense of blood and treasure!

Pip. BITE.

Ac. Bite! how?

sions, which were too dangerous to be cured by the skill of little king Oberon, who then sat in the throne of it. The laziness of this prince threw him upon the choice of a person who was fit to spend his life in contentions, an

Trim. Nay, he has bit you fairly enough; able and profound attorney, to whom he mortthat is certain.

[merged small][ocr errors]

Friend. You are to understand, sir, that simplicity of behaviour, which is the perfection of good breeding and good sense, is utterly lost in the world; and in the room of it there are started a thousand little inventions, which men, barren of better things, take up in the place of it. Thus, for every character in conversation that used to please, there is an impostor put upon you. Him whom we allowed, formerly, for a certain pleasant subtilty, and natural way of giving you an unexpected hit, called a droll, is now mimicked by a biter, who is a dull fellow, that tells you a lie with a grave face, and laughs at you for knowing him no better than to believe him. Instead of that sort of companion who could rally you, and keep his countenance, until he made you fall into some little inconsistency of behaviour, at which you yourself could laugh with him, you have the sneerer, who will keep you company from morning to night, to gather your follies of the day (which perhaps you commit out of confidence in him) and expose you in the evening to all the scorners in town. For your man of sense and free spirit, whose set of thoughts were built upon learning, reason, and experience, you have now an impudent creature made up of vice only, who supports his ignorance by his courage, and want of learning by contempt of it.

gaged his whole empire. This Divito+ is the most skilful of all politicians; he has a perfect art in being unintelligible in discourse, and uncomeatable in business. But he, having no understanding in this polite way, brought in upon us, to get in his money, ladder dancers, jugglers, and mountebanks, to strut in the place of Shakspeare's heroes, and Jonson's humorists. When the seat of wit was thus mortgaged without equity of redemption, an architect arose, who has built the muse a new palace, but secured her no retinue; so that, instead of action there, we have been put off by song and dance. This latter help of sound has also begun to fail for want of voices; therefore the palace has since been put into the hands of a surgeon, who cuts any foreign fellow into a eunuch, § and passes him upon us for a singer of Italy.

Ac. I will go out of town to-morrow.

Friend. Things are come to this pass; and yet the world will not understand, that the theatre has much the same effect on the manners of the age, as the bank on the credit of the nation. Wit and spirit, humour and good sense, can never be revived, but under the gogovernment of those who are judges of such talents; who know, that whatever is put up in their stead, is but a short and trifling expedient, to support the appearance of them for a season. It is possible, a peace will give leisure to put these matters under new regulations, but, at present, all the assistance we can see towards our recovery is as far from giving us help, as a poultice is from performing what can be done only by the grand elixir.

Will's Coffee-house, May 6.

Ac. Dear sir, hold: what you have told me According to our late design in the applauded already of this change in conversation is too verses on the morning, which you lately had miserable to be heard with any delight; but, from hence, we proceed to improve that just methiuks, as these new creatures appear in the intention, and present you with other labours, world, it might give an excellent field to writers made proper to the place in which they were for the stage, to divert us with the representa-written. The following poem comes from Cotion of them there.

[blocks in formation]

penhagen, and is as fine a winter-piece as we have ever had from any of the schools of the most learned painters. Such images as these give us a new pleasure in our sight, and fix upon our minds traces of reflection, which accompany us whenever the like objects occur. In short, excellent poetry and description dwell upon us so agreeably, that all the readers of them are made to think, if not write, like men of wit. But it would be injury to detain you longer from this excellent performance, which is addressed to the earl of Dorset by Mr. Philips, the author of several choice poems in Mr. Tonson's new Miscellany.

Copenhagen, March 9, 1709.
From frozen climes, and endless tracts of snow,
From streams that northern winds forbid to flow,
What present shall the muse to Dorset bring,
Or how, so near the pole, attempt to sing?
The hoary winter here conceals from sight
All pleasing objects that to verse invite.
The hills and dales, and the delightful woods,
The flow'ry plains, and silver-streaming floods,
By snow disguis'd, in bright confusion lie,
And with one dazzling waste fatigue the eye.

No gentle-breathing breeze prepares the spring, No birds within the desert region sing: The ships unmov'd the boisterous winds defy, While rattling chariots o'er the ocean fly. The vast leviathan wants room to play, And spout his waters in the face of day,

The starving wolves along the main sea prowl, 'And to the moon in icy valleys howl.

For many a shining league the level main
Jere spreads itself into a glassy plain:
There solid billows of enormous size,
Alps of green ice, in wild disorder rise.

And yet but lately have I seen, ev'n here, The winter in a lovely dress appear. Ere yet the clouds let fall the treasur'd snow, Or winds began thro' hazy skies to blow, At evening a keen eastern breeze arose ; And the descending rain unsully'd froze. Soon as the silent shades of night withdrew, The ruddy morn disclos'd at once to view The face of nature in a rich disguise, And brighten'd ev'ry object to my eyes: For every shrub, and every blade of grass, And every pointed thorn, seem'd wrought in glass. In pearls and rubies rich the hawthorn's show, While thro' the ice the crimson berries glow. The thick-sprung reeds the watery marshes yield Seem polish'd lances in a hostile field. The stag in limpid currents, with surprise, Sees crystal branches on his forehead risc. The spreading oak, the beech, and towering pine, Glaz'd over, in the freezing æther shine. The frighted birds the rattling branches shun, That wave and glitter in the distant sun.

When, if a sudden gust of wind arise, The brittle forest into atoms flies: The crackling wood beneath the tempest bends, And in a spangled shower the prospect ends; Or, if a southern gale the region warm, And by degrees unbind the wintery charm, The traveller a miry country sees, And journeys sad beneath the dropping trees.

Like some deluded peasant Merlin leads Thro' fragrant bowers, and thro' delicious meads; While here enchanted gardens to him rise, And airy fabrics there attract his eyes, His wandering feet the magic paths pursue; And while he thinks the fair illusion true,

The trackless scenes disperse in fluid air,
And woods, and wilds, and thorny ways appear:
A tedious road the weary wretch returns,
And as he goes, the transient vision mourns.

From my own Apartment, May 6. There has a mail this day arrived from Holland; but the matter of the advices importing rather what gives us great expectations, than any positive assurances, I shall, for this time, decline giving you what I know; and apply the following verses of Mr. Dryden, in the second part of Almanzor,' to the present circumstances of things, without discovering what my knowledge in astronomy suggests to

me:

When empire in its childhood first appears, A watchful fate o'ersees its tender years:

Till, grown more strong it thrusts and stretches out, And elbows all the kingdoms round about.

The place thus made for its first breathing free,

It moves again for ease and luxury:

Till, swelling by degrees, it has possest

The greater space, and now crowds up the rest.
When from behind there starts some petty state,
And pushes on its now unwieldy fate:
Then down the precipice of time it goes,
And sinks in minutes, which in ages rose.

No. 13.]

[ocr errors]

Tuesday, May 10, 1709.

[blocks in formation]

From my own Apartment, May 8. MUCH hurry and business has to-day perplexed me into a mood too thoughtful for going into company; for which reason, instead of the tavern, I went into Lincoln's Inn walks; and, having taken a round or two, I sat down, according to the allowed familiarity of these places, on a bench; at the other end of which sat a venerable gentleman, who speaking with a very affable air,- Mr. Bickerstaff,' said he, I take it for a very great piece of good fortune that you have found me out.'. 'Sir,' said 1,‘I had never, that I know of, the honour of seeing you before.' That,' replied he, is what I have often lamented; but, I assure you, I have for many years done you good offices, without being observed by you; or else, when you had any little glimse of my being concerned in an affair, you have fled from me, and shunned me like an enemy; but, however, the part I am to act in the world is such, that I am to go on in doing good, though I meet with never so many repulses, even from those I oblige.' This, thought I, shews a great good-nature, but little judgment in the persons upon whom he confers his favours. He immediately took notice to me, that he observed by my countenance I thought him indiscreet in his beneficence, and proceeded to tell me his quality in the following manner:

« AnteriorContinuar »