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Molly brought me struck me to the heart, which was, it seems, and is, your ill conlitions for my love and respects to you.

For she told me, if I came forty times to you, you would not speak with me, which words I am sure is a great grief

to me.

Now, my dear, if I may not be permitted to your sweet company, and to have the happiness of speaking with your sweet person, I beg the favour of you to accept of this my secret mind and thoughts, which hath so long lodged in my breast, the which if you do not accept, I believe will go nigh to break my heart.

For, indeed, my dear, I love you above all the beauties I ever saw in my life.

"The young gentleman, and my master's laughter, the Londoner that is come down o marry her, sat in the arbour most part of last night. Oh, dear Betty, must the nightingales sing to those who marry for money, and not to us true lovers! Oh, my lear Betty, that we could meet this night where we used to do in the wood!

Now, my dear, if I may not have the »lessing of kissing your sweet lips, I beg I may have the happiness of kissing your fair hand, with a few lines from your.dear self, presented by whom you please or hink fit. I believe, if time would permit me, I could write all day; but the time being short, and paper little, no more from your never failing lover till death, • JAMES

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Poor James! since his time and paper were so short, I that have more than I can use well of both, will put the sentiments of this kind letter (the style of which seems to be confused with scraps he had got in hearing and reading what he did not understand) into what he meant to express.

DEAR CREATURE,-Can you then neglect him who has forgot all his recreations and enjoyments to pine away his life in thinking of you? When I do so, you appear more amiable to me than Venus does in the most beautiful description that ever was made of her. All this kindness you return with an accusation, that I do not love you: but the contrary is so manifest,

* The writer of this loving epistle was James Hirst, a servant to the Hon. Edward Wortley, esq. In delivering a number of letters to his master, he gave him, by mistake, this which he had just written to his sweetheart, and in its stead kept one of his master's. James soon discovered the error he had committed, and

returned to rectify it, but it was too late: the letter to Betty was the first which met Mr. Wortley's eye, and he had indulged his curiosity in reading the pathetic ffusion of his love-lorn footman. James begged to have it returned: "No, James," said his master, "You

shall be a great man; and this letter must appear in the Spectator."

that I cannot think you are in earnest, But the certainty given me in your mes sage by Molly, that you do not love me, is what robs me of all comfort. She says you will not see me: if you can have so much cruelty, at least write to me, that I may kiss the impression made by your fair hand. I love you above all things, and, in my condition, what you look upon with indifference is to me the most exquisite plea sure or pain. Our young lady and a fine gentleman from London, who are to marry for mercenary ends, walk about our gardens, and hear the voice of evening nightingales, as if for fashion sake they courted those solitudes, because they have heard lovers do so. Oh, Betty! could I hear those rivulets murmur, and birds sing, while you stood near me, how little sensible should I be that we are both servants, that there is any thing on earth above us! Oh! I could write to you as long as I love you, till death itself. JAMES."

N. B. By the words ill conditions, James means, in a woman coquetry, in a man in constancy.

No. 72.] Wednesday, May 22, 1711.

R.

-Genus immortale manet, multosque per aanot Stat fortuna domus, et avi numerantur avorum. Virg. Georg. iv. 208 Th' immortal line in sure succession reigns, The fortune of the family remains, And grandsires' grandsons the long list contains. Dryden.

HAVING already given my reader an account of several extraordinary clubs both ancient and modern, I did not design to have troubled him with any more narratives of this nature; but I have lately received information of a club which I can call neither ancient nor modern, that I dare say will be no less surprising to my reader than it was to myself; for which reason I shall communicate it to the public as one of the greatest curiosities of its kind.

A friend of mine complaining of a tradesman who is related to him, after having represented him as a very idle, worthless fellow, who neglected his family, and spent most of his time over a bottle, told me, to Conclude his character, that he was a member of the Everlasting Club. So very. odd a title raised my curiosity to inquire into the nature of a club that had such a sounding name; upon which my friend gave me the the following account.

The Everlasting Club consists of a hundred members, who divide the whole twenty-four hours 'among them in such a manner, that the club sits day and night from one end of the year to another; no

James at length succeeded in convincing Betty that he had no "ill conditions," and obtained her consent to marry him: the marriage, however, was un-party presuming to rise till they are refortunately prevented by her sudden death; and James, lieved by those who are in course to sucwho seems to have been a good sort of soul, soon ceed them. By this means a member of after married her sister. This sister was, most proba- the Everlasting Club never wants compably, the Molly who trudged so many miles to carry the angry message. ny; for though he is not upon duty himself,

ne is sure to find some who are; so that if | clubs with an eye of contempt, and talks he be disposed to take a whet, a nooning, even of the Kit-Cat and October as of a an evening's draught, or a bottle after couple of upstarts. Their ordinary dismidnight, he goes to the club, and finds a course, (as much as I have been able to knot of friends to his mind. learn of it) turns altogether upon such adIt is a maxim in this club, that the stew-ventures as have passed in their own asard never dies; for as they succeed one an-sembly; of members who have taken the other by way of rotation, no man is to quit the great elbow-chair which stands at the upper-end of the table, till his successor is in readiness to fill it: insomuch that there has not been a sede vacante in the memory of man.

society, when in all human probability the case was desperate.

They delight in several old catches, which they sing at all hours, to encourage one another to moisten their clay, and grow immortal by drinking; with many other edifying exhortations of the like nature.

glass in their turns for a week together, without stirring out of the club; of others who have smoked an hundred pipes at a sitting; of others, who have not missed their morning's draught for twenty years together. Sometimes they speak in rapThis club was instituted towards the end tures of a run of ale in king Charles's reign; (or as some of them say, about the middle) and sometimes reflect with astonishment of the civil wars, and continued without upon games at whist, which have been miinterruption till the time of the great fire,*raculously recovered by members of the which burnt them out, and dispersed them for several weeks. The steward at that time maintained his post till he had like to have been blown up with a neighbouring house, (which was demolished in order to stop the fire;) and would not leave the chair at last, till he had emptied all the bottles upon the table, and received repeated directions from the Club to withdraw himself. This steward is frequently talked of in the club, and looked upon by every member of it as a greater man than the famous captain mentioned in my lord Clarendon, who was burnt in his ship because he would not quit it without orders. It is said, that towards the close of 1700, being the great year of jubilee, the club had it under consideration whether they should break up or continue their session; but after many speeches and debates, it was at length agreed to sit out the other No. 73.] Thursday, May 24, 1711. century. This resolution was passed in a general club nemine contradicente.

Having given this short account of the institution and continuation of the Everlasting Club, I should here endeavour to say something of the manners and characters of its several members, which I shall do according to the best lights I have received in this matter.

There are four general clubs held in a year, at which times they fill up vacancies, appoint waiters, confirm the old firemaker, or elect a new one, settle contributions for coals, pipes, tobacco, and other necessaries.

The senior member has outlived the whole club twice over, and has been drunk with the grandfathers of some of the pre sent sitting members.

-O Dea certe!

pre

Virg. Æn. i. 328.

O goddess! for no less you seem. It is very strange to consider, that a creature like man, who is sensible of so many weaknesses and imperfections, should be actuated by a love of fame: that vice and ignorance, imperfection and misery, should contend for praise, and endeavour as much as possible to make themselves objects of admiration.

It appears by their books in general, that since their first institution, they have But notwithstanding man's essential persmoked fifty tons of tobacco, drank_thirty fection is but very little, his comparative thousand butts of ale, one thousand hogs- perfection may be very considerable. If he heads of red port, two hundred barrels of looks upon himself in an abstracted light, brandy, and a kilderkin of small beer. he has not much to boast of; but if he conThere has been likewise a great consump-siders himself with regard to others, he tion of cards. It is also said, that they observe the law in Ben Jonson's club,† which orders the fire to be always kept in (focus perennis esto) as well for the convenience of lighting their pipes, as to cure the dampness of the club-room. They have an old woman in the nature of a vestal, whose business it is to cherish and perpetuate the fire, which burns from generation to generation, and has seen the glass-house fires in and out above an hundred times.

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may find occasion of glorying, if not in his own virtues, at least in the absence of another's imperfections. This gives a different turn to the reflections of the wise man and the fool. The first endeavours to shine in himself, and the last to outshine others. The first is humbled by the sense of his own infirmities, the last is lifted up by the discovery of those which he observes in other men. The wise man considers what he wants, and the fool what he abounds in. The wise man is happy when he gains his own approbation, and the fool when he recommends himself to the applause of those about him.

But however unreasonable and absurd | smiles make men happy; their frowns drive this passion for admiration may appear in them to despair. I shall only add under such a creature as man, it is not wholly to this head, that Ovid's, book of the Art of be discouraged; since it often produces very Love is a kind of heathen ritual, which good effects, not only as it restrains him contains all the forms of worship which are from doing any thing which is mean and made use of to an idol. contemptible, but as it pushes him to actions which are great and glorious. The principle may be defective or faulty, but the consequences it produces are so good, that for the benefit of mankind, it ought not to be extinguished.

It is observed by Cicero, that men of the greatest and the most shining parts are the most actuated by ambition; and if we look into the two sexes, I believe we shall find this principle of action stronger in women than in men.

when they refuse to comply with the prayers that are offered to them.

It would be as difficult a task to reckon up these different kinds of idols, as Milton's was to number those that were known in Canaan, and the lands adjoining. Most of them are worshipped like Moloch in fires and flames. Some of them, like Baal, love to see their votaries cut and slashed, and shedding their blood for them. Some of them, like the idol in the Apocrypha, must have treats and collations prepared for them every night. It has indeed been known, that some of them have been used The passion for praise, which is so very by their incensed worshippers like the Chivehement in the fair sex, produces excel-nese idols, who are whipped and scourged lent effects in women of sense, who desire to be admired for that only which deserves admiration; and I think we may observe, without a compliment to them, that many of them do not only live in a more uniform course of virtue, but with an infinitely greater regard to their honour, than what we find in the generality of our own sex. How many instances have we of chastity, fidelity, devotion! How many ladies distinguish themselves by the education of their children, care of their families, and love of their husbands, which are the great qualities and achievements of womankind! as the making of war, the carrying on of traffic, the administration of justice, are those by which men grow famous, and get them

selves a name.

But as this passion for admiration, when it works according to reason, improves the beautiful part of our species in every thing that is laudable; so nothing is more destructive to them when it is governed by vanity and folly, What I have therefore here to say, only regards the vain part of the sex, whom for certain reasons, which the reader will hereafter see at large, I shall distinguish by the name of idols. An idol is wholly taken up in the adorning of her person. You see in every posture of her body, air of her face, and motion of her head, that it is her business and employment to gain adorers. For this reason your idols appear in all public places and assemblies, in order to seduce men to their worship. The playhouse is very frequently filled with idols; several of them are carried in procession every evening about the ring, and several of them set up their worship even in churches. They are to be accosted in the language proper to the deity. Life and death are in their power: joys of heaven and pains of hell, are at their disposal; paradise is in their arms, and eternity in every moment that you are present with them. Raptures, transports, and ecstacies are the rewards which they confer; sighs and tears, prayers and broken hearts, are the offerings which are paid to them. Their

I must here observe that those idolaters who devote themselves to the idols I am here speaking of, differ very much from all other kinds of idolaters. For as others fall out because they worship different idols, these idolaters quarrel because they worship the same.

The intention therefore of the idol is quite contrary to the wishes of the idolater: as the one desires to confine the idol to himself, the whole business and ambition of the other is to multiply adorers. This humour of an idol is prettily described in a tale of Chaucer. He represents one of them sitting at a table with three of her votaries about her, who are all of them courting her favour, and paying their adorations. She smiled upon one, drank to another, and trod upon the other's foot which was under the table. Now which of these three, says the old bard, do you think was the favourite? In troth, says he, not one of all the three.

The behaviour of this old idol in Chaucer, puts me in mind of the beautiful Clarinda, one of the greatest idols among the moderns. She is worshipped once a week by candlelight, in the midst of a large congregation, generally called an assembly. Some of the gayest youths in the nation endeavour to plant themselves in her eye, while she sits in form with multitudes of tapers burning about her. To encourage the zeal of her idolaters, she bestows a mark of her favour upon every one of them, before they go out of her presence. She asks a question of one, tells a story to another, glances an ogle upon a third, takes a pinch of snuff from the fourth, lets her fan drop by accident to give the fifth an occasion of taking it up. In short, every one goes away satisfied with his success, and encouraged to renew his devotions on the same canonical hour that day seven-night.

An idol may be undeified by many accidental causes. Marriage in particular is a kind of counter-apotheosis, or a deification inverted. When a n an becomes familiar

with his goddess, she quickly sinks into a

woman.

Old age is likewise a great decayer of your idol. The truth of it is, there is not a more unhappy being than a superannuated idol, especially when she has contracted such airs and behaviour as are only graceful when her worshippers are about her.

Considering therefore that in these and many other cases the woman generally outlives the idol, I must return to the moral of this paper, and desire my fair readers to give a proper direction to their passion for being admired; in order to which, they must endeavour to make themselves the objects of a reasonable and lasting admiration. This is not to be hoped for from beauty, or dress, or fashion, but from those inward ornaments which are not to be defaced by time or sickness, and which appear most amiable to those who are most acquainted with them. C.

No. 74.] Friday, May 25, 1711.

Pendent opera interrupta

Virg. En. iv. 83. The works unfinish'd and neglected lie.

IN my last Monday's paper I gave some general instances of those beautiful strokes which please the reader in the old song of Chevy-Chase; I shall here, according to my promise, be more particular, and show that the sentiments in that ballad are extremely natural and poetical, and full of the majestic simplicity which we admire in the greatest of the ancient poets: for which reason I shall quote several passages of it, in which the thought is altogether the same with what we meet in several passages of the Eneid; not that I would infer from thence that the poet (whoever he was) proposed to himself any imitation of those passages, but that he was directed to them in general by the same kind of poetical genius, and by the same copyings after

nature.

Had this old song been filled with epigrammatical turns and points of wit, it might perhaps have pleased the wrong taste of some readers; but it would never have become the delight of the common people, nor have warmed the heart of Sir Philip Sidney like the sound of a trumpet; it is only nature that can have this effect, and please those tastes which are the most unprejudiced, or the most refined. I must however beg leave to dissent from so great an authority as that of Sir Philip Sidney, in the judgment which he has passed as to the rude style and evil apparel of this antiquated song; for there are several parts in it where not only the thought but the language is majestic, and the numbers sonorous; at least the apparel is much more gorgeous than many of the poets made use of in Queen Elizabeth's time, as the reader

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This way of considering the misfortunes which this battle would bring upon pos terity, not only on those who were born immediately after the battle, and lost their fathers in it, but on those also whoperished in future battles which took their fise from this quarrel of the two earls, is wonderfully beautiful, and conformable to the way of thinking among the ancient poets.

Audiet pugnas vitio parentum

Hor. Lib. 1. Od. ii, 23.

Rara juventus. Posterity, thinn'd by their fathers' crimes, Shall read, with grief, the story of their times. What can be more sounding and poetical, or resemble more the majestic simplicity o the ancients, than the following stanzas?

The stout Earl of Northumberland
A vow to God did make,

His pleasure in the Scottish woods
Three summers' days to take.

'With fifteen hundred bowmen bold,
All chosen men of might,

Who knew full well, in time of need
To aim their shafts aright.

"The hounds ran swiftly through the woods
The nimble deer to take,

And with their cries the hills and dales
An echo shrill did make.’

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The country of the Scotch warriors, described in these two last verses, has a fine romantic situation, and affords a couple of smooth words for verse. If the reader compares the foregoing six lines of the song with the following Latin verses, he will see how much they are written in the spirit of Virgil:

Adversi campo apparent, hastasque reductis

Protendunt longe dextris; et spicula vibrant:--
Quique altum Præneste viri, quique arva Gabinæ
Junonis, gelidumque Anienem, et roscida rivis
Hernica saxa colunt:-qui rosea rura Velini,
Qui Tetricæ horrentes rupes, montemque Severum,
Casperiamque colunt, Forulosque, et flumen Himella
Qui Tiberim Fabarimque bibunt.-

Jn. xi. 605—vii. 682, 51k

Advancing in a line, they couch their spears-
-Præneste sends a chosen band,
With those who plow Saturnia's Gabine land:
Besides the succours which cold Anien yields;

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Turnus ut antevolans tardum præcesserat agmen, &c.
Vidisti, quo Turnus equo, quibus ibat in armis
Aureus

'Our English archers bent their bows,
Their hearts were good and true;
At the first flight of arrows sent,
Full threescore Scots they slew.
"They clos'd full fast on ev'ry side,
No slackness there was found;
And many a gallant gentleman
Lay gasping on the ground.

"With that there came an arrow keen
Out of an English bow,

Which struck Earl Douglas to the heart,

A deep and deadly blow.'

Eneas was wounded after the same manner

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by an unknown hand in the midst of a par-We ley.

Has inter voces, media inter talia verba,
Ecce viro stridens alis allapsa sagitta est,
Incertum qua pulsa manu-
An. xii. 318.

Thus while he spake, unmindful of defence,
A winged arrow struck the pious prince;
But whether from a human hand it came,
Or hostile god, is left unknown by fame. Dryden.
But of all the descriptive parts of this song,
there are none more beautiful than the four
following stanzas, which have a great force
and spirit in them, and are filled with very
natural circumstances. The thought in the
third stanza was never touched by any other
poet, and is such a one as would have shined
in Homer or Virgil:

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So thus did both these nobles die,
Whose courage none could stain;
An English archer then perceiv'd
The noble Earl was slain.

'He had a bow bent in his hand,
Made of a trusty tree,

An arrow of a cloth-yard long

Unto the head drew he.

Against Sir Hugh Montgomery

So right his shaft he set,

The grey-goose wing that was thereon
In his heart-blood was wet.

'This fight did last from break of day
Till setting of the sun;

For when they rung the ev'ning bell
The battle scarce was done.'

Une may observe, likewise, that in the catalogue of the slain, the author has followed the example of the great ancient poets, not only in giving a long list of the dead, but by diversifying it with little characters of particular persons.

'And with Earl Douglas there was slain
Sir Hugh Montgomery,

Sir Charles Carrel, that from the field
One foot would never fly:

'Sir Charles Murrel of Ratcliff too,

His sister's son was he;

Sir David Lamb, so well esteem'd,

Yet saved could not be.'

The familiar sound in these names destroys the majesty of the description; for this rea

'Then stept a gallant 'squire forth,
Witherington was his name,
Who said, I would not have it told
To Henry our king for shame,

"I nat e'er my captain fought on foot,
And I stood looking on.'

meet with the same heroic sentiment in Virgil.

Non pudet, O Rutuli, cunctis pro talibus unam
Objectare animam? numerone, an viribus æqui
Non sumus-
?
En. xii. 220
For shame, Rutilius, can you bear the sight
Of one expos'd for all, in single fight,

Can we before the face of Heav'n confess Our courage colder, or our numbers less? Dryden. What can be more natural, or more moving, than the circumstances in which he describes the behaviour of those women who had lost their husbands on this fatal day?

'Next day did many widows come

Their husbands to bewail;

They wash'd their wounds in brinish tears,
But all would not prevail.

"Their bodies bath'd in purple blood,

They bore with them away;

They kiss'd them dead a thousand times,
When they were clad in clay.'

Thus we see how the thoughts of this poem, which naturally arise from the subject, are always simple, and sometimes exquisitely noble; that the language is often very sounding, and that the whole is written with a true poetical spirit.

If this song had been written in the Gothic manner, which is the delight of all our little wits, whether writers or readers, it would not have hit the taste of so many ages, and have pleased the readers of all ranks and conditions. I shall only beg pardon for such a profusion of Latin quotations; which I should not have made use of, but that I feared my own judgment would have looked too singular on such a subject, had not I supported it by the practice and authority of Virgil. C.

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