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did not till he had repeated and murdered the celebrated ftory of the Ephefian Matron.

Arietta feemed to regard this piece of raillery as an outrage done to her fex; as indeed I have always obferved that women, whether out of a nicer regard to their honour, or what other reafon I cannot tell, are mere fenfibly touched with thofe general afperfions which are caft upon their fex, than men are by what is faid of theirs.

When he had a little recovered herself from the ferious anger fhe was in, fhe replied in the following

manner.

Sir, when I confider how perfectly new all you have faid on this fubject is, and that the story you have given us is not quite two thousand years old, I cannot but think it a piece of prefumption to difpute with you : but your quotations put me in mind of the fable of the Lion and the Man. The man walking with that noble animal, fhewed him, in the oftentation of human fuperiority, a fign of a Man killing a Lion. Upon which the lion faid very juftly, We lions are none of us painters, elfe we could fhew a hundred men killed by lions, for one lion killed by a man. You men are writers, and can represent us women as unbecoming as you please in your works, while we are unable to return the injury. You have twice or thrice observed in your difcourfe, that hypocrify is the very foundation of our education; and that an ability to diffemble our affections is a profeffed part of our breeding. Thefe, and fuch other reflections, are fprinkled up and down the writings of all ages, by authors, who leave behind them memorials of their refentment against the fcorns of particular women, in invectives against the whole fex. Such a writer, I doubt not, was the celebrated Petronius, who invented the pleafant aggravations of the frailty of the Ephefian Lady; but when we confider this queftion between the fexes, which has been either a point of difpute or raillery ever fince there were men and women, let us take facts from plain people, and from fuch as have not either ambition or capacity to embellish their narrations with any beauties of imagination. I was the other day amung myfelf with Ligon's

account of Barbadoes; and, in anfwer to your wellwrought tale, I will give you (as it dwells upon my memory) out of that honeft traveller, in his fifty-fifth page, the history of Inkle and Yarico.

Mr. Thomas Inkle, of London, aged twenty years, embarked in the Downs on the good fhip called the Achilles bound for the Weft-Indies, on the 16th of June, 1647, in order to improve his fortune by trade and merchandise. Our adventurer was the third son of an eminent citizen, who had taken particular care to inftil into his mind an early love of gain, by making him a perfect mafter of numbers, and confequently giving him a quick view of lofs and advantage, and preventing the natural impulfes of his paffions, by prepoffeffion towards his interefts. With a mind thus turned, young Inkle had a perfon every way agreeable, a ruddy vigour in his countenance, ftrength in his limbs, with ringlets of fair hair loofely flowing on his fhoulders. It happened, in the courfe of the voyage, that the Achilles, in fome diftrefs, put into a creek on the main of America, in fearch of provifions. The youth, who is the hero of my ftory, among others went on fhore on this occafion. From their firft landing they were obferved by a party of Indians, who hid themselves in the woods for that purpofe. The English unadvisedly marched a great diftance from the fhore into the country, and were intercepted by the natives, who flew the greatest number of them. Our adventurer efcaped among others, by flying into a foreft. Upon his coming into a remote and pathlefs part of the wood, he threw himself, tired, and breathlefs, on a little hillock, when an Indian maid rufhed from a thicket behind him. After the firft furprife, they appeared mutually agreeable to each other. If the European was highly charmed with the limbs, features, and wild graces of the naked American; the American was no lefs taken with the drefs, complexion and fhape of an European, covered from head to foot. The Indian grew immediately enamoured of him, and confequently folicitous for his prefervation. She therefore conveyed him to a cave, where he gave him a delicious repaft of fruits, and led him to a stream to flake his thirft. In the midst

of thefe good offices, fhe would fometimes play with his hair, and delight in the oppofition of its colour to that of her fingers: then open his bofom, then laugh at him for covering it. She was, it feems, a perfon of diftinction, for the every day came to him in a different drefs, of the most beautiful shells, bugles, and bredes. She likewife brought him a great many fpoils, which her other lovers had prefented to her, fo that his cave was richly adorned with all the fpotted fkins of beafts, and moft party-coloured feathers of fowls, which that world afforded. To make his confinement more tolerable, fhe would carry him in the dusk of the evening, or by the favour of the moon-light, to unfrequented groves and folitudes, and fhew him where to lie down in fafety, and fleep amidst the falls of waters, and melody of nightingales. Her part was to watch and hold him awake in her arms, for fear of her countrymen, and awake him on occafions to confult his fafety. In this manner did the lovers pass away their time, till they had learned a language of their own, in which the voyager communicated to his mistress, how happy he fhould be to have her in his own country, where the fhould be clothed in fuch filks as his waistcoat was made of, and be carried in houses drawn by horses,without being exposed to wind and weather. All this he promised her the enjoyment of, without such fears and alarms as they were there tormented with. In this tender correfpondence thefe lovers lived for feveral months, when Yarico, inftructed by her lover, discovered a veffel on the coast to which she made fignals; and in the night, with the utmoft joy and fatisfaction, accompanied him to a fhip'screw of his countrymen, bound for Barbadoes. When a veffel from the main arrives in that island, it seems the planters come down to the fhore, where there is an immediate market of the Indians and other flaves, as with us of horfes and oxen.

To be short, Mr. Thomas Inkle, now coming into English territories, began ferioufly to reflect upon his lofs of time, and to weigh with himself how many days intereft of his money he had loft during his ftay with Yarico. This thought made the young man very penfive, and careful what account he should be able to give his friends of his

voyage. Upon which confideration, the prudent and frugal young man fold Yarico to a Barbadian merchant; notwithstanding the poor girl, to incline him to commiferate her condition, told him that he was with child by him but he only made use of that information, to rise in his demands upon the purchaser.

I was fo touched with this story (which I think should be always a counterpart to the Ephefian Matron) that I left the room with tears in my eyes, which a woman of Arietta's good fenfe did, I am fure, take for greater applaufe, than any compliments I could make her.

N° 12.

Wednesday, March 14.

-Veteres avias tibi de pulmone revello.

R.

PERS. Sat. 5. ver. 92.

I root th' old woman from this trembling heart.

Ат

T my coming to London, it was fome time before I could fettle myself in a house to my liking. I was forced to quit my first lodgings, by reason of an officious landlady, that would be asking me every morning how I had flept. I then fell into an honeft family, and lived very happily for above a week; when my landlord, who was a jolly good-natured man, took it into his head that I wanted company, and therefore would frequently come into my chamber to keep me from being alone. This I bore for two or three days; but telling me one day that he was afraid I was melancholy, I thought it was high time for me to be gone, and accordingly took new lodgings that very night. About a week after, I found my jolly landlord, who, as I faid before, was an honeft hearty man, had put me into an advertisement of the Daily Courant, in the following words: Whereas a melancholy man left his lodgings on Thursday laft in the afternoon, and was

afterwards feen going towards Iflington; if any one can give notice of him to R. B. Fishmonger in the Strand, he shall be very well rewarded for his pains. As I am the best man in the world to keep my own counsel, and landlord the fishmonger not knowing my name, this accident of my life was never discovered to this very day.

my

I am now fettled with a widow woman, who has a great many children, and complies with my humour in every thing. I do not remember that we have exchanged a word together these five years; my coffee comes into my chamber every morning without afking for it; if I want fire I point to my chimney, if water to my bason: upon which my landlady nods, as much as to fay fhe takes my meaning, and immediately obeys my fignals. She has likewife modelled her family fo well, that when her little boy offers to pull me by the coat, or prattle in my face, his eldest fifter immediately calls him off, and bids him not disturb the gentleman. At my firft entering into the family, I was troubled with the civility of their rifing up to me every time I came into the room; but my landlady obferving that upon thefe occafions I always cried pish, and went out again, has forbidden' any fuch ceremony to be used in the house: fo that at prefent I walk into the kitchen or parlour without being taken notice of, or giving any interruption to the business or difcourfe of the family. The maid will afk her mistress (though I am by) whether the gentleman is ready to go to dinner, as the mistress (who is indeed an excellent housewife) fcolds at the fervants as heartily before my face as behind my back. In short, I move up and down the house, and enter into all companies with the fame liberty as a cat or any other domeftic animal, and am as little fufpected of telling any thing that I hear or fee.

I remember laft winter there were feveral young girls of the neighbourhood fitting about the fire with my landlady's daughters and telling ftories of fpirits and apparitions. Upon my opening the door the young women broke off their difcourfe, but my landlady's daughters telling them that it was no body but the gentleman (for that is the name which I go by in the

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