he went abroad.

He recommended me to a dram of it at the same time, with so much heartiness, that I could not forbear drinking it. As soon as I had got it down, I found it very unpalatable; upon which the knight observing that I had made several wry faces, told me that he knew I should not like it at first, but that it was the best thing in the world against the stone or gravel.

I could have wished indeed that he had acquainted me with the virtues of it sooner; but it was too late to complain, and I knew what he had done was out of good will. Sir Roger told me further, that he looked upon it to be very good for a man whilst he staid in town, to keep off infection, and that he got together a quantity of it upon the first news of the sickness being at Dantzic:1 when of a sudden turning short to one of his servants, who stood behind him, he bid him call a hackney-coach, and take care it was an elderly man that drove it.

He then resumed his discourse upon Mrs. Trueby's water, tell ing me that the Widow Trueby was one who did more good than all the doctors and apothecaries in the county: that she distilled every poppy that grew within five miles of her; that she distributed her water gratis among all sorts of people; to which the knight added, that she had a very great jointure, and that the whole country would fain have it a match between him and her; "and truly," says Sir Roger, "if I had not been engaged, perhaps I could not have done better."

His discourse was broken off by his man's telling him he had called a coach. Upon our going to it, after having cast his eye upon the wheels, he asked the coachman if his axle-tree was good; upon the fellow's telling him he would warrant it, the knight turned to me, told me he looked like an honest man, and went in without further ceremony.

We had not gone far, when Sir Roger popping out his head, called the coachman down from his box, and upon his present

1 A town of North Germany, built in 1165. This refers to a plague which visited it in 1709.

ing himself at the window, asked him if he smoked; as I was considering what this would end in, he bid him stop by the way at any good tobacconist's, and take in a roll of their best Virginia.1 Nothing material happened in the remaining part of our journey, till we were set down at the west end of the Abbey.

As we went up the body of the church, the knight pointed at the trophies upon one of the new monuments, and cried out, “A brave man, I warrant him!" Passing afterwards by Sir Cloudsly Shovel, he flung his hand that way, and cried "Sir Cloudsly Shovel! a very gallant man!" As we stood before Busby's tomb,3 the knight uttered himself again after the same manner, 'Dr. Busby, a great man! he whipped my grandfather; a very great man! I should have gone to him myself, if I had not been a blockhead; a very great man!"

We were immediately conducted into the little chapel on the right hand. Sir Roger planting himself at our historian's elbow, was very attentive to everything he said, particularly to the account he gave us of the lord who had cut off the King of Morocco's head. Among several other figures, he was very well pleased to see the statesman Cecil1 upon his knees; and, concluding them all to be great men, was conducted to the figure which represents that martyr to good housewifery, who died by the prick of a needle. Upon our interpreter's telling us, that she was a maid of honor to Queen Elizabeth,5 the knight was

1 Tobacco.

2 Sir Cloudsly Shovel (1650–1707) was a distinguished English admiral, knighted for his services at Bantry Bay, and prominent in the battle of La Hogue.

3 Dr. Richard Busby (1606–95) was head master of Westminster School for fifty-eight years (1638-95). The recollection of his severity long invested his monument in Westminster Abbey with a peculiar awe.

4 Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury (1560–1612), an able English statesman, was prime-minister under James I., and Lord Treasurer of England.

5 Queen Elizabeth (1533-1603), the most famous of England's queens, reigned from 1558 to 1603. She was the daughter of Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn.

very inquisitive into her name and family; and after having regarded her finger for some time, "I wonder," says he, that Sir Richard Baker has said nothing of her in his 'Chronicle.'"

We were then conveyed to the two coronation chairs, where my old friend, after having heard that the stone underneath the most ancient of them, which was brought from Scotland, was called Jacob's Pillar,1 sat himself down in the chair; and looking like the figure of an old Gothic king, asked our interpreter, what authority they had to say, that Jacob had ever been in Scotland? The fellow, instead of returning him an answer, told him, that he hoped his honor would pay his forfeit. I could observe Sir Roger a little ruffled upon being thus trepanned; but our guide not insisting upon his demand, the knight soon recovered his good humor, and whispered in my ear, that if Will Wimble were with us, and saw those two chairs, it would go hard but he would get a tobacco-stopper out of one or t'other of them.

Sir Roger, in the next place, laid his hand upon Edward III.'s 2 sword, and leaning upon the pommel of it, gave us the whole history of the Black Prince; concluding, that in Sir Richard Baker's opinion, Edward III. was one of the greatest princes that ever sat upon the English throne.

1 Jacob's Pillar or stone, a fragment of sandstone rock inclosed in the coronation chair at Westminster. It is of the same geological formation as the rock of the west coast of Scotland, and probably came from that locality. It formed part of the coronation chair at Scone, Scotland, from the ninth century until Edward I. captured it and transferred it to Westminster. Its name is due to a myth connected with it as early as the fourteenth century, which held that this rock was part of the pillar on which Jacob or Abraham slept at Bethel; that it was transported to Egypt, and thence to Sicily or Spain, in Moses' time; that from Spain it was carried off by Simon Brech, the son of Milo, to Ireland, where, on the sacred hill of Tara, it became “Lia Fail," or the Stone of Destiny. Fergus, the founder of the Scottish monarchy, is supposed to have removed it to Dunstaffnage, Scotland, whence Kenneth II. removed it to Scone, A.D. 840.

2 Edward III. (1312-77), the son of Edward II., was proclaimed king in 1327. He won the battle of Crècy in 1347. He was the father of the Black Prince, the hero of the battle of Poitiers.

We were then shown Edward the Confessor's1 tomb; upon which Sir Roger acquainted us, that he was the first who touched for the evil;2 and afterwards Henry IV.'s,3 upon which he shook his head, and told us there was fine reading in the casualties in that reign.

Our conductor then pointed to that monument where there is the figure of one of our English kings without a head; and upon giving us to know, that the head, which was of beaten silver, had been stolen away several years since: "Some Whig, I'll warrant you," says Sir Roger; "you ought to lock up your kings better; they will carry off the body too, if you don't take care.”

The glorious names of Henry V.4 and Queen Elizabeth gave the knight great opportunities of shining, and of doing justice to Sir Richard Baker, who, as our knight observed with some surprise, had a great many kings in him, whose monuments he had not seen in the Abbey.

For my own part, I could not but be pleased to see the knight show such an honest passion for the glory of his country, and such a respectful gratitude to the memory of its princes.

I must not omit, that the benevolence of my good old friend, which flows out towards every one he converses with, made him very kind to our interpreter, whom he looked upon as an extraordinary man; for which reason he shook him by the hand at

1 Edward the Confessor (1004–66), son of Ethelred, became King of the Anglo-Saxons in 1042.

2 Scrofula was formerly called " King's Evil," because it was supposed that the disease could be cured by the touch of a truly anointed king.

3 Henry IV. of England (1366–1413) was the son of John of Gaunt. He usurped the throne in 1399. He imprisoned his predecessor, Richard II., and is supposed to have ordered his murder. He kept the legitimate heir, young Edward Mortimer, in custody for fourteen years. He passed a statute for burning heretics, and was constantly brawling with his nobles, his neighbors in Scotland, France, and with his son, afterwards Henry V.

4 Henry V. of England (1388-1422), oldest son of Henry IV., distinguished himself at the battle of Shrewsbury, and defeated the French at Agincourt. He married Catherine, daughter of Charles VI.

parting, telling him, that he should be very glad to see him at his lodgings in Norfolk Buildings, and talk over these matters with him more at leisure.

L.

SIR ROGER AND BEARDS.

[BUDGELL, in SPECTATOR, No. 331. Thursday, March 20, 1711-12.]

"Stolidam præbet tibi vellere barbam." 1

PERSIUS, Sat. ii. 28.

HEN I was last with my friend Sir Roger in Westminster

WHE

Abbey, I observed that he stood longer than ordinary before the bust of a venerable old man. I was at a loss to guess the reason of it, when after some time he pointed to the figure, and asked me if I did not think that our forefathers looked much wiser in their beards than we do without them? "For my part," says he, "when I am walking in my gallery in the country, and see my ancestors, who many of them died before they were of my age, I cannot forbear regarding them as so many old patriarchs, and at the same time looking upon myself as an idle smockfaced young fellow. I love to see your Abrahams, your Isaacs, and your Jacobs, as we have them in old pieces of tapestry, with beards below their girdles, that cover half the hangings." The knight added, if I would recommend beards in one of my papers, and endeavor to restore human faces to their ancient dignity, that upon a month's warning he would undertake to lead up the fashion himself in a pair of whiskers.

I smiled at my friend's fancy; but after we parted, could not forbear reflecting on the metamorphoses our faces have undergone in this particular.

The beard, conformable to the notion of my friend Sir Roger, was for many ages looked upon as the type of wisdom.

1 "Holds out his foolish beard for thee to pluck."

Lucian 2

2 Lucian (born about A.D. 120) was one of the wittiest and most origi.