، ، 6 'we put together as well as we could, being able to understand but here and there a word of what they faid, and afterwards making up the meaning of it among ourselves. The men of the country are very cunning and ingenious in 'handicraft works, but withal so very idle, that we often saw young lusty raw-boned fellows carried up and down the street in little covered rooms by a couple of porters, who are hired for 'that service. Their dress is likewise very barbarous, for they almost strangle themselves about the neck, and bind their bodies with many ligatures, that we are apt to think are the occafion of feveral distempers among them, which our country is entirely free from. Inftead of those beautiful feathers with which we adorn our heads, they often buy up a monstrous bufh of hair, which covers their heads, and falls down in a large fleece below the middle of their backs; with which they walk up and down the ftreets, and are as proud of it as if it was of their own growth. 6 6 We were invited to one of their public di' versions, where we hoped to have seen the great men of their country running down a stag or pitching a bar, that we might have difcovered ' who were the perfons of the greatest abilities among them; but instead of that they con. 'veyed us into a huge room lighted up with ' abundance of candles, where this lazy people fat still above three hours to fee several feats ' of ingenuity performed by others, who it seems were paid for it. As for the women of the country, not being ' able to talk with them, we could only make our remarks upon them at a distance. They ८ let the hair of their heads grow to a great length; but as the men make a great show with heads of hair that are none of their own, the women, who they say have very fine heads of hair, tie it up in a knot, and cover it from being feen. The women look like angels, and would be more beautiful than the fun, were it not for little black spots that are apt to break out in their faces, and fometimes rise in very odd figures. I have observed that those little * blemishes wear off very foon; but when they • difappear in one part of the face, they are very apt to break out in another, infomuch that I have seen a spot upon the forehead in the afternoon, which was upon the chin in the morn' ing.' ८ The author then proceeds to shew the abfur dity of breeches and petticoats, with many other curious obfervations, which I shall referve for another occafion, I cannot however conclude this parer, without taking notice, that amidst these wild remarks there now and then appears fomething very reasonable. I cannot likewife forbear observing, that we are all guilty in some meafure of the fame narrow way of thinking, which we meet with in this abftract of the Indian Journal, when we fancy the customs, dreffes, and marners, of other countries are ridiculous and extravagant, if they do not resemble those of pur own. No 51. SATURDAY, APRIL 28. Torquet ab obscenis jam nunc fermonibus aurem. ، 6 Hor. Ep. II. i. 127. He from the taste obscene reclaims our youth. POPE. • Mr. Spectator, M Y fortune, quality, and person, are such as render me as confpicuous as any young woman in town. It is in my power to • enjoy it in all its vanities, but I have, from a very careful education, contracted a great averfion to the forward air and fashion which is practised in all public places and assemblies. 'I attribute this very much to the stile and man'ners of our plays. I was last night at the Fu⚫neral, where a confident lover in the play, • Your conftant reader and well-wisher." The complaint of this young lady is so just, that the offence is gross enough to have difpleased perfons who cannot pretend to that delicacy and modesty, of which the is mistress. But there is a great deal to be said in behalf of an author. If the audience would but consider the difficulty of keeping up a sprightly dialogue for five acts together, they would allow a writer, when he wants wit, and cannot please any otherwise, to help it out with a little smuttiness. I will anfwer for the poets, that no one ever writ bawdry for any other reason but dearth of invention. When the author cannot strike out of himself any more of that which he has fuperior to those who make up the bulk of his audience, his natural recourse is to that which he has in common with them; and a description which gratifies a sensual appetite will please, when the author has nothing about him to delight a refined imagination. It is to such a poverty, we must impute this and all other sentences in plays, which are of this kind, and which are commonly termed luscious expref. fions. This expedient, to supply the deficiencies of wit, has been used more or less, by most of the authors who have fucceeded on the stage; though I know but one who has professedly writ a play upon the basis of the defire of multiplying our species, and that is the polite Sir George Ethercre; if I understand what the lady would be at, in the play called She would if She could. Other poets have, here and there, given an intimation that there is this design, under all the disguises and affectations which a lady may put on; but no author, except this, has made fure work of it, and put the imaginations of the audience upon this one purpose, from the beginning to the end of the comedy. It has always fared accordingly; for whether it be, that all who go to this piece would if they could, or that the innocents go to it, to guess only what She would if She could, the play has always been well received. It lifts an heavy empty sentence, where there iş added to it a lafcivious gesture of body; and when it is too low to be raised even by that, a flat meaning is enlivened by making it a double one. Writers, who want Genius, never fail of keeping this secret in reserve, to create a laugh, er raise a clap. I, who know nothing of women but from seeing plays, can give great guesses at the whole structure of the fair sex, by being innocently placed in the pit, and insulted by the petticoats of their dancers; the advantages of whose pretty persons are a great help to a dull play. When a poet flags in writing lusciously, a pretty girl can move lasciviously, and have the same good consequence for the author. Dull poets in this case use their audiences, as dull parafites do their patrons; when they cannot long divert them with their wit or humour, they bait their ears with fomething which is agreeable to their temper, though below their understanding. Apicius cannot resist being pleased, if you give him an account of a delicious meal; or Clodius, if you defcribe a wanton beauty; though at the fame time, if you do not awake those inclinations in them, no men are better judges of what is just and delicate in conversation. But, as I have before observed, it is easier to talk to the man, than to the man of fenfe. when It is remarkable, that the writers of least learning are best skilled in the luscious way. The poetesses of the age have done wonders in this kind; and we are obliged to the lady who writ Ibrahim, for introducing a preparatory scene to the very action, when the emperor throws his handkerchief as a fignal for his mistress to follow him into the most retired part of the seraglio. It must be confessed his Turkish majesty went off with a good air, but, methought, we made but a sad figure who waited without. This ingepious gentlewoman, in this piece of bawdry, refined upon an author of the farme sex, who, in the Rover, makes a country squire strip to his draw ers. But Blunt is disappointed, and the emperor is understood to go on to the utmost. The pleafantry of stripping almost naked has been fince practised, where indeed it fshould have begun, very successfully at Bartholomew fair. It is not here to be omitted, that in one of the abovementioned female compositions, the Rover is very frequently sent on the fame errand; as I take it, above once every act. This is not wholly unnatural; for, they say, the men-authors draw themselves in their chief characters, and the wo men-writers may be allowed the fame liberty. Thus, as the male wit gives his hero a good fortune, the female gives her heroine a good gallant, at the end of the play. But, indeed, there is hardly a play one can go to, but the hero or fine gentleman of it struts off upon the fame account, and leaves us to confider what good office he has put us to, or to employ ourselves as we please. To be plain, a man who frequents plays would have a very respectful notion of himself, where he to recollect how often he has been used as a pimp to ravishing tyrants, or fuccessful rakes. When the actors make their Exit on this good occafion, the ladies are fure to make an examining glance from the pit, to fee how they relish what passes; and a few lewd fools are very ready to employ their talents upon the composure or freedom of their looks. Such incidents as these make some ladies wholly absent themselves from the playhouse; and others never miss the first day of a play, left it should prove the luscious to admit their going with any countenance to it on the second. If men of wit, who think fit to write for the stage, instead of this pitiful way of giving delight, would turn their thoughts upon raising it from such good natural impulfes as are in the audience, but are choked up by vice and luxury, they would not only please, but befriend us at the same time. If a man had a mind to be new in his way of writing, might not he who is now represented as a fine gentleman, though he betrays the honour and bed of his neighbour and friend, and lies with half the women in the play, and is at last rewarded with her of the best character in it; I say, upon giving the comedy another cast, might not such a one divert the audience quite as well, if at the catastrophe he were found out for a traitor, and met with contempt accordingly? There is seldom a person devoted to above one darling vice at a time, so that there is room enough to catch at mens hearts to their good and advantage, if the poets will attempt it with the honefty which becomes their characters. There is no man who loves his bottle or his mistress, in a manner so very abandoned, as net to be capable of relishing an agreeable character, that is no way a slave to either of those pursuits. A man that is temperate, generous, valiant, chaste, faithful and honeft, may, at the fame time, hav e wit, humour, mirth, good-breeding, and gallartry. While he exerts these latter qualities, twenty occafions might be invented to shew he is master of the other noble virtues. Such characters would smite and reprove the heart of a man of fenfe, when he is given up to his pleasures. He would see he has been mistaken all this while, and be convinced that a sound constitution and an innocent mind are the true ingredients for becoming and enjoying life. All men of true tafte would call a man of wit, who should turn his ambition this way, a friend and benefactor to his country; but I am at a loss what name they would give him, who makes use of his capacity for contrary purposes, R No 52. MONDAY, APRIL 30. And make thee father of a beauteous line. A N ingenious correspondent, like a fprightly did not think my last letter to the deformed fraternity would have occasioned any answer, efpecially since I had promised them so sudden a vifit, but as they think they cannot shew too great a veneration for my person, they have already fent me up an answer. As to the proposal of a marriage between myself and the matchless Hecatitie, I have but one objection to it; which is, that all the society will expect to be acquainted with her; and who can be fure of keeping a woman's heart long, where she may have so much choice? I am the more alarmed at this, because the lady seems particularly smitten with men of their make. I believe I shall set my heart upon her; and think never the worse of my mistress for an epi gram a finart fellow writ, as he thought, against Tafta places, audita places, fi non videare ، Y OUR letter to us we have received, as a fignal mark of your favour and brotherly affection. We shall be heartily glad to see your • short face in Oxford; and fince the wisdom of our legiflature has been immortalized in your fpeculations, and our personal deformities in ' fome fort by you recorded to all posterity; we hold ourselves in gratitude bound to receive, ' with the highest respect, all such perfons as for their extraordinary merit you shall think fit, ' from time to time, to recommend unto the board. As for the Pictish damsel, we have an * easy chair prepared at the upper end of the table; which we doubt not but the will grace ' with a very hideous aspect, and much better • become the feat in the native and unaffected uncomeliness of her person, than with all the superficial airs of the pencil, which, as you have very ingenioufly obferved, vanish with a breath; and the most innocent adorer may deface the shrine with a falutation, and, in the literal fenfe of our poets, snatch and imprinths balmy kiffes, and devour her melting lips: in short, the only taces of the Pictish kind that will • endure the weather, must be of Dr. Carbuncle's * die; though his, in truth, has cost him a world * the painting; but then he boafts with Zeuxes, * in æternitatem pingo; and oft jocofely tells the ८ which otherwise you might have some reafon ' to be apprehensive of. To be plain with you, I can fee nothing shocking in it; for though ' she has not a face like a John-Apple, yet as a late friend of mine, who at fixty-five ventured on a lafs of fifteen, very frequently, in the remaining five years of his life, gave me to un'derstand, that, as old as he then seemed, when they were first married he and his spouse could 'make but fourscore; so may madam Hecatissa very justly alledge hereafter, that, as long-vi'saged as the may then be thought, upon their wedding-day Mr. Spectator and the had but half an ell of face betwixt them; and this my very worthy predecefior, Mr. Serjeant Chin, always 'maintained to be no more than the true oval 'proportion between man and wife. But as this 'may be a new thing to you, who have hitherto had no expectations from women, I shall allow you what time you think fit to confider ont; 'not without fome hope of seing at last your 'thoughts hereupon fubjoined to mine, and. which is an honour much defûred by, • Sir, OU proposed, in your Spectator of laft Tuefday, Mr. Hobbes's hypothefis, for folving that very odd phænomenon of laughter. You ' have made the hypothesis valuable by espoufing 'it yourself; for, had it continued Mr. Hobbes's, nobody would have minded it. Now here this perplexed cafe arifes. A certain company laughed very heartily upon the reading of that very paper of yours; and the truth on it is, he 'must be a man of more than ordinary conftancy ' that could stand it out against so much comedy, ' and not do as we did. Now there are few men ' in the world so far loft to all good fenfe, as to 'look upon you to be a man in a state of folly inferior to himself. Pray then, how do yусц justify your hypothesis of laughter? Thursday, the 26th of Your most humble, 'the month of Fools. 'QR. fair ones, would they acquire colours that would ' stand kiffing, they must no longer paint but • drink for a complexion; a maxim that in this ' our age has been pursued with no ill fuccef; and has been as admirable in its effects, as the famous cofmetic mentioned in the Poft-man, and invented by the renowned British Hippo* crates of the peftile and mortar; making the party, after a due course, rofy, hale, and airy; and the best and most approved receipt now extant for the fever of the spirits. But to return to our female candidate, who, I understand, is returned to herself, and will no longer hang out falfe colours; as the is the first of her fex that has done us fo great an honour, she will certainly, in a very short time, both in profe • and verie, be a lady of the most celebrated desormity now living; and meet with admirers • hare as frightful as herself. But being a long⚫ headed gentlewoman, I am apt to imagine the R ⚫ has fome further design than you have yet pe netrated; and perhaps has more mind to the I N answer to your letter, I must defire you to recollect yourself; and you will find, that, 'when you did me the honour to be so merry over my paper, you laughed at the Idiot, the 'German Courtier, the Gaper, the Merry-Andrew, the Haberdasher, the Biter, the Butt; ८ and not at Your humble servant, The Spectator. Spettator than any of his fraternity, as the per- No 53. TUESDAY, MAY 1. fon of all the world she could like for a para mour: and if fo, really I cannot but applaud ⚫ her choice; and should be glad if it might lie ' in my power, to effect an amicable accommodation betwixt two faces of fuch different extremes, as the only possible expedient, to mend the breed, and rectify the phyfiognomy of the family on both fides. And again, as the is a lady of a very fluent elocution, you need not war that your firft child waleborn dumb, • Mr. Spectator, AM glad I can inform you, that your endeavours to adorn that sex, which is the fairest part of the visible creation, are well received, and like to prove not unsuccessful. The triumph • of Daphne over her sister Lætitia has been the 'fubject of conversation at several tea-tables where I have been present; and I have observed the fair circle not a little please d to find you con' sidering them as reasonable creatures, and en' deavouring to banish that Mahometan custom ' which had too much prevailed even in this island, ' of treating women as if they had no fouls. I ' must do them the justice to say, that there seems to be nothing wanting to the finishing of these ' regulated by the rules of honour and prudence; and have thought it an observation not ill made, that, where that was wholly denied, the women loft their wit, ard the men their good manners. ''Tis fure, from those improper liberties you ' mentioned, that a fort of undiftinguishing peo'ple shall banith from their drawing-rooms the ' best-bred men in the world, and condemn those 'that do not. Your stating this point, might, I ' think, be of good use, as well as much oblige, 'lovely pieces of human nature, besides the turn- No answer to this, till Anna Bella sends a description ing and applying their ambition properly, and the keeping them up to a sense of what is their true merit. Epictetus, that plain honest philo ، sopher, as little as he had of gallantry appears to ، ، of those she calls the best-bred men in the world. Mr. Spectator, Am a gentleman who for many years last past have been well known to be truly sple I have understood them, as well as the polite St. Evremont, and has hit this point very luckily.netic, and that my spleen arises from having "When young women, says he, arrive at a certain age, they hear themselves called Mistresses, and "are made to believe that their only business is to "please the men; they immediately begin to "dress, and place all their hopes in the adorning " of their persons; it is therefore," continues he, "worth the while to endeavour by all means to "make them sensible, that the honour paid to "them is only upon account of their conducting "themselves with virtue, modesty, and difcre" tion." • Now to pursue the matter yet further, and to render your cares for the improvement of the fair ones more effectual, I would propose a new method, like those applications which are faid to convey their virtue by sympathy; and that is, that in order to embellish the mistress, you should give a new education to the lover, and teach the men not to be any longer dazzled by • false charms and unreal beauty. I cannot but think that if our sex knew always how to place their esteem justly, the other would not be fo ⚫ often wanting to themselves in deserving it. For as the being enamoured with a woman of fenfe and virtue is an improvement to a man's un• derstanding and morals, and the paffion is ennobled by the object which inspires it; so on the • other fide, the appearing amiable to a man of a ⚫ wife and elegant mind, carries in itself no small degree of merit and accomplishment. I con⚫clude therefore, that one way to make the women ⚫ yet more agreeable is, to make the men more • virtuous. • Your most humble servant, 'SIR, Y I am, Sir, 'R. B.' April 29. OURS of Saturday last I read, not without some resentment; but I will suppose, • when you say you expect an inundation of ribbons and brocades, and to see many new vani'ties which the women will fall into upon a peace with France, that you intend only the ⚫ unthinking part of our sex; and what methods ⚫ can reduce them to reason is hard to imagine. But, Sir, there are others yet, that your instructions might be of great use to, who, after • their best endeavours, are fometimes at a loss to acquit themselves to a censorious world; I am ' far from thinking you can altogether disapprove ' of conversation between ladies and gentlemen, contracted so great a delicacy, by reading the best authors, and keeping the most refined company, that I cannot bear the leaft impropriety ' of language, or rufticity of behaviour. Now, • Sir, I have ever looked upon this as a wife dif• temper; but by late observations find that every heavy wretch, who has nothing to say, excuses ' his dulness by complaining of the spleen. Nay, I faw the other day, two fellows in a tavernkitchen set up for it, call for a pint and pipes, and only by guzzling liquor to each other's health, and wafting smoke in each other's face, pretend to throw off the spleen. I appeal to ' you whether these dishonours are to be done to 'the distemper of the great and the polite. I be'feech you, Sir, to inform these fellows that they 'have not the spleen, because they cannot talk without the help of a glass at their mouths, or convey their meaning to each other without the interpofition of clouds. If you will not do ' this with all speed, I affure you, for my part, I. will wholly quit the disease, and for the future be merry with the vulgar, ' I am, Sir, HIS is to let you understand, that I am a reformed Starer, and conceived a detestation for that practice from what you have writ upon the subject. But as you have been very ' levere upon the behaviour of us men at divine ' service, I hope you will not be fo apparently partial to the women, as to let them go wholly unobserved. If they do every thing that is pof' fible to attract our eyes, are we more culpable than they, for looking at them? I happened laft Sunday to be shut into a pew, which was full of young ladies in the bloom of youth and beauty. When the fervice began, I had not room to kneel at the confeffion, but as I ftood kept my eyes ⚫ from wandring as well as I was able, till one of the young ladies, who is a Peeper, resolved to bring down my looks, and fix my devotion on herself. You are to know, Sir, that a Peeper ' works with her hands, eyes, and fan; one of ' which is continually in motion, while she thinks she is not actually the admiration of fome Ogier or Starer in the congregation. As I stood, ut• terly at a loss how to behave myself, furrounded * as I was, this Peeper so placed herself as to be kneeling < kneeling just before me. She displayed the most ⚫ beautiful bosom imaginable, which heaved and • fell with fome fervour, while a delicate well• shaped arm held a fan over her face. It was not in nature to command one's eyes from this object, I could not avoid taking notice also of her * fan, which had on it various figures, very im* proper to behold on that occafion. There lay in the body of the piece a Venus, under a purple canopy furled with curious wreaths of drapery, ⚫ half naked, attended with a train of Cupids, • who were bufied in fanning her as she slept. Behind her was drawn a satyr peeping over the • filken fence, and threatening to break through • it. I frequently offered to turn my fight another way, but was still detained by the fascina• tion of the Peeper's eyes, who had long practifed • a skill in them, to recal the parting glances of her • beholders. You see my complaint, and hope you will take these mischievous people, the • Peepers, into your confideration: I doubt not • but you will think a Peeper as much more per⚫nicious than a Starer, as an ambuscade is more • to be feared than an open affault. ' I am, Sir, • Your most obedient fervant.' This Peeper using both fan and eyes, to be confidered as a Pict, and proceed accordingly. • King Latinus to the Spectator, greeting. T HOUGH some may think we descend from our imperial dignity, in holding cor• refpondence with a private Litterato; yet, as • we have great respect to all good intentions for • our service, we do not esteem it beneath us to return you our royal thanks for what you pub• lished in our behalf, while under confinement in the inchanted castle of the Savoy, and for • your mention of a subsidy for a prince in misfor• tune. This your timely zeal has inclined the hearts of divers to be aiding unto us, if we • could propose the means. We have taken their good-will into confideration, and have contrived ' a method which will be easy to those who shall give the aid, and not unacceptable to us who receive it. A concert of music shall be prepared 'at Haberdashers-Hall for Wednesday the second • of May, and we will honour the faid entertain⚫ment with our own prefence, where each perfon • shall be affefsed but at two shillings and fix pence. What we expect from you is, that you • publish these our royal intentions, with injunction that they be read at all tea-tables within the ' cities of London and Westminster; and so we • bid you heartily farewel. 'Latinus King of the Volfcians.' • Given at our court in Vinegar-Yard, story the third ' from the earth, April 28, 1711. R Hor. Ep. I. xi. 28. Laborious idleness our powers employs. CHE following letter being the first that I have received from the learned University of Cambridge, I could not but do myself the honour of publishing it. It gives an account of a new fect of philosophers which has arose in that famous residence of learning; and is perhaps the only sect this age is likely to produce. ، BE Mr. Spectator, Cambridge, April 26. Elieving you to be an universal encourager of liberal arts and sciences, and glad of any 'information from the learned world, I thought 'an account of a sect of philosophers very frequent among us, but not taken notice of, as far 'as I can remember, by any writers either ancient or modern, would not be unacceptable to you. The philosophers of this sect are in the language ' of our University called Lowngers. I am of opi'nion, that, as in many other things, fo likewife 6 in this, the ancients have been defective; viz. ' in mentioning no philosophers of this fort. 'Some indeed will affirm that they are a kind of Peripatetics, because we fee them continually walking about. But I would have these gentle' men confider, that though the ancient Peripatetics walked much, yet they wrote much also; witness, to the forrow of this fect, Aristotle and 'others: whereas it is notorious that most of our profeffors never lay out a farthing either in pen, ink, or paper. Others are for deriving them 'from Diogenes, because several of the leading ' men of the sect have a great deal of the cynical 'humour in them, and delight much in fun-fhine. But then again, Diogenes was content to have his constant habitation in a narrow tub, whilst our philosophers are so far from being of his opi'nion, that it is death to them to be confined ' within the limits of a good, handsome, conve'nient chamber but for half an hour. Others there are, who from the clearness of their heads 'deduce the pedigree of Lowngers from that great 'man, I think it was either Plato or Socrates, ' who after all his study and learning, professed, That all he then knew was, that he knew nothing. You easily see this is but a shallow ar' gument, and may be foon confuted. 'I have with great pains and industry made my observations from time to time, upon these fa'ges; and having now all materials ready, am compiling a treatise, wherein I shall fet forth the 'rife and progress of this famous fect, together ' with their maxims, austerities, manner of living, ' &c. Having prevailed with a friend, who de'figns shortly to publish a new edition of Dio genes Laertius, to add this treatise of mine by 'way of fupplement; I shall now, to let the world 'fee what may be expected from me, first begging Mr. Spectator's leave that the world may fee it, briefly touch upon some of my chief observa'tions, and then subscribe myself your humble 'servant. In the first place I shall give you two or three of their maxims: the fundamental one, upon which their whole system is built, is this, 'viz. That time being an implacable enemy to and destroyer of all things, ought to be paid in 'his own coin, and be destroyed and murdered ' without mercy, by all the ways that can be in' vented. Another favourite saying of theirs is, That business was designed only for knaves, and 'study for block-heads. A third seems to be a ' ludicrous one, but has a great effect upon their 'lives; and is this, That the devil is at home. 'Now for their manner of living: and here I have a large field to expatiate in: but I shall re' serve particulars for my intended discourse, and ' now only mention one or two of their principal ' exercises. The elder proficients employ themselves in inspecting mores hominum multorum, in getting |