to the conversation of any body that addresses himself to them. There are several rooms where the parties may retire, and, if they please, shew their faces by consent. Whispers, squeezes, nods, and embraces, are the innocent freedoms of the place. In short, the whole design of this libidinous assembly seems to terminate in affignations and intrigues; and I hope you will take effectual methods, by your public advice and admonitions, to prevent fuch a promifcuous multitude of both sexes from meeting together in so clandestine a manner. I am

Your humble servant,

and fellow-labourer,

Τ. Β.'

Not long after the perusal of this letter, I received another upon the same subject; which by the date and style of it, I take to be written by some young templar :

'SIR,

Middle Temple, 1710-11.

'WHEN a man has been guilty of any vice or folly, I think the best atonement he can make for it, is to warn others not to fall into the like. In order to this I must acquaint you, that some time in February last I went to the Tuesday's masquerade. Upon my first going in I was attacked by half a dozen female quakers, who seemed willing to adopt me for a brother; but upon a nearer examination I found they were a sisterhood of coquettes, disguised in that precise habit. I was foon after taken out to dance, and as I fancied, by a woman of the first quality, for she was very tall, and moved gracefully. As soon as the minuet was over, we ogled one another through our masks; and as I am very well read in Waller, I repeated to her the four following verses out of his poem to Vandyke:

"The heedless lover does not know
Whose eyes they are that wound him fo;
But confounded with thy art,
Inquires her name that has his heart."

' I pronounced these words with such a languishing air that I had some reason to conclude I had made a conquest. She told me that she hoped my face was not akin to my tongue, and looking upon her watch, I accidentally difcovered the figure of a coronet on the back part of it. I was so transported with the thought of fuch an amour, that I plied her from one room to another with all the gallantries I could invent; and at length brought things to so happy an issue, that she gave me a private meeting the next day, without page or footman, coach or equipage. My heart danced in raptures, but I had not lived in this golden dream above three days, before I found good reason to wish that I had continued true to my laundress. I have since heard, by a very great accident, that this fine lady does not live far from Covent-garden, and that I am not the first cully whom she has passed herself upon for a countess.

Thus, fir, you see how I have mistaken a cloud for a Juno; and if you can make any use of this adventure, for the benefit of those who may possibly be as vain young coxcombs as myself, I do most heartily give you leave.

I am, SIR,

Your most humble admirer,

B. L.'

I design to visit the next masquerade myself, in the fame habit I wore at Grand Cairo; and till then shall suspend my judgment of this midnight entertainment1. Ck.

**

Letters for the Spectator, to be left with Mr. Buckley,

at the Dolphin in Little Britain. - Spect. in folio.

No 9. Saturday, March 10, 1710-11.

-- Tigris agit rabidâ cum tigride pacem
Perpetuam, fævis inter fe convenit ursis.

U

Juv. Sat. xv. 163.

Tiger with tiger, bear with bear, you'll find
In leagues offensive and defenfive join'd.

TATE.

MAN is faid to be a fociable animal, and, as an instance of it, we may observe that we take all occafions and pretences of forming ourselves into those little nocturnal assemblies, which are commonly known by the name of clubs. When

h See Spect. N° 1.

i N° 14, N° 101, and notes on the masquerade.

* By Addifon, dated, it is supposed, from Chelsea. See

N° 7, note ad fin.

VOL. I.

E

a set of men find themselves agree in any particular, though never so trivial, they establish themselves into a kind of fraternity, and meet once or twice a week, upon the account of fuch a fantastic resemblance. I know a confiderable market-town in which there was a club of fat men, that did not come together (as you may well suppose) to entertain one another with sprightliness and wit, but to keep one another in countenance. The room where the club met was fomething of the largest, and had two entrances, the one by a door of a moderate fize, and the other by a pair of folding doors. If a candidate for this corpulent club could make his entrance through the first, he was looked upon as unqualified; but if he stuck in the paffage, and could not force his way through it, the folding doors were immediately thrown open for his reception, and he was faluted as a brother. I have heard that this club, though it consisted but of fifteen persons, weighed above three ton.

In opposition to this society, there sprung up another composed of scarecrows and skeletons, who being very meagre and envious, did all they could to thwart the designs of their bulky brethren, whom they represented as men of dangerous principles; till at length they worked them out of the favour of the people, and consequently out of the magistracy. These factions tore the corporation in pieces for several years, till at length they came to this accommodation; that the two bailiffs of the town should be annually chofen out of the two clubs; by which means the principal magistrates are at this day coupled like rabbits, one fat and one lean.

Every one has heard of the club, or rather the confederacy, of the Kings. This grand alliance was formed a little after the return of king Charles the Second, and admitted into it men of all qualities and profeffions, provided they agreed in the furname of King, which, as they imagined, fufficiently declared the owners of it to be altogether untainted with republican and anti-monarchical principles.

A christian name has likewise been often used as a badge of distinction, and made the occafion of a club. That of the George's, which used to meet at the sign of the George on St. George's day, and swear, ' Before George,' is still fresh in every one's memory.

There are at present in several parts of this city what they call street clubs, in which the chief inhabitants of the street converse together every night. I remember, upon my enquiring after lodgings in Ormond-ftreet, the landlord, to recommend that quarter of the town, told me there was at that time a very good club in it; he also told me, upon further discourse with him, that two or three noisy country squires, who were fettled there the year before, had confiderably funk the price of house-rent; and that the club (to prevent the like inconveniences for the future) had thoughts of taking every house that became vacant into their own hands, till they had found a tenant for it, of a sociable nature and good conversation.