No. 12. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 14. -Veteres avias tibi de pulmone revello. PERS. Sat. v. ver. 92. I root th' old woman from thy trembling heart. AT my coming to London, it was fome time be fore I could fettle myself in a house to my liking. I was forced to quit my first lodgings, by reafon of an officious landlady, that would be afking 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. fifbmonger in the Strand, he fball be very well rewarded for his pains. As I am the best man in the world to keep my own counfel, and my landlord the fishmonger not knowing my name,. this accident of my life was never discovered to this very day. 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 thefe five years; my coffee comes into my chamber every morning without asking for it; if I want fire, I point to my chimney, if water, to my bafon 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 difturb 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 bufinefs or difcourfe of the family. The maid will ask her mistress (though I am by) whether the gentleman is ready to go to dinner, as the mistress (who is indeed an excellent house-wife) fcolds at the fervants as heartily before my face as behind my back. In fhort, I move up and down the house, and enter into all companies with the fame liberty as a cat or any other domestic 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 stories. 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 nobody but the gentleman, (for that is the name which I go by in the neighbourhood as well as in the family), they went on without minding me. I feated myself by the candle that stood on a table at one end of the room; and, pretending to read a book that I took out of my pocket, heard several dreadful stories of ghosts as pale as ashes that had ftood ftood at the feet of a bed, or walked over a churchyard by moon-light: and of others that had been conjured into the Red-Sea, for difturbing people's reft, and drawing their curtains at midnight; with many other old-women's fables of the like nature. As one fpirit raised another, I obferved that at the end of every story, the whole company clofed their ranks, and crowded about the fire: I took notice in particular of a little boy, who was fo attentive to every story, that I am miflaken if he ventures to go to bed by himself this twelvemonth. Indeed they talked fo long, that the imaginations of the whole affembly were manifeftly crazed, and, I am fure, will be the worfe for it as long as they live. I heard one of the girls, that had looked upon me over her fhoulder, afking the company how long I had been in the room, and whether I did not look paler than I used to do. This put me under fome apprehenfions that I fhould be forced to explain myself if I did not re tire; for which reafon I took the candle in my hand, and went up into my chamber, not without wondering at this unaccountable weaknefs in reasonable creatures, that they should love to aftonifh and ter... · rify one another. Were I a father, fhould take a particular care to preferve my children from these little horrors of imagination, which they are apt to contract when they are young, and are not able to fhake off when they are in years. I have known a foldier that has entered a breach, affrighted at his own fhadow; and look pale upon a little fcratching at his door, who the day before had marched up against a battery of cannon. There are instances. of perfons, who have been terrified even to distraction, at the figure of a tree, or the fhaking of a bulruth. The truth of it is, I look upon a found imagination as the greatest bleffing of life, next to a clear judgment, and a good confcience. In the: mean time, fince there are very few whofe minds are not more or lefs fubject to these dreadful thoughts E 3 2 and! and apprehenfions, we ought to arm ourselves against them by the dictates of reafon and religion, to pull the old woman out of our hearts, (as Perfius expreffes it in the motto of my paper), and extinguifh thofe impertinent notions which we imbibed at a time that we were not able to judge of their ab. furdity. Or, if we believe, as many wife and good men have done, that there are fuch phantoms and apparitions as those I have been speaking of, let us endeavour to establish to ourselves an interest in him who holds the reigns of the whole creation in his hand, and moderates them after fuch a manner, that it is impoffible for one being to break loofe upon another without his knowledge and permission. For my own part, I am apt to join in opinion with those who believe that all the regions of nature fwarm with spirits; and that we have multitudes of spectators on all our actions, when we think ourfelves moft alone: but, inftead of terrifying myself with such a notion, I am wonderfully pleased to think that I am always engaged with fuch an innumerable fociety, in fearching out the wonders of the creation, and joining in the fame confort of praise and ado ration.. Milton has finely defcribed this mixed communion of men and spirits in paradife; and had doubtlefs his eye upon a verfe in old Hefiod, which is almost word for word the fame with his third line in the following paffage : -Nor think, though men were none, That heav'n would want spectators, God want praise: Singing Singing their great Creator? Oft in bands, No. 13. THURSDAY, MARCH 15. Dic mihi, fi fueris tu leo, qualis eris? MART. HERE is nothing that of late years has afford than Signior Nicolini's combat with a lion in the Hay-market, which has been very often exhibited to the general fatisfaction of moft of the nobility and gentry in the kingdom of Great Britain. Upon the first rumour of this intended combat, it was confidently affirmed, and is ftill believed by many in both galleries, that there would be a tame lion fent from the Tower every opera night, in order to be killed by Hydafpes; this report, though altogether groundlefs, fo univerfally prevailed in the upper-regions of the play-houfe, that fome of the most refined politicians in those parts of the audience gave it out in whifper, that the lion was a coufin-german of the tiger who made his appearance in King William's days, and that the stage would be fupplied with lions at the public expence, during the whole feffion. Many likewife were the conjectures of the treatment which this lion was to meet with from the hands of Signior Nicolini: fome fuppofed that he was to fubdue him in Recitativo, as Orpheus used to serve the wild beafts in his time, and afterwards to knock him on the head: fome fancied that the lion would not pretend to lay his paws upon the hero, by reafon of the received opinion, that a lion will not hurt a virgin : feveral, who |