which touches all mankind so much as this of the misbehaviour of servants. The complaint of this letter runs wholly upon men-servants; and I can attribute the licentiousness which has at present prevailed among them, to nothing but what an hundred before me have ascribed it to, the custom of giving board-wages. This one instance of false economy is sufficient to debauch the whole nation of servants, and makes them as it were but for some part of their time in that quality. They are either attending in places where they meet and run into clubs, or else, if they wait at taverns, they eat after their masters, and reserve their wages for other occasions. From hence it arises, that they are but in a lower degree what their masters themselves are; and usually affect an imitation of their manners: and you have in liveries, beaux, fops, and coxcombs, in as high a perfection as among people that keep equipages. It is a common humour among the retinue of people of quality, when they are in their revels, that is, when they are out of their masters' sight, to assume in a humorous way the names and titles of those whose liveries they wear. By which means characters and distinctions become so familiar to them, that it is to this, among other causes, one may impute a certain insolence among our servants, that they take no notice of any gentleman, though they know him ever so well, except he is an acquaintance of their master's. My obscurity and taciturnity leave me at liberty without scandal to dine, if I think fit, at a common ordinary, in the meanest as well as the most sumptuous house of entertainment.-Falling in the other day at a victualling-house near the house of peers, I heard the maid come down and tell the landlady at the bar, that my lord bishop swore he would throw her out at window if she did not bring up more mild beer, and that my lord duke would have a double mug of purl. My surprise was increased, in hearing loud and rustic voices speak and answer to each other upon the public affairs, by the names of the most illustrious of our nobility; till of a sudden one came running in, and cried the house was rising. Down came all the company together, and away! The alehouse was immediately filled with clamour, and scoring one mug to the marquis of such a place, oil and vinegar to such an earl, three quarts to my new lord for wetting his title, and so forth. It is a thing too notorious to mention the crowds of servants, and their insolence near the courts of justice, and the stairs towards the supreme assembly, where there is an universal mockery of all order, such riotous clamour and licentious confusion, that one would think the whole nation lived in jest, and that there were no such thing as rule and distinction among us. The next place of resort, wherein the servile world are let loose, is at the entrance of Hyde Park, while the gentry are at the Ring." Hither people bring their lacqueys out of state, and here it is that all they say at their tables, and act in their houses, is communicated to the whole town. There are men of wit in all conditions of life; and mixing with these people at their diversions, I have heard coquettes and prudes as well rallied, and insolence and pride exposed (allowing for their want of education), with as much humour and good sense as in the politest b The ring in Hyde Park was formerly the resort of people of quality on Sunday evenings. There they showed their fine chariots and equipages. Their footmen were always left behind at the gate, who in the mean time were employed in wrestling, &c, and frequently in less innocent diversions. I companies. It is a general observation, that all dependents run in some measure into the manners and behaviour of those whom they serve. You shall frequently meet with lovers and men of intrigue among the lacqueys as well as at White's or in the side-boxes. I remember some years ago an instance of this kind. A footman to a captain of the guards used frequently, when his master was out of the way, to carry on amours and make assignations in his master's clothes. The fellow had a very good person, and there are very many women that think no farther than the outside of a gentleman: besides which, he was almost as learned a man as the colonel himself: say, thus qualified, the fellow could scrawl billetdoux so well, and furnish a conversation on the common topics, that he had, as they call it, a great deal of good business on his hands. It happened one day, that, coming down a tavern stairs in his master's fine guard-coat with a well-dressed woman masked, he met the colonel coming up with other company; but with a ready assurance he quitted his lady, came up to him, and said, 'Sir, I know you have too much respect for yourself to cane me in this honourable habit. But you see there is a lady in the case, and I hope, on that score also, you will put off your anger till I have told you all another time.' After a little pause the colonel cleared up his countenance, and with an air of familiarity whispered his man apart, Sirrah, bring the lady with you to ask pardon for you:' then aloud, 'Look to it, Will, I'll never forgive you else.' The fellow went back to his mistress, and telling her, with a loud voice and an oath, In the Spect. in folio, and in the edit. of 1712, in Svo. this officer is stiled both captain and colonel. that was the honestest fellow in the world, conveyed her to an hackney-coach. But the many irregularities committed by servants in the places above-mentioned, as well as in the theatres, of which masters are generally the occasions, are too various not to need being resumed on another occasion. R.d Adv. This is to give notice, that the three critics who last Sunday settled the characters of my lord Rochester and Boileau, in the yard of a coffee-house in Fuller's Rents, will meet this next Sunday at the same time and place, to finish the merits of several dramatic writers; and will also make an end of the nature of true sublime. This advertisement was subjoined to Eusden's letter in No. 87. No. 89. TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 1711. -Petite hinc, juvenesque senesque, Finem animo certum, miserisque viatica canis. Cras hoc fiet. Idem cras flet. Quid? quasi magnum, PERS. Sat. v. 64. Pers. From thee both old and young, with profit, learn The bounds of good and evil to discern Corn. Unhappy he who does this work adjourn, And to to-morrow would the search delay: His lazy morrow will be like to-day. Pers. But is one day of ease too much to borrow? Corn. Yes, sure; for yesterday was once to-morrow. That yesterday is gone, and nothing gain'd; And all thy fruitless days will thus be drain'd: For thou hast more to-morrows yet to ask, And wilt be ever to begin thy task; Who, like the hindmost chariot-wheels, are curst, DRYDEN. As my correspondents upon the subject of love are very numerous, it is my design, if possible, to range d By Steele. See final note No. 4. on R. them under several heads, and address myself to them at different times. The first branch of them, to whose service I shall dedicate this paper, are those that have to do with women of dilatory tempers, whc are for spinning out the time of courtship to an immoderate length, without being able either to close with their lovers or to dismiss them. I have many letters by me filled with complaints against this sort of women. In one of them no less a man than a brother of the coif tells me that he began his suit Vicesimo non Caroli secundi, before he had been a twelvemonth at the Temple; that he prosecuted it for many years after he was called to the bar; that at present he is a serjeant at law; and notwithstanding he hoped that matters would have been long since brought to an issue, the fair one still demurs.I am so well pleased with this gentleman's phrase that I shall distinguish this sect of women by the title of Demurrers. I find by another letter from one who calls himself Thyrsis, that his mistress has been demurring above these seven years. But among all my plaintiffs of this nature, I most pity the unfortunate Philander, a man of a constant passion and plentiful fortune, who sets forth that the timorous and irresolute Sylvia has demurred till she is past child-bearing. Strephon appears by his letter to be a very choleric lover, and irrevocably smitten with one that demurs out of self-interest. He tells me with great passion that she has bubbled him out of his youth; that she drilled him on to five and fifty; and that he verily believes she will drop him in his old age, if she can find her account in another. shall conclude this narrative with a letter from honest Sam Hopewell, a very pleasant fellow, who it seems zi. e. A serjeant at law. |