such gold as will not give you trouble to change; for I much pity your loss of sight*, which if it pleased God to let you enjoy, your other talents might have been your honest support, and have eased you of your present confinement. I am, sir, your well wishing friend and humble servant,

JONATH. SWIFT+.

I know not who lent me the play; if it came from I will send it back to morrow.

you,

FROM LADY HOWTH.

DEAR SIR,

DECEMBER 26, 1737.

KNOWING you to be very poor, I have sent you a couple of wild ducks,' a couple of partridges, a side of venison, and some plover, which will help to keep your house this Christmas. You may make a miser's feast, and drink your blue-eyed nymph in a bumper, as we do the drapier; and when these are out, let me know, and you shall have a fresh supply. I have sent them by a blackguard, know

1

* Dr. Clancy had pursued the study of physick, and was patronised by Dr. Helsham; but having lost his sight by a cold in 1737, before he could regularly engage in the business of his profession, he kept a Latin school for his support.

+ This letter and the packet were sealed with the head of Socrates.

Lady Howth having very sparkling blue-gray eyes, Dr. Swift used to distinguish her by the name of "the blue-eyed " nymph."

ing you to be of a very generous temper, though very poor. My lord and husband joins with me in wishing you a merry Christmas, and many of them; and am sincerely your affectionate friend and sea nymph.

If I signed my name, and the letter should be found, you and I might be suspected.

FROM DR. CLANCY.

REVEREND SIR,

DEC. 27th, 1737.

WHEN I strive to express the thorough sense I have of your humanity and goodness, my attempt ceases in admiration of them. You have favoured my performance with some degree of approbation, and you have considered my unfortunate condition by a mark of your known benevolence: from my very soul I sincerely thank you. That approbation, which in some more happy periods of my life would have made me proud even to vanity, has now in my distress comforted and soothed my misery.

If I did not fear being troublesome, I should do myself the honour of waiting upon you, if you will be pleased to permit me to do so. At any time I am ready to obey your command; and am, with the utmost respect and gratitude, sir, your most obliged humble servant,

MIC. CLANCY.

ΤΟ

SIR,

TO MR. FAULKNER.

DEANERY HOUSE, DUBLIN, JAN. 6, 1737-8.

I HAVE often mentioned to you an earnest desire

I had, and still have, to record the merit and services of the lord mayor, Humphrey French; whom I often desired, after his mayoralty, to give me an account of many passages that happened in his mayoralty, and which he has often put off, on the pretence of his forgetfulness, but in reality of his modesty : I take him to be a hero in his kind, and that he ought to be imitated by all his successors, as far as their genius can reach. I desire you therefore to inquire among all his friends whom you are acquainted with, to press them to give you the particulars of what they can remember, not only during the general conduct of his life, wherever he had any power or authority in the city; but particularly from Mr. Maple, who was his intimate friend, who knew him best, and could give the most just character of himself and his actions.

When I shall have got a sufficient information of all these particulars, I will, although I am oppressed with age and infirmities, stir up all the little spirit I can raise, to give the publick an account of that great patriot; and propose him as an example to all future magistrates, in order to recommend his virtues to this miserable kingdom.

I am, sir, your very humble servant,

JON. SWIFT.

TO MISS RICHARDSON *.

MADAM,

JAN. 28, 1737-8.

I MUST begin my correspondence by letting you

know that your uncle is the most unreasonable person I was ever acquainted with; and next to him, you are the second, although I think impartially that you are worse than he. I never had the honour and happiness of seeing you; nor can ever expect it, unless you make the first advance by coming up to town, where I am confined by want of health; and my travelling days are over. I find you follow your uncle's steps, by maliciously bribing a useless man, who can never have it in his power to serve or divert you. I have indeed continued a very long friendship with alderman Barber, who is governor of the London society about your parts; whereupon Mr. Richardson came to the deanery, although it was not in my power to do him the least good office, farther than writing to the alderman. However, your uncle came to me several times: and, I believe, after several invitations, dined with me once or twice. This was all the provocation I ever gave him; but he had revenge in his breast, and shall hear how he gratified it. First, he was told "That my ill stomach, and a giddiness I was subject to, "forced me, in some of those fits, to take a spoonful "of usquebaugh :" he discovered where I bought it,

you

* Afterward Mrs. Pratt.

+ Of Kilmacduac.

and

and sent me a dozen bottles, which cost him three pounds. He next was told "That as I never drank "malt liquors, so I was not able to drink Dublin "claret without mixing it with a little sweet Spanish "wine:" he found out the merchant with whom I deal, by the treachery of my butler, and sent me twelve dozen pints of that wine, for which he paid six pounds. But what can I say of a man, who, some years before I ever saw him, was loading me every season with salmons, that surfeited myself and all my visitors; whereby it is plain that his malice reached to my friends as well as to myself? At last, to complete his ill designs, he must needs force his niece into the plot; because it can be proved that you are his prime minister, and so ready to encourage him in his bad proceedings, that you have been his partaker and second in mischief, by sending me half a dozen of shirts, although I never once gave you the least cause of displeasure. And what is yet worse, the few ladies that come to the deanery assure me, they never saw so fine linen, or better worked up, or more exactly fitted. It is a happinesss they were not stockings, for then you would have known the length of my foot. Upon the whole, madam, I must deal so plainly as to repeat, that you are more cruel even than your uncle; to such a degree, that if

my health and a good summer can put it in my power to travel to Summer-Seat, I must take that journey on purpose to expostulate with you for all the unprovoked injuries you have done me. I have seen some persons who live in your neighbourhood, from whom I have inquired into your character; but I found you had bribed them all, by never sending them any such dangerous presents: for they

swore