ledgė, manner, and every thing else. The shaver * is an honest friendly man as before; he has a good deal to do to smother his Welsh fire, which, you know, he has in a greater degree than some would imagine. He posts himself a good part of the year in some warm house, wins the ladies money at ombre, and convinces them, that they are highly obliged to him. Lord and Lady Masham, Mr Hill, and Mrs Hill, often remember you with af fection.

As for your humble servant, with a great stone in his right kidney, and a family of men and women to provide for, he is as cheerful as ever. In public affairs, he has kept, as Tacitus says, Medium iter inter vile servitium, et abruptam contumaciam.— He never rails at a great man, but to his face; which, I can assure you, he has had both the opportunity and license to do. He has some few weak friends, and fewer enemies: if any, he is low enough to be rather despised than pushed at by them. I am faithfully, dear Sir,

Your affectionate humble servant,

J. ARBUTHNOT.

FROM THE DUCHESS OF ORMOND.

SIR,

Dec. 9, 1723.

I FIND by yours of the 6th of November, which

* Erasmus Lewis, Esq. who in Dr Swift's imitation of Horace, Ep. VII. b. 1. is so called.

"This Lewis is an arrant shaver."

I did not receive till last night, that you have been so good as to remember your poor relation here. But as your three last never came to hand, I think it very happy that you have kept your liberty thus long; for I cannot account for my not receiving them any other way, than that they were stopped in the post-office, and interpreted, as most innocent things are, to mean something very distant from the intention of the writer or actor.

I am surprised at the account you give me of that part of Ireland you have been in; for the best I expect from that grateful country is to be forgotten by the inhabitants. For, to remember with any kindness one under the frowns of the court, is not a gift the Irish are endowed with. I am very sorry to hear you have got the spleen, where a man of your sense must every day meet with things ridiculous enough to make you laugh; but I am afraid, the jests are too low to do so. Change of air is the best thing in the world for your distemper. And if not to cure yourself, at least have so much goodness for your friends here, as to come and cure us; for it is a distemper we are overrun with. I am sure your company would go a great way toward my recovery; for I assure you, nobody has a greater value for you than I have, and I hope I shall have the good fortune to see you before I die.

I have no sort of correspondence with the person* you have not seen, and wonder at nothing they do, or do not do.

I will let your brother† and mine know, that you

*The Duke of Ormond,

+ In the society of sixteen, Charles, Lord Butler of Weston, and Earl of Arran, brother to the Duke of Ormond, on whose attainder he was elected chancellor of the university of Oxford,--B.

remembered him in my letter. He is as good a man as lives.

I am afraid you will wish you had not encouraged my scribbling to you, when you find I am still such an insipid correspondent; but with that, which I hope will make some amends, am, with great sincerity and respect,

Your most faithful friend,

and humble servant.

FROM LORD BOLINGBROKE. *

Dec. 25, 1723.

NEVER letter came more opportunely than your last. The gout had made me a second visit, and several persons were congratulating with me on the good effect of the waters, which had determined my former illness to a distemper so desirable. My toe pained me; these compliments tired me; and I would have taken my fever again to give the gout to all the company. At that instant your letter was delivered to me, it cleared my brow, diverted my ill humour, and at least made me forget my pain. I told the persons who were sitting round my bed, and who testified some surprise at so sudden a change, that this powerful epistle came from Ireland; at which, to say the truth, I did not observe that

*This letter appears to have been written from France, though Lord Bolingbroke had come over to England in the latter end of June this year, in order to plead his pardon, which had passed the seals on the 28th of May.-B..

their surprise diminished. But the dullest fellow among them, who was a priest (for that happens to be the case sometimes in this country), told the others, that Ireland had been called insula sanctorum: that by the acquaintance he had at the Irish college, he made no doubt of her deserving still the same appellation and that they might be sure the three pages were filled with matière d'èdification, et matière de consolation, which he hoped I would be so good as to communicate to them. A learned Rosicrucian of my acquaintance, who is a fool of as much knowledge and as much wit as ever I knew in my life, smiled at the doctor's simplicity; observed, that the effect was too sudden for a cause so heavy in its operations; said a great many extravagant things about natural and theurgic magic; and informed us, that though the sages who deal in occult sciences have been laughed out of some countries, and driven out of others, yet there are, to his knowledge, many of them in Ireland. I stopped these guessers, and others who were perhaps ready, by assuring them, that my correspondent was neither a saint nor a conjurer. They asked me what he was then? I answered, that they should know it from yourself; and opening your letter, I read to them in French the character which you draw of yourself. Particular parts of it were approved or condemned by every one, as every one's own habits induced him to judge: but they all agreed, that my correspondent stood in need of more sleep, more victuals, less ale, and better company. I defended you the best I could; and, bad as the cause was, I found means to have the last word, which in disputes you know is the capital point. The truth is, however, that I convinced nobody, not even the weakest of the company, that is myself.

I flatter my friendship for you with the hopes, that you are really in the case, in which you say that our friend Pope seems to be; and that you do not know your own character. Or did you mean to amuse yourself, like that famous painter, who, instead of copying nature, tried in one of his designs, how far it was possible to depart from his original? Whatever your intention was, I will not be brought in among those friends, whose misfortunes have given you an habitual sourness. I declare to you

I

once for all that I am not unhappy, and that I never shall be so, unless I sink under some physical evil. Retrench, therefore, the proportion of peevishness which you set to my account. You might for several other reasons retrench the proportions, which you set to the account of others, and so leave yourself without peevishness, or without excuse. lament, and have always lamented, your being placed in Ireland; but you are worse than peevish, you are unjust, when you say, that it was either not in the power or will of a ministry to place you in England. Write minister, friend Jonathan, and scrape out the words, either, power, or; after which the passage will run as well, and be conformable to the truth of things. I know but one man had power at that time, and that wretched man had neither the will nor the skill to make a good use of it. We talk of characters; match me that if you can, among all the odd phenomena which have appeared in the moral world. I have not a Tacitus by me; but I believe that I remember your quotation, and as a mark that I hit right, I make no comment upon it. As you describe your public

who

* Lord Oxford.