ought to have his choice of two caps, a red cap or a fool's cap. It is a wonderful thing to see the tories provoking his present majesty, whose clemency, mercy, and forgiving temper, have been so signal, so extraordinary, so more than humane, during the whole course of his reign; which plainly appears, not only from his own speeches and declarations, but also from a most ingenious pamphlet just come over, relating to the wicked Bishop of Rochester. But enough of politics. I have no town news: I have seen nobody: I have heard nothing. Old Rochfort has got a dead palsy. Lady Betty has been long ill. Dean Percivale has answered the other dean's journal in Grub Street, justly taxing him for avarice and want of hospitality. Madam Percivale absolutely denies all the facts insists that she never made candles of dripping; that Charley never had the chincough, &c.

My most humble service to Mrs Cope, who entertained that covetous lampooning dean much better than he deserved. Remember me to honest Nanty and boy Barclay.

Ever yours, &c.

JON. SWIFT.

TO THE EARL OF OXFORD.

October 11, 1722.

MY LORD, I OFTEN receive letters franked Oxford, but always find them written and subscribed by your lordship's servant Mynett. His meaning is some business of his own, wherein I am his solicitor; but he makes his court by giving me an account of

the state of your family; and perpetually adds a clause," That your lordship soon intends to write to me.' I knew you indeed when you were not so great a man as you are now, I mean when you were treasurer; but you are grown so proud since your retirement, that there is no enduring you and you have reason, for you never acted so difficult a part of life before. In the two great scenes of power and persecution you have excelled mankind; and in this of retirement, you have most injuriously forgotten your friends. Poor Prior often sent me his complaints on this occasion: and I have returned him mine. I never courted your acquaintance when you governed Europe, but you courted mine; and now you neglect me, when I use all my insinuations to keep myself in your memory. I am very sensible, that next to receiving thanks and compliments, there is nothing you more hate than writing letters but, since I never gave you thanks, nor made you compliments, I have so much more merit than any of those thousands whom you have less obliged, by only making their fortunes, without taking them into your friendship, as you did me; whom you always countenanced in too public and particular a manner to be forgotten, either by the world or myself; for which, never man was more proud, or less vain.

I have now been ten years soliciting for your picture; and if I had solicited you for a thousand pounds (I mean of your money, not the public) I could have prevailed in ten days. You have given me many hundred hours; can you not now give me a couple? have my mortifications been so few, or are you so malicious to add a greater than I ever yet suffered? did you ever refuse me any thing I asked you? and will you now begin? In my con

science, I believe, and by the whole conduct of your life I have reason to believe, that you are too

poor to bear the expence. the richer man of the two

I ever told you, I was and I am now richer by five hundred pounds, than I was at the time when I was boasting at your table of my wealth, before Diamond Pitt.*

I have hitherto taken up with a scurvy print of you, under which I have placed this lemma:

Veteres actus primamque juventam

Prosequar? ad sese mentem præsentia ducunt,

And this I will place under your picture, whenever you are rich enough to send it me. I will only promise, in return, that it shall never lose you the reputation of poverty; which, to one of your birth, patrimony, and employments, is one of the greatest glories of your life, and so shall be celebrated by

me.

I entreat your lordship, if your leisure and your health will permit, to let me know when I can be a month with you at Brampton castle; because I have a great deal of business with you that relates to posterity. Mr Mynett has, for some time, led me an uncomfortable life, with his ill accounts of your health; but, God be thanked, his style of late is much altered for the better.

My hearty and constant prayers are perpetually offered up for the preservation of you and your excellent family. Pray, my lord, write to me: or you

* Thomas Pitt, Esq. who amassed great riches as governor of Fort St George, in the East Indies: he was noted as proprietor of the celebrated diamond, to which he gave a name, as he took designation from it. It was esteemed the largest in the world.

never loved me, or I have done something to deserve your displeasure. My Lord and Lady Harriot, my brother and sister,* pretend to atone by making me fine presents; but I would have his lordship know, that I would value two of his lines, more than two of his manors, &c.

DEAR SIR,

FROM MR GAY.

London, Dec. 22, 1722.

AFTER every post-day, for these eight or nine years I have been troubled with an uneasiness of spirit, and at last I have resolved to get rid of it, and write to you. I do not deserve you should think so well of me as I really deserve; for I have not professed to you, that I love you as much as ever I did: but you are the only person of my acquaintance almost that does not know it. Whomever I see that comes from Ireland, the first question I ask is after your health; of which I had the pleasure to hear very lately from Mr Berkeley. I think of you very often: nobody wishes you better, or longs more to see you. Duke Disney, who knows more news than any man alive, told me I should certainly meet you at the Bath this season: but I had one comfort in being disappointed, that you did not want it for

* The members of the club of sixteen all called one another brothers, and consequently their wives were sisters to the several members.-D. S.

your health. I was there for near eleven weeks for a colic, that I have been often troubled with of late; but have not found all the benefit I expected. *

I lodge at present in Burlington-house, and have received many civilities from many great men, but very few real benefits. They wonder at each other for not providing for me; and I wonder at them all. Experience has given me some knowledge of them; so that I can say, that it is not in their power to disappoint me. You find I talk to you of myself; I wish you would reply in the same manner. I hope, though you have not heard of me so long, I have not lost my credit with you; but that you will think of me in the same manner, as when you espoused my cause so warmly, which my gratitude never can forget. I am, dear Sir,

Your most obliged, and sincere humble servant,
J. GAY.

P. S. Mr Pope, upon reading over this letter, desired me to tell you, that he has been just in the same sentiments with me, in regard to you, and shall never forget his obligations to you.

"If,

* In a letter to Gay, during his illness, Mr Pope says, as I believe, the air of a better clime, as the southern part of France, may be thought useful for your recovery, thither I would go with you infallibly; and it is very probable we might get the Dean with us, who is in that abandoned state already in which I shall shortly be as to other cares and duties.”