the prefent fashion; and there is no young gentlewoman within feveral miles of this place has been kiffed ever fince his firft appearance among us. We country gentlemen cannot begin again and. learn these fine and referved airs; and our con• verfation is at a ftand, until we have your judgment for or against kiffing, by way of civility or falutation; which is impatiently expected by your 'friends of both fexes, but by none fo much as Your humble fervant, RUSTICK SPRIGHTLY.' Mr. SPECTATOR, December 3, 1711. I Was the other night at Philafter, where I ex pected to hear your famous Trunk-maker, but was unhappily difappointed of his company, and faw another perfon who had the like ambition to diftinguish himself in a noify manner, partly by vociferation or talking loud, and partly by his bodily agility. This was a very lufty fellow, but withal a fort of beau, who getting into one of the fide-boxes on the stage, before the curtain drew, was difpofed to fhew the whole audience his activity by leaping over the spikes; he paffed from thence to one of the entering doors, where he took fnuff with a tolerable good grace, • displayed his fine clothes, made two or three feint paffes at the curtain with his cane, then faced about and appeared at the other door: Here he affected to furvey the whole house, bowed and fmiled at random, and then fhewed his teeth, which were fome of them indeed very white: After this he retired behind the curtain, and obliged us with feveral views of his person from every opening. During the time of acting, he appeared fre< quently in the prince's apartment, made one at the hunting-match, and was very forward in the rebellion. If there were no injunctions to the con ©trary, trary, yet this practice must be confeffed to diminifh the pleafure of the audience, and for that reafon prefumptuous and unwarrantable: But fince her Majefty's late command has made it criminal, you have authority to take notice. • of it. T SIR, your humble fervant, No 241. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 6. Semperque relinqui Sola fibi, femper longam incomitata videtur Ire viam. -She feems alone To wander in her fleep thro' ways unknown, Mr. SPECTATOR, DRYDEN. THOUGH HOUGH you have confidered virtuous love in most of its diftreffes, I do not remember 'that you have given us any differtation upon the ' abfence of lovers, or laid down any methods how they fhould fupport themselves under thofe long feparations which they are fometimes forced to undergo. I am at prefent in this unhappy circumftance, having parted with the best of hufbands, who is abroad in the fervice of his country, and may not poffibly return for fome years. His warm and generous affection while we were together, with the tendernefs which he expreffed to me at parting, make his abfence almost infupportable. I think of him every moment of the day, and meet him every night in my dreams. Every thing I fee puts me in mind of him. I apply myfelf with more than ordinary diligence to the care of his family and his eftate; but this, Dd VOL. III. " instead 6 inftead of relieving me, gives me but fo many oc'cafions of wishing for his return. I frequent the rooms where I used to converfe with him, and not meeting him there fit down in his chair, and fall a weeping. I love to read the books he delighted in, and to converfe with the perfons whom he esteemed. I vifit his picture a hundred times a day, and place myself over-against it whole hours together. I pafs a great part of my time in the walks where I used to lean upon his arm, and recollect in my mind the difcourfes which have there paffed between us: I look over the feveral profpects and points of view which we ufed to furvey together, fix my eye upon the objects which he has made me take notice of, and call to mind a thousand agreeable remarks which he has made on thofe occafions. I write to him by every conveyance, and contrary to other people, am always in good humour when an east wind blows, because it feldom fails of bringing me a letter from him. Let me intreat you, Sir, to give me your advice upon this occafion, and to let me know how I may relieve myself in this my widowhood. 4 I am, Sir, your very humble fervant, Abfence is what the poets call death in love, and has given occafion to abundance of beautiful complaints in thofe authors who have treated of this paflion in verfe. Ovid's epiftles are full of them. Otway's Monimia talks very tenderly upon this fubject. -It was not kind To leave me like a turtle, here alone, To droop and mourn the absence of my mate. Thy Thy prefence only 'tis can make me bleft, Heal my unquiet mind, and tune my foul. The confolations of lovers on thefe occafions are very extraordinary. Befides thofe mentioned by Afteria, there are many other motives of comfort, which are made ufe of by abfent lovers. I remember in one of Scudery's romances, a couple of honourable lovers agreed at their parting to fet afide one half hour in the day to think of each other, during a tedious abfence. The romance tells us, that they both of them punctually observed the time thus agreed upon; and that whatever company or bufinefs they were engaged in, they left it abruptly as foon as the clock warned them to retire. The romance further adds, that the lovers expected the return of this ftated hour with as much impatience, as if it had been a real affignation, and enjoyed an imaginary happiness that was almoft as pleafing to them as what they would have found from a real meeting. It was an inexpreffible fatisfaction to thefe divided lovers, to be affured that each was at the fame time employed in the fame kind of contemplation, and making equal returns of tenderness and affection. If I may be allowed to mention a more ferious expedient for the alleviating of abfence, I fhall take notice of one which I have known two perfons practife, who joined religion to that elegance of fentiments with which the paffion of love generally infpires its votaries. This was at the return of fuch an hour, to offer up a certain prayer for each other, which they had agreed upon before their parting. The hufband, who is a man that makes a figure in the polite world, as well as in his own family, has often told me, that he could not have fupported an absence of three years without this expedient. Strada in one of his prolufions, gives an account of of a chimerical correfpondence between two friends by the help of a certain loadftone, which had fuch virtue in it, that if it touched two feveral needles, when one of the needles fo touched began to move, the other, though at never fo great a diftance, moved at the fame time, and in the fame manner. He tells us, that the two friends, being each of them poffeffed of one of thefe needles, made a kind of a dial-plate, infcribing it with the four and twenty letters, in the fame manner as the hours of the day are marked upon the ordinary dial-plate. They then fixed one of the needles on each of these plates. in fuch a manner, that it could move round without impediment, fo as to touch any of the four and twenty letters. Upon their feparating from one another into diftant countries, they agreed to with. draw themselves punctually into their clofets at a certain hour of the day, and to converfe with one another by means of this their invention. Accordingly when they were fome hundred miles afunder, each of them thut himself up in his closet at the time appointed, and immediately caft his eye upon his dial-plate. If he had a mind to write any thing to his friend, he directed his needle to every letter that formed the words which he had occafion for, making a little paufe at the end of every word or fentence, to avoid confufion. The friend, in the mean while faw his own fympathetick needle moving of itself to every letter which that of his correfpondent pointed at. By this means they talked together across a whole continent, and conveyed their thoughts to one another in an inftant over cities or mountains, feas or deferts. If Monfieur Scudery, or any other writer of romance, had introduced a necromancer, who is generally in the train of a knight-errant, making a prefent to two lovers of a couple of thofe abovementioned needles, the reader would not have been a little pleafed to have feen them corresponding with one |