ple of fuch innocent diverfions as I would have you recommend; and am, • Moft efteemed Sir, your ever loving friend, TIMOTHY DOODLE.' The following letter was occafioned by my laft Thursday's paper upon the abfence of Lovers, and the methods therein mentioned of making fuch abfence fupportable. < SIR, A MONG the feveral ways of confolation which abfent lovers make use of while their fouls are in that state of departure, which you fay is death in love, there are fome very material ones that have escaped your notice. Among these, the firft and moft received is a crooked fhilling, which has adminiftered great comfort to Our forefathers, and is still made ufe of on this occafion with very good effect in moft parts of her majefty's dominions. There are fome, I know, who think a crown-piece cut into two equal parts, and preferved by the diftant lovers, is of more fovereign virtue than the former. But fince opi⚫nions are divided in this particular, why may not the fame perfon make ufe of both? The figure * of a heart, whether cut in ftone or caft in metal, ' whether bleeding upon an altar, ftuck with darts, or held in the hand of a Cupid, has always 'been looked upon as talifmanick in diftreffes of this nature. I am acquainted with many a brave fellow, who carries his mistress in the lid of his fnuff-box, and by that expedient has fupported himself under the abfence of a whole campaign. For my own part, I have tried all these remedies, but never found fo much benefit from any as from a ring, in which my miftrefs's hair is platted together very artificially in a kind of true-lo' vers knot. As I have received great benefit from this feeret, I think myfelf obliged to communi 'cate 'cate it to the publick, for the good of my fellowfubjects. I defire you will add this letter as an apendix to your confolations upon abfence, and am, Your very humble fervant, · T. B.' I fhall conclude this paper with a letter from an univerfity gentleman, occafioned by my last Tuesday's paper, wherein I gave fome account of the great feuds which happened formerly in thofe learned bodies, between the modern Greeks and Trojans. SIR, TH His will give you to understand, that there is at prefent in the fociety, whereof I am a member, a very confiderable body of Trojans, who, upon a proper occafion, would not fail to declare ourfelves. In the mean while we do all we can to annoy our enemies by ftratagem, and are refolved by the first opportunity to attack Mr. Joshua Barnes, whom we look upon as the Achilles of the oppofite party. As for myself, I have had the reputation ever fince I came from fchool, of being a trufty Trojan, and am refolved never to give quarter to the fmalleft particle of Greek, wherever I chance to meet it. It is for this reafon I take it very ill of you, that you fometimes hang out Greek colours at the head of your paper, and fometimes give a word of the enemy even in the body of it. When I meet with any thing of this nature, I throw down your fpeculations upon the table, with that form of words which we make ule of when we declare " war upon an author, 6 C Gracum eft, non poteft legi. I give you this hint, that you may for the future abstain from any fuch hoftilitics at your peril. TROILUS.' WEDNESDAY, No 216. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 12. 6 το Οὐκ ἄξει σοί με πωτὴς ἦν ἱπποτα Πηλεύς, Ούδε Θέτις μήτης, γλαυκὴ δὲ σ' ἔτικής θάλασσας, Πέτραι τ' ηλίβατοι, ὅτι τοι νόῳ ἐσὶν ἀπηνής. Hoм. Iliad. xvi. 33 No amorous hero ever give thee birth, • Mr. SPECTATOR, POPE AS your paper is part of the equipage of the tea-table, I conjure you to print what I now 'write to you; for I have no other way to com'municate what I have to fay to the Fair Sex on the most important circumftance of life, even the care of children. I do not understand that you profefs your paper is always to confist of matters which are only to entertain the learned and polite, but it may agree with your design to publish 'fome which may tend to the information of man'kind in general; and when it does fo, you do more than writing wit and humour. Give me leave then to tell you, that all the abuses that ever you have as yet endeavoured to reform, certainly not one wanted fo much your affistance as the abufe in nurfing children. It is unmerciful to fee, that a woman endowed with all the per⚫fections and bleffings of nature, can, as foon as fhe is delivered, turn off her innocent, tender and helpless infant, and give it up to a woman that is (ten thoufand to one) neither in health nor nor good condition, neither found in mind nor body, that has neither honour nor reputation, 'neither love nor pity for the poor babe, but more regard for the money than for the whole child, and never will take farther care of it than what by all the encouragement of money and pretents 'fhe it forced to; like Æfop's earth, which would not nurse the plant of another ground, although never fo much improved, by reason that plant was not of its own production. And fince another's child is no more natural to a nurse than a plant to a ftrange and different ground, how can it be fuppofed that the child could thrive; and if it thrives, muft it not imbibe the grofs humours ⚫ and qualities of the nurse, like a plant in a different ground, or like a graft upon a different ftock? Do not we obferve, that a lamb fuckling a goat changes very much its nature, nay even its fkin and wool into goat kind? The power of a nurse over a child, by infufing into it, with her milk, her qualities and difpofition, is fufficiently and daily obferved: Hence came that old faying concerning an ill-natured and malicious fellow, that he had imbibed his malice with his nurfe's milk, or that fome brute or other had ⚫ been his nurfe. Hence Romulus and Remus were faid to have been nursed by a wolf, Telephus the • fon of Hercules by a hind, Pelias the fon of Neptune by a mare, and Ægisthus by a goat; not that they had actually fucked fuch creatures, as fome fimpletons have imagined, but that their nurfes had been of fuch a nature and a temper, and infufed fuch into them. 6 Many inftances may be produced from good authorities and daily experience, that children actually fuck in the feveral paffions and depraved inclinations of their nurfes, as anger, malice, fear, melancholy, fadnefs, defire, and averfion. This Diodorus, lib. 2. witneffes, when he speaks, 'faying, faying, That Nero the emperor's nurse had been very much addicted to drinking; which habit • Nero received from his nurfe, and was fo very particular in this that the people took fo much notice of it, as inftead of Tiberius Nero, they called him Biberius Mero. The fame Diodorus alfo relates of Caligula, predeceffor to Nero, that his nurfe ufed to moiften the nipples of her breast frequently with blood, to make Caligula take the better hold of them; which, fays Diodorus, was the cause that made him fo blood-thirsty and cruel all his life-time after, that he not only committed frequent murder by his own hand, but likewife wished that all human kind wore but one neck, that he might have the pleasure to cut it off. Such like degeneracies aftonifh the parents, who not knowing after whom the child can take, fee one to incline to ftealing, another to drinking, cruelty, ftupidity; yet all thefe are not minded. Nay, it is eafy to demonftrate, that a child, although it be born from the beft of parents, may be corrupted by an ill-tempered nurfe. How many children do we fee daily brought into fits, confumptions, rickets, &c. merely by fucking their nurses when in a paffion or fury? But indeed almost any disorder of the nurfe is a diforder to the child, and few nurfes can be found in this town but what labour under fome diftemper or other. The first queftion that is generally afked a young woman that wants to be a nurse, Why the fhould be a nurse to other peoples children; is anfwered, by her having an ill husband, • and that he must make fhift to live. I think now this very answer is enough, to give any body a fhock, if duly confidered; for an ill husband may, or ten to one if he does not, bring home to his wife an all diftemper, or at least vexation and difturbance. Befides, as the takes the child out of mere neceffity, her food will be accord . 6 |