Page images
PDF
EPUB

the fine talker. These persons shall be first locked up, for the peace of all whom the one visits, and all whom the other talks to.

The passion, that first touched the brain of both these persons, was envy which had such wondrous effects, that to this lady Fidget owes that she is so courteous; to this, Will Voluble that he is so eloquent. Fidget has a restless torment in hearing of any one's prosperity; and cannot know any quiet until she visits her, and is eye-witness of something that lessens it. Thus her life is a continual search after what does not concern her; and her compa nious speak kindly even of the absent and the unfortunate to teaze her. She was the first that visited Flavia after the small-pox, and has never seen her since, because she is not altered. Call a young woman handsome in her company, and she tells you it is a pity she has no fortune: say she is rich, and she is as sorry that she is silly. With all this ill-nature, Fidget is herself young, rich, and handsome; but loses the pleasure of all those qualities, because she has them in common with others.

To make up her misery, she is well bred; she hears commendations, until she is ready to faint for want of venting herself in contradictions. This madness is not expressed by the voice; but is uttered in the eyes and features; its first symptom is, upon beholding an agreeable object, a sudden approbation immediately checked with dislike.

This lady I shall take the liberty to conduct into a bed of straw and darkness; and have some hopes, that after long absence from the light, the pleasure of seeing at all, may reconcile her to what she shall see, though it proves to be never so agreeable.

My physical remark on the distraction of envy in other persons, and particularly in Will Voluble, is interrupted by a visit from Mr. Kidney, with advices

which will bring matter of new disturbance to many possessed with this sort of disorder, which I shall publish to bring out the symptoms more kindly, and lay the distemper more open to my view.

St. James's Coffee-house, May 19.

This evening a mail from Holland brought the following advices:

From the Camp before Douay, May 26, N. S. On the twenty-third the French assembled their army, and encamped with their right near Bouchain, and their left near Crevecœur. Upon this motion of the enemy, the duke of Marlborough and prince Eugene made a movement with their army on the twenty-fourth, and encamped from Arlieux to Vitry and Isez Esquerchien, where they are so advantageously posted, that they not only cover the siege, secure our convoys of provisions, forage, and ammunition from Lisle and Tournay, and the canals and dikes we have made to turn the water of the Scarp and La Cense to Bouchain; but are in readiness, by marching from the right, to possess themselves of the field of battle marked out betwixt Vitry and Montigny, or from the left to gain the lines of circumvallation betwixt Fierin and Dechy: so that whatever way the enemy shall approach to attack us, whether by the plains of Lens, or by Bouchain and Valenciennes, we have but a very small movement to make, to possess ourselves of the ground on which it will be most advantageous to receive them. The enemy marched this morning from their left, and are encamped with their right at Oisy, and their left towards Arras, and, according to our advices, will pass the Scarp to-morrow, and enter on the plains of Lens, though several regiments of horse, the German and Liege troops, which are destined to

compose part of their army, have not yet joined them. If they pass the Scarp, we shall do the like at the same time, to possess ourselves with all possible advantage of the field of battle: but if they continue where they are, we shall not remove, because in our present station we sufficiently cover from all insults both our siege and convoys.

Monsieur Villars cannot yet go without crutches, and it is believed will have much difficulty to ride. He and the duke of Berwick are to command the French army, the rest of the marshals being only to assist in council.

Last night we entirely perfected four bridges over the Avant Fossé at both attacks; and our saps are so far advanced, that in three or four days, batteries will be raised on the Glacis, to batter in breach both the outworks and ramparts of the town.

Letters from the Hague of the twenty-seventh, N. S. say, That the deputies of the States of Holland, who set out for Gertruydenburgh on the twen ty-third, to renew the conferences with the French ministers, returned on the twenty-sixth, and had communicated to the States-general the new oveltures that were made on the part of France, which, it is believed, if they are in earnest, may produce a general treaty.

N° 175. TUESDAY, MAY 23, 1710.

From my own Apartment, May 22.

IN the distribution of the apartments in the New Bedlam, proper regard is had to the different sexes, and the lodgings accommodated accordingly. Among

other necessaries, as I have thought fit to appoint story-tellers to soothe the men, so I have allowed tale-bearers to indulge the intervals of my female patients. But before I enter upon disposing of the main of the great body that wants my assistance, it is necessary to consider the human race abstracted from all other distinctions and considerations except that of sex. This will lead us to a nearer view of their excellencies and imperfections, which are to be accounted the one or the other, as they are suitable to the design for which the person so defective or accomplished came into the world.

To make this inquiry aright, we must speak of the life of people of condition; and the proportionable applications to those below them will be easily made, so as to value the whole species by the same rule. We will begin with the woman, and behold her as a virgin in her father's house. This state of her life is infinitely more delightful than that of her brother at the same age. While she is entertained with learning melodious airs at her spinnet, is led round a room, in the most complaisant manner to a fiddle, or is entertained with applauses of her beauty and perfection in the ordinary conversation she meets with; the young man is under the dictates of a rigid schoolmaster or instructor, contradicted in every word he speaks, and curbed in all the inclinations he discovers. Mrs. Elizabeth is the object of desire and admiration, looked upon with delight, courted with all the powers of eloquence and address, approached with a certain worship, and defended with a certain loyalty. This is her case as to the world. In her domestic character, she is the companion, the friend, and confidant of her mother, and the object of a pleasure, something like the love between angels, to her father. Her youth, her beauty, her air, are by him looked upon with an ineffa

ble transport beyond any other joy in this life, with as much purity as can be met with in the next.

Her brother William, at the same years, is but in the rudiments of those acquisitions which must gain him esteem in the world. His heart beats for applause among men; yet he is fearful of every step towards it. If he proposes to himself to make a figure in the world, his youth is damped with the prospect of difficulties, dangers, and dishonours; and an opposition in all generous attempts, whether they regard his love or his ambition.

In the next stage of life, she has little else to do but (what she is accomplished for by the mere gifts of nature) to appear lovely and agreeable to her husband, tender to her children, and affable to her servants. But a man, when he enters into this way, is but in the first scene, far from the accomplishment of his design. He is now in all things to act for others as well as himself. He is to have industry and frugality in his private affairs, and integrity and address in public. To these qualities, he must add a courage and resolution to support his other abilities, lest he be interrupted in the prosecution of his just endeavours, in which the honour and interest of his posterity are as much concerned as his own personal welfare.

This little sketch may, in some measure, give an idea of the different parts which the sexes have to act, and the advantageous as well as inconvenient terms on which they are to enter upon their several parts of life. This may also be some rule to us in the examination of their conduct. In short, I shall take it for a maxim, that a woman who resigns the purpose of being pleasing, and the man who gives up the thoughts of being wise, do equally quit their claim to the true causes of living; and are to be

[blocks in formation]
« PreviousContinue »