manner of Plutarch to draw comparisons of his heroes and orators, to set their actions and eloquence in a fairer light; so I would have made the parallel of Pinkethman, Norris, and Bullock; and so far shown their different methods of rais. ing mirth, that any one should be able to distinguish whether the jest was the poet's or the actor's. smile. Her lips are composed with a primness peculiar to her character, all her modesty seems collected into her face, and she but very rarely takes the freedom to sink her cheek into a dimple. The young widow is only a Chian for a time; her smiles are confined by decorum, and she is obliged to make her face sympathize with her As the playhouse affords us the most occa-habit; she looks demure by art, and by the sions of observing upon the behaviour of the strictest rules of decency is never allowed the face, it may be useful (for the direction of those smile till the first offer or advance towards her who would be critics this way) to remark, that is over. the virgin ladies usually dispose themselves in The effeminate fop, who, by the long exercise the front of the boxes, the young married women of his countenance at the glass, hath reduced it compose the second row, while the rear is gene- to an exact discipline, may claim a place in this rally made up of mothers of long standing, un- clan. You see him upon any occasion, to give designing maids, and contented widows. Who-spirit to his discourse, admire his own eloever will cast his eye upon them under this quence by a dimple. view, during the representation of a play, will find me so far in the right, that a double entendre strikes the first row into an affected gravity, or careless indolence, the second will venture at a smile, but the third take the conceit entirely, and express their mirth in a downright laugh. When I descend to particulars, I find the reserved prude will relapse into a sinile at the extravagant freedoms of the coquette; the coquette in her turn laughs at the starchness and awkward affectation of the prude; the man of letters is tickled with the vanity and ignorance of the fop; and the fop confesses his ridicule at the unpoliteness of the pedant. I fancy we may range the several kinds of laughers under the following heads: The Dimplers. The Smilers. The Grinners. The Horse-laughers. The dimple is practised to give a grace to the features, and is frequently made a bait to entangle a gazing lover; this was called by the ancients the Chian laugh. The smile is for the most part confined to the fair sex, and their male retinue. It expresses our satisfaction in a silent sort of approbation, doth not too much disorder the features, and is practised by lovers of the most delicate address. This tender motion of the physiognomy the ancients called the Ionic laugh. The Ionics are those ladies that take a greater liberty with their features; yet even these may be said to smother a laugh, as the former to stifle a smile. The beau is an Ionic out of complaisance, and practises the smile the better to sympathize with the fair. He will sometimes join in a laugh to humour the spleen of a lady, or applaud a piece of wit of his own, but always takes care to confine his mouth within the rules of good breeding; he takes the laugh from the ladies, but is never guilty of so great an indecorum as to begin it. The Ionic laugh is of universal use to men of power at their levees; and is esteemed by judicious place-hunters a more particular mark of distinction than the whisper. A young gentleman of my acquaintance valued himself upon his success, having obtained this favour after the attendance of three months only. A judicious author, some years since, published a collection of sonnets, which be very successfully called, Laugh and be Fat; or, Pills to purge Melancholy; I cannot sufficiently ad. mire the facetious title of these volumes, and must censure the world of ingratitude, while they are so negligent in rewarding the jocose labours of my friend Mr. D'Urfey, who was so large a contributor to this treatise, and to whose humourous productions so many rural squires in the remotest parts of this island are obliged for the dignity and state which corpulency gives them. The story of the sick man's breaking an imposthume by a sudden fit of laughter, is too well known to need a recital. It is my opinion, that the above pills would be extremely proper to be taken with asses' milk, and mightily contribute towards the renewing and restoring The horse-laugh, or the Sardonic, is made decayed lungs. Democritus is generally repre use of with great success in all kinds of dispn-sented to us as a man of the largest size, which tation. The proficients in this kind, by a welltimed laugh, will baffle the most solid argument. This upon all occasions supplies, the want of reason, is always received with great applause in coffee-house disputes; and that side the laugh joins with, is generally observed to gain the better of his antagonist. The laugh among us is the common Risus of the ancients. The grin by writers of antiquity is called the Syncrusian; and was then, as it is at this time, made use of to display a beautiful set of teeth. The prude hath a wonderful esteem for the Chian laugh or dimple: she looks upon all the other kinds of laughter as excesses of levity; and is never seen upon the most extravagant jests, to disorder her countenance with the rufile of a we may attribute to his frequent exercise of his risible faculty. I remember Juvenal says of him, Perpetuo risu pulmonum agitare solebat.-Sat. x. 3. He shook his sides with a perpetual laugh. That sort of man who.n a lite writer has called the Butt, is a great promoter of this healthful agitation, and is generally stocked with so much good humour, as to strike in with the gayety of conversation, though some innocent blunder of his own be the subject of the raillery. I shall range all old amorous dotards under the denomination of Grinners; when a young The wag is of the same kind, and by the same artifice labours to support his impotence of wit: but he very frequently calls in the horselaugh to his assistance. There are another kind of grinners, which the ancients call Megarics; and some moderns have, not injudiciously, given them the name of the Sneerers. These always indulge their mirth at the expense of their friends, and all their ridicule consists in unseasonable ill-nature. I could wish these laughers would consider, that let them do what they can, there is no laughing away their own follies by laughing at other people's. The mirth of the tea-table is for the most part Megaric; and in visits the ladies themselves very seldom scruple the sacrificing a friendship to a laugh of this denomination. I come now to the English, whom I shall treat with such meekness as becomes a good patriot; and shall so far recommend this our island as a proper scene for pastoral, under certain regulations, as will satisfy the courteous reader that I am in the landed interest. I must in the first place observe, that our countrymen have so good an opinion of the ancients, and think so modestly of themselves, that the generality of pastoral writers have either stolen all from the Greeks and Ronians, or so servilely imitated their manners and customs, as makes them very ridiculous. In looking over some English pastorals a few days ago, I perused at least fifty lean flocks, and reckoned up a hundred left-handed ravens, besides blasted oaks, withering meadows, and weeping deities. Indeed most of the occasional pastorals we have, are built upon one and the same plan. A shepherd asks his fellow, 'Why he is so pale? if his favourite sheep hath strayed? if his pipe be broken? or Phyllis unkind?' He answers, 'None of these misfortunes have befallen him, but one much greater, for Damon (or sometimes the god Pan) is dead.' This immediately causes the other to make complaints, and call upon the lofty pincs and silver streams to join in the lamentation. While he goes on, his friend interrupts him, and tells him that Damon lives, and shows him a track of light in the skies to confirm it; then invites him to chesputs and cheese. The coquette hath a great deal of the Megaric in her; but, in short, she is a proficient in laughter, and can run through the whole exercise of the features; she subdues the formal lover with the dimple, accosts the fop with the smile, joins with the wit in the downright laugh, to vary the air of her countenance frequently rallies with the grin, and when she has ridiculed her lover quite out of his understand-Upon this scheme most of the noble families in ing, to complete his misfortunes, strikes him dumb with the horse-laugh. The horse-laugh is a distinguishing characteristic of the rural hoyden, and it is observed to be the last symptom of rusticity that forsakes her under the discipline of the boarding-school. Punsters, I find, very much contribute towards the Sardonic, and the extremes of either wit or folly seldom fail of raising this noisy kind of applause. As the ancient physicians held the Sardonic laugh very beneficial to the langs; I should, methinks, advise all my countrymen of consumptive and hectical constitutions to associate with the most facetious punsters of the age. Persins hath very elegantly described a Sardonic laugher in the following line, Ingeminat tremulos naso cri-pante cachinnos Sat. iii. 87. Redoubled peals of trembling laughter bursts, Convulsing every feature of the face. Laughter is a vent of any sudden joy that strikes upon the mind, which being too volatile and strong, breaks out in this tremor of the voice. The poets make use of this metaphor when they would describe nature in her richest dress, for beauty is never so lovely as when adorned with the smile, and conversation never sits easier upon us, than when we now and then discharge ourselves in a symphony of laughter, which may not improperly be called, The Chorus of Conversation. No. 30.] Wednesday, April 15, 1713. -redeunt Saturnia Regna. Virg. Ecl. iv. 6. -Saturnian times Great Britain have been comforted; nor can I meet with any right honourable shepherd that doth not die and live again, after the manner of the aforesaid Damon. Having already informed my reader wherein the knowledge of antiquity may be serviceable, I shall now direct him where he may law fully deviate from the ancients. There are some things of an established nature in pastoral, which are essential to it, such as a country scene, innocence, simplicity. Others there are of a changeable kind, such as habits, customs, and the like. The difference of the climate is also to be considered, for what is proper in Arcadia, or even in Italy, might be very absurd in a colder country. By the same rule, the difference of the soil, of fruits, and flowers, is to be observed. And in so fine a country as Britain, what occasion is there for that profusion of hyacinths and Pastan roses, and that cornucopia of foreign fruits which the British shepherds never heard of? How much more pleasing is the following scene to an English reader! This place may seem for shepherds' Pisure made, So lovingly these elms unite their shade, Th' ambitions woochine, how it climbs to breathe Its balmy sweets around on all bin atht The ground with grass of che fal green bespread, Thro' which the springing flower uprcars its head! Lo, here the king-cup of a golden hie, Medley'd with daisies white, and endive blue! Hark! how the gaudy golfinch and the thrush, With tuneful warblinge fill that bramble bush! In pleasing concert all the birds combine, And tempt us in the various song to join.' The theology of the ancient pastoral is so very pretty, that it were pity entirely to change it; but I think that part only is to be retained THE Italians and French being despatched, which is universally known, and the rest to be Roll round again. Dryden. made up out of our own rustical superstition | in any profitable discourse. I found her last of hob-thrushes, fairies, goblins, and witches. night sitting in the midst of her daughters, and The fairies are capable of being made very en- forming a very beautiful semicircle about the tertaining persons, as they are described by fire. I immediately took my place in an elbow several of our poets; and particularly by Mr. chair, which is always left empty for me in one Pope : About this spring (if ancient fame say true) The dapper elves their moon-light sports pursue, Their pigmy king, and little fairy queen, In circling dances gambol'd on the green, While tuneful sprites a merry concert made, And airy music warbled through the shade.' corner. Our conversation fell insensibly upon the subject of happiness, in which every one of the young ladies gave her opinion, with that freedom and unconcernedness which they always use when they are in company only with their mother and myself. Mrs. Jane declared, that she thought it the What hath been said upon the difference of climate, soil, and theology, reaches the proverbial sayings, dress, customs and sports of shep-greatest happiness to be married to a man of herds. The following examples of our pastoral sports are extremely beautiful: Whilome did I, all as this poplar fair, Upraise my heedless head, devoid of care, 'Mong rustic routs the chief for wanton game; Nor could they merry make till Lobbin came. Who better seen than I in shepherds' arts, To please the lads, and win the lasses' hearts? How deftly to mine oaten reed, so sweet, Wont they upon the green to shift their feet? And when the dance was done, how would they yearn Some well devised tale from me to learn? For many songs, and tales of mirth had I, To chase the ling`ring sun adown the sky.' -O now! if ever, bring The laurel green, the smelling eglantine, The reason why such changes from the ancients should be introduced is very obvious; namely, that poetry being imitation, and that imitation being the best which deceives the most easily, it follows that we must take up the customs which are most familiar, or universally known, since no man can be deceived or delighted with the imitation of what he is ignorant of. It is easy to be observed that these rules are drawn from what our countrymen Spenser and Philips have performed in this way. I shall not presume to say any more of them, than that both have copied and improved the beauties of the ancients, whose manner of thinking I would above all things recommend. As far as our language would allow them, they have formed a pastoral style according to the Doric of Theocritus, in which I dare not say they have excelled Virgil! but I may be allowed, for the honour of our language, to suppose it more capable of that pretty rusticity than the Latin. To their works I refer my reader to make observations upon the pastoral style; where he will sooner find that secret than from a folio of criticims. merit, and placed at the head of a well-regu lated family. I could not but observe, that in her character of a man of merit, she gave us a lively description of Tom Worthy, who has long made his addresses to her. The sisters did not discover this at first, till she began to run down fortune in a lover, and, among the accomplishments of a man of merit, unluckily mentioned white teeth and black eyes. Mrs. Annabella, after having rallied her sister upon her man of merit, talked much of conve. niences of life, affluence of fortune, and easi ness of temper, in one whom she should pitch upon for a husband. In short, though the bag gage would not speak out, I found the sum of her wishes was a rich fool, or a man so turned to her purposes, that she might enjoy his for tune, and insult his understanding. The romantic Cornelia was for living in a wood among choirs of birds, with zephyrs, echos, and rivulets, to make up the concert: she would not seem to include a husband in her scheme, but at the same time talked so pas sionately of cooing turtles, mossy banks, and beds of violets, that one might easily perceive she was not without thoughts of a companion in her solitudes. Miss Betty placed her summum bonum in equipages, assemblies, balls, and birth-nights, talked in raptures of sir Edward Shallow's gilt coach, and my lady Tattle's room, in which she saw company; nor would she have easily given over, had she not observed that her mother ap peared more serious than ordinary, and by her looks showed that she did not approve such a redundance of vanity and impertinence. My favourite, the Sparkler, with an air of innocence and modesty, which is peculiar to her, said that she never expected such a thing as happiness, and that she thought the most any one could do was to keep themselves from being uneasy; for, as Mr. Ironside has often told us, says she, we should endeavour to be easy here, and happy hereafter: at the same time she begged me to acquaint them by what rules this ease of mind, or if I would please to call it happiness, is best attained. My lady Lizard joined in the same request with her youngest daughter, adding, with a serious look, The thing seemed to her of so great consequence, that she hoped I would, for once, forget they were all women, and give my real thoughts of it with the same justness I would use among a company of my own sex. I complied with her desire, and communicated my sentiments to them on this subject as near as I can remember, pretty much to the following purpose. As nothing is more natural than for every one to desire to be happy, it is not to be wondered at that the wisest men in all ages have spent so much time to discover what happiness is, and wherein it chiefly consists. An eminent writer, named Varro, reckons up no less than two hundred and eighty-eight different opinions upon this subject; and another, called Lucian, after having given us a long catalogue of the notions of several philosophers, endeavours to show the absurdity of all of them, without establishing any thing of his own. applause, are also extremely subject to envy, the most painful as well as the most absurd of all passions. The surest means to attain that 'strength of mind,' and independent state of happiness I am here recommending, is a virtuous mind sufficiently furnished with ideas to support solitude, and keep up an agreeable conversation with itself. Learning is a very great help on this occasion, as it lays up an infinite number of notions in the memory, ready to be drawn out, and set in order upon any occasion. The mind often takes the same pleasure in looking over these her treasures, in augmenting and dispos That which seems to have made so many erring them into proper forms, as a prince does in in this case, is the resolution they took to fix a a review of his army. man's happiness to one determined point; which I conceive cannot be made up but by the concurrence of several particulars. At the same time I must own, that as a mind thus furnished, feels a secret pleasure in the consciousness of its own perfection, and is deI shall readily allow Virtue the first place, as lighted with such occasions as call upon it to try she is the mother of Content. It is this which its force, a lively imagination shall produce a calms our thoughts, and makes us survey our-pleasure very little inferior to the former in selves with ease and pleasure. Naked virtue, persons of much weaker heads. As the first, however, is not alone sufficient to make a man therefore, may not be improperly called, the happy. It must be accompanied with at least heaven of a wise man,' the latter is extremely a moderate provision of all the necessaries of well represented by our vulgar expression, life, and not ruffled and disturbed by bodily which terms it, a fool's paradise.' There is, pains. A fit of the stone was sharp enough to however, this difference between them, that as make a stoic cry out, that Zeno, his master, the first naturally produces that strength and taught him false, when he told him that pain greatness of mind I have been all along dewas no evil.' scribing as so essential to render a man happy, the latter is ruffled and discomposed by every accident, and lost under the most common misfortune. But, besides this, virtue is so far from being alone sufficient to make a man happy, that the excess of it in some particulars, joined to a soft and feminine temper, may often give us the deepest wounds, and chiefly contribute to render us uneasy. I might instance in pity, love, and friendship. In the two last passions it often happens, that we so entirely give up our hearts, as to make our happiness wholly depend upon another person; a trust for which no human creature, however excellent, can possibly give us a sufficient security. The man, therefore, who would be truly happy, must, besides an habitual virtue, attain to such a 'strength of mind,' as to confine his happiness within himself, and keep it from being dependent upon others. A man of this make will perform all those good-natured offices that could have been expected from the most bleeding pity, without being so far affected at the common misfortunes of human life, as to disturb his own repose. His actions of this kind are so much more meritorious than another's, as they flow purely from a principle of virtue, and a sense of his duty; whereas a man of a softer temper, even while he is assisting another, may in some measure be said to be relieving himself. A man endowed with that 'strength of mind' I am here speaking of, though he leaves it to his friend or mistress to make him still more happy, does not put it in the power of either to make him miserable. From what has been already said, it will also appear, that nothing can be more weak than to place our happiness in the applause of others, since by this means we make it wholly independent of ourselves. People of this humour, who place their chief felicity in reputation and It is this strength of mind' that is not to be overcome by the changes of fortune, that rises at the sight of dangers, and could make Alexander (in that passage of his life so much admired by the prince of Condé,) when his army mutinied, bid his soldiers return to Macedon, and tell their countrymen that they had left their king conquering the world; since for his part he could not doubt of raising an army wherever he appeared. It is this that chiefly exerts itself when a man is most oppressed, and gives him always in proportion to whatever malice or injustice would deprive him of. It is this, in short, that makes the virtuous man insensibly set a value upon himself, and throws a varnish over his words and actions, that will at last command esteem, and give him a greater ascendant over others, than all the advantages of birth and fortune. No. 32.] Friday, April 17, 1713. -ipse volens, facilisque sequetur, Si te fata vocant: aliter non viribus ullis HAVING delivered my thoughts upon pastoral poetry, after a didactic manner, in some foregoing papers, wherein I have taken such hints from the critics as I thought rational, and de. parted from them according to the best of my judgment, and substituted others in their place, I shall close the whole with the following fable or allegory. ment so polite, could give him no answer, but presented the pipe. He applied it to his lips, and began a tune which he set off with so many graces and quavers, that the shepherds and shepherdesses (who had paired themselves in order to dance) could not follow it; as indeed it required great skill and regularity of stops, which they had never been bred to. Menalcas ordered him to be stripped of his costly robes, and to be clad in a russet weed, and confiued him to tend the flocks in the vallies for a year and a day. The second that appeared was in a very dif ferent garb. He was clothed in a garment of rough goat-skins, his hair was matted, his beard neglected; in his person uncouth, and awkward In ancient times there dwelt in a pleasant vale of Arcadia a man of very ample possessions, named Menaleas; who, deriving his pedigree from the god Pan, kept very strictly up to the rules of the pastoral life, as it was in the golden age. He had a daughter, his only child, called Amaryllis. She was a virgin of a most enchanting beauty, of a most easy and unaffected air; bat having been bred up wholly in the country, was bashful to the last degree. She had a voice that was exceeding sweet, yet had a rusticity in its tone, which, however, to most who heard her seemed an additional charm. Though in her conversation in general she was very enga-in his gait. He came up fleering to the nymph ging, yet to her lovers, who were numerous, she was so coy, that many left her in disgust after a tedious courtship, and matched themselves where they were better received. For Menalcas had not only resolved to take a son-in-law who should inviolably maintain the customs of his family, but had received one evening as he walked in the fields, a pipe of an antique form from a faun, or as some say, from Oberon the fairy, with a particular charge not to bestow his daughter upon any one who could not play the same tune upon it as at that time he entertained him with. and told her, he had hugged his lambs, and kissed his young kids, but he hoped to kiss one that was sweeter.'* The fair one blushed with modesty and anger, and prayed secretly against him as she gave him the pipe. He snatched it from her, but with some difficulty made it sound; which was in such harsh and jarring notes, that the shepherds cried one and all that he understood no music. He was immediately ordered to the most craggy parts of Arcadia, o keep the goats, and commanded never to touch a pipe any more. The third that advanced appeared in ck thes When the time that he had designed to give that were so strait and uneasy to him, that be her in marriage was near at hand, he published seemed to move with pain. He marched up to a decree, whereby he invited the neighbouring the maiden with a thoughtful look and stably youths to make trial of this musical instrument, pace, and said, 'Divine Amaryllis, you wear not with promise that the victer should possess his those roses to improve your beauty, but to make daughter, on condition that the vanquished them ashamed.'t As she did not comprehend should submit to what punishment he thought his meaning, she presented the instrument with fit to inflict. Those who were not yet discou-out reply. The tune that he played was so in. raged, and had high conceits of their own worth, appeared on the appointed day, in a dress and equipage suitable to their respective fancies. The place of meeting was a flowery meadow, through which a clear stream murmured in many irregular meanders. The shepherds made a spacious ring for the contending lovers: and in one part of it there sat upon a little throne of turf, under an arch o eglantine and woodlines, the father of the maid, and at his right hand the damsel crowned with roses and lilies. She wore a flying robe of a slight green stuff; she had her sheep-hook in one hand, and the fatal pipe in the other. tricate and perplexing, that the shepherds stood stock-still, like people astonished and confound. ed. In vain did he plead that it was the perfec tion of music, and composed by the most skilful master in Hesperia. Menalcas, finding that he was a stranger, hospitably took compassion on him, and delivered him to an old shepherd, who was ordered to get him clothes that would fit him, and teach him to speak plain. The fourth that stepped forwards was young Amyntas, the most beautiful of all the Arcadias swains, and secretly beloved by Amaryllis. He wore that day the same colours as the maid for whom he sighed. He moved towards her with an easy but unassured air: she blushed as he came near her, and when she gave him the fatal present, they both trembled, but neither could speak. Having secretly breathed his vows to the gods, he poured forth such melodious notes, that though they were a little wild and irregular, they filled every heart with delight. The swains immediately mingled in the dance; and the old shepherds affirmed, that they had often heard such music by night, which they imagined to be played by some of the rural del ties. The good old man leaped from his throne, and, after he had embraced him, presented hin to his daughter, which caused a general accla The first who approached her was a youth of a graceful presence and courtly air, but drest in a richer hibit than had ever been seen in Arcadia. He wore a crimson vest, cut indeed after the shepherd's fashion, but so enriched with enbroidery, and sparkling with jewels, that the eyes of the spectators were diverted from considering the mode of the garment by the dazzling of the ornaments. His head was covered with a plume of feathers, and his sheep-hook glittered with gold and enamel. He accosted the damsel after a very gallant manner, and told her, Madam, you need not to consult your glass to adorn yourself to-day; you may see the great-mation ness of your beauty in the number of your con- While they were in the midst of their joy, quests. She having never heard any compli- they were surprised with a very odd appearance. * Vide Fontenelle. * Vide Theocritus. † Vide Tasso. |