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privileges, which were granted by the Roman laws to all fuch as were fathers of three children. Nay, I have heard a rake, who was not quite five and twenty, de elare himself the father of a feventh fon, and very prudently determine to breed him up a physician. In fhort, the town is full of these young patriarchs, not to mention several battered beaus, who, like heedless fpendthrifts that fquander away their eftates before they are mafters of them, have raised up their whole stock of children before marriage.

I must not here omit the particular whim of an impudent libertine, that had a little fmattering of heraldry; and obferving how the genealogies of great families were often drawn up in the fhape of trees, had taken a fancy to difpofe of his own illegitimate iffue in a figure of the fame kind.

Nec longum tempus && ingens

Exiit ad cælum ramis felicibus arbos,
Miraturque novas frondes, & non fua poma.

Virg. Georg. if. 80.

"And in fhort space the laden boughs arise,
With happy fruit advancing to the skies:
"The mother plant admires the leaves unknown
"Of alien trees, and apples not her own."

DRYDEN.

THE trunk of the tree was mark'd with his own name, WILL MAPLE. Out of the fide of it grew a large barren branch, infcribed MARY MAPLE, the name of his unhappy wife. The head was adorned with five huge boughs. On the bottom of the firft was written in capital characters KATE COLE, who branched out into three sprigs, viz. William, Richard, and Rebecca. SAL TWIFORD gave birth to another bough that fhot up into Sarah, Tom, Will, and Frank. The third arm of the tree had only a fingle infant on it, with a fpace left for a fecond, the parent from whom it sprung being near her time when the author took this ingenious device into his head. The two other great boughs were very plentifully loaden with fruit of the fame

kind ; befides which there were many ornamental branches that did not bear. In fhort a more flourishing tree never came out of the Herald's Office.

What makes this generation of vermin fo very prolific, is the indefatigable diligence with which they apply themselves to their bufinefs. A man does not undergo more watchings and fatigues in a campaign, than in the course of a vicious amour. As it is faid of fome men, that they make their bufinefs their pleasure, these fons of darkness may be faid to make their pleafure their bufinefs. They might conquer their corrupt inclinations with half the pains they are at in gratifying them.

Nor is the invention of these men lefs to be admired than their industry and vigilance. There is a fragment of Apollodorus the comic poet (who was contemporary with Menander) which is full of humour, as follows: "Thou mayeft shut up thy doors, fays he, with bars "and bolts. It will be impoffible for the blacksmith "to make them fo faft, but a cat and a whoremaster. "will find a way through them." In a word, there is no head fo full of stratagems as that of a libidinous

man.

Were I to propofe a punishment for this infamous race of propagators, it should be to fend them, after the fecond or third offence, into our American colonies, in order to people thofe parts of her Majefty's dominions where there is a want of inhabitants, and in the phrafe of Diogenes, to PLANT MEN. Some countries punish this crime with death; but I think fuch a banishment would be fufficient, and might turn this generative faculty to the advantage of the public.

In the mean time, until thefe gentlemen may be thus difpofed of, I would earnestly exhort them to take care of thofe unfortunate creatures whom they have brought into the world by these indirect methods, and to give their fpurious children fuch an education as may render them more virtuous than their parents. This is t the belt atonement they can make for their own crimes, and indeed the only method that is left them to repair their past miscarriages.

I would

I would likewise defire them to confider, whether they are not bound in common humanity, as well as by all the obligations of religion and nature, to make fome provifion for those whom they have not only given life to, but entailed upon them, tho' very unreasonably, a degree of fhame and difgrace. And here I cannot but take notice of thofe depraved notions which prevail among us, and which must have taken rise from our natural inclination to favour a vice to which we are so very prone, namely, that baftardy and cuckoldom fhould be looked upon as reproaches, and that the ig nominy, which is only due to lewdnefs and falfhood, fhould fall in fo unreasonable a manner upon the perfons who are innocent.

I have been infenfibly drawn into this difcourfe by the following letter, which is drawn up with fuch a fpirit of fincerity, that I queftion not but the writer of it has reprefented his cafe in a true and genuine light. SIR,

I

Am one of those people who by the general opinion of the world are counted both infamous and unhappy.

My father is a very eminent man in this kingdom, and one who bears confiderable offices in it. I am his fon, but my misfortune is, That I dare not call him father, nor he without fhame own me as his iffue, I being illegitimate, and therefore deprived of that endearing tenderness and unparalleled fatisfaction which a good man finds in the love and converfation of a parent. Neither have I the opportunities to render him the duties of a fon, he having always ⚫ carried himself at fo vaft a distance, and with fuch fuperiority towards me, that by long use I have contracted a timorousness when before him, which hinders me from declaring my own neceffities, and giving him to understand the inconveniencies I un dergo.

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It is my misfortune to have been neither bred a • scholar, a foldier, nor to any kind of business, which renders me intirely uncapable of making provifion for myself without his affiftance; and this creates a • continual

⚫ continual uneafinefs in my mind, fearing I fhall in time want bread; my father, if I may fo call him, giving me but very faint affurances of doing any thing for me.

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I have hitherto lived fomewhat like a gentleman, and it would be very hard for me to labour for my living. I am in continual anxiety for my future fortune, and under a great unhappiness in lofing the fweet converfation and friendly advice of my parents; 'fo that I cannot look upon myself otherwife than as a monfter, ftrangely fprung up in nature, which every one is afhamed to own.

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I am thought to be a man of fome natural parts, and by the continual reading what you have offered the world, become an admirer thereof, which has drawn me to make this confeffion; at the fame time hoping, if any thing herein fhall touch you with a fenfe of pity, you would then allow me the favour of your opinion thereupon; as alfo what part 1, being unlawfully born, may claim of the man's affection who begot me, and how far in your opinion [ am to be thought his fon, or he acknowledged as my father. Your fentiments and advice herein will be a great confolation and fatisfaction to,

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+++ At the Theatre Royal Drury-Lane, this prefent Thurfday, being the 23d of October, "The Careless Hufband." Lord Foppington, Mr. Cibber; Lord Morelove, Mr. Mills; Sir C. Eafy, Mr. Wilks; Lady B. Modifh, Mrs. Oldfield; Lady Graveairs, Mrs. Rogers; Lady Eafy, Mrs. Knight; and Edgin, Mrs. Bicknell. The Farce called "The Country Wake." The part of Hob, by Mr. Dogget. SPECT. in folio.

VOL. III.

H

Wednesday,

N° 204 Wednesday, October 24, 1711.

I

Urit grata protervitas,

Et vultus nimiùm lubricus afpici.

Hor. 1 Od. xix. 7.

"Her face too dazzling for the fight, "Her winning coynefs fires my foul, "I feel a ftrange delight."

Am not at all difpleafed that I am become the courier of love, and that the diftreffed in that paffion convey their complaints to each other by my means. The following letters have lately come to my hands, and fhall have their place with great wil lingnefs. As to the reader's entertainment, he will, I hope, forgive the inferting fuch particulars as to him may perhaps feem frivolous, but are to the perfons who wrote them of the highest confequence. I fhall not trouble you with the prefaces, compliments, and apologies made to me before each epiftle when it was defired to be inferted; but in general they tell me, that the perfons to whom they are addreffed have intimations, by phrafes and allufions in them, from whence they came.

To the SOTHADES.

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HE word, by which I address you, gives you, Twho understand Portuguefe, & lively image

*The Portuguese word Saudades (here inaccurately written Sotbades) fignifies, The most refined, most tender and ardent defires for fomething abfent, accompanied with a folicitude and anxious regard, which cannot be expreffed by one word in any other language.

SAUDADE, lay the Dictionaries, fignifica, Finiffimo fentimiento del bien anfente, com defeo de poffeerlo."-Hence the word Saudades comprehends every good with: and Muitas Saudades is the highest wish and compliment that can be paid to another. So if a perfon is obferved to be melancholy, and is asked "What ails him :" If he anfwers, Tenho Saudades: it is understood to mean "I am under the "most refined torment for the abfence of my love; or for being abfent from my country." &c.

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