obliged to furnish us with what lights he can, to expofe the pernicious arts and practices of thofe unnatural women called bawds. In order to this the inclosed is fent you, which is verbatim the copy of a letter written by a bawd of figure in this town to a noble lord. I ⚫ have concealed the names of both, my intention being not to expose the perfons but the thing.

< My Lord,

I

Having a great efteem for your honour, and a better opinion of you than of any of the quality, makes. me acquaint you of an affair that I hope will oblige you · to know. I have a niece that came to town about a fortnight ago. Her parents being lately dead the came to me, expecting to have found me in fo good a condi-, ⚫tion as to fet her up in a milliner's fhop. Her father

gave,

fourfcore pound with her for five years: her time is out, and the is not fixteen: as pretty a black gentle⚫ woman as ever you faw, a little woman, which I know. your lordship likes: well fhaped, and as fine a complexion for red and white as ever I faw; I doubt not but your lordship will be of the fame opinion. She defigns to go down about a month hence, except I can provide for her, which I cannot at prefent: her father was one with whom all he had, died with him, fo there is four children left deftitute; fo if your lordship thinks fit to make an appointment where I fhall wait on you with my niece, by a line or two, I ftay for your anfwer; for I have no place fitted up fince I left my house, fit to entertain your honour. I told her the fhould go with me to fee a gentleman, a very good friend of mine; fo I defire you to take no notice of my letter, by reafon the is ignorant of the ways of the town. My lord, I defire if you meet us to come alone; for upon my word and honour you are the first that ever I mentioned her to. So I remain,

• Your lordship's

moft humble fervant to command. I beg of you to burn it when you have read it.' DMVO L. IV.

E

T
Tuesday,

N° 275

Tuesday, January, 15.

tribus Anticyris caput infanabile

Hor. Ars Poet. ver. 300.

A head no hellebore can cure.

I Was yefterday engaged in an affembly of virtuofos,

where one of them produced many curious obfervations which he had lately made in the anatomy of an human body. Another of the company communicated to us feveral wonderful discoveries, which he had alfo made on the fame fubject, by the help of very fine glaffes. This gave birth to a great variety of uncommon remarks, and furnished difcourfe for the remaining part of the day.

The different opinions which were started on this occafion, prefented to my imagination fo many new ideas, that by mixing with thofe which were already there, they employed my fancy all the last night, and compofed a wild extravagant dream.

very

I was invited, methought, to the diffection of a beau's head, and of a coquette's heart, which were both of them laid on a table before us. An imaginary operator opened the first with a great deal of nicety, which, upon a curfory and fuperficial view, appeared like the head of another man; but upon applying our glaffes to it, we made a very odd difcovery, namely, that what we looked upon as brains, were not fuch in reality, but an heap of ftrange materials wound up in that shape and texture, and packed together with wonderful art in the feveral cavities of the fkull. For, as Homer tells us, that the blood of the gods is not real blood, but only fomething like it: fo we found that the brain of a beau is not a real brain, but only fomething like it.

The pineal gland, which many of our modern philofophers fuppofe to be the feat of the foul, fmelt very trong of effence and orange-flower water, and was encompaffed with a kind of horny fubftance, cut into a

5

thoufand

thoufand little faces or mirrors, which were imperceptible to the naked eye, infomuch that the foul, if there had been any here, muft have been always taken up in contemplating her own beauties.

We obferved a large antrum or cavity in the finciput, that was filled with ribbons, lace, and embroidery, wrought together in a moft curious piece of net-work, the parts of which were likewife imperceptible to the naked eye. Another of thefe antrums or cavities was ftuffed with invifible billet-doux, love-letters, pricked dances, and other trumpery of the fame nature. In another we found a kind of powder, which fet the whole company a fneezing, and by the fcent discovered itself to be right Spanish. The feveral other cells were ftored with commodities of the fame kind, of which it would be tedious to give the reader an exact inventory.

There was a large cavity on each fide of the head, which I must not omit. That on the right fide was filled with fictions, flatteries, and falfhoods, vows, promifes, and proteftations; that on the left with oaths and impre cations. There iffued out a duct from each of thefe cells, which ran into the root of the tongue, where both joined together, and paffed forward in one common duct. to the tip of it. We difcovered feveral little roads or canals running from the ear into the brain, and took particular care to trace them out through their feveral paffages. One of them extended itself to a bundle of fonnets and little mufical inftruments. Others ended in feveral bladders which were filled either with wind or froth. But the large canal entered into a great cavity of the skull, from whence there went another canal into the tongue. This great cavity was filled with a kind of fpungy fubftance, which the French anatomists call galimatias, and the English nonfenfe.

The fkins of the forehead were extremely tough and thick, and, what very much furprised us, had not in them any fingle blood-veffel that we were able to difcover, either with or without our glaffes; from whence we concluded, that the party when alive must have been intirely deprived of the faculty of blushing.

The os cribriforme was exceedingly ftuffed, and in fome places damaged with fnuff. We could not but take

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notics

notice in particular of that small muscle which is not often difcovered in diffections, and draws the nose upwards, when it expreffes the contempt which the owner of it has, upon feeing any thing he does not like, or hearing any thing he does not understand. I need not tell my learned reader, this is that mufcle which performs the motion fo often mentioned by the Latin poets, when they talk of a man's cocking his nofe, or playing the rhinoceros.

We did not find any thing very remarkable in the eye, faving only, that the mufculi amatorii, or as we may tranflate it into English, the ogling muscles, were very much worn and decayed with uíe; whereas on the contrary, the elevator, or the mufcle which turns the eye towards heaven, did not appear to have been used at all.

I have only mentioned in this diffection fuch new dif coveries as we were able to make, and have not taken any notice of thofe parts which are to be met with in common heads. As for the skull, the face, and indeed the whole outward fhape and figure of the head, we could not discover any difference from what we observe in the heads of other men. We were informed, that the perfon to whom this head belonged, had passed for a man above five and thirty years; during which time he eat and drank like other people, dreffed well, talked loud, laughed frequently, and on particular occafions had acquitted himself tolerably at a ball or an affembly; to which one of the company added, that a certain knot of ladies took him for a wit. He was cut off in the flower of his age by the blow of a paring-shovel, having been furprised by an eminent citizen, as he was tendring fome civilities to his wife.

When we had thoroughly examined this head with all its apartments, and its feveral kinds of furniture, we put up the brain, fuch as it was, into its proper place, and laid it afide under a broad piece of fcarlet cloth, in order to be prepared, and kept in a great repofitory of anflections; our operator telling us that the preparation would not be fo difficult as that of another brain, for that he had obferved feveral of the little pipes and tubes which ran through the brain were already filled with a kind of mercurial fubftance, which he looked upon to be true quick-filver.

He

He applied himself in the next place to the coquette's heart, which he likewife laid open with great dexterity. There occurred to us many particularities in this diffection; but being unwilling to burthen my reader's memory too much, I fhall referve this fubject for the speculation of another day.

N° 276 Wednesday, January 16.

Errori nomen virtus pofuiffet honeftum.

L.

Hor. Sat. 3. lib. 1. ver. 42. Misconduct fcreen'd behind a specious name.

• Mr. Spectator,

I

Hope you have philofophy enough to be capable of bearing the mention of your faults.

Your pa

pers which regard the fallen part of the fair-fex, are, I think, written with an indelicacy which makes them unworthy to be inferted in the writings of a moralift who knows the world. I cannot allow that you are at liberty to obferve upon the actions of mankind with the freedom which you feem to refolve upon; at leaft if you do fo, you should take along with you the diftinction of manners of the world, according to the quality and way of life of the perfons concerned. A man of breeding fpeaks of even misfortune among ladies, without giving it the moft terrible aspect it can bear and this tendernefs towards them, is much more to be preserved when you fpeak of vices. All mankind are fo far related, that care is to be taken, in things to which all are liable, you do not mention what concerns one in terms which fhall difgust ano⚫ther. Thus to tell a rich man of the indigence of a kinfinan of his, or abruptly inform a virtuous woman of the lapfe of one who until then was in the fame degree of esteem with herfelf, is in a kind involving each of them in fome participation of those disadvantages. It is therefore expected from every writer, to treat his argument in fuch a manner, as is most < proper to entertain the fort of readers to whom his • dif

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