No. 20. convinced by the reason of the thing, and a fellow that is capable of fhewing an impudent front before a whole congregation, and can bear being a public fpectacle, is not fo eafily rebuked as to amend by admonitions. If, therefore, my correfpondent does not inform me, that within seven days after this date, the barbarian does not at least stand upon his own legs only, without an eminence, my friend Will Profper has promised to take an haflock oppofite to him, and stare against him in defence of the Ladies. I have given him directions, according to the most exact rules of optics, to place himself in fuch a manner that he fhall meet his eyes wherever he throws them : I have hopes that when Will confronts him, and all the. Ladies, in whofe behalf he engages him, caft kind looks and wishes of fuccefs at their champion, he will have fome fhame, and feel a little of the pain he has often put others to, of being out of countenance.

It has indeed been time out of mind generally remarked, and as often lamented, that this family of ftarers have infested public affemblies: and I know no other way to obviate fo great an evil, except, in the cafe of fixing their eyes upon women, fome male friend will take the part of fuch as are under the oppreffion of impudence, and encounter the eyes of the ftarers wherever they meet them. While we fuffer our women to be thus impudently attacked, they have no defence, but in the end to caft yielding glances at the ftarers: and in this cafe a man who has no fenfe of fhame has the fame advantage over his mistress, as he who has no regard for his own life has over his adverfary. While the generality of the world are fettered by rules, and move by proper and just methods; he who has no refpect to any of them, carries away the reward due to that propriety of behaviour, with no other merit, but that of hav ing neglected it.

I take an impudent fellow to be a fort of outlaw in good-breeding, and therefore what is faid of him

no

no nation or perfon can be concerned for. For this reafon, one may be free upon him. I have put myself to great pains, in confidering this prevailing quality which we call impudence, and have taken notice that it exerts itself in a different manner, according to the different foils wherein fuch fubjects of thefe dominions, as are mafters of it, were born. Impudence in an Englishman is fullen and infolent; in a Scotchman it is untractable and rapacious; in an Irishman abfurd and fawning: As the course of the world now runs, the impudent Englishman behaves like a furly landlord, the Scot like an ill-received guest, and the Irishman like a ftranger who knows he is not welcome. There is feldom any thing entertaining either in the impu dence of a South or North-Briton; but that of an Irifbman is always comic. A true and genuine impudence is ever the effect of ignorance, without the least sense of it. The best and most successful starers now in this town, are of that nation; they have ufually the advantage of the ftature mentioned in the above letter of my correfpondent, and generally take their ftands in the eye of women of fortune: infomuch that I have known one of them, three months after he came from plough, with a tolerable good air lead out a woman from a play, which one of our own breed, after four years at Oxford. and two at the Temple, would have been afraid to look at.

I cannot tell how to account for it, but these peo. ple have ufually the preference to our own fools, in the opinion of the fillier part of womankind., Perhaps it is that an English coxcomb is feldom so obfequious as an Irish one; and when the defign of pleafing is vifible, an abfurdity in the way toward it is eafily forgiven.

But thofe who are downright impudent, and go on without reflection that they are fuch, are more to be tolerated, than a fet of fellows among

us who profefs impudence with an air of humour, and think to carry off the moft inexcufable of all faults in the world, with no other apology than faying in a gay tone, I put an impudent face upon the matter. No; no man fhall be allowed the advantages of impudence, who is confcious that he is fuch: If he knows he is impudent, he may as well be otherwife; and it fhall be expected that he blush, when he fees he makes another do it. For nothing can atone for the want of modefty; without which beauty is ungraceful, and wit deteftable.

No. 21.

I

SATURDAY, MARCH 24.

Locus eft, & pluribus umbris.

. R

HOR. Ep. v. h. 1. ver. 28.

There's room enough, and each may bring his friend. CREECH

AM fometimes very much troubled, when I reflect upon the three great profeffions of Divinity, Law, and Phyfic; how they are each of them overburdened with practitioners, and filled with multitudes of ingenious gentlemen that starve one ano

ther.

We may divide the Clergy into Generals, Field. officers, and Subalterns. Among the firft we may reckon Bishops, Deans, and Arch-Deacons.

mong the fecond are Doctors of Divinity, Prebendaries, and all that wear fcarves. The reft are comprehended under the Subalterns. As for the first clafs, our conftitution preferves it from any redundancy of incumbents, notwithstanding com petitors are numberless. Upon a ftrict calculation,. it is found that there has been a great exceeding of late years in the fecond divifion, feveral brevets having been granted for the converting of Subal

terns

terns into Scarf-officers; infomuch, that within my memory the price of luteftring is raised abovetwo-pence in a yard. As for the Subalterns, they are not to be numbered. Should our clergy once enter into the corrupt practice of the Laiety, by the fplitting of their freeholds, they would be able to carry most of the elections in England.

The body of the law is no lefs incumbered with fuperfluous members, that are like Virgil's army, which he tells us was fo crowded, many of them had not room to use their weapons. This prodigious fociety of men may be divided into the litigi ous and peaceable. Under the first are compre

hended all thofe who are carried down in coachfuls to Westminster-hall, every morning in termtime. Martial's defcription of this fpecies of lawyers is full of humour:

Iras & verba locant.

Men that hire out their words and anger; that are more or lefs paffionate according as they are paid for it; and allow their client a quantity of wrath proportionable to the fee which they receive from him. I muft however obferve to the reader, that above three parts of those whom I reckon among the litigious are fuch as are only quarrelfome in their hearts, and have no opportunity of fhewing their paffion at the bar. Nevertheless, as they do not know what ftrifes may arife, they appear at the Hall every day, that they may fhew themfelves in a readiness to enter the lifts, whenever there fhall be eccafion for them.

The peaceable Lawyers are, in the first place, many of the Benchers of the feveral Inns of Court, who feem to be the dignitaries of the Law, and are endowed with thofe qualifications of mind that ac complish a man rather for a ruler than a pleader. Thefe men live peaceably in their habitations, eating. once a day, and dancing once a year, for the ho nour of their refpective focieties. H 3

Another

Another numberless branch of peaceable Lawyers are thofe young men, who, being placed at the Inns of Court in order to ftudy the Laws of their country, frequent the playhouse, more than Westminsterhall, and are feen in all public affemblies, except in a court of juftice. I fhall fay nothing of those filent and bufy multitudes that are employed within doors in drawing up of writings and conveyances; nor of thofe greater numbers that palliate their want of business with a pretence to fuch chamberpractice.

If, in the third place, we look into the profeffion of Phyfic, we fhall find a moft formidable body of men: the fight of them is enough to make a man ferious, for we may lay it down as a maxim, that when a nation abounds in Physicians it grows thin of people. Sir William Temple is very much puzzled to find out a reason why the Northern Hive, as he calls it, does not send out fuch prodigious fwarms, and over-run the world with Goths and Vandals, as it did formerly; but had that excellent author obferved, that there were no ftudents in Phyfic among the subjects of Thor and Woden, and that this science very much flourishes in the north at prefent, he might have found a better folution for this difficulty than any of those he has made use of. This body of men in our own country, may be defcribed like the British army in Cafar's time:, fome of them flay in chariots, and fome on foot. If the infantry do lefs execution than the charioteers, it is because they cannot be carried fo foon into all quarters of the town, and dispatch fo much business in so short a time. Befides this body of regular troops, there are ftragglers, who, without being duly lifted and enrolled, do infinite mifchief to those who are so unlucky as to fall into their hands.

There are, befides the above-mentioned, innumerable retainers to phyfic, who, for want of other patients, amuse themselves with the ftifling of cats in

ap