of your Lord, fays Mr. Jane, what is the "Friendship of Women Nay, they may well laugh at it. And did no one tell you any thing of the Behaviour Lover Mr. What-d'ye-call laft Night? But perhaps it is nothing to you that he is to be married to young Mrs.on Tuesday next? Belinda was here ready to die with Rage and "Jealoufie. Then Mrs. Jane goes on: I have a young Kinfman who is Clerk to a great Conveyancer, who fhall 'fhew you the rough Draught of the Marriage Settlement. The World fays her Father gives him two thou'fand Pound more than he could have with you. I went innocently to wait on Belinda as ufual, but was not admitted; I writ to her, and my Let'ter was fent back un-opened. Poor Betty her Maid, who is on my fide, has been here juft now blubbering, and told me the whole Matter. She fays fhe did not think I could be fo bafe: and that the is now odious to her Miftrefs for having fo often spoke well of me, that the dare not mention me more. All our Hopes are placed in having thefe Circumstances fairly represented in the SPECTATOR, which Betty 6 Betty fays the dare not but bring up as foon as it is brought in; and has promised when you have broke the Ice, to own this was laid between us: And when I can come to an Hearing, 'the young Lady will fupport what we fay by her Teftimony, that I never faw her but that once in my whole 'Life. Dear Sir, do not omit this true 'Relation, nor think it too particular; 'for there are Crowds of forlorn Co6 quets who intermingle themselves with other Ladies, and contract Familiarities out of Malice, and with no other Defign but to blaft the Hopes of Lovers, the Expectation of Parents, and the Benevolence of Kindred. I doubt ' not but I fhall be, SIR, SIR, Your moft obliged humble Servant, TH CLEANTHES. Will's Coffee-house, Jan. 10. HE other Day entering a Room adorned with the Fair Sex, I offered, after the ufual manner, to each of them a Kifs; but one, more 'fcornful than the reft, turned her Cheek. I did not think it proper to take take any notice of it 'till I had asked your Advice. Your bumble Servant, E. S. THE Correfpondent is defir'd to fay which Cheek the Offender turned to him. ADVERTISEMENT. From the Parish-Vestry, January 9. All Ladies who come to Church in the New-fashioned Hoods, are defired to be there before Divine Service begins, left they divert the Attention of the Congregation. N° 273. Saturday, January 12. -Notandi funt tibi Mores. H Hor. AVING examined the Action of Paradife Loft, let us in the next place confider the Actors. This is Ariftotle's Method of confidering, first the Fable, and secondly the Manners; or, as we generally call them in English, the Fable and the Characters. HOMER has excelled all the Heroic Poets that ever wrote, in the multitude and variety of his Characters. Every God that is admitted into his Poem, acts a Part which would have been fuitable to no other Deity. His Princes are as much diftinguished in their Manners as by their Dominions; and even those among them, whofe Characters feem wholly made up of Courage, differ from one another as to the particular kinds of Courage in which they excel. In fhort, there is scarce a Speech or Action in the Iliad, which the Rea der der may not afcribe to the Person that fpeaks or acts, without feeing his Name, at the Head of it. HOMER does not only out-fhine all other Poets in the Variety, but alfo in the Novelty of his Characters. He has introduced among his Grecian Princes a Person who had lived in three Ages of Men, and converfed with Thefeus, Hercules, Polyphemus, and the first Race of Heroes. His principal Actor is the Son of a Goddess, not to mention the Off-fpring of other Deities, who have likewife a Place in his Poem, and the venerable Trojan Prince, who was the Father of fo many Kings and Heroes. There is in these feveral Charaeters of Homer a certain Dignity as well as Novelty, which adapts them in a more peculiar manner to the Nature of an Heroic Poem. Though at the fame time, to give them the greater variety, he has described a Vulcan, that is, a Buffoon among his Gods, and a Therfites among his Mortals. VIRGIL falls infinitely fhort of Homer in the Characters of his Poem, both as to their Variety and Novelty. Eneas is indeed a perfect Character, but as for Achates, though he is ftiled the He |