This paper iny reader will find was intended for an anfwer to a multitude of correfpondents; but I hope he will pardon me if I fingle out one of them in particular who has made me fo very a humble a request, that I cannot forbear complying with it. SIR, I To the SPECTÀTOR. March 15, 1710-11. Am at prefent fo unfortunate, as to have nothing to do but to mind my own business; and therefore beg of you that you will be pleased to put me into fome fmall poft under you. I observe that you have appointed your printer and publisher to receive letters and advertisements for the city of London; and shall *think myself very much honoured by you, if you will appoint me to take in letters and advertisements for the city of Westminster and the dutchy of Lancaster. Though I cannot promife to fill fuch an employment with fufficient abilities, I will endeavour to make up * with industry and fidelity what I want in parts and genius. I am, SIR, Your most obedient fervant, S Juwa Sat. 10. 1. 191: INCE our perfons are not of our own making, when they are fuch as appear defective or uncomely, it is, methinks, an honeft and laudable fortitude to dare to be ugly; at least to keep ourselves from being abashed with a confcioufnefs of imperfections which we cannot cannot help, and in which there is no guilt. I would not defend an haggard beau, for paffing away much time at a glafs, and giving foftneffes and languishing graces to deformity: All I intend is, that we ought to be con'tented with our countenance and fhape, fo far, as never to give ourselves an uneafy reflection on that fubject. It is to the ordinary people who are not accustomed to make very proper remarks on any occafion, matter of great jeft, if a man enters with a prominent pair of fhoulders into an affembly, or is diftinguished by an expanfion of mouth, or obliquity of afpect. It is happy for a man, that has any of these oddneffes about him if he can be as merry upon himself, as others are apt to be upon that occafion: When he can poffefs himself with 'fuch a chearfulness, women and children, who are at firft frighted at him, will afterwards be as much pleafed with him. As it is barbarous in others to rally him for natural defects, it is extremely agreeable when he can jeft upon himself for them. Madam Maintenon's first hufband was an hero in this kind, and has drawn many pleasantries from the irregularity of his fhape which he defcribes as very much refembling the letter Z. He diverts himself likewise by reprefenting to his reader the make of an engine and pully, with which he used to take off his hat. When there happens to be any thing ridiculous in a visage, and the owner of it thinks it an afpect of dignity, he must be of very great quality to be exempt from raillery: The best expedient therefore is to be pleasant upon himself. Prince Harry and Falstaff, in Shakespeare, have carried the ridicule upon fat and lean as far as it will go. Falstaff is humourously called Woolfack, Bed-preffer, and Hill of Flesh; Harry, a Starveling, an Elves-fkin, a Sheath, a Bow-cafe, and a Tuck. There is in feveral incidents of the converfation between them, the jeft ftill kept up upon the perfon. Great tenderness and fenfibility in this point is one of the greatest weaknesses of self-love. For my own part, I am a little unhappy in the mould of my face, which is not quite fo long as it is broad: Whether this might not partly arife from my opening my mouth much feldomer than other people, and by confequence not fo much lengthning the fibres of my VOL. I. D vifag vifage, I am not at leifure to determine. However it be, I have been often put out of countenance by the fhortness of my face, and was formerly at great pains in concealing it by wearing a periwig with an high foretop, and letting my beard grow. But now I have thoroughly got over this delicacy, and could be contented with a much shorter, provided it might qualify me for a member of the merry club, which the following letter gives me an account of. I have received it from Oxford, and as it abounds with the spirit of mirth and good-humour which is natural to that place, I shall set it down word for word as it came to me. Most profound Sir, Having been very, well entertained, in the laft of your fpeculations that I have yet feen, by your fpecimen upon clubs, which I therefore hope you will continue, I fhall take the liberty to furnish you ⚫ with a brief account of fuch a one as perhaps you have ⚫ not feen in all your travels, unless, it was your fortune to touch upon fome of the woody parts of the African continent, in your voyage to or from Grand Cairo. There have arofe in this univerfity (long fince you left us without faying any thing) feveral of thefe inferior hebdomadal focicties, as the Punning club, the Witty club, and amongst the rest, the Handfome club; as a burleque upon which, a certain merry fpecies, that feem to have come into the world in masquerade, for fome years laft paft have affociated themselves together, and affumed the name of the Ugly club: This ⚫ill-favoured fraternity confift of a prefident and twelve fellows; the choice of which is not confined by patent to any particular foundation, (as St. John's men would have the world believe, and have therefore erected a feparate fociety within themfelves) but liberty is left to elect from any school in Great-Britain, provided the candidates be within the rules of the club, as fet forth in a table, intitled, The act of deformity. A claufe or two of which I fhall tranfmit to you. I. That no perfon whatsoever fhall be admitted without a vifible quearity in his afpect, or peculiar • caf caft of countenance; of which the prefident and officers for the time being are to determine, and the pre⚫fident to have the cafting voice. II. That a fingular regard be had upon examination, to the gibbofity of the Gentlemen tha toffer themselves, as founders kinfmen; or to the obliquity of their figure, in what fort foever. III. That if the quantity of any man's nofe be eminently mifcalculated, whether as to length or • breadth, he shall have a just pretence to be elected. Laftly, That if there shall be two or more compe titors for the fame vacancy cæteris paribus, he that has the thickest fkin to have the preference. Every fresh member, upon his first night, is to 'entertain the company with a dish of cod-fifh, and a • fpeech in praise of Efop; whofe portraiture they have in full proportion, or rather difpropertion, over the chimney; and their defign is, as foon as their funds are fufficient to purchase the heads of Therfites, Duns Scotus, Scarron, Hudibras, and the old Gentleman in Oldham, with all the celebrated ill faces of antiquity, as furniture for the club-room. As they have always been profeffed admirers of the other fex, fo they unanimoufly declare that they will give all poflible encouragement to fuch as will take the benefit of the ftatute, though, none yet have ap'peared to do it. The worthy prefident, who is their moft devoted champion, has lately fhewn me two copies of verses compofed by a Gentleman of his fociety; the first, a congratulatory ode infcribed to Mrs. Touch-wood, upon • the lofs of her two fore-tecth, the other, a panegyrick upon Mrs. Andiron's left fhoulder. Mrs. Vizard (he fays) fince the fmall-pox, is grown tolerably ugly, and a top toaft in the club; but I never heard him fo lavish of his fine things, as upon old Nell Trot, who conftantly ⚫ officiates at their table; her he even adores and extols as the very counterpart of mother Shipton; in short, Nell (fays he) is one of the extraordinary works of nature; but as for complexion, fhape, and features, fo valued by others, they are all mere outside and fymmetry, which is his averfion. Give me leave to τ D 2 6 add, add, that the prefident is a facetious pleafant gentleman, and never more fo, than when he has got (as he calls them) his dear mummers about him; and he often protests it does him good to meet a fellow with a right genuine grimace in his air, (which is fo agreeable in the generality of the French nation ;) and, as an inftance of his fincerity in this particular, he gave me a fight of a lift in his pocket-book of all this clafs, who for these five years have fallen under his observation, with himself at the head of them, and in the rear (as one of a promifing and improving • afpect) Oxford, March 12, 1710. R SIR, N° 18° your obliged and Alexander Carbuncle. Wednesday, March 21. Equitis, quoque jam migravit ab aure voluptas Hor. Ep. 1. 1. 2. ver. 187. But now our nobles too are fops and vain, CREECH T is my defign in this paper to deliver down to pofterity a faithful account of the Italian opera, and of the gradual progrefs which it has made upon the English ftage; for there is no question but our great grand-children will be very curious to know the reason why their forefathers ufed to fit together like an audience of foreigners in their own country, and to hear whole plays acted before them in a tongue which they did not understand. Arfanoe was the first opera that gave us a taste of Italian mufick. The great fuccefs this opera met with produced fome attempts of forming pieces upon Italian plans, |