SOPHOCL.

TO MR. TOWN.

BATSON'S COFFEE-HOUSE,
FEB. 26, 1754.

beg leave to trouble on a Muft ferfous and melancholy fubject; a fubject, which I fear will be attended with the moft dreadful confequences to the whole nation. Notwithtanding the laft mail brought the college pofitive affurances from the French King's phyficians, that the late PLAGUE at Rouen was entirely ceased, I have the strongest reafons to apprehend, that the contagion is already spread to this city. My own practice daily furnishes me with lamentable instances, that manifestly indicate a peftilential disorder in the blood and humours.

I was first induced to fufpect, that fome epidemical diftemper was taking root among us, from my being called in to a noble patient, who (as the public prints have informed you) has lately been afflicted with a violent boil on his back. From this patient there have iffued continually great quantities of corruption of a yellow hue. His complaint feems to be in fome fort conftitutional, as it commonly breaks out with extraordinary Virulence every feven years; and as this is the crifis, we cannot pronounce our noble patient out of danger, till he has got over the enfuing fpring. It is moreover to be feared, that the contagion has likewife reached Ireland; where we hear that the beft phyficians are using the mott forcing medicines, and are of opinion that nothing can relieve the unhappy people, till they have voided a STONE. A great man there labours alfo under the abovementioned complaint of having a violent BOYLE on his back*.

I thall now proceed to give you the hiftory of fome other cafes, which have fallen under my notice, and are to me an indifputable proof that the Plague has got footing among us. It's malignancy fhews itself particularly about

the court; and we are affured, that fome parts of the country are also tainted with it. I have had the honour to attend feveral members of parliament, whofe are very defperate. Some I cafes declining way, given over by all their friends; others are fo weak, that they can't ftand alone; and many are fo reftlefs, that they are continually turning from fide to fide. As I found they had great need of fupport, I have advifed them to drink plentifully of trong liquors, and guard against the ill confequences of a Return.

I vifited the other day a young gentleman, who has lately been promoted to a command in the fquadron defigned for the Eaft-Indies. I found him in a molt languishing condition; his fpirits were quite depreffed; he had a violent palpitation of the heart; and the whole nervous fyftem was relaxed. I would have prefcribed the well-known dietdrink brought into practice by the late, Bishop of Cloyne; but he told me, every thing went against his stomach that favoured of TAR. However, I at length prevailed on him to fubmit to a long courfe of fea-water. I have obferved the fame prognoftics in fome of our land-officers; to whom I have recommended the frequent ufe of exercise, together with a courfe of fteel, and a pow der compofed of nitre and fulphur.

A friend of mine, one of the commoncouncil men of this city, is infected to a ftrong degree with the prefent peftilence. His chief complaint is a canine appetite'; and his wife affures me, the has often felt the wolf in his belly. The feat of this distemper is originally in the palate, and difcovers itfelf by a watering of the mouth from the falival glands, and a grinding of the teeth as in the action of maftication. This diforder being very common in the city, and likely to spread among the livery, I have directed him to perform quarantine for forty days, by abitaining from flesh during the prefent Lent.

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1 know

I know another, a very worthy alderman, who now lies in a moit deplorable condition. He is fwelled to a most enormous fize; his whole face, and particu larly his nofe, is crufted over with fiery puftules of the confluent kind. He is afflicted with an infatiable thirtt, and is very fubject to falling-fits. I was fent for last night, when one of these fits had juft feized him. He lay to all appearance dead on the floor, wallowing in the midit of a foetid mafs, partly folid, par ly fluid, which had iffued from his inouth and noftrils with repeated eructations. I would immediately have administered to him a proper dofe of Aq. Font. tepefa. but on offering him the draught, he thewed the ftrongest fymp. toms of a confirmed hydrophobia.

I went out of charity to fee a poor tragic author, (no reflection upon any of the profeffion, Mr. Town) who has been obliged to keep his room all the winter, and is dying by inches of an inveterate atrophy. By his extravagant ravings, fudden ftarts, incoherent expreflions, and paffionate exclamations, I judged his diforder to be feated in the brain, and therefore dire&ted his head to be blistered all over. I cured another, a comic author, of a lethargy, by making a revultion of the bad humour from the part affected with ftimulating cathartics. A fhort fquabby gentleman of a grofs and corpulent make was feized with a kind of St. Vitus' dance, as he was practifing Harlequin for the mafquerade: his whole body was convulfed with the most violent writhings and ir. regular twitches; but I prefently removed his complaint by applying blifters

to the foles of his feet.

The Plague, as I obferved before, puts on different appearances in different Jubjects. A perfon of quality, one of the club at White's, was feized with the epidemical phrenzy raging there, which propagates itfelf by certain black and red fpots. He had fuffered fo much lofs by continual evacuations, that his whole fubstance was wafted; and when I faw him he was fo reduced, that there were no hopes of a recovery. Another nobleman caught the infection at Newmarket, which brought upon him fuch a running, that he is now in the laft flage of a galloping confumption. A reverend divine, lately made a dignitary of the church, has unhappily loft his Memory; and as fo blind withal, that he

hardly knows any of his old acquainte ance: the mufcles of his face are all contracted into an auftere frown, his knees are stiff and inflexible, and he is unable, poor gentleman! to bend his body, or move his hand to his head. I have obferved others feized at times with a strange kind of deafness; and ar certain intervals, I have found them fo prodigiously hard of hearing, that though a tradefiman has bawled ever fo loudly in their ears, it has had no effect upon them.

By what means this Plague has been introduced among us, cannot easily be afcertained; whether it was imported in the fame band-box with the last new head, or was fecretly conveyed in the plaits of an embroidered fuit :-but that it came over hither from France, plainly appears from the manner in which it affects our people of faftion, especially the ladies, who bear about them the moft evident marks of the French difeafe. This is known to affect the whole babit of body, and extends it's influence from head to foot. But it's ftrongest attacks are levelled at the face; and it has fuch an effect upon the complexion, that it entirely changes the natural colour of the fkin. At Paris, the face of every lady you meet is befmeared with unguent, cerufs, and plaifter; and I have lately remarked, with infinite concern, the native charms of my pretty country-women destroyed by the fame cause. In this cafe I have always propofed calling in the affiftance of a furgeon to pare off this unnatural Epidermis or scarfkin, occafioned by the ignorance of Em pirics in the immoderate application of Alteratives.

From what I have been able to collect from obfervations on my female patients, I have found little variation in the effects of the Plague on that fex. Moft of them complain of a laffitude, a liftleffnefs, an uneafinefs, pains they don't know where, vapours, hysterics, want of reft, want of fpirits, and lofs of appetite: confequently the fame regimen may ferve for all. ́I advise them to use a great deal of exercise in driving about the town, to dilute properly with tea, to perfpire freely at public places, and in their feafons to go to Bath, Tunbridge, Cheltenham, or Scarborough.

I was indeed furprised with an extraordinary new cafe the other night, when I was called out of bed to attend a maid

of

of honour, who is frequently afflicted with fits of the mother. Her abdomen, I found, upon examination, to be preternaturally diftended: the tumour has been gradually increafing; but I would not attempt to difcufs it, as it was not yet arrived to maturity. I intend foon to remove her into the country for a month, in order to deliver her from the complaint the labours under.

I have been induced, Sir, to write to you on this occafion, as you are pleafed to take this city under your immediate care. So alarming an evil calls upon us all to oppose it's progrefs: for my own part, nothing fhall deter me from a diligent discharge of the duty of my profeffion; though it has already expofed me to the greateft dangers in the execution of it. An old captain of a man of war, who is grievoully troubled with choler and overflowing of the gall, on my only hinting a clyfter, swore vehemently that I fhould take one myfelf, and applying his foot directly to my fundament, kicked me down stairs. This very morning I escaped almost by miracle from the contagion, which raged in the most violent degree through a whole

family. The mafter and mistress were both of them in a very high fever, and quite frantic and delirious: their tongues were prodigiously enflamed, with the tip very harp, and perpetually vibrating without the leaft interiniffion. I would have prefcribed fome cooling and lenitive medicines; but the husband in the heighth of his phrenzy Aung my tyewig into the fire, and his wife Quiced me with extravafated urine. As I retired with precipitation, I heard the fame wild ravings from the nursery, the kitchen, and every other quarter, which convinced me that the peftilence had feized the whole houfe. I ran out of doors as fast as poffible, reflecting with Terence' If Health herfelf would fave this family, fhe could not.'

Servare prorfus non poteft hanc familiam.
Ipfa fi cupiat Salus,

Upon the whole, I may conclude with the aphorifin of Hippocrates-That no people can poffibly be afflicted with fo many and fo terrible diforders, unlefs the PLAGUE is among them." I am, Sir, your's &c.

W

Remember to have feen, in fome old Italian poet, a fable called The Education of the Mufes. Apollo is there faid to have taken them at their birth under his immediate care, and as they grew up, to have inftructed them, according to their different capacities, in the feveral branches of playing and finging. Thalia, we are told, was of a lively turn, and took delight in the molt comic airs; but was at first with difficulty refrained from falling into ridiculous drolleries, and what our author calls extravaganzas in her man

Hor.

B. G.

tell how to regulate the ftops of their flutes, or touch the ftrings of their lyres, with judgment and grace. However, by much practice, they improved gra dually under the inftructions of Apollo, till at laft they were able to exert all the powers of mufic: and they now form a compleat concert, which fills all Par naffus with the most enchanting har mony.

writing,

Clio, and the rest of the Nine, had not yet learned to temper their voices with

in their works. to trace them

tions ftill remaining But as it is impoffible

prefent

present the reader with the fum of my own experience, and illustrate, in the life of Mr. Town, the progrefs of an author.

Right or wrong, I have ever been addicted to fcribbling. I was famous at school for my readinefs at crambo and capping verses: I often made themes for other boys, and fold my copy for a tart or a custard. At nine years old I was taken notice of for an English diftich; and afterwards immortalized myfelf by an holiday's talk in the fame language, which my matter, who was himself a poet, pronounced to be scarce inferior to his favourite Blackmore. These were followed by a multitude of little pieces; which, like other fruits that come before their season, had nothing to recommend them but their early appearance.

Filled, however, with great conceptions of my genius and importance, I could not but lament, that fuch extraordinary parts fhould be confined within the narrow circle of my relations and acquaintance. Therefore, in order to oblige and amaze the public, I foon be came a very large contributor to the monthly magazines. But I had the unfpeakable mortification to fee my favours sometimes not inferted, fometimes postponed, often much altered, and you may be fure always for the worfe. On all these occafions, I never failed to condemn the arrogance and foily of the compilers of thefe mifcellanies; wondering how they could fo grofsly miftake their own intereft, and neglect the entertainment of their readers.

In the mean time a maiden aunt, with whom I lived, a very pious old lady, turned Methodist, and often took me with her to the Tabernacle, the Foundery, and many private meetings. This made fuch an impreffion upon my mind, that I devoted myself entirely to facred fubjects, and wrote feveral hymns, which were received with infinite applaufe by all the good women who vifited my aunt; and (the fervants being alfo Methodists) they were often fung by the whole family in the kitchen. I might perhaps in time have rivalled Welley in thefe divine compofitions, and had even begun an entire new verfion of the Pfalms; when my aunt, changing her religion a fecond time, became a Moravian. But the hymns ufually fung by the United Brethren, contain fentiments fo fublime and incomprehenfible, that notwithstand

ing my late fuccefs in that kind of poetry, and the great opinion I entertained of my own talents, I durft not venture on their ftile and manner.

As love and poetry naturally produce each other, it is no wonder, that before I was feventeen I had fingled out my particular Sachariffa. This, you may fuppofe, gave birth to innumerable fongs, elegies, and acroftics. In the space of two years I had written more love-verfes than Waller, or any other poet; when, juft as I imagined I had rhymed myself into her good graces, I had the mortification to find that my mistress was married to a cornet of horfe, a fellow, who I am fure never wrote a line in his life. This threw me into fuch a violent rage against the whole sex, that I immediately burnt every fyllable I had written in her praife, and in bitterness of foul tranflated the fixth fatire of Juvenal.

Soon after this, the fon and heir of Lord Townley, to whom I have the honour of being a distant relation, was engaged in a treaty of marriage with a rich heirefs. I fat down immediately with great compofure to write an epithalamium on this occafion. I trimmed Hymen's torch, and invited the Loves and Graces to the wedding: Concord was prepared to join their hands, and Juno to blefs them with a numerous race of children. After all thefe pains, when every thing was ready for the wedding, and the lait hand put to the epithalamium, the match was fuddenly broke off, and my poem of courfe rendered ufelefs. I was more uneafy under this difappointment than any of the parties could poffibly be; till I was informed of the fudden marriage of a noble lord with a celebrated beauty. On this popular occafion, promifing myfelf univerfal applaufe, I immediately published my epithalamium; which, like Bayes's prologue, was artfully con trived to ferve one purpose as well as another.

As my notions had been hitherto confined within a narrow sphere of life, my literary purfuits were confequently lefs important, till I had the opportunity of enlarging my ideas by going abroad. My travels, of which I have before hinted fomething to the reader, opened to me a new and extenfive field for obfervation. I will not presume to boaft, that I received any part of my education at Geneva, or any of thofe

celebrated