and in a word, that as he never did make any previous offer of his service, or the least step to her affection; so, on his discovery of these designs thus laid to trick him, he could not but afterwards, in justice to himself, vindicate both his innocence and freedom by keeping his proper distance.' This is his apology; and I think I shall be satisfied with it. But I can not conclude my tedious epistle, without recommending to you not only to resume your former chastisement, but to add to your criminals the simoniacal ladies, who seduce the sacred order into the difficulty of either breaking a mercenary troth, made to them whom they ought not to deceive, or by breaking or keeping it, offending against Him whom they can not deceive. Your assistance and labours of this sort would be of great benefit, and your speedy thoughts on this subject would be very seasonable to, sir, "Your most obedient servant, STEELE. 6 CHASTITY LOVEWORTH.' T. No. 299. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 12. Malo venusinam, quàm te, Cornelia, mater JUV. SAT. Some country girl scarce to a curtsey bred, DRYDEN. It is observed that a man improves more by reading the story of a person eminent for prudence and virtue, than by the finest rules and precepts of morality. In the same manner, a representation of those calamities and misfortunes which a weak man suffers from wrong measures, and ill concerted schemes of life, is apt to make a deeper impression upon our minds than the wisest maxims and instructions that can be given us for avoiding the like follies and indiscretions in our own private conduct. It is for this reason that I lay before my reader the following letter, and leave it with him to make his own use of it, without adding any reflections of my own upon the subject matter. 'MR. SPECTATOR, Having carefully perused a letter sent you by Josiah Fribble, Esq. with your subsequent discourse upon pin-money, (No, 295) I do presume to trouble you with an account of my own case, which I look upon to be no less deplorable than that of 'squire Fribble. I am a person of no extraction, having begun the world with a small parcel of rusty iron, and was for some years commonly known by the name of Jack Anvil.* I have naturally a very happy genius for getting money, insomuch that by the age of five-andtwenty, I had scraped together four thousand two hundred pounds five shillings and a few odd pence. I then launched out into considerable business, and became a bold trader both by sea and land; which in a few years raised me a very considerable fortune. For these my good services I was knighted in the thirty-fifth year of my age, and lived with great dignity among my city neighbours by the name of Sir John Anvil. Being in my temper very ambitious, I was now bent upon making a family, and accordingly resolved that my descendants should have a dash of good blood in their veins. In order to this I made love to the lady Mary Oddly, an indigent young woman of quality. To cut short the marriage treaty, I threw her a carte blanche, as our newspapers call it, desiring her to write upon it her own terms. She was very concise in her demands, insisting only that the disposal of my fortune, and the regulation of my family should be entirely in her hands. Her father and brothers appeared exceedingly averse to this match, and would not see me for some time; but at present are so well reconciled, that they dine with me al * An Iron-monger originally, afterwards created a knight, and changed his name from Anvil to Enville. most every day, and have borrowed considerable sums of me, which my lady Mary very often twits me with, when she would show me how kind her relations are to me. She had no portion, as I told you before; but what she wanted in fortune she makes up in spirit. She at first changed my name to Sir John Envil, and at present writes herself Mary Enville. I have had some children by her, whom she has christened with the surnames of her family, in order, as she tells me, to wear out the homeliness of their parentage by the father's side. Our eldest son is the honourable Oddly Enville, esq., and our eldest daughter Harriot Enville. Upon her first coming into my family, she turned off a parcel of very careful servants, who had been long with me, and introduced in their stead a couple of blacka-moors, and three or four very genteel fellows in laced liveries, besides her French woman, who is perpetually making a noise in the house in a language which nobody understands except my lady Mary. She next set herself to reform every room in my house, having glazed all my chimneypieces with looking-glasses, and planted every corner with such heaps of china, that I am obliged to move about my own house with the greatest caution and circumspection, for fear of hurting some of our brittle furniture. She makes an illumination once a week with wax candles in one of the largest rooms, in order, as she phrases it, to see company; at which time she always desires me to be abroad, or to confine myself to the cockloft, that I may not disgrace her among her visitants of quality. Her footmen, as I told you be fore, are such beaux, that I do not much care for asking them questions: when I do, they answer me with a saucy frown, and say that every thing which I find fault with was done by my lady Mary's order. She tells me that she intends they shall wear swords with their next liveries, having lately observed the footmen of two or three persons of quality hanging behind the coach with swords by their sides. As soon as the first honeymoon was over, I represented to her the unreasonableness of those daily innovations which she made in my family; but she told me I was no longer to consider myself as Sir John Anvil, but as her husband; and added with a frown, that I did not seem to know who she was. I was surprised to be treated thus, after such familiarities as had passed between us. But she has since given me to know, that whatever freedoms she may sometimes indulge me in, she expects in general to be treated with the respect that is due to her birth and quality. Our children have been trained up from their infancy with so many accounts of their mother's family, that they know the stories of all the great men and women it has produced. Their mother tells them, that such an one commanded in such a sea engagement, that their great grandfather had a horse shot under him at Edge-Hill, that their uncle was at the siege of Buda, and that her mother danced in a ball at court with the duke of Monmouth, with abundance of fiddle-faddle of the same nature. 1 was the other day a little out of countenance at a question of my little daughter Harriot, who asked me, with a great deal of innocence, why I never told them of the generals and admirals that had been in my family. As for my eldest son, Oddly, e VOL. VI.-11 |