Note 25 — Chapter II

We need scarcely remind our readers that, in 1763, Sandwich had denounced Wilkes in the House of Lords for having composed and printed the ‘Essay on Woman,’ an indecent parody on Pope’s ‘Essay on Man.’ Society resented the attack, placing the accuser and accused on a par in point of morals. ‘The public indignation went so far, that the Beggar’s Opera being performed at Covent Garden Theatre soon after this event, the whole audience, when Macheath says, “That Jemmy Twitcher should peach, I own surprises me,” burst out into an applause of application, and the nickname of “Jemmy Twitcher” stuck by the Earl so as almost to occasion the disuse of his title.’—Walpole’s ‘Memoirs of George III.,’ vol. i., p. 313.