Note 23a — JOURNAL TO STELLA

Erasmus Lewis, Under Secretary of State under Lord Dartmouth, was a great friend of Swift, Pope, and Arbuthnot. He had previously been one of Harley’s secretaries, and in his Horace Imitated, Book I. Ep. vii., Swift describes him as “a cunning shaver, and very much in Harley’s favour.” Arbuthnot says that under George I. Lewis kept company with the greatest, and was “principal governor” in many families. Lewis was a witness to Arbuthnot’s will. Pope and Esther Vanhomrigh both left him money to buy rings. Lewis died in 1754, aged eighty-three.