[Steele
Reading edition
Saturday, April 29, to Tuesday, May 2, 1710.
——Dicenda tacenda loquutus.—Hor., I Ep. vii. 72.
White's Chocolate-house, May 1.
The world is so overgrown with singularities in behaviour, and method of living, that I have no sooner laid before mankind the absurdity of one species of men, but there starts up to my view some new sect of impertinents that had before escaped notice. This afternoon, as I was talking with fine Mrs. Sprightly's porter, and desiring admittance upon an extraordinary occasion, it was my fate to be spied by Tom Modely riding by in his chariot. He did me the honour to stop, and asked what I did there of a Monday? I answered that I had business of importance, which I wanted to communicate to the lady of the house. Tom is one of those fools who look upon knowledge of the fashion to be the only liberal science; and was so rough as to tell me, that a well-bred man would as soon call upon a lady (who keeps a day) at midnight, as on any day but that on which she professes being at home. There are rules and decorums which are never to be transgressed by those who understand the world; and he who offends in this kind, ought not to take it ill if he is turned away, even when he sees the person look out at her window whom he inquires for. "Nay," said he, "my Lady Dimple is so positive in this rule, that she takes it for a piece of good breeding and distinction to deny herself with her own mouth. Mrs. Comma,[240] the great scholar, insists upon it; and I myself have heard her assert, that a lord's porter, or a lady's woman, cannot be said to lie in that case, because they act by instruction; and their words are no more their own, than those of a puppet."
He was going on with this ribaldry, when on a sudden he looked on his watch, and said, he had twenty visits to make, and drove away without further ceremony. I was then at leisure to reflect upon the tasteless manner of life, which a set of idle fellows lead in this town, and spend youth itself with less spirit, than other men do their old age. These expletives in human society, though they are in themselves wholly insignificant, become of some consideration when they are mixed with others. I am very much at a loss how to define, or under what character, distinction, or denomination, to place them, except you give me leave to call them the Order of the Insipids. This order is in its extent like that of the Jesuits, and you see of them in every way of life, and in every profession. Tom Modely has long appeared to me at the head of this species. By being habitually in the best company, he knows perfectly well when a coat is well cut, or a periwig well mounted.[241] As soon as you enter the place where he is, he tells the next man to him who is your tailor, and judges of you more from the choice of your periwig-maker than of your friend. His business in this world is to be well dressed; and the greatest circumstance that is to be recorded in his annals is, that he wears twenty shirts a week. Thus, without ever speaking reason among the men, or passion among the women, he is everywhere well received; and without any one man's esteem, he has every man's indulgence.
This order has produced great numbers of tolerable copiers in painting, good rhymers in poetry, and harmless projectors in politics. You may see them at first sight grow acquainted by sympathy, insomuch that one who had not studied nature, and did not know the true cause of their sudden familiarities, would think that they had some secret intimation of each other, like the freemasons. The other day at Will's I heard Modely, and a critic of the same order, show their equal talents with great delight. The learned insipid was commending Racine's turns; the genteel insipid, Devillier's curls.[242]
These creatures, when they are not forced into any particular employment, for want of ideas in their own imaginations, are the constant plague of all they meet with by inquiries for news and scandal, which makes them the heroes of visiting-days, where they help the design of the meeting, which is to pass away that odious thing called Time, in discourses too trivial to raise any reflections which may put well-bred persons to the trouble of thinking.
From my own Apartment, May 1.
I was looking out of my parlour window this morning,[243] and receiving the honours which Margery, the milkmaid to our lane, was doing me, by dancing before my door with the plate of half her customers on her head, when Mr. Clayton,[244] the author of "Arsinoe," made me a visit, and desired me to insert the following advertisement in my ensuing paper:
The Pastoral Masque composed by Mr. Clayton, author of "Arsinoe," will be performed on Wednesday the 3rd instant, in the great room at York Buildings.[245] Tickets are to be had at White's Chocolate-house, St. James's Coffee-house in St. James's Street, and Young Man's Coffee-house.[246]
Note. The tickets delivered out for the 27th of April will be taken then.
When I granted his request, I made one to him, which was, that the performers should put their instruments in tune before the audience came in; for that I thought the resentment of the Eastern Prince, who, according to the old story, took "tuning" for "playing," to be very just and natural. He was so civil, as not only to promise that favour, but also to assure me, that he would order the heels of the performers to be muffled in cotton, that the artists in so polite an age as ours, may not intermix with their harmony a custom which so nearly resembles the stamping dances of the West Indians or Hottentots.
ADVERTISEMENTS.
A Bass-viol of Mr. Bickerstaff's acquaintance, whose mind and fortune do not very exactly agree, proposes to set himself to sale by way of lottery.[247] Ten thousand pounds is the sum to be raised, at threepence a ticket, in consideration that there are more women who are willing to be married than that can spare a greater sum. He has already made over his person to trustees for the said money to be forthcoming, and ready to take to wife the fortunate woman that wins him.
N.B. Tickets are given out by Mr. Charles Lillie, and Mr. John Morphew. Each adventurer must be a virgin, and subscribe her name to her ticket.[248]
Whereas the several churchwardens of most of the parishes within the bills of mortality, have in an earnest manner applied themselves by way of petition, and have also made a presentment of the vain and loose deportment during divine service, of persons of too great figure in all their said parishes for their reproof: And whereas it is therein set forth, that by salutations given each other, hints, shrugs, ogles, playing of fans, and fooling with canes at their mouths, and other wanton gesticulations, their whole congregation appears rather a theatrical audience, than a house of devotion: It is hereby ordered, that all canes, cravats, bosom-laces, muffs, fans, snuff-boxes, and all other instruments made use of to give persons unbecoming airs, shall be immediately forfeited and sold; and of the sum arising from the sale thereof, a ninth part shall be paid to the poor, and the rest to the overseers.[249]