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are to understand, that I fhall not pretend to raise a credit to this work upon the weight of my politick news only, but, as my Latin fentence in the title page informs you, shall take any thing that offers for the fubject of my difcourfe. Thus new perfons, as well as new things, are to come under my confideration; as when a toaft or wit is firft pronounced fuch, you fhall have the freshest advice of their preferment from me, with a description of the beauty's manners, and the wit's ftile; as alfo in whofe places they are advanced. For this town is never good-natured enough to raise one without depreffing another. But it is my design to avoid faying any thing of any person, which ought juftly to displease; but shall endeavour, by the variety of the matter and ftile, to give entertainment for men of pleasure, without offence to those of bufinefs.

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LETTER FROM A RURAL

CORRESPONDENT-PLEASURES OF

THE COUNTRY-MR. BICKERSTAFF'S ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF -GENEALOGY OF THE STAFFS, AND HOW THE RACE WAS

IMPROVED.

have received this fhort epiftle from an unknown hand.

"SIR,

"That the country is barren of news, has been the excufe, time out of mind, for dropping a correspondence with our friends in London; as if it were impoffible out of a coffee-houfe to write an agreeable letter. I am too ingenuous to endeavour at the covering of my negligence with fo common an excufe. Doubtlefs, amongst friends bred as we have been, to the knowledge of books as well as men, a letter dated from a garden, a grotto, a fountain, a wood, a meadow, or the banks of a river, may be more entertaining than one from Tom's, Will's, White's, or St. James's. I promise therefore to be frequent for the future in my rural dates to you: but for fear you should, from what I have faid, be induced to believe I fhun the commerce of men, I must inform you, that there is a fresh topick of difcourfe lately rifen amongst the ingenious in our part of the world, and is become the more fashionable for the ladies giving into it. This we owe to

Ifaac Bickerstaff, who is very much cenfured by fome, and as much justified by others. Some criticise his style, his humour, and his matter; others admire the whole man. Some pre

tend, from the informations of their friends in town, to decypher the author; and others confefs they are loft in their gueffes. For my part I must own myself a professed admirer of the paper."

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There is no pleasure like that of receiving praise from the praife-worthy; by a person of fo fine a taste as the author of this letter, who is capable of enjoying the world in the fimplicity of its natural beauties. This pastoral letter, if I may fo call it, must be written by a man who carries his entertainment wherever he goes, and is undoubtedly one of those happy men who appear far otherwise to the vulgar. I dare fay, he is not envied by the vicious, the vain, the frolick, and the loud; but is continually blessed with that strong and ferious delight, which flows from a well-taught and liberal mind. With great refpect to country fports, I may say, this gentleman could pass his time agreeably, if there were not a hare or a fox in his county. That calm and elegant fatisfaction which the vulgar call melancholy, is the true and proper delight of men of knowledge and virtue. What we take for diverfion, which is a kind of forgetting ourselves, is but a mean way of entertainment, in comparison of that which is confidering, knowing, and enjoying ourselves. The pleasures of ordinary people are in their paffions; but the feat of this delight is in the reafon and understanding. Such a frame of mind raises that sweet enthusiasm which warms the imagination at the fight of every work of nature, and turns all round you into picture and landscape. I fhall be ever proud of advices from this gentleman; for I profefs writing news from the learned as well as the busy world.

As for my labours, which he is pleased to inquire after, if they can but wear one impertinence out of human life, destroy a fingle vice, or give a morning's cheerfulness to an honeft mind; in short, if the world can be but one virtue the better, or in any degree less vicious, or receive from them the smallest addition to their innocent diverfions, I fhall not think my pains, or indeed my life to have been spent in vain.

Thus far as to my ftudies. It will be expected I should in the next place give some account of my life. I fhall there

fore, for the fatisfaction of the present age, and the benefit of posterity, present the world with the following abridgment of it.

It is remarkable, that I was bred by hand, and ate nothing but milk till I was a twelvemonth old; from which time, to the eighth year of my age, I was observed to delight in pudding and potatoes; and indeed I retain a benevolence for that fort of food to this day. I do not remember that I distinguished myself in anything at thofe years, but my great fkill at taw, for which I was fo barbaroufly used, that it has ever fince given me an averfion to gaming. In my twelfth year, I fuffered very much for two or three falfe concords. At fifteen I was fent to the University, and staid there for fome time; but a drum paffing by (being a lover of mufick) I lifted myself for a foldier. As years came on, I began to examine things, and grew discontented at the times. This made me quit the fword, and take to the study of the occult sciences, in which I was fo wrapped up, that Oliver Cromwell had been buried, and taken up again, five years before I heard he was dead. This gave me first the reputation of a conjuror, which has been of great disadvantage to me ever fince, and kept me out of all publick employments. The greater part of my later years has been divided between Dick's coffee-house, the Trumpet in SheerLane, and my own lodgings.

Of all the vanities under the fun, I confefs that of being proud of one's birth is the greatest. At the fame time, fince in this unreasonable age, by the force of prevailing custom, things in which men have no hand are imputed to them; and that I am used by fome people, as if Ifaac Bickerstaff, though I write myself Efquire, was nobody; to fet the world right in that particular, I fhall give you my genealogy, as a kinfman of ours has fent it me from the Heralds' office. It is certain, and obferved by the wifest writers, that there are men not feverely honeft, in all families; therefore let those who may be apt to raise afperfions upon ours, please to give us as impartial an account of their own, and we shall be fatisfied. The business of heralds is a matter of fo great nicety, that, to avoid mistakes, I shall give you my coufin's letter verbatim, without altering a syllable.

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"DEAR COUSIN,

"Since you have been pleased to make yourself so famous of late, by your ingenious writings, and some time ago by your learned predictions: fince Partridge of immortal memory, is dead and gone, who, poetical as he was, could not understand his own poetry; and philomatical as he was, could not read his own destiny: fince the Pope, the King of France, and great part of his court, are either literally or metaphorically defunct: fince, I fay, these things (not foretold by any one but yourself) have come to pass after fo furprising a manner : it is with no fmall concern I fee the original of the Staffan race fo little known to the world as it is at this time; for which reason, as you have employed your studies in astronomy, and the occult sciences, fo I, my mother being a Welsh woman, dedicated mine to genealogy, particularly that of our own family, which, for its antiquity and number, may challenge any in Great Britain. The Staffs are originally of Staffordfhire, which took its name from them. The first that I find of the Staffs was one Jacobstaff, a famous and renowned aftronomer, who by Dorothy his wife had iffue feven fons, viz., Bickerstaff, Longstaff, Wagstaff, Quarterstaff, Whitestaff, Falstaff, and Tipstaff. He also had a younger brother who was twice married, and had five fons, viz., Distaff, Pikestaff, Mopstaff, Broomftaff, and Raggedftaff. As for the branch from whence you spring, I shall say very little of it, only that it is the chief of the Staffs, and called Bickerstaff, quafi Biggerstaff; as much as to fay, the Great Staff, or Staff of Staffs; and that it has applied itself to aftronomy with great fuccess, after the example of our aforefaid forefather. The defcendants from Longstaff, the second son, were a rakish disorderly fort of people, and rambled from one place to another, till in Harry II.'s time, they settled in Kent, and were called LongTails, from the Long-Tails which were fent them as a punishment for the murder of Thomas-a-Becket, as the legends fay. They have always been fought after by the ladies, but whether it be to show their averfion to Popery, or their love to miracles, I cannot fay. The Wagstaffs are a

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