or four hours by moonlight, and we met no creature of any quality but the King, who gave audience to the vice-chamberlain, all alone, under the garden-wall.

In fhort, I heard of no ball, affembly, baffet-table, or any place where two or three were gathered together, except Madam Kilmanfegg's, to which I had the honour to be invited, and the grace to stay away.

I was heartily tired, and posted to park: there we had an excellent difcourfe of quackery; Dr. S. was mentioned with honour. Lady - walked a whole hour abroad without dying after it, at least in the time I stayed, though fhe feemed to be fainting, and had convulfive motions feveral times in her head.

I arrived in the foreft by Tuesday noon, having fled from the face (I wish I could say the horned face) of Mofes, who dined in the midway thither. I paffed the rest of the day in those woods where I have fo often enjoyed a book and a friend; I made a Hymn as I paffed through, which ended with a figh, that I will not tell you the meaning of.

Your Doctor is gone the way of all his patients, and was hard put to it how to dispose of an estate miferably unwieldy, and fplendidly unufeful to him. Sir Samuel Garth fays, that for Ratcliffe to leave † a

library,

+ Because it was notorious that he had little learning; but he poffeffed what was better, wonderful fagacity and penetration in judging of diseases. Dr. Young has the fame fimile in his fecond fatire:

Unlearned men of Books affume the care,
As Eunuchs are the guardians of the Fair.

library, was as if a Eunuch fhould found a Seraglio. Dr. S lately told a Lady, he wondered she could be alive after him; fhe made answer, fhe wondered because Dr. Ratcliffe was dead,

at it for two reasons,

and because Dr. S

was living. I am

Your, etc,

LETTER XV.

[OTHING could have more of that melancholy which

NOTHING

once used to please me, than my last day's jour ney; for after having paffed through my favourite woods in the foreft, with a thousand reveries of past pleasures, I rid over hanging hills, whofe tops were edged with groves, and whofe feet watered with winding rivers, listening to the falls of cataracts below, and the murmuring of the winds above: the gloomy verdure of Stonor fucceeded to these; and then the shades of the evening overtook me. The moon rose in the clearest sky I ever faw, by whofe folemn light I paced on flowly, without company, or any interruption to the range of my thoughts. About a mile before I reached Oxford, all the bells tolled in different notes; the clocks of every college answered one another, and founded forth (fome in a deeper, fome a fofter tone) that it was eleven at night. All this was no ill preparation to the life I have led fince, among thofe old

walls,

walls, venerable galleries, ftone porticos, ftudious walks, and folitary scenes of the university. I wanted nothing but a black gown and a falary, to be as mere a book-worm as any there. I conformed myself to the college hours, was rolled up in books, lay in one of the most ancient, dusky parts of the University, and was as dead to the world as any hermit of the defart. If any thing was alive or awake in me, it was a little vanity, fuch as even those good men ufed to entertain, when the monks of their own order extolled their piety and abstraction. For I found myself received with a fort of respect, which this idle part of mankind, the learned, pay to their own fpecies; who are as confiderable here, as the bufy, the gay, and the am, bitious are in your world.

Indeed I was treated in such a manner, that I could not but fometimes afk myself in my mind, what college I was founder of, or what library I had built? Methinks, I do very ill to return to the world again, to leave the only place where I make a figure, and, from feeing myself seated with dignity on the most confpicuous fhelves of a library, put myself into the abject posture of lying at a lady's feet in St. James's-fquare.

I will not deny, but that, like Alexander, in the midst of my glory I am wounded, and find myself a mere man. To tell you from whence the dart comes, is to no purpose, fince neither of you will take the tender care to draw it out of my heart, and suck the poifon with your lips.

Here,

Here, at my Lord H-'s, I see a creature nearer an angel than a woman (though a woman be very near as good as an angel); I think you have formerly heard me mention Mrs. T as a credit to the Maker of angels; fhe is a relation of his lordship's, and he gravely proposed her to me for a wife; being tender of her interefts, and knowing (what is a fhame to Providence) that she is lefs indebted to fortune than I. I told him, 'twas what he never could have thought of, if it had not been his misfortune to be blind; and what I never could think of, while I had eyes to see both her and myself.

I must not conclude without telling you, that I will do the utmost in the affair you defire. It would be an inexpreffible joy to me if I could ferve you, and I will always do all I can to give myself pleasure. I wish as well for you as for myself; I am in love with you both, as much as I am with myself, for I find myself most so with either, when I least suspect it.

THE

LETTER XVI.

HE chief cause I have to repent my leaving the town, is the uncertainty I am in every day of your fifter's state of health. I really expected by every post to have heard of her recovery, but on the contrary each letter has been a new awakening to my

appre

apprehenfions, and I have ever fince fuffered alarms upon alarms on her account.

No one can be more

fenfibly touched at this than I; nor any danger of

any

I love could affect me with more uneafinefs. I have felt fome weaknesses of a tender kind, which I would not be free from; and I am glad to find my value for people so rightly placed, as to perceive them on this occafion.

I cannot be fo good a Christian as to be willing to refign my own happiness here, for hers in another life. I do more than wish for her fafety, for every wish I make I find immediately changed into a prayer, and a more fervent one than I had learned to make

till now.

May her life be longer and happier than perhaps herself may defire, that is, as long and as happy as you can wish may her beauty be as great as poffible, that is, as it always was, or as yours is. But whatever ravages a merciless diftemper may commit, I dare promise her boldly, what few (if any) of her makers of vifits and compliments dare to do: fhe fhall have one man as much her admirer as ever. As for your part, Madam, you have me fo more than ever, fince I have been a witness to the

generous tenderness you

have fhewn upon this occafion.

Your, etc.