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the flakes of hair which naturally suggest the idea of lightning; but likewise the violent agitation and force of the neck, which in the oriental tongues had been flatly exprest by a metaphor less than this.

"Canst thou make him afraid as a grasshopper?" There is a twofold beauty in this expression, which not only marks the courage of this beast, by asking if he can be scared? but likewise raises a noble image of his swiftness, by insinuating, that if he could be frighted, he would bound away with the nimbleness of a grasshopper.

-"The glory of his nostrils is terrible." This is more strong and concise than that of Virgil, which yet is the noblest line that was ever written without inspiration:

"Collectumque premens volvit sub naribus ignem.”

Georg. iii. 85.

"And in his nostrils rolls collected fire."

"He rejoiceth in his strength

He mocketh at

fear neither believeth he that it is the sound of the trumpet-He saith among the trumpets, Ha, ha;" are signs of courage, as I said before, flowing from an inward principle. There is a peculiar beauty in his "not believing it is the sound of the trumpet:" that is, he cannot believe it for joy; but when he was sure of it, and is "amongst the trumpets, he saith, Ha, ha," he neighs, he rejoices. His docility is elegantly painted in his being unmoved at the "rattling quiver, the glittering spear, and the shield ;" and is well imitated by Oppian (who undoubtedly read Job as well as Virgil) in his poem upon hunting:

"How firm the manag'd war-horse keeps his ground,
Nor breaks his order, tho' the trumpets sound!
With fearless eye the glittering host surveys,
And glares directly at the helmet's blaze!
The master's word, the laws of war he knows,
And when to stop, and when to charge the foes."

"He swalloweth the ground" is an expression for prodigious swiftness, in use among the Arabians, Job's countrymen, at this day. The Latins have something like it:

"Latumque fugâ consumere campum."

NEMESIAN.

"In flight the extended champain to consume."

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"When in their flight the champain they have snatch'd, No track is left behind."

It is indeed the boldest and noblest of images for swiftness; nor have I met with any thing that comes so near it, as Mr. Pope's, in Windsor Forest:

"The impatient courser pants in ev'ry vein,
And, pawing, seems to beat the distant plain;
Hills, vales, and floods, appear already crost,
And ere he starts, a thousand steps are lost."

"He smelleth the battle afar off," and what follows about the shouting, is a circumstance expressed with great spirit by Lucan:

"So when the ring with joyful shouts resounds,
With rage and pride the imprison'd courser bounds:
He frets, he foams, he rends his idle rein:

Springs o'er the fence, and headlong seeks the plain." 'I am, SIR,

"Your ever obliged servant,

JOHN LIZARD 2."

N° 87. SATURDAY, JUNE 20, 1713.

-Constiterant hinc Thisbe, Pyramus illinc,

Inque vicem fuerat captatus anhelitus oris.

OVID. Met. iv. 71.

Here Pyramus, there gentle Thisbe, strove

To catch each other's breath, the balmy breeze of love.

My Precautions are made up of all that I can hear and see, translate, borrow, paraphrase, or contract, from the persons with whom I mingle and converse, and the authors whom I read. But the grave discourses which I sometimes give the town, do not win so much attention as lighter matters. For this reason it is, that I am obliged to consider vice as it is ridiculous, and accompanied with gallantry, else I find in a very short time I shall lie like waste paper on the tables of coffee-houses. Where I have taken most pains I often find myself least read. There is a spirit of intrigue got into all, even the meanest of the people, and the very servants are bent upon delights, and commence oglers and languishers. I happened the other day to pass by a gentleman's

2 Probably Dr. Young was the author of this paper.

house, and saw the most flippant scene of low love that I have ever observed The maid was rubbing the windows within side of the house, and her humble servant the footman was so happy a man as to be employed in cleaning the same glass on the side towards the street. The wench began with the greatest severity of aspect imaginable, and breathing on the glass, followed it with a dry cloth; her opposite observed her, and fetching a deep sigh, as if it were his last, with a very disconsolate air did the same on his side of the window. He still worked on and languished, until at last his fair one smiled, but covered herself, and spreading the napkin in her hand, concealed herself from her admirer, while he took pains, as it were, to work through all that intercepted their meeting. This pretty contest held for four or five large panes of glass, until at last the waggery was turned into an humourous way of breathing in each other's faces, and catching the impression. The gay creatures were thus loving and pleasing their imaginations with their nearness and distance, until the windows were so transparent that the beauty of the female made the man-servant impatient of beholding it, and the whole house besides being abroad, he ran in, and they romped out of my sight. It may be imagined these oglers of no quality, made a more sudden application of the intention of kind sighs and glances, than those whose education lays them under greater restraints, and who are consequently more slow in their advances. I have often observed all the low part of the town in love, and taking a hackney-coach have considered all that passed by me in that light, as these cities are composed of crowds wherein there is not one who is not lawfully or unlawfully engaged in that passion. When one is in this speculation, it is not unpleasant to ob

serve alliances between those males and females whose lot it is to act in public. Thus the woods in the middle of summer are not more entertaining with the different notes of birds, than the town is of different voices of the several sorts of people who act in public; they are divided into classes, and crowds made for crowds. The hackney-coachmen, chairmen, and porters, are the lovers of the hawkerwomen, fruitresses, and milk-maids. They are a wild world of themselves, and have voices significant of their private inclinations, which strangers can take no notice of. Thus a wench with fruit looks like a mad woman when she cries wares you see she does not carry, but those in the secret know that cry is only an assignation to an hackney-coachman who is driving by, and understands her. The whole people is in an intrigue, and the undiscerning passengers are unacquainted with the meaning of what they hear all round them. They know not how to separate the cries of mercenary traders, from the sighs and lamentations of languishing lovers. The common face of modesty is lost among the ordinary part of the world, and the general corruption of manners is visible from the loss of all deference in the low people towards those of condition. One order of mankind trips fast after the next above it, and by this rule you may trace iniquity from the conversations of the most wealthy, down to those of the humblest degree. It is an act of great resolution to pass by a crowd of polite footmen, who can rally, make love, ridicule, and observe upon all the passengers who are obliged to go by the places where they wait. This licence makes different characters among them, and there are beaux, party-men, and free-thinkers in livery. I take it for a rule, that there is no bad man but makes a bad woman, and the contagion of vice

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