THE following correspondence with Martha and Teresa Blount is now for the first time presented to the public under one view; having in the former editions been dispersed under the heads of "Letters to Martha and Teresa Blount," "Letters to several Ladies," "Letters to several Persons," and "Miscellaneous Letters." The uniting these letters in any regular order has been attended with no small difficulty; as many of them are not only without a date, but without the name of the person to whom they are addressed; and consequently, notwithstanding the utmost care, something must still be trusted to conjecture. This however is of less importance, as many of the letters are merely complimentary, or on trivial subjects; but it has not been thought advisable to deprive the reader of any part of a correspondence which may be requisite to enable him to judge how far there is any just ground for the imputations which have been raised upon it, to misrepresent the motives and to discredit the memory of the parties. LETTERS TO AND FROM MARTHA AND TERESA BLOUNT. MADAM, LETTER I. TO MRS. MARTHA BLOUNT. May 25, 1712. Ar last I do myself the honour to send you the Rape of the Lock; which has been so long coming out, that the lady's charms might have been half decayed, while the poet was celebrating them, and the printer publishing them. But yourself and your fair sister must needs have been surfeited already with this trifle; and therefore you have no hopes of entertainment but from the rest of this book', wherein (they tell me) are some things that may be dangerous to be looked upon however, I think you may venture, though you should blush for it, since blushing becomes you the best of any lady in England, and then the most dangerous thing to be looked upon is yourself. Indeed Madam, not to flatter you, our virtue will be sooner overthrown by one glance of yours, than by all the wicked poets can write in an age, as has been too dearly experienced by the wickedest of them all, that is to say, by, Madam, Your most obedient, &c. From this passage we learn, that this was the second impression of the Rape of the Lock, with the addition of the machinery; and that the Miss Blounts had already seen it as first published. LETTER II. TO MRS. TERESA BLOUNT. Bath, 1714. You are to understand, Madam, that my passion for your fair self and your sister, has been divided with the most wonderful regularity in the world. Even from my infancy I have been in love with one after the other of you, week by week, and my journey to Bath fell out in the three hundred seventy-sixth week of the reign of my sovereign Lady Sylvia. At the present writing hereof it is the three hundred eighty-ninth week of the reign of your most serene majesty, in whose service I was listed some weeks before I beheld your sister. This information will account for my writing to either of you hereafter, as either shall happen to be queen-regent at that time. Pray tell your sister, all the good qualities and virtuous inclinations she has, never gave me so much pleasure in her conversation, as that one vice of her obstinacy will give me mortification this month. Radcliffe commands her to the Bath, and she refuses! Indeed if I were in Berkshire, I should honour her for this obstinacy, and magnify her no less for disobedience than we do the Barcelonians. But people change with the change of places (as we see of late) and virtues become vices when they cease to be for one's interest, with me, as with others. Yet let me tell her, she will never look so finely while she is upon earth, as she would here in the water, It is not here as in most other instances, for those ladies that would please extremely, must go out of their own element. She does not make half so good a figure on horseback as Christina, Queen of Sweden; but were she once seen in the Bath, no man would part with 2 her for the best mermaid in Christendom. You know, I have seen you often; I perfectly know how you look in black and in white; I have experienced the utmost you can do in colours; but all your movements, all your graceful steps, deserve not half the glory you might here attain, of a moving and easy behaviour in buckram: something between swimming and walking, free enough, and more modestly half-naked than you can appear any where else. You have conquered enough already by land; show your ambition, and vanquish also by water. The buckram I mention is a dress peculiarly useful at this time, when, we are told they are bringing over the fashion of German ruffs: you ought to use yourself to some degrees of stiffness beforehand; and when our ladies' chins have been tickled awhile with starched muslin and wire, they may possibly bear the brush of a German beard and whisker. I could tell you a delightful story of Dr. P., but want room to display it in all its shining circumstances. He had heard it was an excellent cure for love, to kiss the aunt of the person beloved, who is generally of years and experience enough to damp the fiercest flame; he tried this course in his passion, and kissed Mrs. E— at Mr. D's, but, he says, it will not do, and that he loves you as much as ever. Your, &c. Such is the superior decency and propriety of public manners, that the strange circumstance of ladies appearing in the Bath, pro bono publico, seems, at this time, scarcely credible. These very Letters may further tend to prove the great superiority of the present period, in this respect, - Bowles. VOL. VI. Y |