pedant, that is perpetually putting cases, who is very well acquainted with my hurepeating the transactions of Westminster-mour, lets me rise and go to bed when I hall, wrangling with you upon the most in- please, dine at his own table or in my different circumstances of life, and not to be chamber, as I think fit, sit still and say noconvinced of the distance of a place, or of thing without bidding me be merry. When the most trivial point in conversation, but the gentlemen of the country come to see by dint of argument. The state pedant is him, he only shows me at a distance. As I wrapt up in news, and lost in politics. If have been walking in his fields, I have obyou mention either of the kings of Spain or served them stealing a sight of me over a Poland, he talks very notably; but if you hedge, and have heard the knight desiring go out of the Gazette, you drop him. In them not to let me see them, for that short, a mere courtier, a mere soldier, a hated to be stared at. mere scholar, a mere any thing, is an insipid pedantic character, and equally ridiculous. Of all the species of pedants, which I have mentioned, the book-pedant is much the most supportable; he has at least an exercised understanding, and a head which is full though confused, so that a man who converses with him may often receive from him hints of things that are worth knowing, and what he may possibly turn to his own advantage, though they are of little use to the owner. The worst kind of pedants among learned men, are such as are naturally endued with a very small share of common sense, and have read a great number of books without taste or distinction. The truth of it is, learning, like travelling, and all other methods of improvement, as it finishes good sense, so it makes a silly man ten thousand times more insufferable, by supplying variety of matter to his impertinence, and giving him an opportunity of abounding in absurdities. Shallow pedants cry up one another much more than men of solid and useful learning. To read the titles they give an editor, or collector of a manuscript, you would take him for the glory of the commonwealth of letters, and the wonder of his age, when perhaps upon examination you find that he has only rectified a Greek particle, or laid out a whole sentence in proper commas. They are obliged indeed to be thus lavish of their praises, that they may keep one another in countenance; and it is no wonder if a great deal of knowledge, which is not capable of making a man wise, has a natural tendency to make him vain and arrogant. No. 106.] Monday, July 2, 1711. Hinc tibi copia L. Manabit ad plenum, benigno Here plenty's liberal horn shall pour Of fruits for thee a copious show'r, Rich honours of the quiet plain. HAVING often received an invitation from my friend Sir Roger de Coverley to pass away a month with him in the country, I last week accompanied him thither, and am settled with him for some time at his country-house, where I intend to form several of my ensuing speculations. Sir Roger, I am the more at ease in Sir Roger's family, because it consists of sober and staid persons; for as the knight is the best master in the world, he seldom changes his servants; and as he is beloved by all about him, his servants never care for leaving him: by this means his domestics are all in years, and grown old with their master. You would take his valet de chambre for his brother, his butler is gray-headed, his groom is one of the gravest men that I have ever seen, and his coachman has the looks of a privy counsellor. You see the goodness of the master even in the old housedog, and in a gray pad that is kept in the stable with great care and tenderness out of regard to his past services, though he has been useless for several years. I could not but observe with a great deal of pleasure the joy that appeared in the countenances of these ancient domestics upon my friend's arrival at his country-seat. Some of them could not refrain from tears at the sight of their old master; every one of them pressed forward to do something for him, and seemed discouraged if they were not employed. At the same time the good old knight, with a mixture of the father and the master of the family, tempered the inquiries after his own affairs with several kind questions relating to themselves. This humanity and good-nature engages every body to him, so that when he is pleasant upon any of them, all his family are in good humour, and none so much as the person whom he diverts himself with: on the contrary, if he coughs, or betrays any infirmity of old age, it is easy for a stander-by to observe a secret concern in the looks of all his servants. My worthy friend has put me under the particular care of his butler, who is a very prudent man, and, as well as the rest of his fellow-servants, wonderfully desirous of pleasing me, because they have often heard their master talk of me as of his particular friend. My chief companion, when Sir Roger is diverting himself in the woods or the fields, is a very venerable man who is ever with Sir Roger, and has lived at his house in the nature of a chaplain above thirty years. This gentleman is a person of good sense and some learning, of a very regular life and obliging conversation: he heartily loves Sir Roger, and knows that he is very much in the old knight's esteem, so that he lives in the family rather as a relation than a dependent. Calamy, with several living authors who have published discourses of practical divinity. I no sooner saw this venerable man in the pulpit, but I very much approved of my friend's insisting upon the qualifications of a good aspect and a clear voice; for I was so charmed with the gracefulness of his figure and delivery, as well as with the discourses he pronounced, that I think I never passed any time more to my satisfaction. A sermon repeated after this manner, is like the composition of a poet in the mouth of a graceful actor. No. 107.] Tuesday, July 3, 1711. L. Æsopo ingentem statuam posuere Attici, The Athenians erected a large statue to sop, and placed him, though a slave, on a lasting pedestal; to show, that the way to honour lies open indifferently to all. I have observed in several of my papers that my friend Sir Roger, amidst all his good qualities, is something of a humorist; and that his virtues, as well as imperfections, are as it were tinged by a certain extravagance, which makes them particularly his, and distinguishes them from those of other men. This cast of mind, as it is generally very innocent in itself, so it renders his conversation highly agreeable, and more delightful than the same degree of sense and virtue would appear in their common I could heartily wish that more of our and ordinary colours. As I was walking country clergy would follow this example; with him last night, he asked me how I and instead of wasting their spirits in laboliked the good man whom I have just now rious compositions of their own, would enmentioned? and without staying for my an- deavour after a handsome elocution, and swer told me, that he was afraid of being all those other talents that are proper to insulted with Latin and Greek at his own enforce what has been penned by greater table; for which reason he desired a par-masters. This would not only be more easy ticular friend of his at the university to find to themselves, but more edifying to the him out a clergyman rather of plain sense people. than much learning, of a good aspect, a clear voice, a sociable temper, and, if possible, a man that understood a little of backgammon. My friend,' says Sir Roger, found me out this gentleman, who, besides the endowments required of him, is, they tell me, a good scholar, though he does not show it. I have given him the parsonage of the parish; and because I know his value, have settled upon him a good annuity for life. If he outlives me, he shall find that he was higher in my esteem than perhaps he THE reception, manner of attendance, thinks he is. He has now been with me undisturbed freedom and quiet, which I thirty years; and though he does not know meet with here in the country, has conI have taken notice of it, has never in all firmed me in the opinion I always had, that that time asked any thing of me for him- the general corruption of manners in serself, though he is every day soliciting me vants is owing to the conduct of masters. for something in behalf of one or other of The aspect of every one in the family carmy tenants his parishioners. There has not ries so much satisfaction, that it appears he been a law-suit in the parish since he has knows the happy lot which has befallen lived among them; if any dispute arises him in being a member of it. There is one they apply themselves to him for the deci- particular which I have seldom seen but at sion; if they do not acquiesce in his judg- Sir Roger's; it is usual in all other places, ment, which I think never happened above that servants fly from the parts of the house once or twice at most, they appeal to me. through which their master is passing; on At his first settling with me, I made him a the contrary, here they industriously place present of all the good sermons which have themselves in his way; and it is on both been printed in English, and only begged sides, as it were, understood as a visit, of him that every Sunday he would pro- when the servants appear without calling. nounce one of them in the pulpit. Accord-This proceeds from the humane and equal ingly he has digested them into such a temper of the man of the house, who also series, that they follow one another natu- perfectly well knows how to enjoy a great rally, and make a continued system of prac-estate with such economy as ever to be tical divinity.' Imuch beforehand. This makes his own mind untroubled, and consequently unapt to vent peevish expressions, or give passionate or inconsistent orders to those about him. Thus respect and love go together; and a certain cheerfulness in performance of their duty is the particular distinction of the lower part of this family. When a servant is called before his master, he does not come with an expectation to hear himself rated for some trivial fault, threatened to be stripped, or used with any other unbecoming language, which mean masters * As Sir Roger was going on in his story, the gentleman we were talking of came up to us; and upon the knight's asking him who preached to-morrow (for it was Saturday night,) told us the bishop of St. Asaph in the morning, and Dr. South in the afternoon. He then showed us his list of preachers for the whole year, where I saw with a great deal of pleasure, archbishop Tillotson, bishop Saunderson, Dr. Barrow, Dr. 1 * Dr. Fleetwood. as humble, and as ready as he was. There is something wonderful in the narrowness of those minds, which can be pleased, and be barren of bounty to those who please them. often give to worthy servants; but it is often | ment will make his successor be as diligent, to know, what road he took, that he came so readily back according to order; whether he passed by such a ground; if the old man who rents it is in good health; or whether he gave Sir Roger's love to him, or the like. A man who preserves a respect founded on his benevolence to his dependents, lives rather like a prince than a master in his family; his orders are received as favours rather than duties; and the distinction of approaching him is part of the reward for executing what is commanded by him. There is another circumstance in which my friend excels in his management, which is, the manner of rewarding his servants. He has ever been of opinion, that giving his cast clothes to be worn by valets has a very ill effect upon little minds, and creates a silly sense of equality between the parties, in persons affected only with outward things. I have heard him often pleasant on this occasion, and describe a young gentleman abusing his man in that coat, which a month or two before was the most pleasing distinction he was conscious of in himself. He would turn his discourse still more pleasantly upon the bounties of the ladies of this kind; and I have heard him say he knew a fine woman, who distributed rewards and punishments in giving becoming or unbecoming dresses to her maids.. But my good friend is above these little instances of good-will, in bestowing only trifles on his servants; a good servant to him is sure of having it in his choice very soon of being no servant at all. As I before observed, he is so good a husband, and knows so thoroughly that the skill of the purse is the cardinal virtue of this life; I say, he knows so well that frugality is the support of generosity, that he can often spare a large fine when a tenement falls, and give that settlement to a good servant who has a mind to go into the world, or make a stranger pay the fine to that servant, for his more comfortable maintenance, if he stays in his service. One might, on this occasion, recount the sense that great persons in all ages have had of the merit of their dependents, and the heroic services which men have done their masters in the extremity of their fortunes, and shown to their undone patrons, that fortune was all the difference between them; but as I design this my speculation only as a gentle admonition to thankless masters, I shall not go out of the occurrences of common life, but assert it as a general observation, that I never saw, but in Sir Roger's family, and one or two more, good servants treated as they ought to be. Sir Roger's kindness extends to their children's children, and this very morning he sent his coachman's grandson to prentice. I shall conclude this paper with an account of a picture in his gallery, where there are many which will deserve my future observation. At the very upper end of this handsome structure I saw the portraiture of two young men standing in a river, the one naked, the other in livery. The person supported seemed half dead, but still so much alive as to show in his face exquisite joy and love towards the other. I thought the fainting figure resembled my friend Sir Roger: and looking at the butler who stood by me, for an account of it, he informed me that the person in the livery was a servant of Sir Roger's, who stood on the shore while his master was swimming, and observing him taken with some sudden illness, and sink under water, jumped in and saved him. He told me Sir Roger took off the dress he was in as soon as he came home, and by a great bounty at that time, followed by his favour ever since, had made him master of that pretty seat which we saw at a distance as we came to this house. I remembered indeed Sir Roger said, there lived a very worthy gentleman, to whom he was highly A man of honour and generosity considers obliged, without mentioning any thing furit would be miserable to himself to have no ther. Upon my looking a little dissatisfied will but that of another, though it were of at some part of the picture, my attendant the best person breathing, and for that rea-informed me that it was against Sir Roger's son goes on as fast as he is able to put his will, and at the earnest request of the genservants into independent livelihoods. The tleman himself, that he was drawn in the greatest part of Sir Roger's estate is ten-habit in which he had saved his master. anted by persons who have served himself or his ancestors. It was to me extremely pleasant to observe the visitants from several parts to welcome his arrival into the Country: and all the difference that I could take notice of between the late servants who came to see him, and those who staid in the family, was that these latter were looked upon as finer gentlemen and better courtiers, a This manumission and placing them in way of livelihood, I look upon as only what is due to a good servant; which encourage R. No. 108.] Wednesday, July 4, 1711. Gratis anhelans, multa agendo nihil agens. with Sir Roger before his house, a country- Mr. Thomas Morecraft, a Yorkshire gentleman. 6 that very morning; and that he presented it | his guest discovered at sight of the good old with his service to him, and intended to come and dine with him. At the same time he delivered a letter, which my friend read to me as soon as the messenger left him. 'SIR ROGER, I desire you to accept of a jack, which is the best I have caught this season. I intend to come and stay with you a week, and see how the perch bite in the Black river. I observed with some concern, the last time I saw you upon the bowling-green, that your whip wanted a lash to it: I will bring half a dozen with me that I twisted last week, which I hope will serve you all the time you are in the country. have not been out of the saddle for six days last past, having been at Eton with Sir John's eldest son. He takes to his learning hugely.—I am sir, your humble servant, 'WILL WIMBLE.' This extraordinary letter, and message that accompanied it, made me very curious to know the character and quality of the gentleman who sent them; which I found to be as follows.-Will Wimble is younger brother to a baronet, and descended of the ancient family of the Wimbles. He is now between forty and fifty; but being bred to no business, and born to no estate, he generally lives with his elder brother as superintendent of his game. He hunts a pack of dogs better than any man in the country, and is very famous for finding out a hare. He is extremely well versed in all the little handicrafts of an idle man. He makes a May-fly to a miracle; and furnishes the whole country with angle-rods. As he is a good-natured officious fellow, and very much esteemed upon account of his family, he is a welcome guest at every house, and keeps up a good correspondence among all the gentlemen about him. He carries a tulip root in his pocket from one to another, or exchanges a puppy between a couple of friends that live perhaps in the opposite sides of the country. Will is a particular favourite of all the young heirs, whom he frequently obliges with a net that he has weaved, or a setting-dog that he has made himself. He now and then presents a pair of garters of his own knitting to their mothers or sisters; and raises a great deal of mirth among them, by enquiring, as often as he meets them, "how they wear!" These gentleman-like manufactures and obliging little humours make Will the darling of the country. Sir Roger was proceeding in the character of him, when he saw him make up to us with two or three hazle twigs in his hand that he had cut in Sir Roger's woods, as he came through them, in his way to the house. I was very much pleased to observe on one side the hearty and sincere welcome with which Sir Roger received him, and on the other, the secret joy which knight. After the first salutes were over, Will desired Sir Roger to lend him one of his servants to carry a set of shuttlecocks he had with him in a little box, to a lady that lived about a mile off, to whom it seems he had promised such a present for above this half year. Sir Roger's back was no sooner turned but honest Will began to tell me of a large cock pheasant that he had sprung in one of the neighbouring woods, with two or three other adventures of the same nature. Odd and uncommon characters are the game that I look for, and most delight in; for which reason I was as much pleased with the novelty of the person that talked to me, as he could be for his life with the springing of a pheasant, and therefore listened to him with more than ordinary attention. In the midst of this discourse the bell rung to dinner, where the gentleman I have been speaking of had the pleasure of seeing the huge jack he had caught, served up for the first dish in a most sumptuous manner. Upon our sitting down to it he gave us a long account how he had hooked it, played with it, foiled it, and at length drew it out upon the bank, with several other particulars that lasted all the first course. A dish of wild fowl that came afterwards furnished conversation for the rest of the dinner, which concluded with a late invention of Will's for improving the quail-pipe. Upon withdrawing into my room after dinner, I was secretly touched with compassion towards the honest gentleman that had dined with us; and could not but consider with a great deal of concern, how so good a heart and such busy hands were wholly employed in trifles; that so much humanity should be so little beneficial to others, and so much industry so little advantageous to himself. The same temper of mind and application to affairs might have recommended him to the public esteem, and have raised his fortune in another station of life. What good to his country or himself might not a trader or a merchant have done with such useful though ordinary qualifications? Will Wimble's is the case of many a younger brother of a great family, who had rather see their children starve like gentlemen, than thrive in a trade or profession that is beneath their quality. This humour fills several parts of Europe with pride and beggary. It is the happiness of a trading nation like ours, that the younger sons, though incapable of any liberal-art or profession, may be placed in such a way of life, as may perhaps enable them to vie with the best of their family, Accordingly we find several citizens that were launched into the world with narrow fortunes, rising by an honest industry to greater estates than those of their elder brothers. It is not improbable but Will was formerly tried at divinity, law, or physic; and that finding him on the pummel of his saddle, he in his genius did not lie that way, his parents that manner rid the tournament over, with gave him up at length to his own inven- an air that showed he did it rather to pertions. But certainly, however improper form the rule of the lists, than expose his he might have been for studies of a higher enemy; however, it appeared he knew how nature, he was perfectly well turned for to make use of a victory, and with a gentle the occupations of trade and commerce. trot he marched up to a gallery, where As I think this a point which cannot be too their mistress sat, (for they were rivals,) much inculcated, I shall desire my reader and let him down with laudable courtesy to compare what I have here written with and pardonable insolence. I do not know what I have said in my twenty-first specu- but it might be exactly where the coffeelation. L. house is now. No. 109.] Thursday, July 5, 1711. Abnormis sapiens Hor. Lib. 2. Sat. ii. 3. 'You are to know this my ancestor was not only a military genius, but fit also for the arts of peace, for he played on the baseviol as well as any gentleman at court; you see where his viol hangs by his basket-hilt sword. The action at the Tilt-yard you Of plain good sense, untutor'd in the schools. may be sure won the fair lady, who was a I WAS this morning walking in the gal- maid of honour, and the greatest beauty of lery, when sir Roger entered at the end her time; here she stands, the next picture. opposite to me, and advancing towards You see, sir, my great great great grandme, said he was glad to meet me among mother has on the new-fashioned petticoat, his relations the De Coverleys, and hoped except that the modern is gathered at the I liked the conversation of so much good waist; my grandmother appears as if she company, who were as silent as myself. I stood in a large drum, whereas the ladies knew he alluded to the pictures, and as he now walk as if they were in a go-cart. For is a gentleman who does not a little value all this lady was bred at court, she behimself upon his ancient descent, I expect-came an excellent country wife, she brought ed he would give me some account of them. ten children, and when I show you the We were now arrived at the upper end of library, you shall see in her own hand (althe gallery, when the knight faced towards lowing for the difference of the language) one of the pictures, and as we stood before the best receipt now in England both for a it, he entered into the matter, after his hasty-pudding and a white-pot. blunt way of saying things, as they occur to his imagination, without regular introduc-it tion, or care to preserve the appearance of a chain of thought. 'It is,' said he, worth while to consider the force of dress; and how the persons of one age differ from those of another, merely by that only. One may observe, also, that the general fashion of one age has been followed by one particular set of people in another, and by them preserved from one generation to another. Thus the vast jetting coat and small_bonnet, which was the habit in Henry the Seventh's time, is kept on in the yeoman of the guard; not without a good and politic view, because they look a foot taller, and a foot and a half broader: besides, that the cap leaves the face expanded, and consequently more terrible, and fitter to stand at the entrance of palaces. This predecessor of ours you see is dressed after this manner, and his cheeks would be no larger than mine, were he in a hat as I am. He was the last man that won a prize in the Tilt-yard (which is now a common street before Whitehall.) You see the broken lance that lies there by his right foot. He shivered that lance of his adversary all to pieces: and bearing himself, look you, sir, in this manner, at the same time he came within the target of the gentleman who rode against him, and taking him with incredible force before 'If you please to fall back a little, because is necessary to look at the three next pictures at one view; these are three sisters. She on the right hand who is so very beautiful, died a maid; the next to her, still handsomer, had the same fate, against her will; this homely thing in the middle had both their portions added to her own, and was stolen by a neighbouring gentleman, a man of stratagem and resolution, for he poisoned three mastiffs to come at her, and knocked down two deer-stealers in carrying her off. Misfortunes happen in all families. The theft of this romp, and so much money, was no great matter to our estate. But the next heir that possessed it was this soft gentleman, whom you see there. Observe the small buttons, the little boots, the laces, the slashes about his clothes, and above all the posture he is drawn in, (which to be sure was his own choosing,) you see he sits with one hand on a desk writing, and looking as it were another way, like an easy writer, or a sonnetteer. He was one of those that had too much wit to know how to live in the world; he was a man of no justice, but great good manners; he ruined every body that had any thing to do with him, but never said a rude thing in his life; the most indolent person in the world; he would sign a deed that passed away half his estate with his gloves on, but would not put on his hat before a lady if it were to save his country. He is |