make us a visit, and I'll subscribe to any side of thefa important questions which you please. We differ lefs than you imagine, perhaps, when you wish'd me banished again: but I am not less true to you and to Philofophy in England, than I was in France.

Had rather live in forty Irelands than under the frequent difquiets of hearing you are out of order. I always apprehend it most after a great dinner; for the leaft Tranfgreffion of yours, if it be only two bits and one fup more than your stint, is a great debauch; for which you certainly pay more than those fots who are carry'd dead drunk to bed. My Lord Peterborow spoiled every body's dinner; but efpecially mine, with telling us that you were detained by fickness. Pray let me have three lines under any hand or pot-hook that will give me a better account of your health; which concerns me more than others, because I love and esteem you for reafons that most others have little to do with, and would be the fame although you had never touched a pen, further than with writing to me.

I am gathering up my luggage, and preparing for my journey; I will endeavour to think of you as little as I can, and when I write to you, I will strive not to think of you: This I intend in return to your

kindness; and further, I know no body has dealt with me fo cruelly as you, the confequences of which ufage I fear will last as long as my life, for fo long fhall I be (in fpite of my heart) entirely Yours.

M

LETTER XVI.

Aug. 22, 1726.

Any a fhort figh you coft me the day I left you, and many more you will cost me, till the day. you return. I really walk'd about like a man banifhed, and when I came home found it no home. 'Tis a fenfation like that of a limb lopp'd off, one is trying every minute unawares to use it, and finds it is not. I may fay you have used me more cruelly than you have done any other man; you have made it more impossible for me to live at ease without you: Habitude itself would have done that, if I had lefs friendship in my nature than I have. Befides my natural memory of you, you have made a local one, which prefents you to me in every place I frequent; I fhall never more think of Lord Cobham's, woods of Ciceter, or the pleafing prospect of Byberry, but your Idea must be joined with 'em; nor fee one feat in my own garden, or one room in my own house, without a Phantome of you, fitting or walking before me. I travelled with you to Chester, I felt the extream heat of the weather, the inns, the roads, the confinement and clofenefs of the uneasy coach, and wifh'd a hundred times I had either a Deanery or a Horfe in my gift. In real truth, I have felt my foul peevith ever fince with all about me, from a warm uneafy defire after you, I am

the

gone out of myself to no purpose, and cannot catch you. Inhiat in pedes was not more properly apply'd to a poor dog after a hare, than to me with regard to your departure. I wish I could think no more of it, but lye down and fleep till we meet again, and let that day (how far foever off it be) be the morrow. Since I cannot, may it be my amends that every thing you wifh may attend you where you are, and that you may find every friend you have there, in the state you wish him, or her; fo that your visits to us may have no other effect, than the progrefs of a rich man to a remote estate, which he finds greater than he expected; which knowledge only ferves to make him live happier where he is, with no disagreeable prospect if ever he should chuse to remove. May this be your state till it become what I wifh. But indeed I cannot exprefs the warmth, with which I wish you all things, and myfelf you. Indeed you are ingraved elsewhere than on the Cups you fent me, (with fo kind an inscription) and I might throw them into the Thames without injury to the giver. I am not pleas'd with them, but take them very kindly too: And had I fufpected any fuch usage from you, I thould have enjoyed your company less than I really did, for at this rate I may say

Nec tecum poffum vivere, nec fine te.

I will bring you over just such another prefent, when I go to the Deanery of St. Patrick's; which I promise you to do, if ever I am enabled to return your kindnefs. Donarem Pateras, &c. Till then I'll drink (or Gay fhall drink) daily healths to you, and I'll add to your infcription the old Roman Vow for years to come, VOTIS X. VOTIS XX. My Mother's age gives me authority to hope it for yours. Adieu.

LETTER XVII.

Sept. 3, 1726.

Ours to Mr. Gay gave me greater fatisfaction than that to me (tho' that gave me a great deal) for to hear you were safe at your journey's end, exceeds the account of your fatigues while in the way to it otherwise believe me, every tittle of each is important to me, which fets any one thing before my eyes that happens to you. I writ you a long letter, which I guess reach'd you the day after your arrival. Since then I had a conference with Sir who exprefs'ed his defire of having feen you again before you left us. He faid he obferved a willingness in you to live among us; which I did not deny; but at the fame time told him, you had no fuch defign in your coming this time, which was merely to fee a few of thofe you loved: but that indeed all thofe wifhed it, and particularly Lord Peterborow and myfelf, who wifhed you lov'd Ireland lefs, had you any reafon to love England more. I faid nothing but what I think wou'd induce any man to be as fond of you as I, plain Truth, did they know either it, or you. I can't help thinking (when I confider the whole fhort Lift of our friends) that none of them except you and I are qualify'd for the Mountains of Wales. The Dr. goes to Cards, Gay to Court; one lofes money, one lofes his time: Another of our friends labours to be unambitious, but he labours in an unwilling foil. One Lady you like has too much of France to be fit for Wales: Another is too much a fubject to Princes and Potentates, to relifh that wild Taste of liberty and poverty, Mr. Congreve is

'too' fick to bear a thin air; and fhe that leads him too rich to enjoy any thing. Lord Peterborow can go to any climate, but never stay in any. Lord Bathurst is too great an husbandman to like barren hills, except they are his own to improve. Mr. Bethel indeed is too good and too honeft to live in the world, but yet 'tis fit, for its example, he fhould. We are left to ourselves in my opinion, and may live where we please, in Wales, Dublin, or Bermudas: And for me, I affure you I love the world fo well, and it loves me fo well, that I care not in what part of it I pass the rest of my days. I fee no fun. fhine but in the face of a friend.

I had a glympfe of a letter of yours lately, by which I find you are (like the vulgar) apter to think well of people out of power, than of people in power; perhaps 'tis a mistake, but however there's fomething in it generous. Mr. ** takes it extreme kindly, I can perceive, and he has a great mind to thank you for that good opinion, for which I believe he is only to thank his ill fortune: for if I am not in an error, he would rather be in power than out.

To fhew you how fit Iam to live in the mountains, I will with great truth apply to myself an old fentence: Those that are in, may abide in; and those that are out, may abide out: yet to me, thofe that are in fhall be as those that are out, and those that are out fhall be as thofe that are in."

I am indifferent as to all those matters, but I mifs you as much as I did the first day, when (with a fhort figh) I parted. Wherever you are, (or on the mountains of Wales, or on the coaft of Dublin,

Tu mihi, feu magni fuperas jam faxa Timavi,
Sive or an Illyrici legis æquoris — )

I am, and ever fhall be Yours, &c.