have it taken back, and the press broke, and let her be satisfied.

The work is done, and there is no more need of the Drapier.

Mrs. Johnson does not understand what you mean by her stamped linen, and remembers nothing of it; supposes it is some jest.

but

The ladies are well; all our services to Mrs. Worrall. Mrs. Dingley at last discovered the meaning of the stamped linen, which makes that part of my letter needless.

Pray pay Jo. Beaumont four pounds for a horse I bought from him, and place it to my account.

J. S.

When Jo. brings you a piece of linen of twentyfour yards, pray put my name upon it, and pay him six pounds, eight shillings.

FROM GEORGE ROCHFORT, ESQ.

DEAR SIR,

WEDNESDAY MORNING,
SEPT. 9, 1725.

I FIND myself stand in need of the advice I be

*

stowed on you the other night, and therefore if you have not got rid of your cold, I would prescribe a small jaunt to Belcamp this morning. If you find yourself thus disposed, I will wait for you here in my boots the weather may perhaps look gloomy

* Dr. Grattan's, about five miles from Dublin.

at the deanery; but I can assure you it is a fine day in the parish, where we set up for as good tastes as our neighbours to convince you of mine, I send you this invitation. I am, dear sir, your much obliged and obedient servant,

GEORGE ROCHFORT.

TO DR. SHERIDAN.

QUILCA, SEPT. 11, 1725.

IF you are indeed a discarded courtier, you have

reason to complain, but none at all to wonder; you are too young for many experiences to fall in your way, yet you have read enough to make you know the nature of man. It is safer for a man's interest to blaspheme God, than to be of a party out of power, or even to be thought so. And since the last was the case, how could you imagine that all mouths would not be open when you were received, and in some manner preferred by the government, though in a poor way? I tell you, there is hardly a whig in Ireland, who would allow a potatoe and butter milk to a reputed tory. Neither is there any thing in your countrymen upon this article, more than what is common in all other nations, only quoad magis et mimus. Too much advertency is not your talent, or else you had fled from that text, as from a rock-†.

St. Mary's parish, about a mile from the deanery. +"ufficient to the day is the evil thereof;" on which Dr. Sheridan preached on the first of August.

For

For as Don Quixote said to Sancho, what business had you to speak of a halter in a family, where one of it was hanged ? And your innocence is a protection, that wise men are ashamed to rely on, farther than with God. It is indeed against common sense to think, that you should choose such a time, when you had received a favour from the lord lieutenant, and had reason to expect more, to discover your disloyalty in the pulpit. But what will that avail? Therefore sit down and be quiet, and mind your business as you should do, and contract your friendships, and expect no more from man than such an animal is capable of, and you will every day find my description of Yahoes more resembling. You should think and deal with every man as a villain, without calling him so, or flying from him, or valuing him less. This is an old true lesson. You believe, every one will acquit you of any regard to temporal interest; and how came you to claim an exception from all mankind? I believe you value your temporal interest as much as any body, but you have not the arts of pursuing it. You are mistaken. Domestick evils are no more within a man than others; and he who cannot bear up against the first, will sink under the second, and in my conscience I believe this is your case; for being of a weak constitution, in an employment precarious and tiresome, loaden with children, a man of intent and abstracted thinking, enslaved by mathematicks, and complaint of the world, this new weight of party malice hath struck you down, like a feather on a horse's back already loaden as far as he is able to bear. You ought to change the apostle's expres

sion, and say, I will strive to learn in whatever state, &c.

I will hear none of your visions; you shall live at Quilca but three fortnights and a month in the year; perhaps not so much. You shall make no entertainments but what are necessary to your interests; for your true friends would rather see you over a piece of mutton and a bottle once a quarter; you shall be merry at the expense of others; you shall take care of your health, and go early to bed, and not read late at night; and laugh with all men, without trusting any; and then a fig for the contrivers of your ruin, who now have no farther thoughts than to stop your progress, which perhaps they may not compass, unless I am deceived more than is usual. All this you will do, si mihi credis, and not dream of printing your sermon, which is a project abounding with objections unanswerable, and with which I could fill this letter. You say nothing of having preached before the lord lieutenant, nor whether he is altered toward you ; for you speak nothing but generals. You think all the world has now nothing to do but to pull Mr. Sheridan down, whereas it is nothing but a slap in your turn, and away. Lord Oxford said once to me on an occasion, these fools, because they hear a noise about their ears of their own making, think the whole world is full of it. When I come to town, we will change all this scene, and act like men of the world. Grow rich and you will have no enemies; go sometimes to the castle, keep fast Mr. Tickell and Balaguer; frequent those on the right side, friends

* He was private secretary to lord Carteret.

to

to the present powers; drop those, who are loud on the wrong party, because they know they can suffer nothing by it.

FROM THE SAME.

QUILCA, SEPT. 19, 1725.

WE have prevailed with Neal, in spite of his harvest, to carry up miss, with your directions; and it is high time, for she was run almost wild, though we have something civilised her since she came among us. You are too short in circumstances. I did not hear you was forbid preaching. Have you seen my lord? Who forbad you to preach? Are you no longer chaplain? Do you never go to the castle? Are you certain of the accuser, that it is Tighe? Do you think my lord acts thus, because he fears it would breed ill humour, if he should openly favour one who is looked on as of a different party? I think, that is too mean for him. I do not much disapprove your letter, but I think it a wrong method; pray read over the enclosed twice, and if you do not dislike it, let it be sent (not by a servant of yours, nor from you) to Mr. Tickell. There the case is stated as well as I could do it in generals, for want of knowing particulars. When I come to

• Richard Tighe, esq., a privy counsellor, and member of the Irish parliament. This gentleman, of whom the dean seems to have had an unfavourable opinion, "hitches in a rhyme," in a poem addressed to Mr. Lindsay in 1728. See vol. VII.

6

town,