FOOTNOTES:
[46] See No. 151.
[47] The Spectator contains accounts of the new-fashioned hoods, which were made in various tints, especially cherry-colour. In the reign of King William the ladies wore a high head-dress, as appears from the following passage in a letter of Swift to Esther Johnson, dated Nov. 22, 1711: "I dined to-day with Sir Thomas Hanmer, whose lady, the Duchess of Grafton, wears a great high head-dress, such as was in fashion fifteen years ago, and looks like a mad woman in it, yet she has great remains of beauty." In the Spectator (No. 98) Addison refers to these high head-dresses as in fashion ten years earlier, i.e. about 1701.
[48] This picture of Flavia has been thought to be a representation of Mrs. Anne Oldfield (see No. 10), of whom Cibber wrote: "Had her birth placed her in a higher rank of life, she had certainly appeared in reality what in the character of Lady Betty Modish she only excellently acted, an agreeable gay woman of quality, a little too conscious of her natural attractions. I have often seen her in private societies, where women of the first rank might have borrowed some part of their behaviour, without the least diminution of their sense of dignity." From this passage it will be seen that the account of a lady "of quality," with "the greatest simplicity of manners," can hardly be a description of Mrs. Oldfield. Moreover, the name "Flavia" occurs in No. 239, by Addison, and it appears that the lady there referred to was Miss Osborne, who became Atterbury's wife.
[49] Something used to frighten children. Cf. Sir T. Smith's "Appendix to his Life," p. 34: "As children be afraid of bear-bugs and bull-beggars."
[50] See No. 210
[51] Ibid.
[No. 213. [Steele.]
From Thursday, Aug. 17, to Saturday, Aug. 19, 1710.
Sheer Lane, Aug. 16.
There has of late crept in among the downright English a mighty spirit of dissimulation. But before we discourse of this vice, it will be necessary to observe, that the learned make a difference between simulation and dissimulation.[52] Simulation is a pretence of what is not, and dissimulation a concealment of what is. The latter is our present affair. When you look round you in public places in this island, you see the generality of mankind carry in their countenance an air of challenge or defiance: and there is no such man to be found among us who naturally strives to do greater honours and civilities than he receives. This innate sullenness or stubbornness of complexion is hardly to be conquered by any of our islanders. For which reason, however they may pretend to choose one another, they make but very awkward rogues; and their dislike to each other is seldom so well dissembled, but it is suspected. When once it is so, it had as good be professed. A man who dissembles well must have none of what we call stomach, otherwise he will be cold in his professions of good-will where he hates; an imperfection of the last ill consequence in business. This fierceness in our natures is apparent from the conduct of our young fellows, who are not got into the schemes and arts of life which the children of this world walk by. One would think that, of course, when a man of any consequence for his figure, his mien, or his gravity, passes by a youth, he should certainly have the first advances of salutation; but he is, you may observe, treated in a quite different manner, it being the very characteristic of an English temper to defy. As I am an Englishman, I find it a very hard matter to bring myself to pull off the hat first; but it is the only way to be upon any good terms with those we meet with: therefore the first advance is of high moment. Men judge of others by themselves; and he that will command with us must condescend. It moves one's spleen very agreeably to see fellows pretend to be dissemblers without this lesson. They are so reservedly complaisant till they have learned to resign their natural passions, that all the steps they make towards gaining those whom they would be well with, are but so many marks of what they really are, and not of what they would appear.
The rough Britons, when they pretend to be artful towards one another, are ridiculous enough; but when they set up for vices they have not, and dissemble their good with an affectation of ill, they are insupportable. I know two men in this town who make as good figures as any in it, that manage their credit so well as to be thought atheists, and yet say their prayers morning and evening. Tom Springly the other day pretended to go to an assignation with a married woman at Rosamond's Pond,[53] and was seen soon after reading the responses with great gravity at six-of-clock prayers.
Sheer Lane, Aug. 17.
Though the following epistle bears a just accusation of myself, yet in regard it is a more advantageous piece of justice to another, I insert it at large:
Garraway's Coffee-house,
Aug. 10.
"Mr. Bickerstaff,
"I have lately read your paper[54] wherein you represent a conversation between a young lady, your three nephews, and yourself; and am not a little offended at the figure you give your young merchant in the presence of a beauty. The topic of love is a subject on which a man is more beholden to nature for his eloquence, than to the instruction of the schools, or my lady's woman. From the two latter, your scholar and page must have reaped all their advantage above him. I know by this time you have pronounced me a trader. I acknowledge it, but cannot bear the exclusion from any pretence of speaking agreeably to a fine woman, or from any degree of generosity that way. You have among us citizens many well-wishers, but it is for the justice of your representations, which we, perhaps, are better judges of than you (by the account you give of your nephew) seem to allow.
"To give you an opportunity of making us some reparation, I desire you would tell your own way the following instance of heroic love in the city. You are to remember, that somewhere in your writings, for enlarging the territories of virtue and honour, you have multiplied the opportunities of attaining to heroic virtue, and have hinted, that in whatever state of life a man is, if he does things above what is ordinarily performed by men of his rank, he is in those instances a hero.[55]
"Tom Trueman, a young gentleman of eighteen years of age, fell passionately in love with the beauteous Almira, daughter to his master. Her regard for him was no less tender. Trueman was better acquainted with his master's affairs than his daughter, and secretly lamented that each day brought him by many miscarriages nearer bankruptcy than the former. This unhappy posture of their affairs the youth suspected was owing to the ill management of a factor, in whom his master had an entire confidence. Trueman took a proper occasion, when his master was ruminating on his decaying fortune, to address him for leave to spend the remainder of his time with his foreign correspondent. During three years' stay in that employment he became acquainted with all that concerned his master; and by his great address in the management of that knowledge, saved him ten thousand pounds. Soon after this accident, Trueman's uncle left him a considerable estate. Upon receiving that advice, he returned to England, and demanded Almira of her father. The father, overjoyed at the match, offered him the £10,000 he had saved him, with the further proposal of resigning to him all his business. Trueman refused both, and retired into the country with his bride, contented with his own fortune, though perfectly skilled in all the methods of improving it.
"It is to be noted, that Trueman refused twenty thousand pounds with another young lady; so that reckoning both his self-denials, he is to have in your court the merit of having given £30,000 for the woman he loved. This gentleman I claim your justice to; and hope you will be convinced, that some of us have larger views than only cash debtor, per contra creditor.
"Yours,
"Richard Traffic."
"N.B.—Mr. Thomas Trueman of Lime Street is entered among the heroes of domestic life.
"Charles Lillie."