He was born on a May-day, so it will not be hard to remember so much of his birthday. But how shall we remember the date? Well, you know the first figure of course, for as we count time, it is always one. Now jump to six. Sixteen hundred? Yes; that's it. Two more figures. What is the next figure to six? Set it down. And the next figure to one? Set that down. Now what have you? Sixteen hundred and seventy-two. A little thinking will fix that date so you will not be likely to forget it, and it is really quite nice to know just when people lived. Now what was Addison, that people are remembering him for two hundred years? First a scholar. Then he must have studied hard. Also he was an author—a poet. When he was about twenty-one he wrote a poem addressed to Dryden. Just remember that man's name, will you? Some day we will make his acquaintance. Then he translated Latin poetry, and wrote several descriptive poems. People do not seem to have thought any of them remarkable, and for my part I don't know how he made his living.
JOSEPH ADDISON.
We next hear of him as a traveller. His friends managed to get a pension for him from the king, which was to give him a chance to
travel and qualify himself to serve his Majesty.
Imagine our government giving a young man a salary to travel around with, just so that he might get ready to work for it! Joseph went to France, and to Italy, and to Switzerland. Wait, did I tell you where he was born? In Wiltshire, England. His father was a minister. I don't think the government was so very good to him, though, for it forgot to pay his salary, after the first year, and he had to pay his own travelling expenses. He seems to have worked hard at his writing, and some of the poems which people read and admire to-day were written during these journeys. One named the "Letter From Italy." Some people think it is the very best of all his poems.
When he was thirty-eight years old his life began to grow brighter. His friends succeeded in getting him a government office, and there was a certain great duke about whose victories Addison made a poem for which he was paid a large price. From that time he steadily rose in power. He became secretary to Lord Halifax, and then entered Parliament. In this place he knew one thing which great men do not always learn. That was, how to keep still. He was
spoken of as "the silent member." A good deal of his writing is in the form of plays which were acted in the theatres.
He had a friend named Richard Steele, with whom we must sometime get acquainted. This Mr. Steele was editor of a paper called The Tattler, for which Addison wrote a great deal. The paper which followed The Tattler was named The Spectator, and in these two papers are gathered some of the finest writings of the two men. Newspapers were not so plenty then as now, and The Spectator became famous. Everybody took it. Addison's essays which were written for it are still read and admired.