“O yes! and married for love too,” answered the other; “but he hath loved away all his love for her long ago, and now, he says, she makes as fine an object of hatred. I think, if the fellow ever appears to have any wit, it is when he abuses his wife; and, luckily for him, that is his favourite topic. I don’t know the poor wretch, but, as he describes her, it is a miserable animal.”
“I know her very well,” cries the other; “and I am much mistaken if she is not even with him; but hang him! what is become of Booth?”
At this instant a great noise arose near that part where the two ladies were. This was occasioned by a large assembly of young fellows whom they call bucks, who were got together, and were enjoying, as the phrase is, a letter, which one of them had found in the room.
Curiosity hath its votaries among all ranks of people; whenever therefore an object of this appears it is as sure of attracting a croud in the assemblies of the polite as in those of their inferiors.
When this croud was gathered together, one of the bucks, at the desire of his companions, as well as of all present, performed the part of a public orator, and read out the following letter, which we shall give the reader, together with the comments of the orator himself, and of all his audience.
The orator then, being mounted on a bench, began as follows:
“Here beginneth the first chapter of—saint—Pox on’t, Jack, what is the saint’s name? I have forgot.”
“Timothy, you blockhead,” answered another; “—Timothy.”
“Well, then,” cries the orator, “of Saint Timothy.
“‘SIR,—I am very sorry to have any occasion of writing on the following subject in a country that is honoured with the name of Christian; much more am I concerned to address myself to a man whose many advantages, derived both from nature and fortune, should demand the highest return of gratitude to the great Giver of all those good things. Is not such a man guilty of the highest ingratitude to that most beneficent Being, by a direct and avowed disobedience of his most positive laws and commands?