Printed for H. Payne & W. Croply, at Dryden’s Head in Paternoster Row.
John Macnaghton, Esq., was a real gentleman criminal, and though food for the halter was plenty in 1762 and thereabouts, gentlemen were “tucked up” still more rarely than within ordinary recollections; for stern as was the law a hundred years ago, it had very merciful consideration for persons of quality, and the hanging of a landed proprietor for a mere paltry murder was a very noticeable event. In the London Gazette of February 23-27, we find a record of the coronation of their illustrious and sacred Majesties, George and Charlotte, which runs thus:—
Albemarle St., Feby. 26, 1762.
THE Gold Medals intended for the Peers and Peeresses who in their robes attended at the Coronation of their Majesties (according to a list obtained from the proper officers) will be delivered at the Earl of Powis’s house in Albemarle Street, on Wednesday and Thursday next, from ten to twelve o’clock each day.
It is therefore desired that the Peers and Peeresses, as above mentioned, will send for their Medals; and that the persons who shall be sent for them shall bring Cards, signed by such Peers or Peeresses, as the Medals shall be required for, and sealed with their Arms.
In the same paper we come upon the advertisement of a book which is even now read with interest, though the price at which a modern issue of it is offered is ludicrously small compared with that of the original edition:—
THIS day is published, in small quarto, Price Thirty Shillings, Printed at Strawberry Hill, Anecdotes of Painting in England, with incidental Notes on other Arts. Collected by the late Mr George Vertue, and now first digested and published from his original Manuscripts. By Mr Horace Walpole. Vol. I. and II. With above forty Copper plates, four of which are taken from antient Paintings; the rest, heads of Artists, engraved by Grignion, Muller, Chambers, and Bannerman.
To be had of W. Bathoe, Bookseller, in the Strand, near Exeter Exchange.
As we have no wish whatever to paint the lily, we will, although the subject is a kindred one, leave Horace Walpole’s book without a fresh criticism to add to the thousand and odd already passed upon it, and will pass on to the land “where the men are all brave and the women all beautiful,” and where, in Faulkner’s Dublin Journal, also of February 1762, we come upon the cry of a young man for his mother. In the advertisement is the nucleus of a story quite equal to “Tom Jones,” provided, of course, that its author possessed the fancy of a Fielding. We are not aware of any literary gentleman who would succeed, though we are acquainted with plenty who would most confidently make the attempt; their only doubt, if doubt possessed them at all, being not in their own powers, but in the discernment of the reading public. To them, therefore, we present the groundwork of a story which would naturally enlist the sympathies of England and Ireland. A little might also be thrown in for the benefit of Scotland, which would hardly like to be left out of so fascinating a romance:—
WHEREAS a lady who called herself a native of Ireland was in England in the year 1740, and resided some time at a certain village near Bath, where she was delivered of a son, whom she left with a sum of money under the care of a person in the same parish, and promised to fetch him at a certain age, but has not since been heard of; now this is to desire the lady, if living, and this should be so fortunate as to be seen by her, to send a letter, directed to T. E. to be left at the Chapter Coffee house, St Paul’s Churchyard, London, wherein she is desired to give an account of herself, and her reasons for concealing this affair: or if the lady should be dead, and any person is privy to the affair, they are likewise desired to direct as above.—N.B. This advertisement is published by the person himself, not from motives of necessity, or to court any assistance (he being, by a series of happy circumstances, possessed of an easy and independent fortune) but with a real desire to know his origin.—P.S. The strictest secrecy may be depended on.