"Your humble Servant,
"The unfortunate
"Statira."
The name my correspondent gives herself, puts me in mind of my old reading in romances, and brings into my thoughts a speech of the renowned Don Bellianis, who, upon a complaint made him of a discourteous knight, that had left his injured paramour in the same manner, dries up her tears with a promise of relief. "Disconsolate damsel," quoth he, "a foul disgrace it were to all right worthy professors of chivalry, if such a blot to knighthood should pass unchastised. Give me to know the abode of this recreant lover, and I will give him as a feast to the fowls of the air, or drag him bound before you at my horse's tail."
I am not ashamed to own myself a champion of distressed damsels, and would venture as far to relieve them as Don Bellianis; for which reason, I do invite this lady to let me know the name of the traitor who has deceived her; and do promise, not only her, but all the fair ones of Great Britain who lie under the same calamity, to employ my right hand for their redress, and serve them to my last drop of ink.
FOOTNOTES:
[62] Altered, in error, to "three," in the 1711 edition. In No. 124 "ten months" remains. The drawing was at Michaelmas 1710.