[No. 270. [Steele.]
From Thursday, Dec. 28, to Saturday, Dec. 30, 1710.
Cum pulchris tunicis sumet nova consilia et spes.
Hor., 1 Ep. xviii. 33.
From my own Apartment, Dec. 29.
According to my late resolution, I take the holidays to be no improper season to entertain the town with the addresses of my correspondents. In my walks every day there appear all round me very great offenders in the point of dress. An armed tailor had the impudence yesterday in the park to smile in my face, and pull off a laced hat to me, as it were in contempt of my authority and censure. However, it is a very great satisfaction, that other people as well as myself are offended with these improprieties. The following notices from persons of different sexes and qualities are a sufficient instance how useful my Lucubrations are to the public.
"Jack's Coffee-house, near
Guildhall, Dec. 27.
"Cousin Bickerstaff,
"It has been the peculiar blessing of our family to be always above the smiles or frowns of fortune, and by a certain greatness of mind to restrain all irregular fondnesses or passions. From hence it is, that though a long decay, and a numerous descent, have obliged many of our house to fall into the arts of trade and business, no one person of us has ever made an appearance that betrayed our being unsatisfied with our own station of life, or has ever affected a mien or gesture unsuitable to it.
"You have up and down in your writings very justly remarked, that it is not this or the other profession or quality among men that gives us honour and esteem, but the well or ill behaving ourselves in those characters. It is therefore with no small concern, that I behold in coffee houses and public places my brethren, the tradesmen of this city, put off the smooth, even, and ancient decorum of thriving citizens, for a fantastical dress and figure, improper for their persons and characters, to the utter destruction of that order and distinction which of right ought to be between St. James's and Milk Street, the Camp and Cheapside.