but not of any booksellers, that I know of, except the unfortunate subject of the following paper; I mean Mr. Edmund Curll, at the Bible and Dial in Fleet-street, who was yesterday poisoned by Mr. Pope, after having lived many years an instance of the mild temper of the British nation.

Everybody knows that the said Mr. Edmund Curll, on Monday the 26th instant, published a satirical piece, entitled "Court Poems," in the preface whereof they were attributed to a lady of quality, Mr. Pope, or Mr. Gay; by which indiscreet method though he had escaped one revenge, there were still two behind in reserve.

Now on the Wednesday ensuing, between the hours of ten and eleven, Mr. Lintot, a neighbouring bookseller, desired a conference with Mr. Curll about settling a title-page, inviting him at the same time to take a whet together. Mr. Pope, who is not the only instance how persons of bright parts may be carried away by the instigation of the devil, found means to convey himself into the same room, under pretence of business with Mr. Lintot, who, it seems, is the printer of his Homer. This gentleman, with a seeming coolness, reprimanded Mr. Curll for wrongfully ascribing to him the aforesaid poems: he excused himself by declaring that one of his authors (Mr. Oldmixon by name) gave the copies to the press, and wrote the preface. Upon this Mr. Pope, being to all appearance reconciled, very civilly drank a glass of sack to Mr. Curll, which he as civilly pledged; and though the liquor in colour and taste differed not from common sack, yet it was plain, by the pangs this unhappy stationer felt soon after, that some poisonous drug had been secretly infused therein.

About eleven o'clock he went home, where his wife, observing his colour change, said, "Are you not sick, my dear!" He replied, "Bloody sick;" and incontinently fell a-vomiting and straining in an uncommon and unnatural manner, the contents of his vomiting being as green as grass. His wife had been just reading a book of her husband's printing concerning Jane Wenham, the famous witch of Hertford, and her mind misgave her that he was bewitched; but he soon let her know that he suspected poison, and recounted to her, between the intervals of his yawnings and retchings, every cir cumstance of his interview with Mr. Pope.

Mr. Lintot, in the mean time coming in, was extremely affrighted at the sudden alteration he observed in him: "Brother Curll," says he, "I fear you have got the vomiting distemper, which I have heard kills in half an hour. This comes from your not following my advice, to drink old hock in a morning as I do, and abstain from sack." Mr. Curll replied, in a moving tone, "Your author's sack I fear has done my business."-" Z-ds," says Mr. Lintot, "my author!-Why did not you drink old hock?" Notwithstanding which rough remonstrance he did in the most friendly manner press him to take warm water; but Mr. Curll did with great obstinacy refuse it; which made Mr. Lintot infer that he chose to die as thinking to recover greater damages.

All this time the symptoms increased violently, with acute pains in the lower belly. "Brother Lintot," says he, "I perceive my last hour approaching; do me the friendly office to call my partposterity with an obloquy he little deserved. Whatever were his demerits as a bookseller, they were amply atoned for by his indefatigable industry in preserving our national remains. Nor did he publish a single volume, but what, amidst a profusion of base met, contained some precious ore, some valuable reliques, which future collectors could nowhere else have found.

ner, Mr. Pemberton, that we may settle our worldly affairs." Mr. Lintot, like a kind neighbour, was hastening out of the room, while Mr. Curll raved aloud in this manner: "If I survive this I will be revenged on Tonson; it was he first detected me as the printer of these poems, and I will reprint these very poems in his name." His wife admonished him not to think of revenge, but to take care of his stock and his soul; and in the same instant Mr. Lintot, whose goodness can never be enough applauded, returned with Mr. Pemberton. After some tears jointly shed by these humane booksellers, Mr. Curll being, as he said, in his perfect senses, though in great bodily pain, immediately proceeded to make a verbal will, Mrs. Curll having first put on his nightcap, in the following manner :

"GENTLEMEN, in the first place I do sincerely pray forgiveness for those indirect methods I have pursued in inventing new titles to old books, putting private quarrels for public entertainment; all which author's names to things they never saw, publishing I hope will be pardoned, as being done to get an honest livelihood.

"I do also heartily beg pardon of all persons of honour, lords spiritual and temporal, gentry, burgesses, and commonalty, to whose abuse I have any or every way contributed by my publications; particularly I hope it will be considered that, if I have vilified his grace the duke of Marlborough, I have likewise aspersed the late duke of Ormond; if I have abused the honourable Mr. Walpole, I have also libelled the lord Bolingbroke; so that I have preserved that equality and impartiality which becomes an honest man in times of faction and division.

"I call my conscience to witness that many of these things which may seem malicious were done out of charity; I having made it wholly my business to print for poor disconsolate authors, whom all other booksellers refuse. Only God bless sir Richard Blackmore! you know he takes no copymoney.

"The second collection of poems, which I groundlessly called Mr. Prior's, will sell for nothing, and has not yet paid the charge of the advertisements which I was obliged to publish against him: therefore you may as well suppress the edition, and beg that gentleman's pardon in the name of a dying

christian.

"The French Cato, with the criticisms showing how superior it is to Mr. Addison's (which I wickedly ascribed to madame Dacier), may be suppressed at a reasonable rate, being damnably translated.

་

་

having printed part of Callipodia,' and an incorrect "I protest I have no animosity to Mr. Rowe, edition of his poems, without his leave, in quarto. Mr. Gildon's Rehearsal, or Bays the Younger,' did more harm to me than to Mr. Rowe, though, upon the faith of an honest man, I paid him double for abusing both him and Mr. Pope.

"Heaven pardon me for publishing the Trials of Sodomy' in an Elzevir letter! but I humbly hope my printing sir Richard Blackmore's Essays will atone for them. I beg that you will take what remains of these last (which is near the whole impression, presents excepted), and let my poor widow have in exchange the sole property of the copy of Madame Mascranny."

[Here Mr. Pemberton interrupted, and would by no means consent to this article, about which some dispute might have arisen unbecoming a dying person, if Mr. Lintot had not interposed, and Mr. Curl vomited.]

[What this poor unfortunate man spoke afterward was so indistinct, and in such broken accents (being perpetually interrupted by vomitings), that the reader is entreated to excuse the confusion and imperfection of this account.]

"Dear Mr. Pemberton, I beg you to beware of the indictment at Hicks's-hall for publishing Rochester's bawdy poems; that copy will otherwise be my best legacy to my dear wife and helpless child. "The case of impotence was my best support all the last long vacation."

[In this last paragraph Mr. Curll's voice grew more free; for his vomitings abated upon his dejections, and he spoke what follows from his close-stool.]

"For the copies of 'Noblemen's and Bishops' Last Wills and Testaments,' I solemnly declare I printed them not with any purpose of defamation, but merely as I thought those copies lawfully purchased from Doctors'-commons at one shilling a-piece. Our trade in wills turning to small account, we may divide them blindfold.

"For Mr. Mainwaring's Life' I ask Mrs Oldfield's pardon; neither his nor my lord Halifax's lives, though they were of service to their country, were of any to me; but I was resolved, since I could not print their works while they lived, to print their lives after they were dead."

While he was speaking these words Mr. Oldmixon entered. "Ah! Mr. Oldmixon," said poor Mr. Curll,"to what a condition have your works reduced me! I die a martyr to that unlucky preface. However, in these my last moments I will be just to all men; you shall have your third share of the Court Poems,' as was stipulated. When I am dead where will you find another bookseller? Your 'Protestant Packet' might have supported you had you writ a little less scurrilously; there is a mean in all things."

Here Mr. Lintot interrupted, Why not find another bookseller, brother Curll?" and then took Mr. Oldmixon aside and whispered him: "Sir, as soon as Curll is dead I shall be glad to talk with you over a pint at the Devil."

Mr. Curll, now turning to Mr. Pemberton, told him he had several taking title-pages, that only wanted treatises to be wrote to them, and earnestly desired that when they were written his heirs might have some share of the profit of them.

After he had said this he fell into horrible gripings, upon which Mr. Lintot advised him to repeat the Lord's-prayer. He desired his wife to step into the shop for a common-prayer-book, and read it by the help of a candle without hesitation. He closed the book, fetched a groan, and recommended to Mrs. Curll to give forty shillings to the poor of the parish of St. Dunstan's, and a week's wages advance to each of his gentlemen-authors, with some small gratuity in particular to Mrs. Centlivre.

The poor man continued for some hours with all his disconsolate family about him in tears, expecting his final dissolution; when of a sudden he was surprisingly relieved by a plentiful fetid stool, which obliged them all to retire out of the room. withstanding, it is judged by sir Richard Blackmore that the poison is still latent in his body, and will infallibly destroy him by slow degrees in less than

a month.

Not

It is to be hoped the other enemies of this wretched stationer will not further pursue their revenge, or shorten this short period of his miserable

life.

A FURTHER ACCOUNT OF THE MOST DEPLORABLE CONDITION OF

MR. EDMUND CURLL,

BOOKSELLER:

SINCE HIS BEING POISONED ON THE 28th OF MARCH To be published weekly. London printed, and sold by all the publishers, mercuries, and hawkers, within the bills of mortality 1716.

THE public is already acquainted with the manner of Mr. Curll's empoisonment, by a faithful though unpolite historian of Grub-street. I am but the continuer of his history; yet I hope a due distinction will be made between an undignified scribbler of a sheet and a haif, and the author of a threepenny stitched book, like myself.

66

Wit," says sir Richard Blackmore, [Essays, vol. ii.] "proceeds from a concurrence of regular

and exalted ferments, and an influence of animal spirits rectified and refined to a degree of purity." On the contrary, when the ingenious particles rise with the vital liquor, they produce an abstraction of the rational part of the soul, which we commonly call madness. The verity of this hypothesis is justified by the symptoms with which the unfortunate Emund Curll, bookseller, has been afflicted ever since his swallowing the poison at the Swan tavern in Fleet-street. For though the neck of his retort, which carries up the animal spirits to the head, is of an extraordinary length, yet the said animal spirits rise muddy, being contaminated with the inflammable particles of this uncommon poison.

The symptoms of his departure from his usual temper of mind were at first only speaking civilly to his customers, singeing a pig with a new purchased libel, and refusing two-and-ninepence for sir Richard Blackmore's Essays.

As the poor man's frenzy increased, he began to void his excrements in his bed, read Rochester's

bawdy poems to his wife, gave Oldmixon a slap on the chops, and would have kissed Mr. Pemberton's - by violence.

a

But at last he came to such a pass that he would dine upon nothing but copper-plates, took a clyster for a whipped syllabub, and made Mr. Lintot eat a suppository for a radish with bread and butter.

We leave it to every tender wife to imagine how sorely all this afflicted poor Mrs. Curll: at first she privately put a bill into several churches, desiring the prayers of the congregation for a wretched stationer, distempered in mind. But when she was sadly convinced that his misfortune was public to all the world, she writ the following letter to her good neighbour Mr. Lintot.

A true copy of Mrs. CURLL's letter to Mr.
LINTOT.

"WORTHY MR. LINTOT,

"You and all the neighbours know too well the frenzy with which my poor man is visited. I never perceived he was out of himself till that melancholy day that he thought he was poisoned in a glass of sack; upon this he ran vomiting all over the house, nay, in the new-washed dining-room. Alas! this is the greatest adversity that ever befel my poor man, since he lost one testicle at school by the bite of a black boar. Good Lord! if he should die, where should I dispose of the stock? unless Mr. Pemberton or you would help a distressed widow; for God knows, he never published any books that lasted above a week, so that, if he wanted daily books, we wanted daily bread. I can write no more, for I hear the rap of Mr. Curll's ivory-headed cane upon the

counter.-Pray recommend me to your pastry-cook, who furnishes you yearly with tarts in exchange for your paper, for Mr. Curll has disobliged ours since his fits came upon him;-before that, we generally lived upon baked meats.-He is coming in, and I have but just time to put his son out of the way, for fear of mischief: so, wishing you a merry Easter, I remain your most humble servant, "C. CURLL.

"P. S. As to the report of my poor husband's stealing o' calf, it is really groundless, for he always binds in sheep."

But return we to Mr. Curll, who all Wednesday continued outrageously mad. On Thursday he had a lucid interval, that enabled him to send a general summons to all his authors. There was but one porter who could perform this office, to whom he gave the following bill of directions, where to find them. This bill, together with Mrs. Curll's original letter, lie at Mr. Lintot's shop, to be perused by the curious. Instructions to a Porter how to find Mr. CURLL'S Authors.

"At a tallow-chandler's in Petty France, half way under the blind arch, ask for the historian.

At the Bedstead and Bolster, a music-house in Moorfields, two translators in a bed together.

At the Hercules and Still in Vinegar-yard, a schoolmaster with carbuncles on his nose.

At a blacksmith's shop in the Frier's, a pindaric writer in red stockings.

In the calender-mill room at Exeter Change, a composer of meditations.

At the Three Tobacco-pipes in Dog and Bitch yard, one that has been a parson; he wears a blue camblet coat, trimmed with black; my best writer against revealed religion.

At Mr. Summers, a thief-catcher's in Lewkner's

lane, the man who wrote against the impiety of Mr. Rowe's plays.

At the Farthing-pie-house in Tooting-fields, the young man who is writing my new pastorals.

At the laundress's, at the Hole in the Wall in Cursitor's-alley, up three pair of stairs, the author of my Church History;-if his flux be over-you may also speak to the gentleman who lies by him in the flockbed, my index-maker.

The cook's wife [Mrs. Centlivre] in Buckinghamcourt; bid her bring along with her the similes that were lent her for her next new play.

Call at Budge-row for the gentleman you used to go to in the cockloft; I have taken away the ladder, but his landlady has it in keeping.

I don't much care if you ask at the Mint for the old beetled-browed critic [Dennis], and the purblind poet at the alley over against St. Andrew's, Holborn. But this as you have time."

All these gentlemen appeared at the hour appointed in Mr. Curll's dining-room, two excepted; one of whom was the gentleman in the cockloft, his landlady being out of the way, and the Gradus ad Parnassum taken down; the other happened to be too closely watched by the bailiffs.

They no sooner entered the room but all of them showed in their behaviour some suspicion of each other; some turning away their heads with an air of contempt; others squinting with a leer, that showed at once fear and indignation; each with a haggard abstracted mien, the lively picture of scorn, solitude, and short commons. So when a keeper feeds his hungry charge of vultures, panthers, and of Libyan leopards, each eyes his fellow with a fiery glare: high hung, the bloody liver tempts their maw. housewife stands before her pales, surrounded by her

VOL. I.

Or as a

"Whores and authors must be paid beforehand to put them in good humour; therefore, here is halfa-crown a-piece for you to drink your own healths, and confusion to Mr. Addison and all other successful writers.

"Ah, gentlemen! what have I not done, what have I not suffered, rather than the world should be deprived of your lucubrations! I have taken involuntary purges, I have been vomited, three times have I been caned, once was I hunted, twice was my head broke by a grenadier, twice was I tossed in a blanket; I have had boxes on the ear, slaps on the chaps; I have been frighted, pumped, kicked, slandered and beshitten.--I hope, gentlemen, you are all convinced that this author of Mr. Lintot's could mean nothing else but starving you by poisoning me. It remains for us to consult the best and speediest method of revenge."

He had scarce done speaking but the historian proposed a history of his life. The Exeter-change gentleman was for penning articles of his faith. Some pretty smart pindaric, says the red-stocking poet, would effectually do his business. But the index-maker said there was nothing like an index to his Homer.

After several debates, they came to the following resolutions :—

Resolved, That every member of this society, according to his several abilities, shall contribute some way or other to the defamation of Mr. Pope.

"Resolved, That towards the libelling of the said

Pope, there be a sum employed not exceeding six pounds sixteen shillings and ninepence (not including advertisements).

"Resolved, That Mr. Dennis make an affidavit before Mr. justice Tully, that in Mr. Pope's Homer there are several passages contrary to the established rules of our sublime.

"Resolved, That he has on purpose, in several passages, perverted the true ancient heathen sense of Homer, for the more effectual propagation of the popish religion.

"Resolved, That the printing of Homer's battles at this juncture has been the occasion of all the disturbances of this kingdom.

"Ordered, That Mr. Barnivelta be invited to be a member of this society in order to make further discoveries.

"Resolved, That a number of effective erratas be raised out of Pope's Homer (not exceeding 1746), and that every gentleman who shall send in one works of the society gratis. error, for his encouragement shall have the whole

"Resolved, That a sum not exceeding ten shillings and sixpence be distributed among the members of the society for coffee and tobacco, in order to enable them the more effectually to defame him in coffeehouses.

"Resolved, That toward the further lessening the character of the said Pope, some persons be deputed to abuse him at ladies' tea-tables, and that, in consideration our authors are not well dressed enough, Mr. C-y and Mr. Ke-1 be deputed for that service.

"Resolved, That a ballad be made against Mr. Pope, and that Mr. Oldmixon, Mr. Gildon, and Mrs. Centlivreb do prepare and bring in the same. "Resolved, That above all some effectual ways and means be found to increase the joint stock of the reputation of this society, which at present is exceedingly low, and to give their works the greater currency, whether by raising the denomination of the said works by counterfeit title-pages, or mixing a greater quantity of the fine metal of other authors with the alloy of this society.

"Resolved, That no member of this society for the future mix stout in his ale in a morning, and that Mr. B- remove from the Hercules and Still.

"Resolved, That all our members (except the cook's wife) be provided with a sufficient quantity of the vivifying drops, or Byfield's sal volatile.

"Resolved, That sir Richard Blackmore be appointed to endow this society with a large quantity of regular and exalted ferments, in order to enliven their cold sentiments (being his true receipt to make wits)."

These resolutions being taken, the assembly was ready to break up, but they took so near a part in Mr. Curll's afflictions, that none of them could leave him without giving him some advice to reinstate him in his health.

Mr. Gildon was of opinion, that in order to drive a pope out of his belly, he should get the mummy of some deceased moderator of the general assembly in Scotland, to be taken inwardly, as an effectual antidote against antichrist; but Mr. Oldmixon did conceive that the liver of the person who administered the poison, boiled in broth, would be a more certain cure.

While the company were expecting the thanks of Mr. Curll for these demonstrations of their zeal, a whole pile of sir Richard's Essays on a sudden fell on his head; the shock of which in an instant brought back his delirium. He immediately rose up, overturned the close-stool, and beshit the Essays (which may probably occasion a second edition); then, without putting up his breeches, in a most furious tone he thus broke out to his books, which his distempered imagination represented to him as alive, coming down from their shelves, fluttering their leaves and flapping their covers at him :

"Now G-d damn all folios, quartos, octavos, and duodecimos! ungrateful varlets that you are, who have so long taken up my house without paying for your lodging! Are you not a beggarly brood of fumbling journeymen, born in garrets among lice and cobwebs, nursed up on grey peas, bullock's liver, and porter's ale? Was not the first light you saw the farthing candle I paid for? Did you not come before your time into dirty sheets of brown paper? And have I not clothed you in double royal, lodged you handsomely on decent shelves, laced your backs with gold, equipped you with splendid titles, and sent you into the world with the names of persons of quality? Must I be always plagued with you? Why flutter ye your leaves and flap your covers at me? Damn ye all, ye wolves in sheep's clothing; rags ye were, and to rags ye shall return. Why hold you forth your texts to me, ye paltry sermons? Why cry ye at every word to me, ye bawdy poems? To my shop at Tunbridge ye shall go, by G-, and

Gildon, a writer of criticisms and libels, who abused Mr. Pope in several pamphlets and books printed by Curll.

Mrs. Susannah Centlivre, the "slip-shod Sibyl" in the

Dunciad.

Sir Richard Blackmore, in his Essays, vol. ii. p. 270, accused Mr. Pope, in very high and sober terms, of profaneness and immorality, on the mere report of Curll that he was author of a travestie on the first Psalm.

thence be drawn, like the rest of your predecessors, bit by bit, to the passage-house; for in this present emotion of my bowels how do I compassionate those who have great need, and nothing to wipe their breech with!"

Having said this, and at the same time recollect. ing that his own was unwiped, he abated of his fury, and with great gravity applied to that function the unfinished sheets of the "Conduct of the Earl of Nottingham."

A STRANGE BUT TRUE RELATION HOW

MR. EDMUND CURLL,

OF FLEET-STREET, STATIONER, Out of an extraordinary desire of lucre, went into 'Change Alley, and was converted from the Christian Religion by certain eminent Jews:

And how he was circumcised and initiated into their Mysteries.

AVARICE (as sir Richard, in the third page of his Essays, has elegantly observed) is an inordinate impulse of the soul toward the amassing or heaping together a superfluity of wealth, without the least regard of applying it to its proper uses.

And how the mind of man is possessed with this vice may be seen every day both in the city and suburbs thereof. It has been always esteemed by Plato, Puffendorf, and Socrates, as the darling vice of old age; but now our young men are turned usurers and stock-jobbers; and instead of lusting after the real wives and daughters of our rich citizens, they covet nothing but their money and estates. Strange change of vice! when the concupiscence of youth is converted into the covetousness of age, and those appetites are now become venal which should be venereal.

In the first place, let us show you how many of the ancient worthies and heroes of antiquity have been undone and ruined by this deadly sin of avarice.

I shall take the liberty to begin with Brutus, that noble Roman. Does not Etian inform us that he received fifty broad pieces for the assassination of that renowned emperor Julius Cæsar, who fell a sacrifice to the Jews, as sir Edmundbury Godfrey did to the papists?

Did not Themistocles let the Goths and Vandals into Carthage for a sum of money, where they barbarously put out the other eye of the famous Hannibal? as Herodotus has it in his ninth book upon the Roman medals.

Even the great Cato (as the late Mr. Addison has very well observed), though otherwise a gentleman of good sense, was not unsullied by this pecuniary contagion; for he sold Athens to Artaxerxes Longimanus for a hundred rix-dollars, which in our money will amount to two talents and thirty sestertii, according to Mr. Demoivre's calculation. See Hesiod in his seventh chapter of "Feasts and Festivals."

Actuated by the same diabolical spirit of gain, Sylla, the Roman consul, shot Alcibiades the senator with a pistol, and robbed him of several bank-bills and 'chequer notes to an immense value; for which he came to an untimely end, and was denied christian burial. Hence comes the proverb incidat in Syllam.

'Tis that I

To come near to our own times, and give you one modern instance, though well known and often quoted by historians, viz. Echard, Dionysius Halicarnasseus, Virgil, Horace, and others. mean of the famous Godfrey of Bulloigne, one of the great heroes of the holy war, who robbed Cleopatra queen of Egypt, of a diamond necklace, ear

rings, and a Tompion's gold watch (which was given her by Mark Antony); all these things were found in Godfrey's breeches-pocket when he was killed at the siege of Damascus.

Who then can wonder, after so many great and illustrious examples, that Mr. Edmund Curll, the stationer, should renounce the christian religion for the mammon of unrighteousness, and barter his precious faith for the filthy prospect of lucre in the present fluctuation of stocks?

It having been observed to Mr. Curll by some of his ingenious authors (who I fear are not overcharged with any religion), what immense sums the Jews had got by bubbles, &c., he immediately turned his mind from the business in which he was educated, but thrived little, and resolved to quit his shop for 'Change-alley. Whereupon falling into company with the Jews at their club at the sign of the Cross in Cornhill, they began to tamper with him upon the most important points of the christian faith, which he for some time zealously, and like a good christian, obstinately defended. They promised him paradise and many other advantages hereafter, but he artfully insinuated that he was more inclinable to listen to present gain. They took the hint, and promised him that immediately upon his conversion to their persuasion he should become as rich as a Jew.

They made use likewise of several other arguments; to wit,

That the wisest man that ever was, and inasmuch the richest, beyond all peradventure, was a Jew, videlicet, Solomon.

That David, the man after God's own heart, was a Jew also. And most of the children of Israel are suspected for holding the same doctrine.

trance into the room he perceived a meagre man with a sallow countenance, a black forky beard, and long vestment. In his right hand he held a large pair of shears, and in his left a red-hot searing-iron. At sight of this Mr. Curll's heart trembled within him, and fain would be retire; but he was prevented by six Jews, who laid hands upon him, and, unbuttoning his breeches, threw him upon the table, a pale pitiful spectacle.

He now entreated them in the most moving tone of voice to dispense with that unmanly ceremonial, which if they would consent to, he faithfully promised that he would eat a quarter of paschal lamb with them the next Sunday following.

All these protestations availed him nothing, for they threatened him that all contracts and bargains should be void unless he would submit to bear all the outward and visible signs of Judaism.

Our apostate, hearing this, stretched himself upon his back, spread his legs, and waited for the operation: but when he saw the high priest take up the cleft stick, he roared most unmercifully, and swore several christian oaths, for which the Jews rebuked

him.

The savour of the effluvia that issued from him convinced the old Levite and all his assistants that he needed no present purgation, wherefore without further anointing him he proceeded in his office; when, by an unfortunate jerk upward of the impatient victim, he lost five times as much as ever Jew did before.

They, finding that he was too much circumcised, which by the Levitical law is worse than not being circumcised at all, refused to stand to any of their contracts: wherefore they cast him forth from their synagogue; and he now remains a most piteous, woful, and miserable sight, at the sign of the Old Testament and Dial in Fleet-street; his wife (poor woman!) is at this hour lamenting over him, wring

They then promised if he would poison his wife and give up his griskin, that he should marry the rich Ben Meymon's only daughter. This made some impression on him.

They now talked to him in the Hebrew tongue, which he not understanding it was observed had very great weight with him.

They now, perceiving that his godliness was only gain, desisted from all other arguments, and attacked him on his weak side, namely, that of avarice.

Upon which John Mendez offered him an eighth of an advantageous bargain for the Apostles' Creed, which he readily and wickedly renounced.

He then sold the nine-and-thirty articles for a bull; but insisted hard upon black-puddings, being

a great lover thereof.

Joshua Pereira engaged to let him share with him in his bottomry; upon this he was persuaded out of his christian name; but he still adhered to blackpuddings.

Sir Gideon Lopez tempted him with a forty-pound subscription in Ram's bubble, for which he was content to give up the four Evangelists; and he was now completed a perfect Jew, all but black-pudding and circumcision, for both of which he would have been glad to have had a dispensation.

But on the 17th of March Mr. Curll (unknown to his wife) came to the tavern aforesaid. At his en

Bubble was a name given to all the extravagant projects, for which sub-criptions were raised, and negotiated at vast premiums in 'Change-alley, in the year 1720.

Bulls and bears. He who sells that of which he is not possessed is proverbially said "to sell the skin before he has caught the bear."

PRAYER.

(To save the stamp.)

"KEEP us, we beseech thee, from the hands of such barbarous and cruel Jews, who, albeit they abhor the blood of black-puddings, yet thirst they vehemently after the blood of white ones. And that we may avoid such-like calamities, may all good and well-disposed christians be warned by this unhappy wretch's woful example, to abominate the heinous sin of avarice, which sooner or later will draw them into the cruel clutches of Satan, papists, and stockjobbers. Amen."

THOUGHTS

ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS.

BY MR. POPE.

PARTY is the madness of many, for the gain of a few.

There never was any party, faction, sect, or cabal whatsoever, in which the most ignorant were not the most violent; for a bee is not a busier animal than a

• All Forms of Prayer and Thanksgiving, Books of Devotion, &c., being excepted in the statute of 12th Anne (1712) charging pamphlets and papers contained in half a sheet with one halfpenny, and every such paper being one whole sheet with a stamp duty of one penny for every copy.