hands in the pit and gallery. He was the more struck with the impropriety, he says, from his being accompanied by a gentleman, a native of Italy, though enough a proficient in our language to understand the play. He describes the surprise and horror of the susceptible Albani,' (so it seems the stranger is called) accustomed as he had been to the decorum of the Italian stage, to find, instead of silence and involuntary tears, the roar and riot with which our audience received the most pathetic speeches of one of the best of our tragedies,

.

'On Sunday,' continues my correspondent, Albani and I went to church. The plainness of the edifice, and the simplicity of our worship, struck him much yet he was pleased with the decency which prevailed and charmed with the discourse.' I am surprised,' said he, as we walked home, that so elegant a preacher is not a greater favourite with the public. You are mistaken,' I replied, he has long been their favourite.'- Nay,' said he, do not tell me so; you saw they did not give him a single mark of applause during the whole discourse, nor even at the end.'-'I laughed, Mr. Lounger, so perhaps will you; but I believe you will find it difficult to assign any good reason, why silence, attention, and tears, which are thought ample approbation in the one place, should be held insufficient in the other; or why that boisterous applause which is thought so honourable in the Theatre, should be thought a disgrace to merit in the Pulpit or at the Bar.'

I cannot, however, perfectly agree with my correspondent in this last observation. At the Bar, indeed, the clapping of hands, and the beating the floor with people's sticks, might do well enough; but at the Bar it is a rule, never to make a noise for nothing. In the Church, not to mention the inde

cency

of the thing, disturbancesof that kind are perfectly averse to the purpose for which many grave and good christians go thither.

In the Playhouse, besides the prescriptive right which the audience have now acquired to this sort of freedom, I think that part of the house by which it is commonly exercised have much to plead in its defence. The boxes frequently contrive to drown the noise of the stage, and it is but fair that the pit and gallery should in their turn drown the noise of the boxes.

ap

My correspondent seems to allow this sort of plause at the representation of Comedy, or at least of Farce; and indeed I am inclined to think, that in some of our late Farces, a very moral use may be made of it, as the less that is heard of them by the boxes the better. The cudgels of the audience, of the barbarity of which Nerva complains so warmly, cannot be better employed, except perhaps they could be applied to recompence the merit of the author, instead of the talents of the actors. Moral writers on the subject of the Stage used to vent their reproaches against the Comic authors of the last age, who mixed so much indecency with their wit. The censure does not exactly apply to the petite piece writers of our days; for they keep strictly to the unity of composition, and mix no wit with their indecency. I fairly confess, that I have been obliged to abate somewhat of the severity of my former opinion with regard to the wicked wits of the old school, and am content to go back to Wycherly and Congreve, having always thought, with my friend Colonel Caustic, that if one must sin, it is better to sin like a gentleman. Besides, a very dull or a very innocent person may possibly miss the allusion of a free speech, when it is covered with the veil of wit or of irony. But the good things of our modern Farce-mongers

have nothing of disguise about them; the dishes they are pleased to serve up to us are not garlicked ragouts, but ragouts of garlic. I was much pleased with the answer which I heard a plain country-gentleman give to another in the pit some weeks ago, who observed to him, that the farce was droll and laughable enough, but that there was a good deal of double entendre in it. I don't know what you may think double, said he, in reply; but in my mind, it was as plain single entendre as ever I heard in my life.

V

N° 81. SATURDAY, AUGUST 19, 1786.

THE Love of Fame, that last infirmity of noble minds,' though it may sometimes expose its votaries to a certain degree of blame or of ridicule, is in the main a useful passion. In the present age, I have often thought, that, instead of being restrained, a love of fame and of glory ought to be encouraged, as an incitement to virtue, and to virtuous actions. From various causes which I mean not at present to investigate, this passion seems to have lost its usual force; it has almost ceased to be a motive of action; and its place seems now to be supplied by a sordid love of gain, by which men of every rank and of every station appear to be actuated. In the Camp, as upon 'Change, profit and loss is the great object of attention. When a young soldier sets out on an expedition against the enemies of his country, he does not now talk so much of the honour and repu tation he is to acquire, as of the profit he expects to

reap from his conquests. Accordingly we have seen gallant officers metamorphosed into skilful merchants, who, though they had spirit enough to expose themselves to the cannon's mouth,' were very much disposed to seek something there more solid than the bubble Reputation.'

The Roman triumph, which to us wears so barbarous an appearance, was intended to excite this love of glory; and if we may judge from consequences, it was a wise and useful institution. In our own country, it rarely happens that distinguished military merit is allowed to pass unnoticed and unrewarded. There is something indeed so dazzling in the glory of a hero, that, when not restrained by motives of jealousy or of envy, we are apt rather to heighten than to detract from it. If therefore, it be true that our fleets and armies have of late made a less distinguished figure than in former times, it certainly cannot be attributed to any want of public honour or public applause.

But there is a species of merit less brilliant, though not perhaps less useful or less praise-worthy, which often is disregarded by the world, and in general entitles its possessor to little attention while alive, and to little fame after his death. There is a sort of military spirit and honour which is sometimes opposed to the same qualities in a civil sense; and a young man, when he puts on his uniform, often thinks himself exempted from the obligation of certain duties which he allows to be commendable enough in the sons of peace.. A want of attention to his own interest, or the interest of those connected with him, a degree of dissipation and extravagance equally hurtful to both, are held as venial offences in a soldier, whose business is to march and to fight, but who is not bound to think or to feel. Yet true nobleness of mind is where the same, and may

every

be equally shown in the honourable dealings of private life, as in the most splendid exertions of spirit or of valour. As the Historian of character and manners, (in which light a periodical author, to be of any use at all, must be considered,) I am happy when I have an opportunity of recording any example of that more humble merit which other annalists have no room to celebrate. In this view, 1 was much pleased with an anecdote I was told t'other day, of General W- one of Queen Anne's Generals. It is not, however, as a soldier (although he possessed great professional merit) that wish to introduce General Wto my readers.

Mr. W obtained an ensigncy in the army when rather more advanced in life than most of the captains of the present times, who make so fine a figure upon all occasions, in their green, red, and white feathers, and whose heads at every assembly rival those of our most fashionable ladies. From the time Mr. W- joined his regiment, he was distinguished for an unwearied attention to the duties of his station. When he appeared in public, or upon duty his dress and deportment were always decent and proper. Of his manner of life in private, even his brother officers were for some time ignorant. He did not mess with them, and he partook of none of their expensive pleasures and amusements. At length it was discovered, that he fared worse, and lived on less, than any private soldier in the regiment. The good sense and the known spirit of Mr. Wpreserved him from the ridicule and contempt with which this discovery might otherwise have been attended. His merit as an officer mean-while recommended Mr. W to the notice of his superiors; he was promoted from time to time; but no promotion ever made any alteration on his mode of life. After serving with distinguished reputation under King William, Mr. W- went to Flanders in the