to Miss Nancy's personal knowledge of the world, I believe she has not yet taught you the secret of keeping your word without hurting your principles. This is a science worthy of a superior genius; and without a compliment, Harry, you have talents to improve it into a system of treachery, which, though it may shorten your natural life, will make your reputation immortal.

In the first place, I presume, you will have no difficulty in breaking your word with Mrs. C- -y; the whole distress lies in keeping it with your friend the Marquis. My advice is, therefore, that you should order Mr. Bradshaw to write to his Lordship, and assure him in the civilest terms, that “circumstances which you had not foreseen;-that it was with infinite concern; that his Lordship's recommendation had such weight with you;—that in any other instance;—that you flattered yourself his Lordship would be candid enough to distinguish between the minister and the man;-but that in short you were so unfortunately situated, &c., &c., &c." Mr. Bradshaw's manner will make the message palatable, and it would not be amiss if he were to carry it himself. Having disengaged yourself from Lord Rockingham, you must at the same instant write me a letter of congratulation, and desire me to take possession immediately. By these expedients you will preserve all the duplicity and wayward humour of your character; you will have the merit and satisfaction of failing to two people: you will confer a favour without obliging anybody; and your enemies give you credit for a conduct equally honourable to your morals and your understanding.

Farewell, Harry, and believe me to be, with the most perfect contempt, yours,

ΡΟΜΟΝΑ.

P.S. If the place is to be given in trust for Miss Parsons, I beg leave to withdraw my pretensions; for I am determined not to suffer a woman to be quartered upon me in any shape.

* Nancy Parsons.

LETTER XXVI.

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.

SIR, July 19, 1768. THE spirit which once animated the London Gazette seems to have expired with the war. The learned compiler of that paper was blest with a genius equal to the description of battles and victories, but could not descend with dignity to the pacific annals of domestic economy. While our troops were sacrificed abroad, his pen was employed with equal bravery in murdering our language at home. He never lost a consonant from the Elbe to the Weser, or mollified one circumstance in all the guttural pomp of a German campaign. But, unfortunately for the world, his style perished with his subject, and we see him now hardly able to support the fatigue of advertising court-mourning, and introducing foreign ministers under the auspices of Mr. Stephen Cotterell. The gentle slumbers of the ministry prevail over the Gazette in which their dreams are recorded; and if ever we see the author betray a sign of life, it is only when his principals turn in their sleep. I presume we owe the Gazette of last Tuesday to an insomnium with which these gentlemen are sometimes troubled. The new commission of trade bears all the marks of that drowsy wildness which possesses a man, when he would fain go to sleep, but is so sore all over that he does not know which side to lie upon. One day we have a third secretary of state for a new fancy. Next day down goes to:

*

* The following is a copy of the article alluded

"6 "Whitehall, July 12. "The King has been pleased to constitute and appoint the lord high chancellor; the first commissioner of his Majesty's treasury; the lord president of the council; the first commissioner of the admiralty; his Majesty's principal secretaries of state; the chancellor of his Majesty's exchequer; the lord bishop of London; and the surveyor and auditor general of all his Majesty's revenues in America for the time being; together with Soame Jenyns, Edward Eliot, George Rice, John Roberts, Jeremiah Dyson, William Fitzherbert, and Thomas Robinson, Esquires, to be commissioners for promoting trade, and for inspecting and improving his Majesty's plantations in America and elsewhere. And his Majesty has thought fit to direct that Wills, Earl of Hillsborough, one of his said principal secretaries of state, shall duly attend the meetings of his said commissioners."

poor Lord Clare (not all the softness of his manners nor modest eloquence can save him) and up gets the new secretary to represent both. Hence we might have expected a pause of a few minutes, but these gentlemen are too modest to be satisfied with anything they do; and now for measures of vigour with a vengeance! The chief officers of the crown having little else to do, are called from their respective departments; the prayers of a reverend prelate are desired; Messieurs Rice, Jenyns, Fitzherbert, Eliot, and Robinson still contribute their mites, and Wills, Earl of Hillsborough, is duly to attend the meetings. The colonies must be ungovernable indeed if such a junto cannot govern them. In the last article the writer of the Gazette is particularly fortunate, and avails himself with his usual dexterity of all the advantage of publishing nonsense by authority. This due attendance will mean anything or nothing, just as the reader chooses. By the mark set upon Wills, it should seem that the other commissioners are not duly to attend the meetings; or perhaps government, with a laudable caution, means to guard against any undue attendance of the said Wills; they may possibly mean that Wills alone shall be a quorum; or it may be- -but to guess at their meaning is to reason without data, so I leave it as they have done, to be explained by contingencies.

After all, Mr. Printer, these are feverish symptoms, and look as if the disorder were coming to a crisis. Even this last effort is the forerunner of their speedy dissolution; like the false strength of a delirium which exerts itself by fits, and dies in convulsions.

C*.

LETTER XXVII.

TO MR. WOODFALL.

SIR, July 21, 1768. I COULD not help smiling at your correspondent C.'s dreaming animadversion, in your paper of yesterday, upon the commis

*To this letter was given a short answer, which, as it produced a reply from Junius, is here inserted.

sion of the Board of Trade. He modestly fancies himself awake, while all the ministry are enveloped in darkness and dreams, and, according to him, only stir to stir no more. Thus drunkards imagine that everybody reels, and that the world itself is in disorder.

He owns that his assertions are the result of guess, and that his reasonings are without the necessary data. He might have spared himself that trouble; everybody will tell him the same. Vastly displeased with the compiler of the Gazette, he drops him to abuse his principals; and because they do not, or choose not, to furnish his empty brain with chat for a day, or with battles, sieges, and victories in time of peace, they are therefore doing nothing, or at best are but dreaming like-himself. As he most sagaciously begins without his data, so he proceeds (as Mr. Locke says) by seeing a little, perhaps like a man half awake, presuming a great deal, and then jumping to a conclusion. This, it is owned, he has admirably well done. He reads in the Gazette, that several of the chief officers of the crown, the Bishop of London, and some others, are appointed, together with Messieurs Jenyns, Rice, Eliot, Fitzherbert, and Robinson (whom he very decently and liberally styles a junto) to be commissioners for trade and plantations, and that the Earl of Hillsborough is duly to attend their meetings. This throws our gentleman into a trance (convincing the world that his ignorance and insomnia are well blended), and, fraught with this intelligence, he avers that all these respectable personages are new commissioners; whereas, in fact, from the original constitution of the Board of Trade, they have a right to sit there in virtue of their respective offices, though not obliged as Messrs. Jenyns, &c., to a due and constant attendance. In every new commission of the Board of Trade, these officers for the time being are inserted at length; and at the same time, on account of their other public avocations, they are therein released from the obligation of continually sitting at that board. As the business of the colonies has of late years much increased, it was judged necessary by the Crown to appoint one other principal secretary of state for the transaction of colony affairs, which are daily increasing in their importance to this kingdom; and, perhaps, the noble Lord, who is chosen to this direction, and whose masterly abilities are the object of your correspondent's

invidious scurrility, is the only man of rank adequate to this arduous task in the present crisis. His Lordship is also to preside at the Board of Trade, for the facility and dispatch of business, and will thereby save the government (as he has no salary) the expense of a first commissioner. He is duly to attend the meetings of that board, which cannot, as Mr. C. would wisely obtrude upon the public judgment, mean anything or nothing at pleasure; for when there are no meetings his Lordship cannot attend, but when there are it is his duty. This, every man who is awake can understand; but as for such dreamers as good Master C., I wish they might sleep more soundly, till the patriotism they attack is extinguished; and then I believe the world will not be much disturbed with the impertinent visions of such unquiet repose.

INSOMNIS.

LETTER XXVIII.

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.

SIR, July 23, 1768. I AM willing to join issue with your correspondent Insomnis, that one of us is fast asleep, and submit to be tried by a jury of plain Englishmen, who may be supposed to understand their own language. If their verdict be given against him, all I desire is that you will not expose his infirmity to the public, or suffer him to say things in his sleep, which his modesty will blush for when he wakes.

In the first place, I never averred that they were all new commissioners, though I spoke of a new commission. Is it possible for a man to be awake and not distinguish between these expressions? But now for a curious discovery: the great officers of state, it seems, are bound and released by one and the same act; that is, they are bound to the public, and released in private. They figure away as men of business in the Gazette, yet by a secret stipulation are relieved from the trouble of attendance. If Malagrida had any interest with the present ministry, I should have no doubt that this was one of his subtle contrivances. An ostensible engagement.