parts above water, and every spectator imagines him difengaged, his lower parts drag him down again and fink him to the nofe; he makes new efforts to emerge, and every effort increafing his weakness, only tends to fink him the deeper.

There are some here who, I am told, make a tolerable fubfiftence by the credulity of their countrymen: as they find the publick fond of blood, wounds and death, they contrive political ruins fuited to every month in the year; this month the people are to be eaten up by the French in flat-bottomed boats; the next by the foldiers, defigned to beat the French back; now the people are going to jump down the gulph of luxury; and now nothing but an herring fubfcription can fifh them up again. Time paffes on; the report proves falfe; new circumftance's produce new changes, but the people never change, they are perfevering in folly.

In other countries thofe boding politician's would be left to fret over their own fchemes alone, and grow fplenetic without hopes of infecting others': but England feems to be the very region where fpleen delights to dwell; a man not only can give an unbouuded scope to the disorder in himself, but may, if he pleafes, propagate it over the whole kingdom, with a certainty of fuccefs. He has only to cry out, that the government, the government is all wrong, that their schemes are leading to ruin, that Britons are no more; every good member of the commonwealth thinks it his duty, in fuch á cafe, to deplore the univerfal decadence with fympathetic forrow, and, by fancying the conftitution in a decay, abfolutely to impair its vigour.

This people would laugh at my fimplicity, fhould I advise them to be lefs fanguine in harbouring gloomy predictions, and examine coolly before they attempted to complain. I have juft heard a ftory,

which, though tranfacted in a private family, ferves very well to defcribe the behaviour of the whole nation, in cafes of threatened calamity. As there are public, fo there are private incendiaries here. One of the laft, either for the amusement of his friends, or to divert a fit of the fpleen, lately fent a threatening letter to a worthy family in my neighbourhood, to this effect.

"SIR, Knowing you to be very rich, and find"ing myself to be very poor, I think proper to in"form you, that I have learned the fecret of poi"foning man, woman, and child, without danger "of detection. Do not be uneafy, Sir, you may "take your choice of being poifoned in a fortnight, "or poisoned in a month, or poifoned in fix weeks;

you shall have full time to fettle all your affairs. "Though I am poor, I love to do things like a gen"tleman. But, Sir, you must die; I have deter"mined it within my own breaft that you must die. “Blood, Sir, blood is my trade; fo I could wish 66 you would this day fix weeks take leave of your "friends, wife, and family, for I cannot poffibly "allow you longer time. To convince you more "certainly of the power of my art, by which you

may know I fpeak truth, take this letter; when

you have read it, tear off the feal, fold it up, "and give it to your favourite Dutch mastiff that "fits by the fire; he will fwallow it, Sir, like a but"tered toaft; in three hours four minutes after he "has taken it, he will attempt to bite off his own 66 tongue, and half an hour after burst asunder in "twenty pieces. Blood, blood, blood; fo no more "at present from, Sir, your moft obedient, most "devoted humble fervant to command till death."

You may eafily imagine the confternation into which this letter threw the whole good-natured family. The poor man, to whom it was addreffed,

was

was the more furprized, as not knowing how he could merit fuch inveterate malice. All the friends of the family were convened; it was univerfally agreed, tnat it was a moft terrible affair, and that the government fhould be folicited to offer a reward and a pardon: a fellow of this kind would go on poisoning family after family; and it was impoffible to fay where the deftruction would end. In pursuance of these determinations the government was applied to; ftrict fearch was made after the incendiary, but all in vain. At laft, therefore, they recollected that the experiment was not yet tried upon the dog; the Dutch maftiff was brought up, and placed in the midft of the friends and relations, the feal was torn off, the pacquet folded up with care, and foon they found, to the great furprize of all-that the dog would not eat the letter. Adieu.

LETTER CVII.

TO THE SAME.

I HAVE frequently been amazed at the ignorance of almost all the European travellers, who have penetrated any confiderable way Eastward into Afia. They have been influenced either by motives of commerce or piety, and their accounts are fuch as might reafonably be expected from men of very narrow or very prejudiced education, the dictates of fuperftition or the refult of ignorance. Is it not furprizing, that in fuch a variety of adventurers not one fingle philofopher should be found? for as to

the

the travels of Gemelli, the learned are long agreed that the whole is but an impofture.

There is fcarcely any country how rude or uncultivated foever, where the inhabitants are not pof feffed of fome peculiar fecrets either in Nature or art, which might be tranfplanted with fuccefs; in Siberian Tartary, for inftance, the natives extract a ftrong spirit from milk, which is a fecret probably unknown to the chymifts of Europe. In the moft favage parts of India they are poffeffed of the fecret of dying vegetable fubftances fcarlet ; and of refining lead into a metal which for hardnefs and colour is little inferior to filver; not one of which fecrets but would in Europe make a man's fortune. The power of the Afiatics in producing winds, or bringing down rain, the Europeans are apt to treat as fabulous, because they have no inftances of the like nature among themselves; but they would have treated the fecrets of gunpowder, and the mariner's compafs in the fame manner, had they been told the Chinese used fuch arts before the invention was common with themselves at home.

Of all the English philofophers I moft reverence Bacon, that great and hardy genius; he it is who allows of fecrets yet unknown; who, undaunted by the feeming difficulties that oppofe, prompts human curiofity to examine every part of Nature, and even exhorts man to try whether he cannot fubject the tempeft, the thunder, and even earthquakes to human control; O did a man of his daring fpirit, of his genius, penetration and learning travel to thofe countries which have been vifited only by the fuperftitious and mercenary, what might not mankind expect how would he enlighten the regions to which he travelled! And what a variety of know

ledge

ledge and useful improvement would he not bring back in exchange!

There is probably no country fo barbarous, that would not disclose all it knew, if it received from the traveller equivalent information; and I am apt to think, that a perfon, who was ready to give more knowledge than he received, would be welcome wherever he came. All his care in travelling should only be to fuit his intellectual banquet to the people with whom he converfed; he should not attempt to teach the unlettered Tartar aftronomy, nor yet inftruct the polite Chinese in the ruder arts of fubfistence; he fhould endeavour to improve the Barbarian in the fecrets of living comfortably; and the inhabitant of a more refined country in the fpeculative pleasures of science. How much more nobly would a philofopher thus employed spend his time, than by fitting at home earnestly intent upon adding one ftar more to his catalogue; or one monfter more to his collection; or ftill, if poffible, more triflingly fedulous in the incatenation of fleas, or the fculpture of a cherry-stone!

I never confider this fubject, without being furprized that none of thofe focieties fo laudably established in England for the promotion of arts and learning, have ever thought of fending one of their members into the moft eaftern parts of Afia, to make what difcoveries he was able. To be convinced of the utility of fuch an undertaking, let them but read the relations of their own travellers. It will be there found, that they are as often deceived themselves, as they attempt to deceive others. The merchant tells us perhaps the price of different. commodities, the methods of baling them up, and the propereft manner for an European to preferve his health in the country. The miffioner, on the other hand, informs us, with what pleasure the

country