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beg your pardon for this slovenly letter*; but I have not health to transcribe it. My service to my cousin, your brother, who I hear is happy in your company; which he is not, who most desires it, and who is, madam, your most obliged, obedient servant,

JOHN DRYDEN †.

* The paper was blotted with ink in several places, and otherwise soiled.

This great poet died on the first of May, only twenty days after this letter was written.

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WILLIAM CONGREVE TO MR. PORTER.

Calais, Aug. 11th, O. S. 1700. HERE is admirable Champagne for twelve pence a quart, and as good Burgundy for fifteen pence; and yet I have virtue enough to resolve to leave his place to-morrow, for St. Omers, where the same wine is half as dear again, and may be not quite so good. Dear neighbours, Charles and Jacob, &c. I have never failed drinking your healths since we saw you, nor ever will till we see you again. We had a long passage, but delicate weather. We set sail from Dover on Saturday morning, four o'clock, and did not land here till six the same evening; nor had we arrived even in that time, if a French open boat with oars had not been straggling towards us, when we were not quite half seas over, and

rowed us hither from thence in five hours, for the packet boat came not till this morning. When I come to Brussels, I shall have more to write to you; till then I am most humbly and heartily yours,

W. CONGREVE.

My humble service to my neighbour, your mother, Mrs. Arne, Mrs. Travers, not forgetting the Alcayde, who, I hope, in my absence, may be.reconciled to punch.

Poor Charles is just writing to Mrs. A. and straining very hard to send something, besides the ballad, to please her much.

WILLIAM CONGREVE TO MRS. PORTER.

Rotterdam, September 27, 1700. I LEAVE you to judge whether Holland can be said to be wanting in gallantry, when it is customary there to enclose a billet doux to a lady in a letter to her husband. I have not so much as made mention of this to yours, and if you tell first, let the sin fall upon your head, instead of his. For my part, I keep the commandments; I love my neighbour as myself, and, to avoid coveting my neighbour's wife, I desire to be coveted by her, which you know is quite another thing. About five weeks since I wrote a very passionate letter to you from Antwerp, which, I believe, you never received, for just now it is found carefully put up by my man, who has been drunk ever since. I understand you have not been in the country: I am glad of it; for I

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