the place, which swept away great multitudes, and among others Theodosius. Upon his deathbed he sent his benediction in a very moving manner to Constantia, who at that time was herself so far gone in the same fatal distemper, that she lay delirious. Upon the interval which generally precedes death in sicknesses of this nature, the abbess, finding that the physicians had given her over, told her that Theodosius was just gone before her, and that he had sent her his benediction in his last moments. Constantia received it with pleasure: "And now, now," says she, "if I do not ask anything improper, let me be buried by Theodosius. My vow reaches no farther than the grave. What I ask is, I hope, no violation of it." She died soon after, and was interred according to her request.

Their tombs are still to be seen, with a short Latin inscription over them to the following purpose:

Here lie the bodies of Father Francis and Sister Constance. They were lovely in their lives, and in their death they were not divided.

The Spectator, No. 164.

Friday, September 7, 1711.

LXXVI

The Adulteration of English

-Si forte necesse est,

Fingere cinctutis non exaudita Cethegis,

Continget: dabiturque licentia sumpta pudenter.

HOR.

I HAVE often wished, that as in our constitution there are several persons whose business it is to watch over our laws, our liberties and commerce, certain men might be set apart as superintendents of our language, to hinder any words of a foreign coin from passing among us; and in particular to prohibit any French phrases from becoming current in this kingdom, when those of our own stamp are altogether as valuable. The present war has so adulterated our tongue with strange words, that it would be impossible for one of our great-grandfathers to know what his posterity have been doing, were he to read their exploits in a modern newspaper. Our warriors are very industrious in propagating the French language, at the same time that they are so gloriously successful in beating down their power. Our soldiers are men of strong heads for action, and perform such feats as they are not able to express. They want words in their own tongue to tell us what it is they achieve, and therefore send us over accounts of their performances in a jargon of phrases, which they learn among their conquered enemies. They ought however to be provided with

secretaries, and assisted by our foreign ministers, to tell their story for them in plain English, and to let us know in our mother-tongue what it is our brave countrymen are about. The French would indeed be in the right to publish the news of the present war in English phrases, and make their campaigns unintelligible. Their people might flatter themselves that things are not so bad as they really are, were they thus palliated with foreign terms, and thrown into shades and obscurity; but the English cannot be too clear in their narrative of those actions, which have raised their country to a higher pitch of glory than it ever yet arrived at, and which will be still the more admired the better they are explained.

For my part, by that time a siege is carried on two or three days, I am altogether lost and bewildered in it, and meet with so many inexplicable difficulties, that I scarce know what side has the better of it, till I am informed by the Tower guns that the place is surrendered. I do indeed make some allowances for this part of the war, fortifications having been foreign inventions, and upon that account abounding in foreign terms. But when we have won battles which may be described in our own language, why are our papers filled with so many unintelligible exploits, and the French obliged to lend us a part of their tongue before we can know how they are conquered? They must be made accessory to their own disgrace, as the Britons were formerly so artificially wrought in the curtain of the Roman theatre, that they seemed to

draw it up in order to give the spectators an opportunity of seeing their own defeat celebrated upon the stage; for so Mr. Dryden has translated that verse in Virgil,

Purpurea intexti tollant aulaea Britanni.

Which interwoven Britons seem to raise,

And show the triumph that their shame displays.

The histories of all our former wars are transmitted to us in our vernacular idiom, to use the phrase of a great modern critic. I do not find in any of our chronicles, that Edward the Third ever reconnoitred the enemy, though he often discovered the posture of the French, and as often vanquished them in battle. The Black Prince passed many a river without the help of pontoons, and filled a ditch with faggots as successfully as the generals of our time do it with fascines. Our commanders lose half their praise, and our people half their joy, by means of those hard words and dark expressions in which our newspapers do so much abound. I have seen many a prudent citizen, after having read every article, inquire of his next neighbour what news the mail had brought.

I remember in that remarkable year when our country was delivered from the greatest fears and apprehensions, and raised to the greatest height of gladness it had ever felt since it was a nation, I mean the year of Blenheim, I had the copy of a letter sent me out of the country, which was written from a young gentleman in the army to his father, a man of a good

estate and plain sense: as the letter was very modishly chequered with this modern military eloquence, I shall present my reader with a copy of it.

SIR-Upon the junction of the French and Bavarian armies they took post behind a great morass which they thought impracticable. Our general the next day sent a party of horse to reconnoitre them from a little hauteur, at about a quarter of an hour's distance from the army, who returned again to the camp unobserved through several defiles, in one of which they met with a party of French that had been marauding, and made them all prisoners at discretion. The day after a drum arrived at our camp, with a message which he would communicate to none but the general; he was followed by a trumpet, who they say behaved himself very saucily, with a message from the Duke of Bavaria. The next morning our army, being divided into two corps, made a movement towards the enemy: you will hear in the public prints how we treated them, with the other circumstances of that glorious day. I had the good fortune to be in the regiment that pushed the Gens d'Arms. Several French battalions, who some say were a Corps de Réserve, made a show of resistance; but it only proved a gasconade, for upon our preparing to fill up a little fosse, in order to attack them, they beat the Chamade, and sent us Charte Blanche. Their commandant, with a great many other general officers, and troops without number, are made prisoners of war,