fect which he met with in the too mean, but very, friendly entertainment, which his house afforded: and being answered by the marquis, that his treatment had been full of civility; that he had never passed so many days more agreeably in his life, and could not but wonder that the other should suspect the contrary: the nobleman then told him, "That the leaving ten pistoles to be distributed amongst the servants, was treating his house as an inn, and was the greatest affront that could be offered to a man of quality that he paid his own servants well, and hired them to wait on his friends as well as himself: that he considered him as a stranger who might be unacquainted with the customs of France, and err through some practice deemed less dishonourable in his own country; otherwise his resentment should have prevented any expostulation: but as the case stood, after having explained the nature of the affair, he must either redress the mistake by receiving back the ten pistoles, or give him the usual satisfaction of men of honour for an avowed affront." The marquis acknowledged his error, took back his money, and returned to Paris with less anxiety about his subsistence.

Your readers, Mr. Fitz-Adam, may learn from this story, that all our fashions, are not borrowed from France.

Yours, &c.

A. Z.

HONOURED SIR,

THIS is to acquaint you that I am a gentleman's servant, and that I have read the letter upon servants, signed O. S, in the WORLD of the twenty-first of February last and though I admit the charge brought against us in that letter to be true, namely, that those

who have nothing to give may go whistle for a clean plate or a glass of wine; yet I do not agree that a poor poet (for I am sure he must be a poet that wrote that letter; if he had been a gentleman, he would have done as gentlemen do; I say, that I do not agree that a poor poet) has any right to abuse those that are his betters. A good servant, and one who knows his business, will endeavour all he can to keep low people from intruding at his master's table: and yet so far are many of us from holding poets in contempt, that they are always welcome to dinner in the hall with the best of us, and have free leave to read their verses, or sing their songs for the entertainment of the company.

If this same Mr. O. S. had been a philosopher or a man of deep learning, he might have had some sort of reason to find fault; for it is not to be denied that we are a little apt to overlook such sort of gentry; but not so much because they have nothing to give, as from an absence of mind which we constantly observe in these philosophers and men of deep learning, who if they ask for bread, beer, or wine, are as well contented with oil, vinegar, or mustard, or any thing else that happens to be readiest at hand.

I beg pardon for troubling you with this letter, which is only to set these matters in a clear light, and to request that you will publish no more papers about servants, but let things go on in the old way; and in so doing you will oblige us all in general, and in particular,

Honoured sir,

Your dutiful servant

To command,

I. K.

As I am desirous of being a peace-maker upon all occasions, I shall comply with the request of this correspondent, and conclude my paper with a hint to all gentlemen in livery, that as poets, philosophers, and men of learning, will be sometimes intruders at their masters' tables, let them consider them as brethren, and treat them with humanity.

No. LXX. THURSDAY, MARCH 21.

Ψυχης Ιατρείον

To Mr. Fitz-Adam.

SIR,

YOUR correspondent in your sixty-third paper has, I must confess, shewn no less ingenuity than the duke de Vivonne did wit in his celebrated answer to Lewis the fourteenth, upon that king's asking him at table, "Mais á quoi sert de lire? La lecture, (said the duke,) fait à l'esprit ce que vos perdrix font á mes joues." But whatever new doctrines these gentlemen are pleased to broach, that books are the food of the mind, I must beg leave to say, that they have from time immemorial been called physic, not food: and for this I appeal to the famous inscription on the Alexandrian library, which I have placed at the head of my letter," Physic for the Soul."

For my own part, I can truly say that I have considered all books as physic from my earliest youth; and so indeed have most of my school-fellows and acquaintance, and nauseated them accordingly: nor

VOL. II.

can any of us at this time endure the sight or touch of them, not even a present from the author, unless it be as thoroughly gilt as the most loathsome pill, or qualified and made palatable by the syrup of a dedication.

Those who have endeavoured to conquer this disgust, have given the most forcible proofs of the truth of my argument; many of them by venturing to prescribe to themselves, have so injudiciously taken their potions, that their minds have been thrown into various ill habits and disorders. Some have fallen into so lax a state, that they could neither digest nor keep any thing whatsoever. Nay, I have been acquainted with such as have taken the most innocent and salutary of these medicines, but by overdosing themselves, and making no allowance for their own corrupt and acrimonious humours, have fallen into the most violent agitations, discharging such a quantity of undigested and virulent matter, that they have poisoned the neighbourhood round. Some, only upon taking the quantity of a few pages, have stared, raved, foamed at the mouth, and discovered all the symptoms of madness; while the very same dose has had the contrary effect upon others, operating only as an opiate.

The true and genuine food of the mind is News. That this is incontestable, appears from the number of souls in this metropolis who subsist entirely upon this diet, without the least addition of any other nourishment whatsoever. In all ages and countries the poets have constantly described the avidity with which it is taken, by the figurative expressions of eating or drinking. Shakspeare uses a more general term:

With open mouth swallowing a taylor's news.

Another witty author calls news the manna of the day: alluding to that food with which the Israelites were

supplied in the wilderness from day to day, and which in a very little time became stale and corrupt: as indeed Providence has in its wisdom ordained that all kinds of sustenance shall be in their nature corruptible, to remind man continually of the dependency of his state on earth. Whereas physic (particularly of the modern chemical preparation) preserves its efficacy and virtues uncorrupted and unimpaired by time; a property it has in common with books; which never suffer by age, provided they are originally well composed, and of good ingredients. The principal of these ingredients are generally thought to be wit; and I fancy, Mr. Fitz-Adam, by the quantity of it with which you now and then season your speculations, that you have adopted that opinion. But let me tell you, sir, that though my supposition should be true, you are in the wrong to rely upon it too much : for though this seasoning should happen to preserve them for the admiration of future times, it is certainly your business to accommodate yourself to the taste of the present. If therefore you would make sure of customers, give us news; for which there is as constant a demand as for daily bread: and as for your wit, which is a luxury, treat it as the Dutch do their spices; burn half of it, and you may possibly render the remaining half of some value. But if you produce all you have for the market, you will soon find it become a mere drug, and bear no price.

I am,

Your friend and well-wisher,

A. B..

I have published this letter just as I received it: and as a proof that my correspondent is not singular in his opinion of wit, I must observe that the sagacious author of the late excellent abridgement of the history of France expresses a doubt, that the present