that day, and what a sparkle my eyes had; but I did not let any body know how they came by it.

Indeed, if there is any sin in't, I am sure it is not worth the while here; for there is nobody to see one needs care how one looks for. I used to be joked about our neighbour young Broadcast, who is reckoned one of the best matches in our neighbourhood, and my father brought him to see me the very day after my arrival. But he is grown so fat and so coarse since I left this, and talks and laughs so loud, and speaks of nothing but the value of land, and the laying out of farms! I received him very coldly, and he has not come back since: for my own part, I don't care if he should never come back.

There is, however, some pleasure in dressing one's self, to have the amusement of making the people stare and wonder as they do. It is very diverting to me to hear the observations of some of the good ladies our neighbours, when I put on some of my town things, on purpose to provoke them. La! what a head!-Good gracious; what a neck! and mercy upon us! what a bunch behind!--Sunday last, being the first opportunity for my appearing in public, I resolved to make a figure? and so I went to church with my head as well curled as my maid and I could make it, my newest-fashioned hat, and a round hoop Mrs. Mushroom had just sent me from London. Would you think it, Mr. Lounger, I had like to have been mobb'd in the coming out?, and the people followed the carriage till it came to the church-way ford in our way home.

But this will only do now and then; and, on the whole, I find my time hang very heavy on my hands; though I try all I can to coax away a great part of the day too. As I am a person of some consequence

good deal in the disposal of my time, even though it sometimes runs a little cross to the regularity of theirs; only my father growls now and then; but we don't mind that much. I seldom rise till near eleven, and generally breakfast in bed. I read the newspapers my brother sends down, all except the politics. I stroll out, as I told before, between one and three; then, if I dress, or perhaps alter the sit of my cap, or change my feathers before the glass, I am seldom ready till long past dinner-time: they put it back an hour ever since my brother came first home. In the evening I play the new minuets, teach my sisters cards, or we guess the riddles in the Lady's Magazine; and I think of the Promenade in Prince's-street, and of Dunn's rooms, and of being in Edinburgh next winter if I can.

I am told there is to be a ball in our county town, when the Judges come this way on their circuit, in about a fortnight hence, which the Homespuns talk of with great glee. And they tell me there is a set of players who are to perform there at that time, and the German Tumbler with his bear and dogs. But, for my part, I have very little inclination to go. After seeing Lamash, and Wilson, and Kipling; not to mention Wood's and Mrs. Crawford. But above all, to think of the German Tumbler after Richer and Dubois; and his dogs forsooth after the dear little dogs at the Black Bull !-Oh! Mr. Lounger, as Macbeth says,

What a falling off is there!

It will be really compassionate in you to give us a paper now and then about what is going on in town. And do, Mr. Lounger, let there be plenty of characters in it. I have told the Homespuns the owners of all the characters in your paper, from the very

beginning without missing one. For, believe me, I am, dear Mr. Lounger, whether in town or country, your constant reader and admirer,

Ꮓ

MARJORY MUSHROOM.

N° 63. SATURDAY, APRIL 15, 1786.

An is mibi liber cui mulier imperat? cui leges imponit præscribit, vetat quod videtar? CICERO.

SIR,

To the LOUNGER.

I Am a middle-aged gentleman, possessed of a moderate income, arising chiefly from the profits of an office, of which the emolument is more than sufficient to compensate the degree of labour with which the discharge of its duties is attended. About my forty-fifth year I became tired of the bachelor-state ; and taking the hint from some little twinges of the gout, I began to think it was full time for me to look out for an agreeable help-mate. The last of the juvenile tastes that forsakes a man is his admiration of youth, and beauty; and I own I was so far from being insensible to these attractions, that I felt myself sometimes tempted to play the fool, and marry for love. I had sense enough, however, to resist this inclination, and, in my choice of a wife, to sacrifice rapture and romance to the prospect of ease and comfort. I wedded the daughter of a country gentleman

of small fortune, a lady much about my own time of life, who bore the character of a discreet prudent woman, who was a stranger to fashionable folly and dissipation of every kind, and whose highest merit. was that of an excellent housewife.

When I begin by telling you that I repent of my choice, you will naturally suppose, Mr. Lounger (a very common case), that I have been deceived in the idea I had formed of my wife's character. Not at all, Sir; I found it true to a tittle. She is a perfect paragon of prudence and discretion. Her moderation is exemplary in the highest degree; and as to œconomy she is all that I expected, and a great deal more too. You will ask, then, of what it is that I complain? I shall lay my grievances before you without reserve.

A man, Sir, who with no bad dispositions, and with some pretensions to common sense, has arrived at the age of five and forty, may be presumed to have formed for himself a plan of life, which he will not care hastily to relinquish, merely to gratify the caprices of another. I entered the matrimonial state with a firm resolution not to quarrel with my wife for trifles; but really, Sir, the sacrifices daily exacted on my part, and the mortifications I have been forced to submit to, are at length become so numerous and so intolerable, that I must either come to a downright rupture, or be hooted at for a silly fellow by all my acquaintance.

Before I married, having, as I already informed you, a decent income, I thought myself entitled to many of those little indulgencies to which a social disposition inclines a man who is possessed of the means of gratifying it. The necessary business in which my office engaged me occupying several hours of the day, it was my highest pleasure to pass the evenings with a few sensible friends, either at my

own lodgings, at theirs, or in the tavern. I found myself likewise a very welcome guest in many respectable families, where, as the humour struck me, I could go in at any hour, and take my part of a domestic meal without the formality of an invitation. I was a member too of a weekly club, which met on the Saturday evenings, most of them people of talents, and some of them not unknown in the world of letters. Here the entertainment was truly Attic. a single bottle was the modicum, which no man was allowed to exceed. Wit and humour flowed without

reserve, where all were united by the bonds of inti macy and learning lost her gravity over the enlivening glass. O noctes canaque Deum!

As my profession was a sedentary one, I kept for the sake of exercise, a couple of good geldings, and at my leisure hours contrived frequently to indulge myself in a scamper of a dozen miles into the country. It was my pride to keep my horses in excellent order; and when debarred by business from riding them, I consoled myself with a visit to the stable. Shooting was likewise a favourite amusement; and though I could not often indulge it, I had a brace of springing spaniels, and a couple of excellent pointers. In short, between my business and amusement, my time passed most delightfully; and I really believe I was one of the happiest bachelors in Great Britain.

Alas, Sir, how little do we know what is for our good! Like the poor gentleman who killed himself by taking physic when he was in health*, I wanted to be happier than I was, and I have made myself miserable.

My wife's ruling passion is, the care of futurity. We had not been married above a month before she * Mr. Easy alludes to the Italian epitaph, Stava ben, ma ber star meglio, sto qui.