his burgoo with his fingers or with a horn fpoon? What are his debts and his misery to us? Juft as if we cared whether his pofteriors were covered with a pair of breeches, or a kilt, or whether he was literally fans culotte? In great Britain, indeed, his barking might anfwer fome purpofe; there he was near the object of his fury; but here he is like a cur howling at the moon.

Indeed, he himself seems to have been fully fenfible of the ridiculoufnefs of the fituation in which this publication would place him, and therefore he has had the precaution to furround, himself with company, to keep him in countenance. He fays that Mr. Jefferson, late American Secretary of State, fpoke of his work, on different occafions, in refpectful terms; and that he declared " it contained "the most aftonishing concentration "abuses, that he had ever heard of." He tells us befides, that other gentlemen have delivered their opinions to the fame effect; and that their encouragement was one principal caufe of the appearance of this American edition.

of

And did he in good earneft, imagine that mixing with fuch company would render his perfon facred and invulnerable? He should have recollected, that, though one scabby sheep

infects a whole flock, he does not thereby work his own cure.

As to Mr. Jefferson, I must fuppofe him entirely out of the Queftion; for, nobody that has the least knowledge of the talents, penetration and taste of that Gentleman, will ever believe, that he could find any thing worthy of respect in a production, evidently intended to feduce the rabble of North Britain. Befides,

upon looking a fecond time over the words attributed to Mr. Jefferson, I think, it is easy to discover that the quotation is erroneous: the word abuses, I am pretty confident, should be abuse; and thus, by leaving out an's, the fentence expreffes exactly what one would expect from fuch a person as Mr. Jefferson: “ that "the work contained the most aftonishing con"centration of abuse, that he had ever heard " of."

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With respect to thofe other gentlemen whofe encouragement has thrufted the Author forward, it is not difficult to guefs to what clan they belong; but, let them be who they may, and let their fituation be what it may (and if I am right in my guess, it is at this time awkward enough), I think they would not exchange it for the one they have placed him in. He vainly imagines himself the hero of the

farce, when he is nothing but the buffoon, Indeed he has defcribed the part he is acting better than I, or any one elfe can do it. He fays that Authors of revolutionary pamphlets form a kind of "forlorn hope on the skirts of "battle." Every one knows, that the forlorn hope, or enfans perdus, was amongst the ancient Gauls, compofed of the outcasts of fociety; wretches whofe lives were already forfeited (and who had not had the good luck, like our Author to "efcape") who were fet in the front of battle, not for their courage, but their crimes. The comparison he has pilfered from Dean Swift; it is therefore juft to return it to its owner; but as to the application of it to himself, I am certain, no body can have the leaft objection.

However, I can hardly imagine, that the encouragement of thefe gentlemen would, alone, have dragged him into fo dangerous a fervice. I think, his conduct may be, in part, accounted for upon phyfical principles. We are told, that there is, or ought to be, about every human body, a certain part called the crumena, upon which depends the whole economy of the intestines. When the crumena is full, the inteftines are in a correfpondent ftate; and then the body is inclined to repofe, and the mind to peace and good neighbourhood: but when

the crumena becomes empty, the fympathetic inteftines are immediately contracted, and the whole internal state of the patient is thrown into infurrection and uproar, which, communicating itself to the brain, produces what a learned ftate phyfician calls, the mania reformatio; and if this malady is not ftopped at once, by the help of an hempen necklace, or some other remedy equally efficacious, it never fails to break out into Atheism, Robbery, Unitarianifm, Swindling, Jacobinism, Maffacres, Civic Feafts and Infurrections. Now, it appears to me, that our unfortunate Author must be afflicted with this dreadful malady, and if fo, I will appeal to any man of feeling, whether his friends would not have fhewn their humanity, in relieving him by other means than those they have encouraged him to employ; which, befides being unproductive, have exposed both him and them to the birch of public opinion.

Such are the mighty effects of the mania reformatio, that I was at firft inclined to believe, we were indebted to that alone for the publication in queftion; and that the gentlemen, from whom the Author had received encouragement to proceed, were purely the creatures of his difordered imagination; but I have lately feen it introduced to public notice fo often, and in

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fuch a way, that I have been obliged to change my opinion.

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A Newfpaper printed at Philadelphia, whofe motto is, "The Public Will our Guide;-the Public Good our End," has borne a confpicuous part in "ufhering this dark born devil into light." In one number of that truly puffing print, the fpeech of a member of Congrets is cut afunder in the middle, for the purpose of wedging in an extract from The Political Progrefs of Britain. The debate was on the propriety of the houfe's cenfuring certain focieties that had affifted in bringing about an infurrection in the western counties of Pennfylvania; and the extracted morfel, wedged in as above mentioned, went to prove that bread was abfolutely dearer in Scotland than in England!Well enough may you ftare, reader. Was there ever fuch an impudent, fuch a barefaced puff as this, fince the noble art of puffing has been discovered? And did the author of it imagine, that there was any two legged creature fo ftupid as not to perceive it? It is an infult to our national understanding. Why not fay candidly; "gentlemen and ladies, here is a poor man in diftrefs, who, for want of better employment, has trumped up an old pamphlet, which he proposes to fell for a new one; in buying each of you one, you will render him a great fervice, and the bookfeller a still greater. Unless you will be pleased to bestow your charity, the worms will stuff away upon the work,

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