“What if I could inform you, that among scores of belles, flatterers, triflers, who swim along these walks, self-satisfied and pleased, and looking defiances to men (and to modesty, I had like to have said; for bashfulness seems to be considered as want of breeding in all I see here); a pretty woman is as rare as a black swan; and when one such starts up, she is nicknamed a Beauty, and old fellows and young fellows are set a-spinning after her.”

“Miss Banks (Miss Peggy Banks) was the belle when I came first down—­yet she had been so many seasons here, that she obtained but a faint and languid attention; so that the smarts began to put her down in their list of had-beens.  New faces, my dear, are more sought after than fine faces.  A piece of instruction lies here—­that women should not make even their faces cheap.”

“Miss Chudleigh next was the triumphant toast:  a lively, sweet-tempered, gay, self-admired, and not altogether without reason, generally-admired lady—­she moved not without crowds after her.  She smiled at every one.  Every one smiled before they saw her, when they heard she was on the walk.  She played, she lost, she won—­all with equal good-humour.  But, alas, she went off, before she was wished to go off.  And then the fellows’ hearts were almost broken for a new beauty.”

“Behold! seasonably, the very day that she went away entered upon the walks Miss L., of Hackney!—­Miss Chudleigh was forgotten (who would wish for so transient a dominion in the land of fickledom!)—­And have you seen the new beauty?—­And have you seen Miss L.? was all the inquiry from smart to smartless.  But she had not traversed the walks two days, before she was found to want spirit and life.  Miss Chudleigh was remembered by those who wished for the brilliant mistress, and scorned the wifelike quality of sedateness—­and Miss L. is now seen with a very silly fellow or two, walking backwards and forwards unmolested—­dwindled down from the new beauty to a very quotes pretty girl; and perhaps glad to come off so.  For, upon my word, my dear, there are very few pretty girls here.”

“But here, to change the scene, to see Mr. W——­sh at eighty (Mr. Cibber calls him papa), and Mr. Cibber at seventy-seven, hunting after new faces; and thinking themselves happy if they can obtain the notice and familiarity of a fine woman!—­How ridiculous!—­If you have not been at Tunbridge, you may nevertheless have heard that here are a parcel of fellows, mean traders, whom they call touters, and their business, touting—­riding out miles to meet coaches and company coming hither, to beg their custom while here.”