SIR,

’After the many heavy Lashes that have fallen from your Pen, you may justly expect in return all the Load that my Ink can lay upon your Shoulders.  You have Quartered all the foul Language upon me, that could be raked out of the Air of Billingsgate, without knowing who I am, or whether I deserved to be Cupped and Scarified at this rate.  I tell you once for all, turn your Eyes where you please, you shall never Smell me out.  Do you think that the Panicks, which you sow about the Parish, will ever build a Monument to your Glory?  No, Sir, you may Fight these Battles as long as you will, but when you come to Ballance the Account you will find that you have been Fishing in troubled Waters, and that an Ignis fatuus hath bewildered you, and that indeed you have built upon a sandy Foundation, and brought your Hogs to a fair Market.

  I am, SIR,

  Yours, &c._

* * * * *

No. 596.  Monday, September 20, 1714.

  ‘Molle meum levibus Cor est violabile Telis.’

  Ovid.

The Case of my Correspondent who sends me the following Letter has somewhat in it so very whimsical, that I know not how to entertain my Readers better than by laying it before them.

  SIR,

’I am fully convinced that there is not upon Earth a more impertinent Creature than an importunate Lover:  We are daily complaining of the Severity of our Fate, to People who are wholly unconcerned in it; and hourly improving a Passion, which we would persuade the World is the Torment of our Lives.  Notwithstanding this Reflection, Sir, I cannot forbear acquainting you with my own Case.  You must know then, Sir, that even from my Childhood, the most prevailing Inclination I could perceive in my self, was a strong Desire to be in Favour with the Fair Sex.  I am at present in the one and twentieth Year of my Age, and should have made Choice of a She Bed-fellow many Years since, had not my Father, who has a pretty good Estate of his own getting, and passes in the World for a prudent Man, being pleased to lay it down as a Maxim, That nothing spoils a young Fellow’s Fortune so much as marrying early; and that no Man ought to think of Wedlock ’till six and twenty.  Knowing his Sentiments upon this Head, I thought it in vain to apply my self to Women of Condition, who expect Settlements; so that all my Amours have hitherto been with Ladies who had no Fortunes:  But I know not how to give you so good an Idea of me, as by laying before you the History of my Life.

’I can very well remember, that at my School-mistresses, whenever we broke up, I was always for joining my self with the Miss who Lay in, and was constantly one of the first to make