Any person that shall come publicly abroad in a fantastical habit, contrary to the present mode and fashion, except Don Diego Dismallo,[257] or any other out of poverty, shall have his name and dress inserted in our next.

N.B.—­Mr. How’d’call is desired to leave off those buttons.

[Footnote 249:  Ben Jonson’s “Volpone; or, The Fox.”]

[Footnote 250:  The comedy, “Love in a Hollow Tree; or, The Lawyer’s Fortune,” was published by William, Lord Viscount Grimston (1683-1756), when he was twenty-two years of age.  On the occasion of a contested election for the borough of St. Albans (1736), it was reprinted—­by the Duchess of Marlborough, it is said—­with notes attacking the author, and adorned with the frontispiece of an elephant dancing on a rope.  The viscount bought up as nearly as he could the whole edition.  “This worthy notleman was a good husband to one of the best of wives, an indulgent father of a numerous offspring, a kind master to his servants, a generous friend, and an affable, hospitable neighbour.” (Biog.  Dram.)]

[Footnote 251:  See No. 17]

[Footnote 252:  Probably the Hon. Edward Howard, second son of Henry, fifth Earl of Suffolk.  On the death of his nephew without issue in 1722, he became eighth Earl of Suffolk, but he died unmarried in 1731.]

[Footnote 253:  See No. 7.]

[Footnote 254:  Dr. Jonathan Goddard, the physician and confidant of Cromwell, a member of the Royal Society, and medical professor of Gresham College, discovered in the course of his chemical experiments, the famous elixir, called here his “drops.”  Dr. Goddard died of an apoplexy in 1675.  “March 24, 1674-5.  About 10 o’clock that night, my very good friend, Dr. Jonathan Goddard, reader of the physic lectures at Gresham College, suddenly fell down dead in the street, as he was entering into a coach.  He was a pretty corpulent and tall man, a bachelor between 45 and 50 years of age; he was melancholy, inclined to be cynical, and used now and then to complain of giddiness in his head.  He was an excellent mathematician, and some time physician to Oliver the Protector” (John Coniers, apothecary, in Shoe Lane.  MSS.  Sloan. 958).  The “drops” were a preparation of spirit of hartshorn, with other things; they were used in fainting, apoplexies, &c.]

[Footnote 255:  With this satire on the vulgar prejudices concerning witches, may be compared what Addison says in the Spectator (No. 117):  “I believe in general that there is and has been such a thing as witchcraft; but at the same time can give no credit to any particular instance of it.”]

[Footnote 256:  The number of advertisements in the Tatler gradually increased; but as a compensation the “news” paragraph was dropped.]

[Footnote 257:  This name was afterwards applied by the Tory writers to the Earl of Nottingham; and the author of the ‘Examiner’ (vol. iii.  No 48) says that it was Steele who first used the name for this nobleman, “and upon no less an important affair, than the oddness of his buttons.”  In the ’Guardian (No. 53), however, Steele disavowed any reference to Lord Nottingham:  “I do not remember the mention of Don Diego; nor do I remember tht ever I thought of Lord Nottingham in any character drawn in any one paper of Bickerstaff.”  See also No. 31, below.]