then were uttered, one would have thought that the Goddess of Friendship herself had descended upon earth, and was animating the voice of the companions of Flavillus.

With all this Flavillus was far from being happy. Superior to the companions he now lived with, he could not always avoid reflecting on the nothingness of his situation; and though he was afraid to think upon it, he could not help at times foreseeing that the means of his extravagance must draw to a close. His spirit on some occasions rose within him, and he formed unavailing plans to retrieve his situation, and act worthy of himself; but he had proceeded too far to be able easily to retract; he had sunk in his own esteem, and, what was worse, was accustomed to feel that he had done so. In this state he remained for some time, the voice of reason and of right becoming more and more feeble, and the influence of present gratification strengthening with every fresh indul

gence.

Matters, however, at length came to a crisis. Upon applying to his man of business, who had, without effect, made repeated remonstrances against his expensive course of life, he was told that there was no more money to be had-that his creditors, who had already had much patience, were now become too clamorous to be any longer flattered or amused; in short, he was informed in plain language, that without discharging his debts a jail must be the consequence.

Flavillus's mind was no longer what it had been. At a former period, had he foreseen such an event, it is hard to say what would have been the consequence. Now he stooped to the misery of his situation. The very night before he received this decisive intelligence he had been engaged in a debauch, which lasted from dinner till morning; he had parted with his com

VOL. I.

U

panions amidst the loudest exclamations of social joy and social affection: the next night they had resolved to repeat their bliss and reiterate their enjoyment.— At this second meeting Flavillus ventured to mention his situation. I will spare my readers an account of the mortifying indifference with which his story was received. Flavillus found that from those friends whom he had frequently heard boast of the warmth and generosity of their souls, when compared with the meaner and colder minds of the dull, the plodding, and the sober; from those men with whom he used to set the table in a roar, with whom he had a thousand times come under the most sacred bonds of attachment, and who had a thousand times sworn they could not live without him;-from all of them was he obliged to receive, in different terms, the same mortifying reply, that they could not afford him the smallest relief or assistance.

A gentleman, whom I shall here call Marcus, who had known Flavillus in younger days, who knew his good qualities, his accomplishments, so worthy of a better fate, who had often mourned over him, but who, from indignation at the dissipated course he had followed, had avoided his company, heard accidentally of this incident in his life. In the most delicate manner in the world, without his so much as knowing from whom the relief came, he was relieved, and, by this gentleman's bounty, was freed from the impending horror of a jail.

But Flavillus, though ruined by dissipation, had not yet fully attained either its apathy or its meanness. The generosity of Marcus, though it relieved his present distress, showed him at once the station he had lost, and that to which he was reduced. His body, which his former course of life had enfeebled, was too weak to support the agitation of his mind. He retired to a little country village, where he might

equally avoid the neglect of those companions by whom his former follies had been shared, and the reproach or the pity of those by whom they had been censured or shunned. Here he lived on a small pension which the same benevolent interposition procured him, till a lingering nervous disorder put a period to his sufferings.

'Twas but a few weeks ago I assisted at his funeral. There I saw one or two of his former associates who had taken the trouble to attend, who, after a few inquiries after the cause of his death, and a few common-place regrets, that so agreeable and goodhearted fellow should have been so unfortunate, made an appointment for a supper in the evening. Marcus put a plain stone over his grave. I never look on it without the mortifying reflection, with how many virtues it might have been inscribed! without lamenting that so excellent natural abilities as those of Flavillus, so much improved by education, and so susceptible of farther improvement, should have been lost to every worthy and valuable purpose; lost in a course of frivolous or criminal dissipation, amidst companions without attachment or friendship, amidst pleasures that afforded so little real happiness or enjoyment.

P.

No. 36. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1785.

SIR,

Divitias operosiores. HOR.

TO THE AUTHOR OF THE LOUNGER.

'Tis but very lately that I became acquainted with your paper, our family only having taken it in last week for the first time, when it was recommended to my brother by Lady Betty Lampoon, who happened to be on a visit in our country. Her ladyship said, it was a dear sweet satirical paper, and that one found all one's acquaintance in it. And sure enough I found some of my acquaintance in it (for I am the only reader among us), and so shall I tell Mr. John Homespun when I meet him. Only think of a man come to his years to go to put himself and his neighbours into print in the manner he has done. But I dare to say it is all out of spite and envy at our having grown so suddenly rich, by my brother's good fortune in India; and to be sure, sir, things are changed with us from what I remember; and yet perhaps we are not so much to be envied neither, if all were known. Do tell me, sir, how we shall manage to be as happy as people suppose our good fortune must have made

us.

But perhaps, sir, it is not the fashion (as my sisterin-law and Mons. de Sabot says) to be happy.-Lord, sir, I had forgot you don't know Mons. de Sabot! But really my head is not so clear as it used to be. I

will try to tell you things in their order.-My brother, who, as Mr. Homespun has informed you, is returned home with a great fortune, is determined to live as becomes it, and sent down a ship-load of blacks in laced liveries, the servants in this country not being handy about fine things; though to tell you the truth, some of the blackamoors don't give themselves much trouble about their work, and two of them never do a turn except playing on the French horn, and sometimes making punch, when it is wanted particularly

nice.

Besides these, there came down in two chaises my brother's own valet de sham, my sister's own maid, a man cook, who has two of the negers under him, and Mons. de Sabot, whom my brother wrote to me he had hired for a butler; but, when he came, he told us he was maitre dotelle, and had been so to the Earl of C, the Duke of N- and two German princes. So, to be sure, we were almost afraid to speak to him, till we found he was as affable and obliging as could be, and told us every thing we ought to do to be fashionable, and like the great folks of London and Paris. Mons. de Sabot is acquainted with every one of them.

But then, sir, it is so troublesome an affair to be fashionable! and so my father and mother, and the rest of us, who have never been abroad, find. We used to be as cheerful a family as any in the country; and at our dinners and suppers, if we had not fine things, we had pure good appetites, and, after the table was uncovered, used to be as merry as grigs at cross purposes, questions and commands, or what's my thought like? But now we must not talk loud, nor laugh, nor walk fast, nor play at romping games; and we must sit quiet during a long dinner of two courses and a dessert, and drink wine and water, and never touch our meat but with our fork, and pick