ment, therefore, may be found, to make a notable and legitimate drunkard of the bachelor, the married man, or the widower. It is difficult to ascertain amongst what class of people this accomplishment is in the highest repute. A first minister must have hours of relaxation, and a first minister's footman those of entertainment: to accomplish which, the former has a right, if he pleases, to get "drunk as a piper" and the latter, by the same rule, "drunk as a lord." From the proverbial phrase, which I have had occasion to quote, "drunk as a piper," and other circumstances, I am led to conjecture, that the science of drinking has been cultivated with particular success among musicians, Queis liquidam pater To whom Apollo has given, To whet their whistle, and handle the lyre. The great man, whose musical talents are annually noised in Westminster Abbey, was no less the votary of Bacchus than of Apollo; and from a late newspaper we learn, that Mr. Abel, the celebrated performer, amidst the joys of wine, either being little skilled in our language, or having drank until he was unable to speak any, caught up his viol de Gamba, and with great execution and goodhumour obliged the company with the story of Le Fevre. Such a story so told to a man of quick apprehension, a good ear, and tolerably drunk, must, no doubt, have proved a recreation interesting and entertaining. Yet I cannot but rejoice, that there are many people in the world who still continue to use the old way of telling stories by word of mouth, and who can join in a conversation without thinking it necessary to have recourse to F sharp. I am, however, no judge of these matters, and think it right to confess that I am no musician; and that the enthusiastic raptures of a drunken fiddler convey to my mind no ideas of the true sublime. Those great geniuses who are not thoroughly satisfied with being vicious, unless they can find precedents for their vice, may drink on under the sanction and authority of Alcæus, Aristophanes, and Ennius. Dulness may still plead a right to this indulgence, because the unsteady principles of heathen morality did not stigmatise it in Cato. I have already produced examples, under which all musicians, poets, satirists, and great wits, may shelter themselves; and I will undertake to furnish the same kind of license for the barbers, the dentists, the carpenters, the glaziers, or any other order of men who will depute an embassy to call upon me:-I shall only request, in return, that they will allow me a trifling consideration in their respective branches. I shall stipulate for a triple bob-major, because Demosthenes shaved his head; and to have my teeth drawn, because that orator had an impediment in his speech; I must have a wooden leg, because Agesilaus was lame; and a pair of glass eyes, because Homer was blind. I shall at least be supplied with as rational apologies for my deformity, as they will for their drunkenness; and, in process of time, I have no doubt, but it will be considered as highly ornamental to be bald-pated, fluttering, limping, and blear-eyed. To say nothing of the immorality of drunkenness, I cannot look upon it as the accomplishment of a gentleman. It seems to me to be in the same class of polite sciences with quoits, cock-fighting, tobacco-chewing, and quarter-staff. men. If we examine the character of Falstaff, in whom all the bewitching qualities of a professed drunkard are exhibited, we shall find it such a one as few would willingly think like themselves. He has not only wit himself, but is the cause of it in other He manifests much good humour in bearing the raillery of others, and great quickness in retorts of his own. He drinks much; and, while he enumerates the qualities of your true sherris, he skilfully commends what he drinks. Yet, the same character is as strongly represented to us, a parasite, an unseasonable joker, a liar, a coward, and a dishonest man. There are, perhaps, some few circumstances under which the liberal use of wine may be more easily excused; but, while we furnish palliatives for vice, we only multiply the means to cheat ourselves. I shall conclude this paper with a few remarks on the character of the drunkard, from a pleasant writer of the last century :— "A drunkard (says he) is in opinion a good fellow, in practise a living conduit; his vices are like errata in the latter end of a false coppie, they point • John Stephens the younger, of Lincoln's Inn, 1615, the way to vertue by setting downe the contrary. There is some affinity betwixt him and a chamelion; he feeds upon ayre, for he doth eate his word familiarly. He cannot run fast enough to prove a good footman: for ale and beere (the heaviest element next earth) will overtake him. His nose, the most innocent, beares the corruption of his other senses folly; from it may bee gathered the emblem of one falsely scandal'd, for it not offending is colourably punish'd. A beggar and hee are both of one stocke, but the beggar claims antiquity. The beggar begs that he may drink, and hath his meaning; the other drinks that he may beg, and shall have the true meaning shortly," &c. MONRO. No. XIX. SATURDAY, JULY 21, 1787. Rudis indigestaque moles. MANY of my readers will, perhaps, compare this day's provision to the Saturday's dinner of a notable housewife, composed of beef-steaks, and the fragments of the week. I wish them rather to consider it as an entertainment, to the furnishing of which the presents of my friends have principally contributed, and wherein it only remains for me to place the dishes on the table. To the Author of the Olla Podrida. DEAR SIR, I BE a baker's daughter, and, to tell you the truth, so much in love you can't think. Now, sir, as you seems to be a grave sort of a gentleman, I dares to say you can read the hand, cast nativities, tell fortunes, and all that. What now do you think, sir, I will give you, if so be that you will tell me for certain whether or no I shall have Dick? why fourteen kisses, and that's a baker's dozen you know; and so no more from yours, till I'm married. PATTY PENNYLESS. To this fair lady the author of the Olla Podrida has only to reply, that he is not a conjurer, nor indeed does he wear a wig. However, by consulting his books, he has discovered a few negative maxims, by the observance of which his correspondent may have Dick if Dick be worth her having. Should he be extravagant in the praise of her beauty, she is advised not to believe him; should he offer her a green gown, not to accept it. In the disposal of her baker's dozens, not to be profuse; and, moreover, not to be any person's till she is married, not even her well-wisher's, and so no more. TARATALLA. |