much truth. But this sorrowful rogue is too dull to be witty, and as for truth, I suppose it would neither suit his argument nor his disposition. His raillery upon a shabby black coat is indeed delicate to an extreme; but he forgets that wit and abilities have as little connection with rich clothes as they have with great places, and that a man may wear a fine suit,

Lordships. My part has not been an obscure one: I may say, with the sublimest of all poets,

Not to know me, c.

In short, my Lords, I think I have trode the public stage of the world with some degree of applause, with a pen that can blacken the whitest character, and a tongue that can dush the maturest councils, I hold myself equipped at all points for the offices of party. One in particular of this Right Honourable Company can bear testimony to my performances.What need of more words?

I have done the state some service, and they know it.

But, my Lords, to come to the point at once.-No man, I trust, in these times, serves the state for nothing; yet such has been my pride or folly (call it which you will), that I have got nothing for my pains but empty praise. Now, my Lords, this diet begins to grow too thin for my stomach. I must own I expected to have reaped good interest for my self-denial; but things have not come round as I looked for; the revolutions in govern. ment have not kept pace with those that have been made in my fortune; and the late unprosperous fatal negotiation has broken all my measures, and thrown me at length upon your Lordships' mercy, the humblest of your petitioners.

Lord President.

Will your Lordships have the patience to hear this prating fellow any longer?

Lord Camden.

Mr. Brazen, you will please to contract your discourse as much as the matter will admit. A great deal that you have now been relating to us might, in my humble opinion, have been spared without any prejudice to your petition, or to your principles. If you have any real business, worthy being communicated to this company, we shall wish you to let us hear it without further preface.

Brazen.

I should have thought that your Lordship, at least in the course of your high office, had been more patient under circumlocution, than to correct me for the little I have now made use of; however, not to incur your displeasure, I will come at once to the point. Your Lordships see these two papers. This in my left hand, my Lords, contains the most important intelligence that was ever directed to ministers. It is, my Lords, the whole scheme and plan of opposition, which you are shortly to encounter, concerted, modelled and digested, according to rules logical, metaphysical

and

or figure as a secretary of state, without a single grain of either. But, Sir, if facts asserted are notoriously false, the assertion of them can do no mischief; if notoriously true, they are beyond the reach of his wit, if he had any, to palliate, or of his modesty, which I think is upon a par with his wit, to deny.

and mathematical. It is the most beautiful, as well as the sublimest system of politics, that ever sprung from the brain of man. I am here ready to consign it over to your Lordships, upon the terms and conditions annexed to it, and with it myself, my faith, my friendship, and my conscience. Witness that here Iago doth give up

The execution of his wit, hands, heart,

To this great Council's service.

(The whole of the Council rise at once, and the High Treasurer speaks.) High Treasurer.

My Lords, I see the indignation with which you receive this proposal, and the just contempt with which you are about to treat this most infamous proponent. But I beseech you, let what I shall now say to him serve 2 for his dismission, and hold him unworthy of any further reply. We reject ** your offer, Sir, with the most consummate disdain. Unfaithful to your own party, we scorn to admit you into ours; and though the bounty of the de council holds forth rewards for merit, we have neither the will nor the means to bribe and seduce a villain. Amongst those gentleman, whom you thus offer to abandon, there are many for whose persons and characters we have the most absolute regard. Whatever their councils may be, and however hostile to our measures, we scorn to look into them by any indirect means. Friends to the liberties of our country, and protectors of its constitution, we wish not to destroy opposition by the force of corruption, we seek only to confute it by the prevalence of reason; every proposal that has the public welfare for its object, from whatever party it springs, shall have our support; and while we have truth and justice on our side, we have nothing to apprehend from opposition, though all your genius, and (which is more) all your ill nature shall be drawn forth in its support.

Brazen.

'Tis very well, my Lords; 'tis mighty well; you have rejected the olive branch, take then the sword.-This paper, my Lords, in my right hand, holds a mine that shall blow you into the air. It is a libel wrote in gall, Your present consultations are the subject; and every member here present shall have a seat, except I think fit to dispatch your unimportant Grace to Newmarket. For you, my lord president, I shall characterise you under the name of Tilbury, because when that man kept an inn at Bagshot, you put up at his house. To my Lord Camden, I shall bequeath the odious name of Jefferyes, by the old derivatory rule of Lucus a non lucendo. Cau, tion without foresight shall be your title, Sir; and your noble colleague's, Malagrida,

Now, Sir, if I were not afraid of distressing him too much, I would ask him whether Lord Townshend, did not openly complain, only three days before his departure, that he could not, by the warmest solicitations, prevail on the ministry, to agree upon any one system of instructions for him; that he was left entirely to himself; and that the ministry could not be persuaded to pay the smallest attention either to his situation or to that of the country he was sent to govern. Did he not say this without reserve to every man he met, even in public court, and with all possible marks of resentment and disgust? I would advise your second correspondent not to deny these known facts; for if he does, I will assuredly produce some proofs of them, which will gall his patrons a little more than any thing they have seen already. Let one of them only recollect what sort of conversation very lately passed between him and the Lord Lieutenant, how he was pressed, and how he evaded. But the facts, of which the public are already possessed, sufficiently speak for themselves, and the nation wants no further proof of the weakness, ignorance, irresolution, and spirit of discord, which reign triumphant in this illustrious divan, who have dared to take upon them the conduct of an empire.

One question more, and I have done. Did it become him, who has undertaken the defence of a whole ministry, to forget one of the principal characters of the piece? Why should he omit the dog? This mongrel, that barks, and bites, and fawns, has nevertheless a share in council, and, in the opinion of the best judges, cuts full as good a figure in it as his

master.

Here, who waits there?-O charming antithesis! O polished language! and equally fit for the noble Lord who speaks, or for the footman who hears it.

Malagrida; when I have thought of any reason for either, I may give it you. To your Excellency, by way of contrast, I decree the name of Boutdeville or Sulky.

S. S.

Here; who waits there? Take this fellow and put him out of the house.

Exit BRAZEN between two footmen.

LETTER IX.

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.

5 Dec. 1767.

MR. PRINTER, THERE are a party of us who, for our amusement, have established a kind of political club. We mean to give no offence whatever to any body in our debates. The following is a mere jeu d'esprit, which I threw out at one of our late meetings, and is at your service, if you think it will afford the least entertainment to your readers*.

I am, &c.

Y. Z.

Mr. President. The condition of this country, at the conclusion of the last spring, was such as gave us strong reason to expect, that not a single moment of the interval between that period and our winter meeting would be lost or misemployed. We had a right to expect, that gentlemen, who thought themselves equal to advise about the government of the nation, would, during this period, have applied all their attention, and exerted all their efforts to discover some effectual remedy for the national distress. For my own part, I had no doubt that, when we again met, the committee would

As the debates in Parliament were not allowed at this period to be given verbatim, they were usually detailed to the public under the guise of fictitious assemblies and opinions, through the medium of imaginary characters; and under this form the writer undertakes to canvass the measures of government, on the opening of the Session of Parliament in November, 1767. The satire however was at first so severe, and at the same time so applicable, that the printer was half afraid to insert it; whence, after duly expressing his thanks for the honour which he felt was conferred upon the paper "by the correspondence of this masterly writer," he made the following apology the next day for its non-appearance, "We most heartily wish to oblige our valuable correspondent C., but his last favour is of so delicate a nature, that we dare not insert it, unless we are permitted to make such changes in certain expressions, as may take off the immediate offence."

This request appears to have been complied with: and hence the abruptness that will be found in several of the passages of the article as it was at length printed, and the palpable omissions in others. EDIT.

have been ready to lay before us some plan for a speedy relief of the people, founded upon such certain lights and informations as they alone are able to procure, and digested with an accuracy proportioned to the time they have had to consider of it: But if these were our expectations, if these were the hopes conceived by the whole society, how grievously are we disappointed! After an interval of so many months, instead of being told that a plan is formed, or that measures are taken, or, at least, that materials have been diligently collected, upon which some scheme might be founded for preserving us from famine; we see that this provident committee, these careful providers, are of opinion, they have sufficiently acquitted themselves of their duty, by advising the chair to recommend the matter once more to our consideration, and so endeavouring to relieve themselves from the burthen and censure which must fall somewhere, by throwing it upon the society. God knows in what manner they have been employed for these four months past. It appears too plainly they have done but little good.-I hope they have not been busied in doing mischief; and though they have neglected every useful, every necessary occupation, I hope their leisure has not been spent * * in spreading corruption through the people.

Sir, I readily assent to the laborious panegyric which the gentleman upon the lower bench has been pleased to make of a very able member of the committee, whom we have lately lost. No man had a higher opinion of his talents than I had; but as to his having conceived any plan for remedying the general distress about provisions, (as the gentleman would have us understand) I see many reasons for suspecting that it could never have been the case. If that gentleman had formed such a plan, or if he had collected such materials as we are now told he had, I think it is impossible but that, in the course of so many months, some knowledge or intimation of it must have been communicated to the gen

The Right Honourable Charles Townshend, chancellor of the exche. quer, who died September 4th, 1767, and was succeeded in that office by the Duke of Grafton. EDIT.