In the place I moft ufually frequent, men differ rather in the time of day in which they make a figure, than in any real greatnefs above one another. I, who am at the coffee-house at fix in a morning, know that my friend Beaver the haberdasher has a levee of more undiffembled friends and admirers, than most of the courtiers or generals of Great Britain. Every man about him has, perhaps, a news-paper in his hand; but none can pretend to guess what ftep will be taken in any one court of Europe, till Mr. Beaver has thrown down his pipe, and declares what measures the allies must enter into upon this new pofture of affairs. Our coffee-house is near one of the inns of court, and Beaver has the audience and admiration of his neighbours from fix till within a quarter of eight, at which time he is interrupted by the ftudents of the houfe; fome of whom are ready-dreffed for Westminster, at eight in a morning, with faces as bufy as if they were retained in every cause there; and others come in their nightgowns to faunter away their time, as if they never defigned to go thither. I do not know that I meet, in any of my walks, objects which move both my spleen and laughter fo effectually, as thofe young fellows at the Grecian, Squire's, Searl's, and all other coffeeboufes adjacent to the law, who rife early for no other purpose but to publish their laziness. One would think thefe young virtuofos take a gay cap and flippers, with a fcarf and party-coloured gown, to be enfigns of dignity; for the vain things approach each other with an air, which fhews they regard one another for their veftments. I have obferved that the fuperiority among thefe proceeds from an opinion of gallantry and fashion: the gentleman in the ftrawberry fafh, who prefides fo much over the reft, has, it seems, fubfcribed to every opera this laft winter, and is fuppofed to receive favours from one of the actreffes.

When the day grows too busy for these gentlemen to enjoy any longer the pleafures of their defhabille, with any manner of confidence, they give place to men who have bufinefs or good fenfe in their faces, and come to the coffee-houfe either to tranfact affairs or enjoy converfation. The perfons to whofe behaviour and difcourfe I have moft regard are fuch as are between

these two forts of men; fuch as have not spirits too active to be happy and well pleased in a private condition, nor complexions too warm to make them neglect the duties and relations of life. Of these fort of men confift the worthier part of mankind; of thefe are all good fathers, generous brothers, fincere friends, and faithful fubjects. Their entertainments are derived rather from reason than imagination; which is the caufe that there is no impatience or inftability in their fpeech or action: You fee in their countenances they are at home, and in quiet poffeffion of the prefent inftant, as it paffes, without defiring to quicken it by gratifying any paffion, or profecuting any new defign. Thefe are the men formed for fociety, and thofe little communities which we exprefs by the word neighbourhoods.

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The coffee-house is the place of rendezvous to all that live near it, who are thus turned to relish calm and ordinary life. Eubulus prefides over the middle hours of the day, when this affembly of men meet together. He enjoys a great fortune. handfomely, without launching expence ; and exerts many noble and useful qualities, without appearing in any public employment. His wisdom and knowledge are ferviceable to all that think fit to make use of them; and he does the office of a council, a judge, an executor, and a friend, to all his acquaintance, not only without the profits which attend fuch offices, but alfo without the deference and homage which are ufually paid to them. The giving of thanks is difpleafing to him. The greatest gratitude you can fhew him, is to let him fee you are the better man for his fervices; and that you are as ready to oblige others, as he is to oblige you.

In the private exigencies of his friends he lends, at legal value, confiderable fums, which he might highly increase by rolling in the public ftocks. He does not confider in whofe hands his money will improve moft, but where it will do moft good.

Eubulus has fo great an authority in his little diurnal audience, that when he shakes his head at any piece of public news, they all of them appear dejected; and, on the contrary, go home to their dinners with a good ftomach and chearful afpect, when Eubulus feems to intimate that things go well. Nay, their veneration towards.

him is fo great, that when they are in other company they speak and act after him; are wife in his fentences, and are no fooner fat down at their own tables, but they hope or fear, rejoice or defpond, as they faw him do at the coffee-houfe. In a word, every man is Eubulus as foon as his back is turned.

Having here given an account of the feveral reigns that fucceed each other from day-break till dinner-time, I fhall mention the monarchs of the afternoon on another occafion, and fhut up the whole feries of them with the history of Tom the Tyrant; who, as first minifter of the coffee-houfe, takes the government upon him between the hours of eleven and twelve at night, and gives his orders in the most arbitrary manner to the fervants below him, as to the difpofition of liquors, coals, and cinders.

R.

N° 50.

Friday, April 27.

4

Nunquam aliud natura, aliud fapientia dixit.

Juv. Sat. xiv. 321.

Good fenfe and nature always speak the fame.

WHEN the four Indian kings were in this country

about a twelvemonth ago, I often mixed with the rabble, and followed them a whole day together, being wonderfully ftruck with the fight of every thing that is new or uncommon. I have, fince their departure, employed a friend to make many inquiries of their landlord the upholsterer, relating to their manners and converfation, as alfo concerning the remarks which they made in this country for, next to the forming a right notion of fuch ftrangers, I fhould be defirous of learning what ideas they have conceived of us.

The upholsterer, finding my friend very inquifitive about thefe his lodgers, brought him fome time fince a

little bundle of papers, which he affured him were written by king Sa Ga Yean Qua Rafh Tow, and, as he fuppofes, left behind by fome mistake. These papers are now tranflated, and contain abundance of very odd obfervations, which I find this little fraternity of kings made during their ftay in the ifle of Great Britain. I fhall present my reader with a short specimen of them in this paper, and may perhaps communicate more to him hereafter. In the article of London are the follow--ing words, which without doubt are meant of the church of St. Paul.

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'On the most rifing part of the town there ftands a 'huge house, big enough to contain the whole nation of 'which I am king. Our good brother E Tow O Koam, king of the Rivers, is of opinion it was made by the ⚫ hands of that great God to whom it is confecrated. The kings of Granajah and of the Six Nations believe that it was created with the earth, and produced on the fame day with the fun and moon. But for my own part, by 'the beft information I could get of this matter, I am apt to think that this prodigious pile was fashioned into the fhape it now bears by feveral tools and inftruments, ' of which they have a wonderful variety in this country. It was probably at firft an huge misfhapen rock that < grew upon the top of the hill, which the natives of the country, after having cut it into a kind of regular figure, bored and hollowed with incredible pains and industry, 'till they had wrought in it all thofe beautiful vaults and < caverns into which it is divided at this day. As foon as this rock was thus curiously fcooped to their liking, a prodigious number of hands must have been employed in chipping the outfide of it, which is now as fmooth as the furface of a pebble; and is in feveral places hewn cut into pillars that ftand like the trunks of fo many trees bound about the top with garlands of leaves. It is probable that when this great work was begun, which must have been many hundred years ago, there was fome religion among this people: for they give it the name of a temple, and have a tradition th ́t it was defigned for men to pay their devotions in. And indeed there are several reafons which make us think that the natives of this country had formerly

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among them fome fort of worship; for they set apart every feventh day as facred: but upon my going into one of thefe holy houses on that day, I could not obferve any circumftance of devotion in their behaviour. There was indeed a man in black who was mounted ' above the reft, and feemed to utter fomething with a great deal of vehemence; but as for those underneath him, instead of paying their worship to the deity of the place, they were moft of them bowing and curtfying to one another, and a confiderable number of them fast 'afleep.

The queen of the country appointed two men to attend us, that had enough of our language to make 'themselves understood in fome few particulars. But 'we foon perceived these two were great enemies to one another, and did not always agree in the fame ftory. 'We could make a fhift to gather out of one of them, that this island was very much infefted with a monstrous kind of animals, in the fhape of men, called Whigs; and he often told us, that he hoped we should meet with none of them in our way, for that, if we did, they 'would be apt to knock us down for being kings.

Our other interpreter ufed to talk very much of a 'kind of animal called a Tory, that was as great a mon'fter as the Whig, and would treat us as ill for being foreigners. These two creatures, it feems, are born with a fecret antipathy to one another, and engage ' when they meet as naturally as the elephant and the ' rhinoceros. But as we faw none of either of thefe fpecies, we are apt to think that our guides deceived us with mifreprefentations and fictions, and amused us with an account of such monsters as are not really in their country..

Thefe particulars we made a fhift to pick out from the difcourfe of our interpreters; which we put together as well as we could, being able to understand but here and there a word of what they faid, and afterwards making up the meaning of it among ourselves. The men of the country are very cunning and ingenious in ⚫ handicraft works, but withal fo very idle, that we often faw young lufty raw-boned fellows carried up and