conduct. He is a eunuch-bashaw, that has charge
of the women and governs all their public affairs,
because he is not able to do them any considerable
private services. One of his prime qualifications
is to convey their persons in and out of coaches,
as tenderly as a cook sets his custards in an oven
and draws them out again, without the least discomposure
or offence to their inward or outward woman; that
is, their persons and dresses. The greatest care
he uses in his conversation with ladies is to order
his peruke methodically, and keep off his hat with
equal respect both to it and their ladyships, that
neither may have cause to take any just offence, but
continue him in their good graces. When he squires
a lady he takes her by the handle of her person, the
elbow, and steers it with all possible caution, lest
his own foot should, upon a tack, for want of due
circumspection, unhappily fall foul on the long train
she carries at her stern. This makes him walk
upon his toes and tread as lightly as if he were leading
her a dance. He never tries any experiment solitary
with her, but always in consort, and then he acts
the woman’s part and she the man’s, talks
loud and laughs, while he sits demurely silent, and
simpers or bows, and cries, “Anon, Madam, excellently
good!” &c. &c. He is a kind of hermaphrodite,
for his body is of one sex and his mind of another,
which makes him take no delight in the conversation
or actions of men, because they do so by his, but
apply himself to women, to whom the sympathy and likeness
of his own temper and wit naturally inclines him,
where he finds an agreeable reception for want of a
better; for they, like our Indian planters, value
their wealth by the number of their slaves. All
his business in the morning is to dress himself, and
in the afternoon to show his workmanship to the ladies,
who after serious consideration approve or disallow
of his judgment and abilities accordingly, and he
as freely delivers his opinion of theirs. The
glass is the only author he studies, by which his
actions and gestures are all put on like his clothes,
and by that he practices how to deliver what he has
prepared to say to the dames, after he has laid a train
to bring it in.
AN HYPOCRITE
Is a saint that goes by clockwork, a machine made
by the devil’s geometry, which he winds and
nicks to go as he pleases. He is the devil’s
finger-watch, that never goes true, but too fast or
too slow as he sets him. His religion goes with
wires, and he serves the devil for an idol to seduce
the simple to worship and believe in him. He puts
down the true saint with his copper-lace devotion,
as ladies that use art paint fairer than the life.
He is a great bustler in reformation, which is always
most proper to his talent, especially if it be tumultuous;
for pockets are nowhere so easily and safely picked
as in jostling crowds. And as change and alterations
are most agreeable to those who are tied to nothing,