We are generally so much pleased with any little Accomplishments, either of Body or Mind, which have once made us remarkable in the World, that we endeavour to perswade our selves it is not in the Power of Time to rob us of them.  We are eternally pursuing the same Methods which first procured us the Applauses of Mankind.  It is from this Notion that an Author writes on, tho he is come to Dotage; without ever considering that his Memory is impaired, and that he has lost that Life, and those Spirits, which formerly raised his Fancy, and fired his Imagination.  The same Folly hinders a Man from submitting his Behaviour to his Age, and makes Clodius, who was a celebrated Dancer at five and twenty, still love to hobble in a Minuet, tho he is past Threescore.  It is this, in a Word, which fills the Town with elderly Fops, and superannuated Coquets.

Canidia, a Lady of this latter Species, passed by me Yesterday in her Coach.  Canidia was an haughty Beauty of the last Age, and was followed by Crowds of Adorers, whose Passions only pleased her, as they gave her Opportunities of playing the Tyrant.  She then contracted that awful Cast of the Eye and forbidding Frown, which she has not yet laid aside, and has still all the Insolence of Beauty without its Charms.  If she now attracts the Eyes of any Beholders, it is only by being remarkably ridiculous; even her own Sex laugh at her Affectation; and the Men, who always enjoy an ill-natured Pleasure in seeing an imperious Beauty humbled and neglected, regard her with the same Satisfaction that a free Nation sees a Tyrant in Disgrace.

WILL.  HONEYCOMB, who is a great Admirer of the Gallantries in King Charles the Seconds Reign, lately communicated to me a Letter written by a Wit of that Age to his Mistress, who it seems was a Lady of Canidia’s Humour; and tho I do not always approve of my Friend WILLS Taste, I liked this Letter so well, that I took a Copy of it, with which I shall here present my Reader.

  To CLOE. 
  MADAM,

Since my waking Thoughts have never been able to influence you in my Favour, I am resolved to try whether my Dreams can make any Impression on you.  To this end I shall give you an Account of a very odd one which my Fancy presented to me last Night, within a few Hours after I left you.

Methought I was unaccountably conveyed into the most delicious Place mine Eyes ever beheld, it was a large Valley divided by a River of the purest Water I had ever seen.  The Ground on each Side of it rose by an easie Ascent, and was covered with Flowers of an infinite Variety, which as they were reflected in the Water doubled the Beauties of the Place, or rather formed an Imaginary Scene more beautiful than the real.  On each Side of the River was a Range of lofty Trees, whose Boughs were loaden with almost as many Birds as Leaves.  Every Tree was full of Harmony.

I had not gone far in this pleasant Valley,