If there be really so great a difference in principle between the high-flying Whigs, and the friends of France, I cannot but repeat the question, how come they to join in the destruction of the same man?  Can his death be possibly for the interest of both? or have they both the same quarrel against him, that he is perpetually discovering and preventing the treacherous designs of our enemies?  However it be, this great minister may now say with St. Paul, that he hath been “in perils by his own countrymen, and in perils by strangers.”

In the midst of so melancholy a subject, I cannot but congratulate with our own country, that such a savage monster as the Marquis de Guiscard, is none of her production; a wretch perhaps more detestable in his own nature, than even this barbarous act has been yet able to represent him to the world.  For there are good reasons to believe, from several circumstances, that he had intentions of a deeper dye, than those he happened to execute;[18] I mean such as every good subject must tremble to think on.  He hath of late been frequently seen going up the back stairs at court, and walking alone in an outer room adjoining to her Ma[jest]y’s bed-chamber.  He has often and earnestly pressed for some time to have access to the Qu[een], even since his correspondence with France; and he has now given such a proof of his disposition, as leaves it easy to guess what was before in his thoughts, and what he was capable of attempting.

It is humbly to be hoped, that the legislature[19] will interpose on so extraordinary an occasion as this, and direct a punishment[20] some way proportionable to so execrable a crime.

  Et quicunque tuum violavit vulnere corpus,
  Morte luat merita——­[21]

[Footnote 1:  No. 32 in the reprint. [T.S.]]

[Footnote 2:  To this number the writer of “The Political State of Great Britain” made a pretty tart reply.  In the issue for April, 1711, pp. 315-320 he says:  “One of the Tory writers, shall I call him? or rather libellers—­one who presumptuously sets up for an Examiner—­who, in order, as he fondly expects, to make his court to some men in power, with equal insolence and malice, makes it his weekly business to slander the moderate party; who, without the least provocation, brandishes his virulent pen against the best men ... instances in the murders of Caesar, Henry III. and Henry IV. of France, and of the Duke of Buckingham; and having extenuated the last, ’from the motives Felton is said to have had,’ he concludes,” etc.  The writer further goes on to say:  “As to the imputation of villanous assassinations, which the Examiner charges so home on the French nation, I am heartily sorry he has given them so fair an opportunity to retort the unfair and unjust argument from particulars to generals.  For, without mentioning Felton, whose crime this writer has endeavoured to extenuate, no foreign records can afford a greater number of murders, parricides, and, to use the Examiner’s expression, solid villanies, than our English history.”  Swift retorted on this writer in No. 42, post, pp. 276, 277. [T.S.]]