“Let me hear often from you.  I am glad you think of coming to Twickenham.  I hope we shall meet at Marble Hill; but do not fail of letting me know as soon as possible whether the Duchess is convinced I was in no wise in fault, and that she does me the justice in believing I can never willingly be so to me.  If you do not leave off ladyship, I shall complain to the Duchess, who shall make you go supperless to bed.  Exercise agrees so well with me, that I cannot advise you not to use it; but if her Grace feeds you moderately, I should think your exercise ought to be so.  God bless you.”

DEAN SWIFT TO JOHN GAY.

  December 1st, 1731.

“If your ramble was on horse back, I am glad of it on account of your health; but I know your arts of patching up a journey between stage-coaches and friends’ coaches:  for you are as arrant a cockney as any hosier in Cheapside, and one clean shirt with two cravats, and as many handkerchiefs, make up your equipage; and as for a nightgown, it is clear from Homer that Agamemnon rose without one.

“I have often had it in my head to put it into yours, that you ought to have some great work in scheme, that may take up seven years to finish, besides two or three under-ones, that may add another thousand pounds to your stock; and then I shall be in less pain about you.

“I know you can find dinners, but you love twelvepenny coaches too well, without considering that the interest of a whole thousand pounds brings you but half-a-crown a day.”

JOHN GAY TO DEAN SWIFT.

  December 1st, 1731

“You used to complain that Mr. Pope and I would not let you speak:  you may now be even with me, and take it out in writing.  If you do not send to me now and then, the post-office will think me of no consequence, for I have no correspondent but you.  You may keep as far from us as you please; you cannot be forgotten by those who ever knew you, and therefore please me by sometimes showing I am not forgot by you.  I have nothing to take me off from my friendship to you:  I seek no new acquaintance, and court no favour; I spend no shillings in coaches or chairs to levees or great visits, and, as I do not want the assistance of some that I formerly conversed with, I will not so much as seem to seek to be a dependant.

“As to my studies, I have not been entirely idle, though I cannot say that I have yet perfected anything.  What I have done is something in the way of those Fables I have already published.

“All the money I get is saving, so that by habit there may be some hopes (if I grow richer) of my becoming a miser.  All misers have their excuses.  The motive to my parsimony is independence."[7]

[Footnote 1:  Swift:  Works (ed.  Scott), XVII, p. 358]

[Footnote 2:  Ibid., XVII, p. 342.]