should always know whether he had a servant to reprove or a stranger to punish.  In another he expresses his alarm at hearing of a private suit against Morphew, the printer of the Mercurius Politicus, for a passage in that paper, and explains, first, that the obnoxious passage appeared two years before, and was consequently covered by a capitulation giving him indemnity for all former mistakes; secondly, that the thing itself was not his, neither could any one pretend to charge it on him, and consequently it could not be adduced as proof of any failure in his duty.  In another letter he gives an account of a new treaty with Mist.  “I need not trouble you,” he says, “with the particulars, but in a word he professes himself convinced that he has been wrong, that the Government has treated him with lenity and forbearance, and he solemnly engages to me to give no more offence.  The liberties Mr. Buckley mentioned, viz. to seem on the same side as before, to rally the Flying Post, the Whig writers, and even the word ‘Whig,’ &c., and to admit foolish and trifling things in favour of the Tories.  This, as I represented it to him, he agrees is liberty enough, and resolves his paper shall, for the future, amuse the Tories, but not affront the Government.”  If Mist should break through this understanding, Defoe hopes it will be understood that it is not his fault; he can only say that the printer’s resolutions of amendment seem to be sincere.

“In pursuance also of this reformation, he brought me this morning the enclosed letter, which, indeed, I was glad to see, because, though it seems couched in terms which might have been made public, yet has a secret gall in it, and a manifest tendency to reproach the Government with partiality and injustice, and (as it acknowledges expressly) was written to serve a present turn.  As this is an earnest of his just intention, I hope he will go on to your satisfaction.”

“Give me leave, Sir, to mention here a circumstance which concerns myself, and which, indeed, is a little hardship upon me, viz. that I seem to merit less, when I intercept a piece of barefaced treason at the Press, than when I stop such a letter as the enclosed; because one seems to be of a kind which no man would dare to meddle with.  But I would persuade myself, Sir, that stopping such notorious things is not without its good effect, particularly because, as it is true that some people are generally found who do venture to print any thing that offers, so stopping them here is some discouragement and disappointment to them, and they often die in our hands.”

“I speak this, Sir, as well on occasion of what you were pleased to say upon that letter which I sent you formerly about Killing no Murder, as upon another with verses in it, which Mr. Mist gave me yesterday; which, upon my word, is so villainous and scandalous that I scarce dare to send it without your order, and an assurance