LETTER 31.

London, Sept. 25, 1711.

I dined in the City to-day, and at my return I put my 30th into the post-office; and when I got home I found for me one of the noblest letters I ever read:  it was from ——­, three sides and a half in folio, on a large sheet of paper; the two first pages made up of satire upon London, and crowds and hurry, stolen from some of his own schoolboy’s exercises:  the side and a half remaining is spent in desiring me to recommend Mrs. South, your Commissioner’s widow,[1] to my Lord Treasurer for a pension.  He is the prettiest, discreetest fellow that ever my eyes beheld, or that ever dipped pen into ink.  I know not what to say to him.  A pox on him, I have too many such customers on this side already.  I think I will send him word that I never saw my Lord Treasurer in my life:  I am sure I industriously avoided the name of any great person when I saw him, for fear of his reporting it in Ireland.  And this recommendation must be a secret too, for fear the Duke of Bolton[2] should know it, and think it was too mean.  I never read so d——­d a letter in my life:  a little would make me send it over to you.—­I must send you a pattern, the first place I cast my eyes on, I will not pick and choose.  In this place (meaning the Exchange in London), which is the compendium of old Troynovant, as that is of the whole busy world, I got such A surfeit, that I grew sick of mankind, and resolved for ever after to bury myself in the Shady Retreat of —­ —–.  You must know that London has been called by some Troynovant, or New Troy.  Will you have any more?  Yes, one little bit for Stella, because she’ll be fond of it.  This wondrous theatre (meaning London) was no more to me than a desert, and I should less complain of solitude in a Connaught shipwreck, or even the great bog of Allen.  A little scrap for Mrs. Marget,[3] and then I have done.  Their royal Fanum, wherein the Idol Pecunia is daily worshipped, seemed to me to be just like A hive of Bees working and labouring under huge weights of cares.  Fanum is a temple, but he means the Exchange; and Pecunia is money:  so now Mrs. Marget will understand her part.  One more paragraph, and I—­ Well, come, don’t be in such a rage, you shall have no more.  Pray, Stella, be satisfied; ’tis very pretty:  and that I must be acquainted with such a dog as this!—­Our peace goes on fast.  Prior was with the Secretary two hours this morning:  I was there a little after he went away, and was told it.  I believe he will soon be despatched again to France; and I will put somebody to write an account of his second journey:  I hope you have seen the other.  This latter has taken up my time with storming at it.