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next Advice, is, to retaliate upon your Neighbours, plant Cuckoldum as thick as you can in your Hundred, and, for that End, get in with the Aunts, the Nurfes, and Midwives; but above all, fecure the Church, and get the Clergy on your Side. When your Numbers are grown pretty confiderable, make a Defcent into the next Hundred, and fo on, 'till you have made the whole County of a Piece. When you have effected this, you'll be above the Reach of Scandal; your Multitudes will protect you, and then you'll live as comfortably as we do here in London. what shall I do with my Wife? I have already told you: Build her a Bridge, and lofe no Time. I am

Your loving Coufin,

But

T. B.

To W. Knight, Efquire. Written in the Time of the Frost, Jan. 22.

Dear Sir,

"T

IS a Sign I am never weary of keeping a Correfpondence with you, fince I can afford to do it at this terrible Juncture, when the Ink friezes as I write: But you must expect nothing elfe from me, but what you would hear in every Coffee-house, were you in Town, and and that is, to be entertain'd about the Froft. The common People here, are of Opinion, that the Northern Monarch, who has done us the Honour of a Vifit, has brought his own Country Weather along with him, and they confirm it with a very good

Inftance;

Inftance ; for they remember, that when the Morocco Embaffador was here, we had the hottest Summer that ever was known. Thus, according to these merry Philofophers, every Foreigners that comes to fee us, takes Care, like Nicholas in the Virtuofo, to bottle up fome of the Air of his own Climate, and retails it among us here.

It has been a general Complaint, that all the Seafons, but Winter, have been of late inverted. Mr. Flamsteed, you know, has pretended, that the Sun has been out of Order this good while; and a Friend of yours, who loves dearly to fit up a-Nights, being afk'd what was the Reason that he never faw him, reply'd, that he could not endure to fee fick Folks. 'Tis no Wonder that he can do no more in January, fince for eight Years laft paft, he has not been scarce able to maintain his Summer Quarters, and Winter has had the Impudence to bully him even in his own Dog-days. Indeed if he decays in Proportion to what he has done of late, the Lord have Mercy, fay I, on Dr. Burnet's Hypothefis of the Charter-house; for he'll be no more able to caufe a general Conflagration, than Parr was to get a Bastard in the hundred and fifty fecond Year of his Age.

But to leave off thefe metaphyfical Contemplations. If this fevere Seafon lafts many Days longer, it will as effectually try the Orthodoxy of Peoples Conftitutions, as the new A

con

cerning King James, will fhew who is fanch, to the Government, and who not. We used to fay in the late Reign, that if Popery prov'd to be long-liv'd, 'twould foon be found out who were in the Interefts of the Whore of Babylon. But this Froft, I conceive, will make truer and jufter Discoveries; for a Man, if he's wickedly inclin'd, may play a thousand Tricks with his Faith, and no Body be the wiser; but the Devil is in him, if fuch fearching Weather (which penetrates deeper than the Inquifition) does not extort very unlucky Confeflions from his Car

N 2

cafs,

cafs, efpecially if in his younger Days he ftudy'd natural Philofopy in Covent Garden. I can't tell how it fares with you in the Country, but here in Town, Water is fcarcer than its oppofite Element, Fire.

A Friend of mine happen'd Yesterday to be in a Tavern Kitchin, near the Custom Houfe, and complaining of the Cold, Lord, fays a Sea Captain to him, this is nothing, Sir, to what I have felt; no more, as God fhall judge me, than a Tooth-picker is to the Main-maft of the Britannia. I made the North-East Voyage with Captain Wood, and have been in a Country,Sir,where they don't bury between Michaelmas and Lady day. What, faid my Friend, don't the People-die all that Time? Yes, a Pox on them, they die faft enough; but the Ground is as hard as a Flint, and they are forc'd, in their own Defence, to pile up their dead Folks in the Belfry, as we do Faggots in a Wood-yard, and tie Pieces of Paper about their Necks, for all the World, Sir, (as your good Housewifes in the Country do about their Cordial Bottles) to know them again; and fo they bury them at Spring of the Year. Sir, fays my Friend to him, you feem to be an honeft Gentlenen, and I don't doubt but what you tell me is true; for I, in my Time, have been a Piece of a Traveller, and have pafs'd a Month or two among the Samoeids, where it is fo exceflive cold, that, as in Italy and other hot Countries, they forbid the Priefts to preach out of the Canticles during Juy and August, for Fear of putting fome old Whimfies into the Heads of the People: So here, the Patriarch of Mofco forbids all the Clergy, under Pain of Sufpenfion, not to make the least Mention of the Roasting that is used in the other World, left they should fet all their Congregations a longing to be there. In short, noble Captain, the Parfons take as much Care to conceal the Doctrine of Hell Fire, for the Reafon above-mention'd, from the poor Inhabitants of this Country, as they do the Bible from the Laity in Spain. The Captain graciously.

thank'd

thank'd my Friend for his News, and fo they parted.

One would be apt to imagine, 'twas in fuch Weather as this that David penn'd the Pfalms, where he advifes People to look to their Ways. The Streets are fo exceflive flippery, that a Man runs thro' half the Danger of an Eaft-India Voyage, in pafling only from Temple bar to the 'Change in a Coach; and if he ventures it on Foot, he's oblig'd to walk with the fame Precaution upon the King's High-way, as your Fellows in Bartholmew-Fair manage themfelves upon the High Rope, For want of obferving this Direction, a Country Gentlewoman, t'other Day, met with a fad Mifchance at the Corner of Fetter-lane; for up flew her Heels, and off came her Commode, and the unluckily discover'd a hideous Breach in her Fabrick, at which two Foot-Soldiers ran away in a Fright, and a grave Citizen that pafs'd by, was exceedingly fcandaliz'd. The Phyficians and Surgeons, however, are no Lofers by this Seafon; for what between Phthi fick and Fever, (which really makes a handsome Figure in the Weekly-Bill) and thofe providential Bleflings, call'd broken Arms and Legs, both Profefli.. ons find as much Employment, as Dr. Oates will tell you the Pimps had at White-hall in the Reign of King Charles II. Our Divines need not be over-nice in what they preach; for there is fuch everlasting Barking in the Churches, that tho' the Parfon had the Lungs of twenty Trumpeters, yet 'twere impoflible to underftand a Syllable he fays. Some Phthificky old Gentleman leads up a Cough, his next Neighbour immediately takes the Hint from him, a third purfues it, and fo the Snow-ball rowls merrily on, 'till at laft the whole Congregation joins in the Chorus, and one Side of the Church aufwers the other as regularly and harmoniously, as two contending Nightingales in a Hedge, or the Vicars in the new Choir at St. Paul's. The Thames is in great Danger of being made a Captive, and of wearing Fetters, which

he generously endeavours to throw off every Tide and never was fo true an Emblem as now, of that noble-fpirited Island of which he is the Defence as well as Ornament, which can never have Chains put upon it of any Continuance.

I am forry to find by your laft, that your Neighbour Mr. H. grows fat upon Marriage; for I don't fee how he can anfwer it to his Confcience. Marriage is a lean, hungry, craving Soil, on which he that can fatten, may raife an Eftate in Scotland, or recover from an Ague by removing into the Hundreds. Ecclefiaftical Hiftory tells us of a Bishop that fufpended one of his Priefts for no Crime, but because he had a double Chin. That Prelate could not be perfwaded that his Curate preach'd, and pray'd, and minded the Bufinefs of his Parish, fo long as he carry'd fuch an unapoftolical Badge about him. Pray acquaint your Friend Mr. H

with this Adventure of the double Chin, and tell him from me, that neither Canon, nor Civil, nor Common Law, will justify him in making a Sine Cure of his Wife.

I am

Your most humble Servant,

THO. BROWN.

Some

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