invented the title of this paper. I therefore earnestly desire all persons, without distinction, to take it in for the present gratis, and hereafter at the price of one penny, forbidding all hawkers to take more for it at their peril. And I desire all persons to consider, that I am at a very great charge for proper materials for this work, as well as that, before I resolved upon it, I had settled a correspondence in all parts of the known and knowing world. And forasmuch as this globe is not trodden upon by mere drudges of business only, but that men of spirit and genius are justly to be esteemed as considerable agents in it, we shall not, upon a dearth of news, present you with musty foreign edicts, and dull proclamations, but shall divide our relation of the passages which occur in action or discourse throughout this town, as well as elsewhere, under such dates of places as may prepare you for the matter you are to expect in the following manner.

All accounts of gallantry, pleasure, and entertainment, shall be under the article of White's Chocolate-house ;* poetry under that of Will's Coffee-house; † Learning, under the title of Grecian; foreign and domestic news, you will have from St. James's Coffee-house; and what else I have to offer on any other subject shall be dated from my own Apartment.

I once more desire my reader to consider, that as I cannot keep an ingenious man to go daily to Will's under two-pence each day, merely for his charges; to White's under six-pence; nor to the Grecian, without allowing him some plain Spanish, to be as able as others at the learned table; and that a good observer cannot speak with even Kidney § at St. James's without clean linen; I say, these considerations will, I hope, make all persons willing to comply with my humble request

* White's Chocolate-house was in St. James's-street.

Will's Coffee-house was on the north-side of Russell-street in Covent Garden, where the wits of that time used to assemble, and where Dryden had, when he lived, been accustomed to preside.

The Grecian was in Devereux-court in the Strand; probably the most ancient coffee-house in London. In 1652 an English Turkey merchant brought home with him a Greek servant, who first opened a house for making and selling coffee.

§ Kidney was one of the waiters at St. James's Coffee-house.

(when my gratis stock is exhausted) of a penny apiece; especially since they are sure of some proper amusement, and that it is impossible for me to want means to entertain them, having, besides the force of my own parts, the power of divination, and that I can, by casting a figure, tell you all that will happen before it comes to pass.

But this last faculty I shall use very sparingly, and speak but of few things until they are passed, for fear of divulging matters which may offend our superiors.

TWO BEAUTIES.

No. 4. TUESDAY, APRIL 19, 1709. [STEELE.]

ALL hearts at present pant for two ladies only, who have for some time engrossed the dominion of the town. They are indeed both exceeding charming, but differ very much in their excellences. The beauty of Clarissa is soft, that of Chloe piercing. When you look at Clarissa, you see the most exact harmony of feature, complexion, and shape; you find in Chloe nothing extraordinary in any one of those particulars, but the whole woman irresistible: Clarissa looks languishing; Chloe killing: Clarissa never fails of gaining admiration; Chloe of moving desire. The gazers at Clarissa are at first unconcerned, as if they were observing a fine picture. They who behold Chloe, at the first glance discover transport, as if they met their dearest friend. These different perfections are suitably represented by the last great painter Italy has sent us, Mr. Jervas.† Clarissa is by that skilful hand placed in a

*The Author here celebrates two beauties of those times, whose real names the Editor has not been able to discover. Perhaps Steele only remarks on two pictures of Jervas [the instructor and intimate friend of Pope], whom he certainly meant to recommend as an excellent painter.

manner that looks artless, and innocent of the torments she gives; Chloe is drawn with a liveliness that shows she is conscious of, but not affected with, her perfections. Clarissa is a shepherdess, Chloe a country girl. I must own, the design of Chloe's picture shows, to me, great mastery in the painter; for nothing could be better imagined than the dress he has given her of a straw-hat and a ribbon, to represent that sort of beauty which enters the heart with a certain familiarity, and cheats it into a belief that it has received a lover as well as an object of love. The force of their different beauties is seen also in the effects it makes on their lovers. The admirers of Chloe are eternally gay and well-pleased: those of Clarissa melancholy and thoughtful. And as this passion always changes the natural man into a quite different creature from what he was before, the love of Chloe makes coxcombs ; that of Clarissa, madmen. There were of each kind just now in this room. Here was one that whistles, laughs, sings, and cuts capers, for love of Chloe. Another has just now writ three lines to Clarissa, then taken a turn in the garden, then came back again, then tore his fragment, then called for some chocolate, then went away without it.

Chloe has so many admirers in the house at present, that there is too much noise to proceed in my narration; so that the progress of the loves of Clarissa and Chloe, together with the bottles that are drunk each night for the one, and the many sighs which are uttered, and songs written on the other, must be our subject on future occasions.

THE STAFFS.

No. 11. THURSDAY, MAY 5, 1709. [STEELE.]

Of all the vanities under the sun, I confess that of being proud of one's birth is the greatest. At the same time, since

in this unreasonable age, by the force of prevailing custom, things in which men have no hand are imputed to them; and that I am used by some people, as if Isaac Bickerstaff, though I write myself Esquire, was nobody to set the world right in that particular, I shall give you my genealogy, as a kinsman of ours has sent it me from the Heralds office. It is certain, and observed by the wisest writers, that there are women who are not nicely chaste, and men not severely honest, in all families; therefore let those who may be apt to raise aspersions upon ours, please to give us as impartial an account of their own, and we shall be satisfied. The business of heralds is a matter of so great nicety, that, to avoid mistakes, I shall give you my cousin's letter verbatim, without altering a syllable.

"DEAR COUSIN,

"Since you have been pleased to make yourself so famous of late, by your ingenious writings, and some time ago by your learned predictions: since Partridge of immortal memory is dead and gone, who, poetical as he was, could not understand his own poetry; and philomatical as he was, could not read his own destiny: since the Pope, the King of France, and great part of his court, are either literally or metaphorically defunct since, I say, these things (not foretold by any one but yourself) have come to pass after so surprising a manner; it is with no small concern I see the original of the Staffian race so little known in the world as it is at this time; for which reason, as you have employed your studies in astronomy, and the occult sciences, so I, my mother being a Welsh woman, dedicated mine to genealogy, particularly that of our own family, which, for its antiquity and number, may challenge any in Great Britain. The Staffs are originally of Staffordshire, which took its name from them: the first that I find of the Staffs was one Jacobstaff, a famous and renowned astronomer, who by Dorothy his wife had issue seven sons, viz., Bickerstaff, Longstaff, Wagstaff, Quarterstaff, Whitestaff, Falstaff, and Tipstaff. He also had a younger brother, who

was twice married, and had five sons, viz., Distaff, Pikestaff, Mopstaff, Broomstaff, and Raggedstaff. As for the branch from whence you spring, I shall say very little of it, only that it is the chief of the Staffs, and called Bickerstaff, quasi Biggerstaff; as much as to say, the Great Staff, or Staff of Staffs; and that it has applied itself to astronomy with great success, after the example of our aforesaid forefather. The descendants from Longstaff, the second son, were a rakish disorderly set of people, and rambled from one place to another, until, in the time of Harry the Second, they settled in Kent, and were called long-tails, from the long-tails which were sent them as a punishment for the murder of Thomas-àBecket, as the legends say. They have always been sought after by the ladies; but whether it be to show their aversion to popery, or their love to miracles, I cannot say. The Wagstaffs are a merry thoughtless sort of people, who have always been opinionated of their own wit; they have turned themselves mostly to poetry. This is the most numerous branch of our family, and the poorest. The Quarterstaffs are most of them prize-fighters or deer-stealers: there have been so many of them hanged lately, that there are very few of that branch of our family left. The Whitestaffs are all courtiers, and have had very considerable places. There have been some of them of that strength and dexterity, that five hundred † of the ablest men in the kingdom have often tugged in vain to pull a staff out of their hands. The Falstaffs are strangely given to whoring and drinking: there are abundance of them in and about London. One thing is very remarkable of this branch, and that is, there are just as many women as men in it. There was a wicked stick of wood of this name in Harry the Fourth's time, one Sir John Falstaff. As for Tipstaff, the youngest son, he was an honest fellow; but his sons, and his sons' sons, have all of them been the veriest rogues living it is this unlucky branch that has stocked the nation with that

* An allusion to the staff carried, as an ensign of his office, by the First Lord of the Treasury.

The House of Commons.