C Tuesday, April 17. Tu non inventa reperta es. Ovid. OMPASSION for the Gentleman who writes the following Letter, fhould not prevail upon me to fall upon the Fair Sex, if it were not that I find they are frequently Fairer than they ought to be. Such Impostures are not to be tolerated in Civil Society; and I think his Misfortune ought to be made publick, as a Warning for other Men always to Examine into what they Admire. SIR, UPPOSING you to be a Perfon of general Knowledge, I make my Application to you on a very particular Occafion. I have a great Mind to be: rid of my Wife, and hope, when you confider my Cafe, you will be of Opinion I have very juft Pretenfions to a Divorce. I am a mere Man of the Town, and have: very little Improvement,but what I have got from Plays. I remember in The Silent Woman, the Learned Dr. Cutberd, or Dr. Otter (I forget which) makes one of the Caufes of Separation to be Error Perfona, when a Man marries a Woman, and finds her not to be the fame Woman whom he intended to marry, but another. If that be Law, it is, I prefume, exactly my Cafe. For you are to know, Mr. SPECTATOR, that there are Women who do not let their Husbands fee their Faces till they are • married. 6 NOT to keep you in fufpence, I mean plainly, that Part of the Sex who paint. They are fome of them fo exquifitely skilful this Way, that give them but a tolerable Pair of Eyes to fet up with, and they will make Bofom, Lips, Cheeks and Eyebrows, by their own Induftry. As for my Dear, never Man was fo enamoured as I was of her fair Forehead, Neck and Arms, as well as the bright Jett of her Hair; but to my great Aftonishment,. I find they were all the Effects of Art: Her Skin is fo tarnished with this Practice, that when fhe first wakes in a Morning, fhe fcarce feems young enough to be the Mother of her whom I carried to Bed the Night before.. I fhall take the Liberty to part with her by the firft Opportunity, unless her Father will make her Portion fuitable to her real, nor her affumed, Countenance. This I thought fit to let him and her know by your Means. I cannot tell what the Law, or the Parents of the Lady will do for this Injured Gentleman, but muft allow he has very much Juftice on his Side. I have indeed very long obferved this Evil, and distinguished thofe of our Women who wear their own, from thofe in borrowed Complexions, by the Picts and the British. There does not need any great Difcernment to judge which are which. The British have a lively animated Afpect; The Picts, tho' never fo Beautiful, have dead uninformed Countenances. The Muscles of a real Face fometimes fwell with foft Paffion, fudden Surprize, and are flushed with agreeable Confusions according as the Objects before them, or the Ideas prefented to them, affect their Imagination. But the Picts behold all things with the fame Air, whether they are Joyful or Sad; the fame fixed Infenfibility appears upon all Occafions. A Pict, tho' fhe takes all that Pains to invite the Approach of Lovers, is obliged to keep them at a certain Distance; a Sigh in a Languishing Lover, if fetched too near her, would diffolve a Feature; and a Kiss fnatched by a Forward one, might transfer the Complexi on of the Mistress to the Admirer. It is hard to speak of thefe falfe Fair Ones, withing faying fomething uncomplaifant, but I would only recommend to them to confider how they like coming into a Room new Painted; they may affure themselves, the near Approach of a Lady who uses this Practice is much more offenfive. WILL. HONEYCOMB told us, one Day, an Adventure he once had with a Pict. This Lady had Wit, as well as Beauty, at Will; and made it her Bufinefs to gain Hearts, for no other Reason, but to rally the Torments of her Lovers. She would make great Advances to infnare Men, but without any manner of Scruple break off when there was no Provocation. Her Ill-Nature and Vanity made my Friend very eafily Proof against the Charms of her Wit and Converfation; but her beauteous Form, inftead of being blemished by her Falfhood and Inconftancy, every Day increased upon him, and fhe had new Attractions every time he faw her. When fhe obferved WILL irrevocably her Slave, fhe began to use him as fuch, and after many Steps towards fuch a Cruelty, fhe at laft utterly banished him. The unhappy Lover ftrove in vain, by fervile Epistles, to revoke his Doom; till at length he was forced to the laft Refuge, a round Sum of Money to her Maid. This corrupt Attendant placed him early in the Morning behind the Hangings in her Miftrefs's DreffingRoom. He flood very conveniently to obferve, without being feen. The Pift begins the Face fhe defigned to wear that Day, and I have heard him proteft fhe had worked a full half Hour before he knew her to be the fame Woman. As foon as he faw the Dawn of that Complexion, for which he had fo long languifhed, he thought fit to break from his Concealment, repeating that of Cowley: Th' adorning Thee with fo much Art, Is but a barb'rous Skill; 'Tis like the Pois'ning of a Dart, THE Pict stood before him in the utmost Confufion, with the prettieft Smirk imaginable on the finished side of her Face, pale as Ashes on the other. HONEYCOMB feized all her Gally-pots and Washes, and carried off his Handkerchief full of Brufhes, Scraps of Spanish Wool, and Phials of Unguents. The Lady went into the Country, the Lover was cured. IT is certain no Faith ought to be kept with Cheats, and an Oath made to a Pict is of it felf void. I would therefore exhort all the British Ladies to fingle them out, nor do I know any but Lindamira who fhould be exempt from Discovery; for her own Complexion is fo delicate, that he ought to be allowed the covering it with Paint, as a Punishment for chufing to be the worst Piece of Art extant, extant, inftead of the Mafterpiece of Nature. As for my part, who have no Expectations from Women, and confider them only as they are Part of the Species, I do not half fo much fear offending a Beauty as a Woman of Sense; 1 fhall therefore produce feveral Faces, which have been in Publick this many Years, and never appeared; it will be a very pretty Entertainment in the Play-houfe, (when I have abolifhed this Cuftom) to fee fo many Ladies, when they first lay it down, incog. in their own Faces. IN the mean time, as a Pattern for improving their Charms, let the Sex ftudy the agreeable Statira. Her Features are enlivened with the Chearfulness of her Mind, and good Humour gives an Alacrity to her Eyes. She is Graceful without affecting an Air, and Unconcerned without appearing Careless. Her having no manner of Art in her Mind, makes her want none in her Perfon. HOW like is this Lady, and how unlike is a Pict, to that Description Dr. Donne gives of his Mistress? Her pure and eloquent Blood Spoke in her Cheeks, and fo diftinctly wrought, ADVERTISEMENT. A young Gentlewoman of about Nineteen Years of Agè (bred in the Family of a Perfon of Quality lately deceased) who Paints the finest Flesh-colour, wants a Place, and is to be heard of at the House of Minheer Grotefque, a Dutch Painter in Barbican. N. B. She is alfo well-skilled in the Drapery-part, and puts on Hoods and mixes Ribbons fe as to fuit the Colours of the Face with great Art and Success. R Wednesday N° Wednesday, April 18. Garganum mugire putes nemus aut mare Thufcum, A Hor. RISTOTLE has obferved, That ordinary Writers in Tragedy endeavour to raise Terror and Pity in their Audience, not by proper Sentiments and Expreffions, but by the Dreffes and Decorations of the Stage. There is fomething of this kind very ridiculous in the English Theatre. When the Author has a Mind to terrifie us, it thunders; When he would make us melancholy, the Stage is darkened. But among all our Tragick Artifices, I am the most offended at those which are made ufe of to infpire us with magnificent Ideas of the Perfons that speak. The ordinary Method of making an Hero, is to clap a huge Plume of Feathers upon his Head, which rifes fo very high, that there is often a greater Length from his Chin to the Top of his Head, than to the Sole of his Foot. One would believe, that we thought a great Man and a tall Man the fame thing. This very much embaraffes the Actor, who is forced to hold his Neck extreamly stiff and fteady all the while he fpeaks; and notwithstanding any Anxieties which he pretends för his Mistress, his Country, or his Friends, one may fee by his Action, that his greatest Care and Concern is to keep the Plume of Feathers from falling off his Head. For my own part, when I fee a Man uttering his Complaints under fuch a Mountain of Feathers, I am apt to look upon him rather as an unfortunate Lunatick, than a diftreffed Hero. As thefe fuperfluous Ornaments upon the Head make a great Man, a Princess generally receives her Grandeur from thofe additional Incumbrances that fall |