learned from a lefs rhetorical quarter, i. e. from the lips of Mr. Samuel Sarcasm, that the present noise had been occafioned by the conduct of Mr. Edward Elixir, who, on his departure from the manfion-house, ran upon the Green and jumped about, saying such extravagant things about my generofity, my wit, and my fine fenfe, accompanying all thefe affertions with fuch jeftures as very fairly gave reafon for the workmen to imagine there was fomething contageous in my diforder, the worst part of which had been, as they prefumed, caught by the apothecary. To crush all these fooleries and false suggestions by one decifive ftroke, I took up the whole affair on on very serious ground, and infisted on being attended to. I represented this to the gentlemen as very ill behaviour. With regard to their petition, I observed, that I was willing to fee it in the moft favourable light; but, whatever I had done, or might do, depended on my own pleasure, for which I chose to pay in proportion. That their part of the business was, peaceably to purfue each man his particular avocation till the work was finished. That it was impertinent to enquire for what particular use I raised up to myself a town. It was for them to do fo much work, agreeable to my directions, for fo much money; and that, if I chose 3 to to build a palace for a parcel of horses, and put my friends in a pig ftye, it was wholly my affair, and not theirs. The apothecary, Mr. Elixir, had been, I obferved, fent by Mr. Flourish on a foolish errand, namely, to cure a man who was in perfect health; and that, as to his jumping about for joy, in talking of me, it might be partly from the vivacity of his conftitution, and partly from the goodness of his heart, at hearing there was a man who had the courage to proceed in erecting a town to ferve the Unfortunate, when it was found to be fo very contrary to the fordid maxims of the world, that even the workmen were up in arms. This This being a full explanation; I added, that I expected matters would go on regularly for the future, and that they would so far enlarge their hearts, as to pursue their duty with a diligent chearfulness; and that, while they were pursuing it, they fhould not think the worfe of their patron's understanding for acting by them more generously than fome of their former employers. The paffions of a mob are never fixed. These filly people now ran into the other extreme, and were, by the foregoing fpeech, fo fully fatisfied, that I was unanimously extolled as a paragon of sense and folid learning; as charitable beyond the reach of inftances, and as the best |