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before the judges of the King's Bench, in open court. I am sure he used her very kindly here to the very last. The news-papers never mention her, and we have heard nothing of her since her commitment there. Let me know if you hear any thing concerning her. She was always obliging to me, and I heartily wish her life safe. You may venture to call on her on a Sunday, and remember me to her kindly.

As for Mr. Weaver's affair, what he desired you to do, was done for him by Mr. Dagge when in London. Mr. Nash* (though I wrote to hiin since) has never once wrote or sent to me.

I received a letter from my sistert, and one from my niecet, the very post after my writing to you. My sister's I answered in a long letter of three sides of paper. I am amazed at not hearing from you that she has received my answer: surely Mr. Pyne would not dare to intercept it. I take it very kind

called on her. I directed mine to her exactly according to her own direction; and would not, on any consideration, it should miscarry.

Mr. Crozier is dead, and his widow will not renew her action against me. As for Madain Wolf Bitchf, the African monster, Mr. Dagge, unknown to me, offered her, before he went to London, three guineas to release me. She asked time to consider of it; and, at his return to Bristol, sent him word, that she was determined to keep me in confinement a twelvemonth : however, she will soon be perhaps sick of her resolution. Through Mr. Ward's means, I was Jast court-day but one sent for up by habeas corpus to the Guildhall, where a rule, on my appearance there, was entered, to force her to proceed to execution; which if she does not by the next court-day, her action will be superseded; and if sbe does, then Madam Wolf Bitch must al. low the two shillings and four-pence per week. However, as I was standing at our door in the street (which I am allowed to do alone whenever I please,) who should be passing by one evening but Mr. Becket? He was reduced so thin by a fever, which lasted him ten weeks, that I scarce knew him. In

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* Bcau Nash gave him five guincas when first taken into custody, and promised to promote a subscription for hiin at Bach with all his interest. N. + Who and what were this sister and niece of Savage? N.

He was arrested for eight pounds at the suit of a Mrs. Read, who kept coffee-house. N.

This confirms what we are told by Dr. Johnson, that “ he took care to epler his name according to the forms of the court, that the creditor migh' be obliged to make him some allowance, if he was continued a prisoner.'' .

he came, and we drank in Mr. Dagge's parlour one negus and two pints of wine. He told me, the city were highly exasperated at my Satire*, and that some of the merchants would, by way of revenge, subscribe the two and four-pence to confine me still. But this I looked on as bravado, and treated it with contempt. One day last week Mr. Dagge, finding me at the door, asked me to take a walk with him, which I did a mile beyond Baptist Mill, in Gloucestershire; where, at a public-house, he treated me with ale and toddy. Baptist Mill is the pleasantest walk near this city. I found the smell of the new-mown hay very sweet, and every breeze was reviving to my spirits. I had forgot, when I mentioned Crozier, to tell you, that, when be was alive, Mr. Dagge offered him to take the note he charged me with, in lieu of a debt which Crozier owed him, in order that the said Crozier might have been no bar to my release, had Madam Wolf Bitch been pleased to consent to it as far as it related to her ladyship. This Mr. Dagge offered of bis own accord, which made it still a more generous action. When I appeared at the Guildhall, the court paid me great deference and respect. Is the devil always to possess that worthless fellow Saunders ? can he never open his mouth in conversation, but out of it must issue a lie? can he never set to writing a letter, but immediately a lie must drop from bis pen upon the paper? I have a copy of what I wrote to him, taken by Mr. Weaver; and I shewed the original to the two reverend gentlemen, Mr. Price and Mr. Davies, before I sent it, who can all three attest that I have not mentioned you as my author for one of those facts for which the dog say's I have mentioned you. As for the impudent manner in which he says I wrote to him, those words shall cost him dear, unless he retracts them, and asks my pardon under his own hand-writing. He sent me an answer to mine, stuffed with prevarication, poor weak reasoning, and false facts; beginning in the haughty style of an emperor, and ending in the low fawning, fearful air of a spaniel. I intend very shortly to expose him in print, as he deserves, and paste him up at the Tolzey, as he has done Mr Hooke before; and I shall let him know by a message

depend upon this, unless he pays you the note he owes you, with legal interest and asks of me forgiveness.

Mr. Davies is frequently here. Mr. Price visits me in a friendly manner, and not long ago sent me a present of

a

he may

* “ London and Bristol delineated,"

four pint bottles of excellent rum, and two of as fine shrub, for punch. I am sincerely your well-wisher and servant,

R. SAVAGE. P. S. For God's sake, call on my dear sister, and let her know the state of my affairs.

R. SAVAGE.

LETTER II.

To Mr. Strong, at the Post-Office,

June 21, 1743. I SENT your letter to Mrs. Dowding by Mr. Barret, who says he delivered it safe. Saunders has published another Dialogue in Mr. Cave's Magazine for last month, and it is a most wretched performance. When he attempts poetry without assistance, he exposes himself more than any enemy can expose him. Pray mention not Newgate on the direction of

any

letter to me; there is no occasion for it, and it may hurt me. Pray tell my sister the same, and desire her only to put Bristol in her direction; and to avoid miscarriages, let her (which she never does) add

my

christianname to my sur-name. I wrote to my niece this post.

I was yesterday, in the afternoon, out upon a field-walk again with Mr. Dagge, and we also regaled ourselves at a public-house in the city.

Pray lose not a post in letting me know whether the judges have decided Mrs. Harris's case; and if so, how it is determined. It will oblige Mr. Dagge, who, with Mrs. Dagge and Mortimer, desire to be remembered to you.

I broke this letter open since it was first sealed in order to write this Postscript. Pray call on my sister. I cannot but smile at Saunders-he calls

you poor creature!” he stole that very expression out of my letter to him, where, with great propriety, it was applied to himself. 1787, Dec.

R. SAVAGE.

LXIV. Thomas Hearne to Lord Harley, on the Alexandrian MS.

of the New Testament.

MR. URBAN, IT afforded me great pleasure, upon looking over some MSS, in the British Museum, to find, among a collection of letters from Mr. Hearne to Edward Lord Harley, one which I could not help particularly noticing. It contains an anticipated encomium on the truly learned Dr. Woide, to whom the Republic of Letters is so justly indebted, for his laborious undertaking of publishing a fac-simile of the famous Alexandrian Manuscript.— I trust his reward has been more than adequate to his labours,--for empty honours are of poor avail.-The encomium, however just, might appear indelicate, did it not appear in the writing of a stranger, as well as having been written very nearly seventy

years since.

MSS. Harl. 1757, fol. H. “ MY LORD,

0.xon, Jan. 3, 1715-16. “UPON the receipt of your Lordship's very kind letter of the 27th. of last month, I waited upon Dr. Stratford, who hath undertaken the trouble of returning me the five guineas, after he hath seen your Lordship at London. In the mean time I renew iny thanks for this designed present, and for your Lordship’s generous offer of the use of any MSS. that are to be met with in your own collection. I was never yet in London; but, if I should happen to come thither, I should take the opportunity of noting down whatever curious MSS. (particularly such as concern our own history and antiquities) I should find, that are not to be met with in this place. I shall be very glad if I can satisfy any query of your Lordship's. I have no copy of the better paper of Leland's Itinerary. That which I designed to keep for myself, was long since disposed of by me to Sir Thomas Sebright. 'Tis a great satisfaction to me, that your Lordship is pleased with my edition of the Acts of the Apostles. I wish we had more of the old version besides that which is published with this edition. 'Twould be a great piece of service to the public, if the Alexandrian MS. were printed in the same manner; that is, letter for letter, as it is written, without any alteration. Improvements might be made afterwards, either by the publisher, or by other learned men. 'Tis pity Dr. Grabe had not taken this method : he might have finished the work before he died. There is as much reason for printing MSS. in capital letters (provided they are written in such characters,) as there is for printing inscriptions in that manner. The only objection I can see is, that the exact bigness and figure of the letters cannot be retained, unless letters be cast on purpose. But the same may be also offered with respect to inscriptions. 'Tis

sufficient that a specimen of the letter is given at the beginning, the make of the letters in these MSS. seldom or never varying; at least the variations are not momentous. I wish your Lordship many happy new years; and am, my Lord, your Lordship's most obliged, humble servant,

Tho. Hearne." For the Rt. Honble. the Lord Harley, at Wimpole,

near Cambridge." 1787, Dec.

9

LXV. David Hume to Sir John Pringle, M. D. on the Pretender's

being in London in 1753.

St. Andrew's Square, Edinburgh, Feb. 10, 1773. MY DEAR SIR, THAT the present Pretender was in London in the year 1753, I know with the greatest certainty, because I had it from Lord Marechal, who said it consisted with his certain knowledge.— Two or three days after his lordship gave me this information, he told me, that the evening before he had learned several curious particulars from a lady (who I imagined to be Lady Primrose,) though my lord refused to name her. The Pretender came to her house in the evening, without giving her any preparatory information, and entered the room when she had a pretty large company with her, and was herself playing at cards. He was an. nounced by the servant under another name: she thought the cards would have dropped from her hands on seeing him; but she had presence enough of mind to call him by the name he assumed, to ask him when he came to England, and how long he intended to stay there. After he and all the company went away, the servants remarked how wonderfully like the strange gentleman was to the prince's picture which hung on the chimney-piece in the very room in which he entered.-My lord added (I think from the authority of the same lady,) that he used so little precaution, that he went abroad openly in day-light in his own dress, only laying aside his blue ribband and star; walked once through St. James's, and took a turn in the Mall,

About five years ago, I told this story to Lord Holderness, who was Secretary of State in the year 1753 ; and I

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