Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/285

Rh silence with regard to this work, nor ever once mentioned it to any of his nearest friends during his stay in England, they were at first in some doubt whether it were his or not: and yet they concluded, as was done on a similar occasion, that it must be aut Erasmi aut Diaboli. They all wrote to him about it, considering it as his, and yet at the same time kept a reserve, as having some reasons to be dubious about it. Gay, in a letter, November 17, 1726, writes to him thus. "About ten days ago a book was published here of the Travels of one Gulliver, which has been the conversation of the whole town ever since: the whole impression sold in a week; and nothing is more diverting than to hear the different opinions people give of it, though all agree in liking it extremely. 'Tis generally said that you are the author, but I am told the bookseller declares he knows not from what hand it came. From the highest to the lowest it is universally read, from the cabinet council to the nursery. You may see by this you are not much injured by being supposed the author of this piece. If you are, you have disobliged us, and two or three of your best friends, in not giving us the least hint of it. Perhaps I may all this time be talking to you of a book you have never seen, and which has not yet reached Ireland; if it have not, I believe what we have said will be sufficient to recommend it to your reading, and that you will order me to send it to you." In like manner Pope says, "Motte received the copy, he tells me, he knew not from whence, nor from whom, dropped at his house in the dark, from a hackney coach: by computing the time, I found it was after you left England, so " for