Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 12.djvu/443

Rh you. I know you can find dinners, but you love twelvepenny coaches too well, without considering that the interest of a whole thousand pounds brings you but half a crown a day. I find a greater longing than ever to come among you; and reason good, when I am teased with dukes and duchesses for a visit, all my demands complied with, and all excuses cut off. You remember, "O happy Don Quixote! queens held his horse, and duchesses pulled off his armour," or something to that purpose. He was a mean spirited fellow; I can say ten times more; happy, &c. such a duchess was designed to attend him, and such a duke invited him to command his palace. Nam istos reges ceteros memorare nolo, hominum mendicabula: go read your Plautus, and observe Strobilus vapouring after he had found the pot of gold. I will have nothing to do with that lady: I have long hated her on your account, and the more, because you are so forgiving as not to hate her: however, she has good qualities enough to make her esteemed; but not one grain of feeling. I only wish she were a fool. I have been several months writing near five hundred lines on a pleasant subject, only to tell what my friends and enemies will say on me after I am dead. I shall finish it soon, for I add two lines every week, and blot out four, and alter eight. I have brought in you and my other friends, as well as enemies and detractors. It is a great comfort to see how corruption and ill conduct are instrumental in uniting virtuous persons and lovers of their country of all denominations: whig and tory, high and low church, as soon as they are left to think freely, all