Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 13.djvu/364

352 papers. The moment they are put into my hands I will write to you again.

I do not know why the dean's friends should think it derogatory, either to his station or character, to print the history by subscription, considering how the money arising by the sale of it is to be applied. I am not for selling the copy to a bookseller: for, unless a sufficient caution be taken, the bookseller, when he is master of the copy, will certainly print it by subscription, and so have all the benefit which the dean refuses. But I shall be better able to send you my thoughts of this matter, when I have talked with some of my friends, who have had more dealings in this way than I have.

And have you at last got store of copper halfpence, and are content to give us gold and silver in exchange for this new coin? This serves to verify an observation I have frequently made, that the grossest imposition on the publick will go down, if the managers have but patience to try it twice, and art enough to give it a new name. The excise scheme, which made such a noise here a few years ago, passed here last winter with little opposition, under a new shape and title. How would the ghost, of Wood triumph over the Drapier, and rattle his copper chains, if the spectre were permitted to meet him in his walks? But I am unawares running into politicks, without considering that these reflections may occasion the loss of my letter. I have therefore done with your copper. You

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