Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 5.djvu/267

Rh advanced by the great waste of paper made by our present set of poets; not to mention other necessary uses of the same to shopkeepers, especially grocers, apothecaries, and pastry cooks, and I might add, but for our writers, the nation would in a little time be utterly destitute of bumfodder, and must of necessity import the same from England and Holland, where they have it in great abundance, by the indefatigable labour of their own wits: I say, these things considered, I am humbly of opinion, it would be worth the care of our governors to cherish gentlemen of the quill, and give them all proper encouragements here. And, since I am upon the subject, I shall speak my mind very freely, and if I add saucily, it is no more than my birthright as a Briton.

Seriously then, I have many years lamented the want of a Grub street in this our large and polite city, unless the whole may be called one. And this I have accounted an unpardonable defect in our constitution, ever since I had any opinions I could call my own. Every one knows Grub street is a market for small ware in wit, and as necessary, considering the usual purgings of the human brain, as the nose is upon a man's face: and for the same reason we have here a court, a college, a playhouse, and beautiful ladies, and fine gentlemen, and good claret, and abundance of pens, ink, and paper, clear of taxes, and every other circumstance to provoke wit; and yet those, whose province it is, have not thought fit to appoint a place for evacuations of it, which is a very hard case, as may be judged by comparisons.

And truly this defect has been attended with unspeakable inconveniencies; for, not to mention the prejudice done to the commonwealth of letters, I Rh