pose that any of them have ever taken up the more fashionable employment of a Pimp: yet it is certain, that this is a very common and lucrative profession, and that very many provide themselves with the necessaries of life, by administering to the pleasures of others. A convenient cousin, sister, or wife, has sometimes proved the chief means of making a fortune; and the tongue of slander has often ventured to affirm, that the price of procuration has been paid with a place or a bishopric.

The most advantageous and genteel of all profes sions is Gaming. Whoever will make this science his study, will find it the readiest way to riches, and most certain passport to the best company: for the polite world will always admit any one to their society who will condescend to win their money. The followers of this profession are very numerous : which is indeed no wonder, when we reflect on the numbers it supports in ease and affluence, at no greater pains than packing the cards or cogging the dice, and no more risk than being sometimes tweaked by the nose, or kicked out of company; besides which, this profession daily receives new lustre from the many persons of quality that follow it, and crowd into it with as much eagerness as into the army. Among Gamesters may also be found Lawyers, who get more by being masters of all the Cases in Hoyle, than by their knowledge of those recorded in the Report books; Physicians, the chief object of whose attention is the circulation of the E. O. table; and Divines, who, we may suppose, were hinted at by a famous wit in a certain assembly, when, among the other benefits resulting from a double tax upon dice, he thought fit to enumerate, that it might possibly prevent the Clergy from playing at backgammon.

But the more danger the more honour: and therefore no profession is more honourable than that of a highwayman. Who the followers of this profes

sion are, and with what success they practise it, I will not pretend to relate; as the memoirs of several of them have been already penned by the Ordinary of Newgate, and as it is to be hoped that the lives of all the present practitioners will be written hereafter by that faithful historian. I shall therefore only say, that the present spirit of dissoluteness and free-thinking must unavoidably bring this honourable profession more and more into vogue, and that every Sessions may soon be expected to afford an instance of a Gentleman-Highwayman.

W

No. CXVII. THURSDAY, APRIL 22.

Ergo haud difficile est perituram arcessere summam
Lancibus oppositis, vel matris imagine fracta.

JUV.

Here to the spendthrift ready cash is lent
On plate, or rings, or watches, cent. per cent.
Here, from it's frame th' enamell'd portrait drawn,
The circling brilliants are receiv'd in pawn.

1 HAVE often amused myself with considering the mean and ridiculous shifts to which the extravagant are sometimes reduced. When the certain supplies of a regular income are exhausted, they are obliged to cast about for ready cash, and set the invention to work, in order to devise means of repairing their finances. Such attempts to enlarge their revenue have frequently driven those, whose great souls would not be curbed by the straitness of their circumstances, into very uncommon undertakings: they have sent lords to Arthur's, and la

dies to assemblies, or sometimes worse places. We may safely conclude, that whoever breaks through all economy, will soon discard honesty: though perhaps it might be deemed Scandalum Magnatum to aver, that prodigal men of quality have often sold their country to redeem their estates; and that extravagant ladies have been known to make up the deficiencies of their pin-money by pilfering and larceny.

One of the first and chief resources of extravagance, both in high and low life, is the pawnbroker's. I never pass by one of these shops, without considering them as the repositories of half the jewels, plate, &c. in town. It is true, indeed, that the honest and industrious are sometimes forced to supply their necessities by this method: but if we were to enquire to whom the several articles in these miscellaneous warehouses belong, we should find the greatest part of them to be the property of the idle and infamous among the vulgar, or the prodigal and luxurious among the great and if, in imitation of the ancients, who placed the temple of honour behind the temple of virtue, propriety should be attempted in the situation of pawnbroker's shops; they would be placed contiguous to a ginshop (as in the ingenious print of Hogarth) or behind a tavern, gaming-house, or bagnio.

Going home late last Saturday night, I was wit ness to a curious dialogue at the door of one of these houses. An honest journeyman carpenter, whose wife, it seems, had pawned his best clothes, having just received his week's pay, was come to redeem them; but, it being past twelve o'clock, the man of the house, who kept up the conversation by means of a little grate in the door, refused to deliver them; though the poor carpenter begged hard for his holiday clothes, as the morrow was Easter Sunday. This accident led me to reflect on the various per

sons in town who carry on this kind of commerce with the pawnbrokers, and gave occasion to the following dream.

I was scarce asleep, before I found myself at the entrance of a blind alley, terminated by a little hatch; where I saw a vast concourse of people of different ages, sex and condition, going in and coming out. Some of these I observed, as they went up, very richly drest; and others were adorned with jewels and costly trinkets; but I could not help remarking, that at their return they were all divested of their finery; and several had even their gowns and coats stripped off their backs. A lady, who strutted up in a rich brocaded suit, sneaked back again in an ordinary stuff night-gown: a second retreated with the loss of a diamond solitaire and pearl necklace; and a third, who had bundled up her whole stock of linen, scarce escaped with what she had upon her back. I observed several gentlemen, who brought their sideboards of plate to be melted down, as it were, into current specie: many had their pockets disburthened of their watches; and some, even among the military gentlemen, were obliged to deliver up their swords. Others of the company marched up, heavy laden with pictures, household goods, and domestic utensils : : one carried a spit; another brandished a gridiron; a third flourished a frying-pan; while a fourth brought to my remembrance the old sign of the Dog's Head in the Porridge-pot. I saw several trot up merrily with their chairs, tables, and other furniture; but I could not help pitying one poor creature among the rest, who after having stripped his whole house, even to his feather-bed, stalked along like a Lock-patient, wrapped up in the blankets, while his wife accompanied him doing penance in the sheets.

As I was naturally curious to see the inside of the receptacle, where all these various spoils were deposited; I stepped up to the hatch, and meeting a grave old gentleman at the threshold, I desired him to inform me what place it was, and what business was transacted there. He very courteously took me by the hand, and leading me through a dark passage, brought me into a spacious hall, which he told me was the Temple of Usury, and that he himself was the chief-priest of it. One part of this building was hung round with all kinds of apparel, like the sale-shops in Monmouth-street; another was strewed with a variety of goods, and resembled the brokers' shops in Harp-alley; and another part was furnished with such an immense quantity of jewels and rich plate, that I should rather have fancied myself in the church of the Lady of Loretto. All these my guide informed me, were the offerings of that crowd which I had seen resorting to this Temple. The churches in Roman Catholic countries have commonly a Cross fixed upon them; the Chinese erect Dragons, and hang bells about their Pagods; and the Turkish mosques are distinguished by Crescents; but I could not help taking particular notice, that this Temple of Usury had its vestibule adorned with three wooden balls painted blue; the mystery of which, I was told, was as dark and unfathomable as the Pythagorean number, or the secret doctrines of Trismegist.

When I had in some measure satisfied my curiosity in taking a general survey of the Temple, my instructor led me to an interior corner of it, where the most splendid offerings were spread upon a large altar. This bauble, said he, shewing me an elegant sprig of diamonds, is an aigret, sent in last week by a lady of quality, who has ever since kept home, with her head muffled up in a double clout, for a pretended fit of the tooth-ache.