plunged me headlong into the inky flood. While I lay gasping and struggling beneath the waves, methought I heard a familiar voice calling me by my name; which awaking me, I with pleasure recollected the features of the Genius in those of my publisher, who was standing by my bed-side, and had called upon me for copy. T.

N° 4. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1754.

Conjugium vocat, hoc prætexit nomine culpam.

VIRG.

Where matrimony veils th' incestuous life,
And whore is shelter'd in the name of wife.

IT is with the utmost concern I have heard myself within this week past accused at several tea-tables, of not being a man of my word. The female part of my readers exclaim against me for not having as yet paid my particular addresses to the fair. "Who is this

"Mr. Town? says one: Where can the creature live? "He has said nothing yet of the dear Burletta girl.” Another wonders that I have not recommended to the ladies Mr. Hoyle's New Calculation of Chances; for understanding which nothing more is required, we are told, than the first principles of arithmetic; that is, to know how to tell the pips, and set up one's game. But I find the whole sex in general have expected from me some shrewd remarks upon the Marriage Bill. To oblige them in some measure, 1 shall at present recommend to their notice the following advertisement, which has been sent me with a request to make it public.

THE REVEREND MR. KEITH,

(Who has had the honour to perform before several of the Nobility, Gentry, and others)

GIVES THIS PUBLIC NOTICE,

That he shall continue at his Chapel in May-Fair no longer than the present month. He will then set out on his progress through the principal markettowns, where he will exhibit publicly, without loss of time, any hour of the day or night. He will perform to no less than two persons, and will wait on any Gentleman and Lady privately at their own houses.

We have no connexion with the Fleet Parsons, or other Pretenders. Beware of Counterfeits. Ego sum solus.

I may perhaps take a future opportunity of enlarging on this very important subject, the Marriage Bill; but shall at present oblige the ladies by celebrating an order of females lately sprung up among them, usually distinguished by the denomination of Demi-Reps ;a word not to be found in any of our dictionaries.

This order, which seems daily encreasing upon us, was first instituted by some ladies eminent for their public spirit, with a view of raising their half of the species to a level with the other in the unbounded license of their enjoyments. By this artifice the most open violation of modesty takes the name of innocent freedom and gaiety; and as long as the last failing remains a secret, the lady's honour is spotless and untainted. In a word, a Demi-Rep is a lady, whom every body thinks, what nobody chooses to call her.

It is absolutely necessary, that every lady of this order should be married. Custom has given a certain

charm to wedlock, which changes the colour of our actions, and renders that behaviour not improper, which in a state of celibacy would be accounted inde. cent and scandalous. As to the promises made in marriage "to love, honour, and obey," custom has made them also merely ceremonial, and in fact as little binding as the wedding-ring, which may be put on or pulled off at pleasure.

Religious and political writers have both for diffe rent reasons endeavoured to encourage frequent marriages: but this order, if it maintains its ground, will more certainly promote them. How inviting must such a state appear to a woman of spirit! An English wife, with all the indiscretions of a girl, may assume more than the privileges of a woman; may trifle publicly with the beaus and smarts, introduce them to her toilette, and fix it as a certain rule in all her conversation and behaviour, that when once marriage has (in Lucy's phrase) "made an honest woman of her," she is entitled to all the license of a courtezan.

I have lately seen, with a good deal of compassion, a few forward maiden ladies investing themselves with the dignities, and incroaching on the privileges of this order. It may not be improper to caution them to recede in time. As their claim to these liberties is unwarranted by custom, they will not retain that ambiguous reputation enjoyed by the Demi-Reps, whose whole system of conduct is founded on the basis of matrimony. Every lady, therefore, inclined to in dulge herself in all those little innocent freedoms, should confine herself within the pale of matrimony, to elude censure; as insolvent debtors avoid a jail by lodging within the verge of the court.

A Demi-Rep then must necessarily be married: Nor is it easy for a lady to maintain so critical a character, unless she is a woman of fashion. Titles and estates bear down all weak censures, and silence scan.

dal and detraction. That good breeding too, so inviolably preserved among persons of condition, is of infinite service. This produces that delightful insipidity so remarkable in persons of quality, whose conversation flows with an even tenor, undisturbed by sentiment, and unruffled by passion: insomuch that husbands and wives, brothers, sisters, cousins, and in short the whole circle of kindred and acquaintance, can entertain the most thorough contempt and even hatred for each other, without transgressing the minutest article of good breeding and civility. But those females, who want the advantages of birth and fortune, must be content to wrap themselves up in their integrity; for the lower sort are so notoriously deficient in the requisites of politeness, that they would not fail to throw out the most cruel and bitter invectives against the pretty delinquents.

The great world will, I doubt not, return me thanks for thus keeping the canaille at a distance, and securing to them a quiet possession of their enjoyments. And here I cannot but observe, how respectable an order the Demi-Reps compose, of which the lovely sisterhood must all be married, and almost all Right Honourable.

For this order, among many other embellishments of modern life, we are indebted to the French. Such flippant gaiety is more agreeable to the genius of that nation. There is a native bashfulness inherent in my country-women, which it is not easy to surmount: but our modern fine ladies, who take as much pains to polish their minds as to adorn their persons, have got over this obstacle with incredible facility. They have so skilfully grafted the French genius for intrigue upon British beauty and liberty, that their conduct appears perfectly original: though we must do the French the justice to allow, that when a lady of this airy dispo sition visits Paris, she returns most wonderfully improved. Upon the whole, France appears the proper

est school to instruct the ladies in the theory of their conduct; but England, and more especially London, the most commodious place to put it in practice. In this town, indeed, a lady studious of improvement, may in a very short time become a considerable proficient, by frequenting the several academies kept constantly open for her profit and instruction. The card tables and masquerades in particular have trained up some ladies to a surprising eminence, without the least assistance from a foreign education.

It is observed, that the difference between the se veral species in the scale of beings is but just sufficient to preserve their distinction; the highest of one order approaching so near to the lowest of the other, that the gradation is hard to be determined; as the colours of the rainbow, through an infinite variety of shades, die away into each other imperceptibly. The Demi. Reps hold this intermediate station, in the characters of females, between the modest women and the women of pleasure; to both which they are in some measure connected, as they stand upon the utmost verge of reputation, and totter on the brink of infamy. It were therefore to be wished, that these ladies wore some symbol of their order, or were distinguished by some peculiar mode of dress. The Romans assigned different habits to persons of different ages and stations; and I hope, that when the bustle of the ensuing elections is over, the new parliament will take this matter into consideration, and oblige the several classes of females to distinguish themselves by some external marks and badges of their principles.

Till some act of this nature shall take place, I shall propose a method, by which every lady may exactly learn in what class she may be reckoned. The world must know then, that my very good friend Mr. Ayscough has at length with infinite pains and study constructed a thermometer; upon which he has delineated,