LETTER XC.

To the Same.

THE ENGLISH SUBJECT TO THE SPLEEN.1

WHEN the men of this country are once turned of thirty they regularly retire every year, at proper intervals, to lie in of the spleen. The vulgar, unfurnished with the luxurious comforts of the soft cushion, down bed, and easy chair, are obliged, when the fit is on them, to nurse it up by drinking, idleness, and ill-humour. In such dispositions, unhappy is the foreigner who happens to cross them; his long chin, tarnished coat, or pinched hat, are sure to receive no quarter. If they meet no foreigner, however, to fight with, they are, in such cases, generally content with beating each other.

The rich, as they have more sensibility, are operated upon with greater violence by this disorder. Different from the poor, instead of becoming more insolent, they grow totally unfit for opposition. A general here, who would have faced a culverin when well, if the fit be on him, shall hardly find courage to snuff a candle. An admiral, who could have opposed a broadside without shrinking, shall sit whole days in his chamber, mobbed up in double nightcaps, shuddering at the intrusive breeze, and distinguishable from his wife only by his black beard and heavy eyebrows.

In the country, this disorder mostly attacks the fair sex; in town, it is most unfavourable to the men. A lady, who has pined whole years amidst cooing doves and complaining nightingales, in rural retirement, shall resume all her vivacity in one night at a city gaming-table; her husband, who roared, hunted, and got drunk at home, shall grow splenetic in town in proportion to his wife's good humour. Upon their arrival in London, they exchange their disorders. In consequence of her parties and excursions, he

1 Dated Dec. 17, 1760, in the Public Ledger.-ED.

puts on the furred cap and scarlet stomacher, and perfectly resembles an Indian husband,1 who, when his wife is safely delivered, permits her to transact business abroad, while he undergoes all the formality of keeping his bed, and receiving all the condolence in her place.

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But those who reside constantly in town, owe this disorder mostly to the influence of the weather. It is impossible to describe what a variety of transmutations an east wind shall produce; it has been known to change a lady of fashion into a parlour couch; an alderman into a plate of custard; and a dispenser of justice into a rat-trap. Even philosophers themselves are not exempt from its influence; it has often converted 3 a poet into a coral and bells, and a patriot senator into a dumb waiter.3

Some days ago I went to visit the man in black, and entered his house with that cheerfulness which the certainty of a favourable reception always inspires. Upon opening the door of his apartment, I found him with the most rueful face imaginable, in a morning gown and flannel nightcap, earnestly employed in learning to blow the German flute. Struck with the absurdity of a man in the decline of life thus blowing away all his constitution and spirits, even without the consolation of being musical, I ventured to ask what could induce him to

The Ledger text has "an husband of Congo."-ED.

2 Sir William Temple says (Works, 1770, vol. iii. p. 426) :-" Our country must be confessed to be, what a great foreign physician called it, the region of spleen; which may arise a good deal from the great uncertainty and many sudden changes of our weather in all seasons of the year. And how much these affect the heads and hearts, especially of the finest tempers, is hard to be believed by men whose thoughts are not turned to such speculations."-ED.

3.3 In lieu of this passage the Public Ledger has " an algebraist into a broker, and an anatomist into a city carver." These are effects of hypochondriasis. Boswell, the biographer of Johnson, suffered from this complaint. He describes it thus (Napier's 8vo. edition of the 'Life of Johnson,' vol. i. p. 37):-"It is a common effect of low spirits or melancholy, to make those who are afflicted with it imagine that they are actually suffering those evils which happen to be most strongly presented to their minds. Some have fancied themselves to be deprived of the use of their limbs, some to labour under acute diseases, others to be in extreme poverty; when in truth there was not the least reality in any of the suppositions; so that when the vapours were dispelled, they were convinced of the delusion."-ED.

attempt learning so difficult an instrument so late in life? To this he made no reply, but groaning, and still holding the flute to his lips, continued to gaze at me for some moments very angrily, and then proceeded to practise his gamut as before. After having produced a variety of the most hideous tones in nature, at last turning to me, he demanded, whether I did not think he had made a surprising progress in two days? "You see," continues he, "I have got the ambusheer already; and as for fingering, my master tells me, I shall have that in a few lessons more." I was so much astonished with this instance of inverted ambition, that I knew not what to reply, but soon discerned the cause of all his absurdities: my friend was under a metamorphosis by the power of spleen, and fluteblowing was unluckily become his adventitious passion.

In order, therefore, to banish his anxiety imperceptibly, by seeming to indulge it, I began to descant on those gloomy topics by which philosophers often get rid of their own spleen, by communicating it: the wretchedness of a man in this life; the happiness of some wrought out of the miseries of others; the necessity that wretches should expire under punishment, that rogues might enjoy affluence in tranquillity: I led him on from the inhumanity of the rich to the ingratitude of the beggar; from the insincerity of refinement to the fierceness of rusticity; and at last had the good fortune to restore him to his usual serenity of temper, by permitting him to expatiate upon all the modes of human misery.'

"Some nights ago," says my friend, "sitting alone by my fire, I happened to look into an account of the detection of a set of men called the thief-takers. I read over the many hideous cruelties of those haters of mankind, of their pretended friendship to wretches they meant to betray, of their sending men out to rob, and then hanging them. I could not avoid sometimes interrupting the narrative, by crying out, 'Yet these are men!' As I went on, I was informed that they had lived by this practice

The Public Ledger text has here in addition, "Even at last he was so far master of himself as to describe his own situation under the disorder in which I found him."-ED.

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several years, and had been enriched by the price of blood: 'And yet,' cried I, 'I have been sent into this world, and am desired to call these men my brothers!' I read, that the very man who led the condemned wretch to the gallows, was he who falsely swore his life away; 'and yet,' continued I, that perjurer had just such a nose, such lips, such hands, and such eyes, as Newton!' I at last came to the account of the wretch that was searched after robbing one of the thief-takers of half-a-crown. Those of the confederacy knew that he had got but that single half-crown in the world;' after a long search, therefore, which they knew would be fruitless, and taking from him the half-crown, which they knew was all he had, one of the gang compassionately cried out, 'Alas! poor creature, let him keep all the rest he has got, it will do him service in Newgate, where we are sending him.'' This was an instance of such complicated guilt and hypocrisy, that I threw down the book in an agony of rage, and began to think with malice of all the human kind. I sat silent for some minutes, and soon perceiving the ticking of my watch beginning to grow noisy and troublesome, I quickly placed it out of hearing, and strove to resume my serenity. But the watchman soon gave me a second alarm. I had scarcely recovered from this, when my peace was assaulted by the wind at my window; and when that ceased to blow, I listened for death-watches in the wainscot. I now found my whole system discomposed. I strove to find a resource in philosophy and reason; but what could I oppose, or where direct my blow, when I could see no enemy to combat? I saw no misery approaching, nor knew any I had to fear, yet still I was miserable. Morning came, I sought for tranquillity in dissipation, sauntered from one place of public resort to another, but found myself disagreeable to my acquaintance, and ridiculous to others." I tried at different times dancing, fencing, and riding; I solved geometrical problems, shaped tobacco-stoppers, wrote verses, and cut

1 The Ledger text has in addition, " yet pretended to believe that he had more."-ED.

2 The Ledger has "where he is going.”—ED.

3 The Ledger has "disagreeable to my friends, ridiculous to my enemies."-ED.

paper. At last I placed my affections on music, and find, that earnest employment, if it cannot cure, at least will palliate every anxiety." Adieu.

LETTER XCI.

To the Same.

THE INFLUENCE OF CLIMATE AND SOIL UPON THE TEMPERS

AND DISPOSITIONS OF THE ENGLISH. [THE ENGLISHMAN.] 2

It is no unpleasing contemplation, to consider the influence which soil and climate have upon the disposition of the inhabitants, the animals, and vegetables, of different countries. That among the brute creation is much more visible than in man, and that in vegetables more than either. In some places, those plants which are entirely poisonous at home lose their deleterious quality by being carried abroad: there are serpents in Macedonia so harmless as to be used as playthings for children; and we are told, that in some parts of Fez, there are lions so very timorous as to be scared, though coming in herds, by the cries of women.

I know of no country where the influence of climate and soil is more visible than in England; the same hidden cause which gives courage to their dogs and cocks, gives also a fierceness to their men. But chiefly this ferocity appears among the vulgar. The polite of every country pretty nearly resemble each other. But, as in simpling, it is among the uncultivated productions of nature we are to examine the characteristic differences of climate and soil, so in an estimate of the genius of the people, we must look

1 Goldsmith played the flute, it will be remembered; and the man in black is conjectured as being in part drawn from Goldsmith's self. See notes ante, pp. 48, 98, 99, Life,' &c.-ED.

* Dated Nov. 17, 1760, in the Public Ledger.-ED.

3 Follows here in the Public Ledger "as in the Manzana Persica, for instance. If we may credit Lucian."-ED.

The culling of herbs, &c.-ED.