MCLXXII. [Nichols.]

SIR,

SWIFT TO WILLIAM RICHARDSON

April 9, 1737.

I HAVE wondered, since I have had the favour to know you, what could possibly put you upon your civility to me.' You have invited me to your house, and proposed everything according to my own scheme that would make me easy. You have loaded me with presents, although it never lay in my power to do you any sort of favour or advantage. I have had a salmon from you of twenty-six pounds weight, another of eighteen pounds, and the last of fourteen pounds; upon which my ill-natured friends descant, that I am declining in your good-will by the declining of weight in your salmon. They would have had your salmon double the weight: the second should have been of fifty-two pounds, the third of a hundred and four pounds, and the last of two hundred and eight pounds. It seems this is the way of Dublin computors, who think you country gentlemen have nothing to do but to oblige us citizens, who are not bound to make you the least return, farther than, when you come hither, to meet you by chance in a coffee-house, and ask you what tavern you dine in, and there pay your club. I intend to deal with you in the same manner; and if you come to town for three months, I will invite you once to dinner, for which I shall expect to stay a whole year with you, and you will be bound to thank me for honouring your house. You saw me ill enough when I had the honour to see you at the Deanery. Mrs. Whiteway, my cousin, and the only cousin I own, remembers she was here in your company, and desires to present her humble service to you, and no wonder, for you sent so much salmon, that I was forced to give her a part.

Some ten days ago there came to see me one Mr. Lloyd a clergyman, who lives, as I remember, near Coleraine. He had a commission from the people in and about that town which belongs to the London Society. It seems that, three

1

Supra, vol. v, p. 425.

2

Supra, vol. v, p. 429.

years ago, the Society increased their rents from three hundred pounds to twelve hundred pounds a year; since which time the town is declined, the tenants neglect their houses, and the country tenants are not able to live. I writ a letter by him to Alderman Barber, because their demands seem very extravagant; but I had no other reason for doing so than the ample commission he had from the town of Coleraine. I wish I knew your sentiments in this affair. I never saw the gentleman before, but the commission he had encouraged me so far, that I could not refuse him the letter.

Although I was ill enough when I saw you, I am forty times worse at present, and am no more able to be your guest this summer than to travel to America. I have been this month so ill with a giddy head, and so very deaf, that I am not fit for human conversation; besides, my spirits are so low that I do not think anything worth minding; and most of my friends, with very great justice, have forsaken me. I find you deal with Faulkner. I have read his Rollin's History. The translator did not want knowledge enough, but is a coxcomb by running into those cant words and phrases which have spoiled our language, and will spoil it more every day. Your presents are so numerous that I had almost forgot to thank you for the cheese; against which there can be no objection but that of too much rennet, for which I so often wish ill to the housewife. I am, Sir, with true esteem,

Your most obedient humble servant,

MCLXXIII. [Original]

SWIFT TO

JON. SWIFT.

SIR,

Deanery House, April 15, 1737.

I FIND that ever since you have been employed as Seneschal to my Lord Archbishop of Dublin, you have been upon all occasions encroaching upon the Liberties of the Dean and Chapter of St. Patrick's, in a most arbitrary and unprecedented manner. You know very well that our

Liberties were confirmed by an Act of Parliament in the reign of Edward the Fourth, which Act we have by us in the book called Dignitas Decani, and the Archbishop then alive was cast, although he did not act in a degree so arbitrarily and magisterially as you, who like a lawyer call it a merit in any court to extend your jurisdiction.' I resent this so highly, that knowing I am in the right, by having the opinion for many years of several able lawyers, I will resist by force any of your people who dare to enter our Liberty, as having any power here. I am, Sir,

Your humble servant,

J. SWIFT.

If the Archbishop knew the foot we stand on, I believe he would not much approve of your proceedings.

Endorsed-Letter to the Archbishop's Seneschal; not sent by Mr. King's' advice.

MCLXXIV. [Deane Swift.]

WILLIAM RICHARDSON TO SWIFT

REVEREND SIR,

April 17, 1737.

I RETURNED last night from Derry, where I have been for some time past, and where you will be received with great respect. I pleased myself with the hopes of finding

The chartulary, to which Swift refers, is preserved in the archives of St. Patrick's Cathedral. It contains a collection of charters and documents relating to the history of the Cathedral, and as the Bishop of Ossory points out in a calendar of the volume which he contributed to the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy (vol. xxv, sec. C, p. 481) it derives its name from the phrase "dignitas decani et omnium canonicorum," which is frequently used in referring to the privileges of the capitular body, and it concerns the Dean no more than any member of the Chapter. The Archbishop who had sought in Edward the Fourth's time to curtail the privileges of the Dean and Chapter was John Walton, previously Abbot of Osney, near Oxford, and the statute by which he was restrained is printed by Mason in his "History of St. Patrick's Cathedral."

2 Probably the incumbent of St. Bride's Church (supra, vol. v, p. 255).