Letter No. 526. Monday, November 3, 1712. Steele.
'--Fortius utere Loris.'
Ovid.
I am very loth to come to Extremities with the young Gentlemen mention'd in the following Letter, and do not care to chastise them with my own Hand, till I am forc'd by Provocations too great to be suffer'd without the absolute Destruction of my Spectatorial Dignity. The Crimes of these Offenders are placed under the Observation of one of my chief Officers, who is posted just at the entrance of the Pass between London and Westminster. As I have great Confidence in the Capacity, Resolution and Integrity of the Person deputed by me to give an Account of Enormities, I doubt not but I shall soon have before me all proper Notices which are requisite for the Amendment of Manners in Publick, and the Instruction of each Individual of the Human Species in what is due from him, in respect to the whole Body of Mankind. The present Paper shall consist only of the above-mentioned Letter, and the Copy of a Deputation which I have given to my trusty Friend Mr. John Sly; wherein he is charged to notify to me all that is necessary for my Animadversion upon the Delinquents mentioned by my Correspondent, as well as all others described in the said Deputation.
To the SPECTATOR-GENERAL of Great Britain.
'I grant it does look a little familiar, but I must call you
Dear Dumb,
'Being got again to the farther End of the Widow's Coffeehouse, I
shall from hence give you some account of the Behaviour of our
Hackney-Coachmen since my last. These indefatigable Gentlemen, without
the least Design, I dare say, of Self-Interest or Advantage to
themselves, do still ply as Volunteers Day and Night for the Good of
their Country. I will not trouble you with enumerating many
Particulars, but I must by no means omit to inform you of an Infant
about six foot high, and between twenty and thirty Years of Age, who
was seen in the Arms of a Hackney Coach-man driving by Will's
Coffee-house in Covent-Garden, between the Hours of four and five in
the Afternoon of that very Day, wherein you publish'd a Memorial
against them. This impudent young Cur, tho' he could not sit in a
Coach-box without holding, yet would he venture his Neck to bid
defiance to your Spectatorial Authority, or to any thing that you
countenanced. Who he was I know not, but I heard this Relation this
Morning from a Gentleman who was an Eye-Witness of this his Impudence;
and I was willing to take the first opportunity to inform you of him,
as holding it extremely requisite that you should nip him in the Bud.
But I am my self most concerned for my Fellow-Templers,
Fellow-Students, and Fellow-Labourers in the Law, I mean such of them
as are dignified and distinguish'd under the Denomination of
Hackney-Coachmen. Such aspiring Minds have these ambitious young Men,
that they cannot enjoy themselves out of a Coach-Box. It is however an
unspeakable Comfort to me, that I can now tell you, that some of them
are grown so bashful as to study only in the Nighttime, or in the
Country. The other Night I spied one of our young Gentlemen very
diligent at his Lucubrations in Fleet-Street; and by the way, I
should be under some concern, lest this hard Student should one time
or other crack his Brain with studying, but that I am in hopes Nature