great ornaments. I am convinced it is from hence that our ladies have borrowed the thought. Their induftrious diflocation of the neck has anfwered all the purposes of fnow-water, and produced thofe brawny excrefcences which, in Alto Relievo, decorate the fhoulders of every fashonable fair one that we meet. Yet I fear our ideas of beauty are too obftinately fixed, to be easily reconciled to these acquired goters, be the practice ever fo univerfal, and that it will be difficult to bring us to perceive that graceful ease refulting from this attitude, which the acuter view of the ladies can difcern. On the contrary, it appears to us to be the most laboured and constrained pofition that can well be imagined. A gentleman of my acquaintance, whofe fimiles are ftrong but coarfe, fays, that a lady of fashionable carriage, gives him the very fame idea of eafe, with a man in the pillory, a truffed fowl, or a skewered rabbet. The truth is, we have not been accustomed to fee the words easy and natural difunited. All the imitative arts, and every fpecies of compofition, feem to regard them as infeparable. From this theory, (be it true or falfe) we are induced to fancy, that the neck, when left in the erect ftate of nature, is more at liberty, and capable of more grace, than when stiffened into a state of protrufion; and that the face has a greater power and variety of expreffion when the head is permitted to play freely on it's natural pivot, than when it is forced forward, and rivetted down on the breast. Our feelings confefs a line of beauty (and a bewitching one !) in a fine flowing neck and fwelling bofom but Hogarth himfelf could not fhew it to us in a hump; nor can we be perfuaded but that (to adopt a thought of COWLEY'S) a wo man's perfon will do infinitely more execution in the fhape of Cupid's arrow than his bow. My My fair readers fhould confider, that, tho' fome little affectations may be inoffenfive, nay perhaps, in some few hands, may even please, yet where they tend, as in this case to fix a real imperfection, they become dangerous. Fashions are fluctuating; and if flat fhoulders should again come into vogue, fome of them may be fairly taken in. The celestial Goddess may, in her monthly progrefs, repair her gibbous form, but our mortal ones will infallibly carry theirs to the grave. The intellect in ruins is a painful fight, and next to it is the human form debased. The blemishes of nature, and the effects of accident, demand our pity; the confequences of inattention may be viewed with indulgence; but a ftudied depravation of fhape, arifing from affectation, will generally, I fear, excite lefs favourable fentiments. The effect cannot fail to difguft, nor the cause to be despised. F. SIR, To Mr. FLYN, AM by profeffion a critic, and have had the honour of an intimacy with the greateft wits of both fexes in the kingdom. On coming to this city, I was a good deal furprised at the neglect with which fome of our great modern modern writers have been treated, and the little tafte which generally prevails here for those peculiar beauties of ftile and fentiinent, for which thofe extraordinary geniuses are in other places so much celebrated. I therefore hope my time will not be mifemployed, if I lay myself out to improve the public, through the channel of your paper, by pointing out the fpecific excellences of our moft eminent authors, and fhewing clearly their fuperiority to thofe antients, for whom, from the prejudice of education, too many still retain a blind implicit affection and respect. For let your pedants fay what they will, is Thucydides to be compared to Dr. Smollet, Euripides to Mr. Home, or Mr. Murphy; Homer to Macpherson; or Plato to the divine author of the Rambler ? As a fpecimen of my abilities, I fhall first indulge my fair readers with a letter in the Richardsonian, or, novel ftile: the principal requifites in which are, an easy flowing chit chat, fuch as people of fashion talk, with now and then a ftroke of the pathetic or fentimental, and an utter neglect of ftops, the idle diftinctions of which it would be unpolite to trouble them with, but in their place, dafhes, which alone ferve for them all. Mifs HARRIET SELWYN to LUCY Mifs THOMPSON. 'MY DEAR GIRL, • I am just preparing for the feast and ball Sir Harry is is to give to day to the whole country-I am dreffed in the flowered luteftring you fay becomes me fo well-It really is a genteel thing Molly has tiffed me out to great advantage-I like French night-caps prodigiously-Don't you-They fet fet off a long lank yellow vifage wonderfully My mamma and I go in the chaife and Mr. O'Fla herty escorts us-Rap-Rap-Rap-Here he comes. 'No-he is not come-'Twas a falfe alarm-Don't 'take it into your head now that I am in love with the man-To be fure I feel fomething of a fluttera'tion about me when he fqueezes my hand Quarter paft Eleven "He is come indeed-And with him Mifs Manly rid ing fingle-fhe pretends towit but tis only pertnefs'Lord how the looks in her blue cloth habit-The fight of it is enough to ftiffle one this hot weather. There's Mifs Taunton-conceited thing-She thinks he's bandfome-In her old fashioned brow 'filk and green flounces-What a fright I tell you who's to be there-Lady Betty and 'the two Mifs Grevilles and Mifs Meredith and 'Mrs. Reeves and Mifs Pomfret and Mifs Jervis ' and my cousin Dixon and Mr. Bramber and Mr. 'Watson-How I run on-Ought'nt I to be afhamed of myfelf-So you ought-And fo I am my dear-My grandmamma calls me— Ten o'clock at night. What a fright I am in-O my dear dear girl-! fhall never forget it-O men! men! what fad creatures you are Sir Harry's a very fenfible man-He made me feveral compliments at dinner and I coud'nt you 'know avoid paying all my attention to him-This ' made Mr. O'Flaherty quite jealous and he was fo F • much much out of temper that he fnuffed and fnubbed every body and was particularly fnappish to Mr. 'Mc. Gregor an exciseman that fat oppofite to him they began their nafty politicks before we left the roomMy mind niif gave me that they'd quarrel and juft fo it happened, for we had hardly fweetened our tea when we heard high words and prodigious noises in the next room-We all went to fee what was the matter when-horrid fight-poor • Mr. O'Flaherty had one of his eyes almoft beat out of his head and Mr. Mc. Gregor lay ftretched on the floor just for all the world like a corpfe→→→→ Pity me my dear creature-I fainted away-and don't know how I get home The next fpecies of writing is the Macphersonic, and is the inft difficult of all. Yet let none despair,, for I am poffeffed of certain rules, which will enable any perfon, without the leaft genius, to write a whole epic poem in the space of a week befides fragments; while fipping a difh of coffee. Here I can't help confuting a vulgar error, that poetry should be intelligible. It should be quite the contrary, for nothing adds fo much to the terrific and fublime as not knowing what the poet would be at. But this I fhall prove beyond contradiction in a New Art of Poetry which I intend to publish, and to which I must re er you for the receipt of making night-fcenes, moon-light scenes, love scenes, ghoft-fcenes, death-scenes, compound epithets, finiles and battles. And in the mean time I fhall take part of the above ftory and turn it into a fragment of Gallic Poetry, calling Mc. Gregor by his own name, and changing O'Flaherty into Der mot. FRAGMENT. The gates of the Eaft are barred on the fun's eagle |