you to think of living without her; this is all that sticks with me. But considering the friendship you express to me for the Dean, I hope you will be persuaded to consider his good rather than your own; and send her up immediately; or else it will put him to the expense of giving three shillings and four pence for a wife; and he declares that the badness of pay of his tithes, since the resolutions of the parliament of Ireland, puts this out of his power."

I could not guess why you were so angry at Fowlbrother; till Mrs. Whiteway, who you find is now with me, said it was for publishing some works of yours and mine like a rogue: which is so usual to their trade, that I now am weary of being angry with it. I go on, to desire that Mrs. Donaldson* will let me know what I owe her, not in justice but generosity. If you could find wine and victuals, I could be glad to pass some part of the summer with you, if health would permit me; for I have some club enemies, that would be glad to shoot me, and I do not love to be shot: it is a death I have a particular aversion to. But I shall henceforth walk with servants well armed, and have ordered them to kill my killers; however I would have them be the beginners. I will do what I can with Mr. Richardson, who (money excepted) is a very honest man. How is your breathing? As to myself, my life and health are not worth a groat. How shall we get wine to your cabin? I can spare some; and

* An inn-keeper at Cavan. D. S.

am

am preparing diaculum to save my skin as far as Cavan; and even to Belturbet *. Pray God preserve you!

I am, &c.

JON. SWIFT.

I

SIR,

TO MR. BENJAMIN MOTTE.

DUBLIN, MAY 25, 1736.

LATELY received a long letter from Mr. Faulkner, grievously complaining upon several articles of the ill treatment he hath met with from you, and of the many advantageous offers he hath made you, with none of which you thought fit to comply. I am not qualified to judge in the fact, having heard but one side; only one thing I know, that the cruel oppressions of this kingdom by England are not to be borne. You send what books you please hither, and the booksellers here can send nothing to you that is written here. As this is absolute oppression, if I were a bookseller in this town, I would use all the safe means to reprint London books, and run them to any town in England, that I could, because whoever offends not the laws of God, or the country he lives in, commits no sin. It was the fault of you and other booksellers who printed any thing supposed to be mine, that you did not agree with

* Mr. Richardson's rectory. F.

+ Motte filed a bill in Chancery in England, against Faulkner, for printing Swift's Works, to stop the sale of them there, which made the author write this letter. F.

each

each other to print them together, if you thought they would sell to any advantage. I believe I told you long ago, that Mr. Faulkner came to me, and told me his intention to print every thing that my friends told him they thought to be mine, and that I was discontented at it; but when he urged, that some other bookseller would do it, and that he would take the advice of my friends, and leave out what I pleased to order him, I said no more, but that I was sorry it should be done here.------But I am so incensed against the oppressions from England, and have so little regard to the laws they make, that I do, as a clergyman, encourage the merchants both to export wool and woollen manufactures to any country in Europe, or any where else; and conceal it from the customhouse officers, as I would hide my purse from a highwayman, if he came to rob me on the road, although England hath made a law to the contrary: and so I would encourage our booksellers here to sell your authors books printed here, and send them to all the towns in England, if I could do it with safety and profit ; because (I repeat it) it is no offence against God, or the laws of the country I live in. Mr. Faulkner hath dealt so fairly with me, that I have a great opinion of his honesty, although I never dealt with him as a printer or a bookseller; but since my friends told me, those things, called mine, would certainly be printed by some hedge bookseller, I was forced to be passive in the matter. I have some things which I shall leave my executors to publish after

"Directions to Servants," and the " History of the last Session of Queen Anne, and of the Peace of Utrecht," both since printed. N.

my

เ

my decease, and have directed that they shall be printed in London. For, except small papers, and some treatises writ for the use of this kingdom, I always had those of any importance published in London, as you well know. For my own part, although I have no power any where, I will do the best offices I can to countenance Mr. Faulkner. For, although I was not at all pleased to have that collection printed here, yet none of my friends advised me to be angry with him; although, if they had been printed in London by you and your partners, perhaps I might have pretended to some little profit. Whoever may have the hazard or advantage of what I shall leave to be printed in London after my decease, I will leave no other copies of them here; but, if Mr. Faulkner should get the first printed copy, and reprint it here, and send his copies to England, I think he would do as right as you London booksellers, who load us with yours. If I live but a few years, I believe I shall publish some things that I think are important; but they shall be printed in London, although Mr. Faulkner were my brother. brother. I have been I have been very tedious in telling you my thoughts on this matter, and so I remain, sir,

Your most humble servant,

JON. SWIFT.

1

DEAR SIR,

FROM MR. FORD.

LONDON, JUNE 3, 1736.

THOUGH you have left off corresponding with me these two years and a half, I cannot leave you off yet; and I think this is the sixth letter I have sent you, since I have heard one word of you from your own hand. My lord Oxford told me last winter that he had heard from you, and you were then well. Mr. Cæsar very lately told me the same. It is always the most welcome news that can come to me: but it would be a great addition to my pleasure to have it from yourself; and you know my sincere regard for you may in some measure claim it.

I have been engaged these five months in a most troublesome lawsuit with an Irish chairman. Those fellows swarm about St. James's, and will hardly allow you to walk half a street, or even in the Park, on the fairest day. This rascal rushed into the entry of a tavern to force me into his chair, ran his poles against me, and would not let me pass till I broke his head. He made a jest of it that night; but the next morning an Irish solicitor came, out of profound respect, to advise me to make the fellow amends: he told a dismal story of the surgeon and the bloody shirt, and spoke against his own interest, merely to hinder me, whom he had never seen before, from being exposed. Neither his kind persuasions, nor the prudent counsels of our friends Mr. L, and a few more, could

prevail