der, I may be a cannon against Porus; or else provide for me in the burning of Persepolis, or what other method you shall think fit. SALMONEUS of Covent Garden.' The petition of all the devils of the play-house, in behalf of themselves and families, setting forth their expulsion from thence, with certificates of their good life and conversation, and praying relief.. The merit of this petition referred to Mr. Chr. Rich, who made them devils. The petition of the grave-digger in Hamlet, to command the pioneers in the expedition of Alexander. Granted. The petition of William Bullock, to be Hephestion to Penkethman the great. Granted. ADVERTISEMENT. 'A widow gentlewoman, well born both by father and mother's side, being the daughter of Thomas Prater, once an eminent practitioner in the law, and of Lætitia Tattle, a family well known in all parts of this kingdom, having been reduced by misfortunes to wait on several great persons and for some time to be a teacher at a boarding school of young ladies, giveth notice to the public, that she hath lately taken a house near Bloomsbury square, commodiously situated next the fields, in a good air, where she teaches all sorts of birds of the loquacious kind, as parrots, starlings, magpies, and others, to imitate human voices in greater perfection than ever yet was practised. They are not only instructed to pronounce words distinctly, and in a proper tone and accent, but to speak the language with great purity and volubility of tongue, together with all the fashionable phrases and compliments now in use either at tea-tables or visiting days. Those that have good voices may be taught to sing the newest opera airs, and if required, to speak either Italian or French, paying something extraordinary above the common rates. They whose friends are not able to pay the full prices, may be taken as half boarders. She teaches such as are designed for the diversion of the public, and to act in enchanted woods on the theatres, by the great. As she has often observed with much concern how indecent an education is usually given these innocent creatures, which in some measure is owing to their being placed in rooms next the street, where to the great offence of chaste and tender ears they learn ribaldry, obscene songs, and immodest expressions from passengers and idle people, as also to cry fish and cardmatches, with other useless parts of learning, to birds who have rich friends,she has fitted up proper and neat apartments for them in the back part of her said house, where she suffers none to approach them but herself and a servant maid who is deaf and dumb, and whom she provided on purpose to prepare their food and cleanse their cages; having found by long experience how hard a thing it is for those to keep silence, who have the use of speech, and the dangers her scholars are exposed to by the strong impressions that are made by harsh sounds and vulgar dialects. In short, if they are birds of any parts or capacity, she will undertake to render them so accomplished in the com pass of a twelvemonth, that they shall be fit conversation for such ladies as love to choose their friends and companions out of this species.' R. *No. 37. THURSDAY, APRIL 12. By Addison. -Non illa colo calathisve Minervæ Foemineas assueta manus VIRG. Unbred to spinning, in the loom unskill'd. DRYDEN. Some months ago, my friend, sir Roger, being in the country, inclosed a letter to me directed to a certain lady, whom I shall here call by the name of Leonora, and as it contained matters of consequence, desired me to deliver it to her with my own hand. Accordingly I waited upon her ladyship pretty early in the morning, and was desired by her woman to walk into her lady's library till such time as she was in readiness to receive me. The very sound of a lady's library gave me a great curiosity to see it; and as it was some time before the lady came to me, I had an opportunity of turning over a great many of her books, which were ranged together in a very beautiful order. At the end of the folios (which were finely bound and gilt) were great jars of China, placed one above another in a very noble piece of architecture. The quartos were separated from the octavos by a pile of smaller vessels, which rose in a delightful pyramid. The octavos were bounded by teadishes of all shapes, colours and sizes, which were so disposed on a wooden frame, that they looked like one continued pillar, indented with the finest strokes of sculpture, and stained with the greatest variety of dyes. That part of the library which was designed for the reception of plays and pamphlets, and other loose papers, was inclosed in a kind of square, consisting of one of the prettiest grotesque works that I ever saw, and made up of scaramouches, lions, monkeys, mandarines, trees, shells, and a thousand other odd figures in China ware. In the midst of the room was a little Japan table, with a quire of gilt paper upon it, and on the paper a silver snuff-box made in the shape of a little book. I found there were several other counterfeit books upon the upper shelves, which were carved in wood, and served only to fill up the numbers like fagots in the muster of a regiment. I was wonderfully pleased with such a mixed kind of furniture, as seemed very suitable both to the lady and the scholar, and did not know at first whether I should fancy myself in a grotto or in a library. Upon my looking into the books, I found there were some few which the lady had bought for her own use, but that most of them had been got together, either because she had heard them praised, or because she had seen the authors of them. Among several that I examined, I very well remember these that follow: Ogilby's Virgil. Sir Isaac Newton's Works. The Grand Cyrus; with a pin stuck in one of the middle leaves. Pembroke's Arcadia. Locke on Human Understanding; with a paper 'of patches in it. A spelling-book. A dictionary for the explanation of hard words. Sherlock upon Death. The Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony. Sir William Temple's Essays. Father Malebranche's Search after Truth, translated into English. A book of novels. The Academy of Compliments. The Lady's Calling. Tales in Verse, by Mr. Durfey; bound in red leather, gilt on the back, and doubled down in several places. All the classic authors in wood. A set of Elzevirs, by the same hand. Clelia: which opened of itself in the place that describes two lovers in a bower. Baker's Chronicle. Advice to a daughter. The New Atalantis, with a key to it. A prayer-book, with a bottle of Hungary water by the side of it. Dr. Sacheverel's Speech. Fielding's Trial. Seneca's Morals. Taylor's Holy Living and Dying. La Ferte's Instructions for Country-dances. I was taking a catalogue in my pocket-book of these, and several other authors, when Leonora entered; and upon my presenting her with the letter from the knight, told me with an unspeak |