for the cock, and deliver him out of the lion's paw. I find likewife in ancient times the conceit of making an Echo talk fenfibly, and give rational answers. If this could be excufable in any writer, it would be in Ovid, where he introduces the Echo as a nymph, before she was worn away into nothing but a voice. The learned Erafmus, though a man of wit and genius, has compofed a dialogue upon this filly kind of device, and made ufe of an Echo who feems to have been a very extraordinary linguift, for fhe anfwers the perfon fhe talks with in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, according as the found the fyllables which fhe was to repeat in any of those learned languages. Hudibras, in ridicule of this False kind of Wit, has described Bruin bewailing the lofs of his bear to a folitary Echo, who is of great ufe to the poet in feveral diftichs, as he does not only repeat after him, but helps out his verfe, and furnishes him with rhymes. He rag'd, and kept as heavy a coil as Forcing the valleys to repeat The accents of his fad regret; He beat his breast, and tore his hair, And most unconscionably depofe Things of which the nothing knows; Then what has quell'd thy ftubborn heart? Nor did I ever winch or grudge it, For thy dear fake. (Quoth fhe) Mum budget. C*. • By ADDISON, dated it is thought from Chelsea. See final Note to N° 7, on Addifon's Signatures C, L, I, O; N° 221 and Note, on the Letters at the bottoms of these Papers. This Evening," Henry IV." Falstaff, Mr. Eftcourt; Hotspur, Mr. Booth; King, Mr. Keene; P. of Wales, Mr. Wilks; Douglas, Mr. Mills; Sir R. Vernon, Mr. Bullock Jun.; Francis, Mr. Norris; Carriers, Meffrs. Johnson and Bullock Sen.; Kate, Mrs. Bradshaw. SPECT. in folio. N° 60. N° 60. Wednesday, May 9, 1711. Hoc eft quod palles? Cur quis non prandeat, SEV EVERAL kinds of Falfe WIT that vanished in the refined ages of the world, discovered themselves again in the times of monkish igno rance. As the monks were the mafters of all that little learning which was then extant, and had their whole lives entirely difengaged from business, it is no wonder that feveral of them, who wanted genius for higher performances, employed many hours in the compofition of fuch tricks in writing, as required much time and little capacity. I have feen half the Eneid turned into Latin rhymes by one of the Beaux Efprits of that dark age; who fays in his preface to it, that the Æneid wanted nothing but the sweets of rhyme to make it the most perfect work in its kind. I have likewise seen an hymn in hexameters to the Virgin Mary, which filled a whole book, though it confifted but of the eight following words. Tot, tibi, funt, Virgo, dotes, quot, fidera, cœlo. Thou haft as many virtues, O Virgin, as there are ftars in heaven. The The poet rung the changes upon thefe eight feveral words, and by that means made his verfes almost as numerous as the virtues and the stars which they celebrated. It is no wonder that men who had fo much time upon their hands did not only restore all the antiquated pieces of Falfe WIT, but enriched the world with inventions of their own. It was to this age that we owe the production of Anagrams, which is nothing else but a tranfmutation of one word into another, or the turning of the fame set of letters into different words; which may change night into day, or black into white, if Chance, who is the goddess that prefides over these sorts of compofition, fhall fo direct. I remember a witty author, in allusion to this kind of writing, calls his rival, who (it feems) was diftorted, and had his limbs fet in places that did not properly belong to them, The Anagram of a man. When the Anagrammatist takes a name to work upon, he confiders it at first as a mine not broken up, which will not fhew the treasure it contains, till he shall have spent many hours in the fearch of it; for it is his bufinefs to find out one word that conceals itself in another, and to examine the letters in all the variety of stations in which they can poffibly be ranged. I have heard of a gentleman who, when this kind of wit was in fashion, endeavoured to gain his mistrefs's heart by it. She was one of the finest women of her age, and known by the name of the lady Mary Boon. The lover not being able to make any thing of Mary, by certain liberties indulged indulged to this kind of writing, converted it into Moll; and after having shut himself up for half a year, with indefatigable industry produced an anagram. Upon the prefenting it to his miftrefs, who was a little vexed in her heart to fee herfelf degraded into Moll Boon, fhe told him, to his infinite surprise, that he had mistaken her firname, for that it was not Boon, but Bohun, Ibi omnis The lover was thunder-ftruck with his miffortune, infomuch that in a little time after he loft his fenfes, which indeed had been very much impaired by that continual application he had given to his Anagram. The Acroftic was probably invented about the fame time with the Anagram, though it is impoffible to decide whether the inventor of the one or the other were the greater blockhead. The fimple ACROSTIC is nothing but the name or title of a perfon, or thing, made out of the initial letters of feveral verfes, and by that means written, after the manner of the Chinese, in a perpendicular line. But befides thefe there are compound ACROSTICS, when the principal letters ftand two or three deep. I have feen fome of them where the verfes have not only been edged by a name at each extremity, but have had the fame name running down like a seam through the middle of the poem. There is another near relation of the Anagrams and Acroftics, which is commonly called a Chro |