37 This "Memorial to Mr. Harley about the First-Fruits" is dated Oct. 7, 1710.
38 Henry St. John, created Viscount Bolingbroke in July 1712. In the quarrel between Oxford and Bolingbroke in 1714, Swift"s sympathies were with Oxford.
39 I.e., it is decreed by fate. So Tillotson says, "These things are fatal and necessary."
40 See Letter 3, note 8.
41 Obscure. Hooker speaks of a "blind or secret corner."
42 Ale served in a gill measure.
43 Scott suggests that the allusion is to The Tale of a Tub.
44 An extravagant compliment.
45 See Letter 8.
46 L"Estrange speaks of "trencher-flies and spungers."
47 See Letter 1, note 10.
48 Samuel Garth, physician and member of the Kit-Cat Club, was knighted in 1714. He is best known by his satirical poem, The Dispensary, 1699.
49 Gay speaks of "Wondering Main, so fat, with laughing eyes" (Mr.
Pope"s Welcome from Greece, st. xvii.).
50 See Letter 5, note 10.
51 See the letter of Oct. 10, 1710, to Archbishop King.
52 See Letter 1.
53 Seventy-three lines in folio upon one page, and in a very small hand." (Deane Swift).
Letter 6.
1. I.e., Lord Lieutenant.
2 Tatler, No. 238.
3 See Letter 1, note 12.
4 Charles Coote, fourth Earl of Mountrath, and M.P. for Knaresborough.
He died unmarried in 1715.
5 Henry Coote, Lord Mountrath"s brother. He succeeded to the earldom in 1715, but died unmarried in 1720.
6 The Devil Tavern was the meeting-place of Ben Jonson"s Apollo Club.
The house was pulled down in 1787.
7 Addison was re-elected M.P. for Malmesbury in Oct. 1710, and he kept that seat until his death in 1719.
8 Captain Charles Lavallee, who served in the Cadiz Expedition of 1702, and was appointed a captain in Colonel Hans Hamilton"s Regiment of Foot in 1706 (Luttrell, v. 175, vi. 640; Dalton"s English Army Lists, iv.
126).
9 See Letter 5.
10 The Tatler, No. 230, Sid Hamet"s Rod, and the ballad (now lost) on the Westminster Election.
11 The Earl of Galway (1648-1720), who lost the battle of Almanza to the Duke of Berwick in 1707. Originally the Marquis de Ruvigny, a French refugee, he had been made Viscount Galway and Earl of Galway successively by William III.
12 William Harrison, the son of a doctor at St. Cross, Winchester, had been recommended to Swift by Addison, who obtained for him the post of governor to the Duke of Queensberry"s son. In Jan. 1711 Harrison began the issue of a continuation of Steele"s Tatler with Swift"s a.s.sistance, but without success. In May 1711, St. John gave Harrison the appointment of secretary to Lord Raby, Amba.s.sador Extraordinary at the Hague, and in Jan. 1713 Harrison brought the Barrier Treaty to England. He died in the following month, at the age of twenty-seven, and Lady Strafford says that "his brother poets buried him, as Mr. Addison, Mr. Philips, and Dr.
Swift." Tickell calls him "that much loved youth," and Swift felt his death keenly. Harrison"s best poem is Woodstock Park, 1706.
13 The last volume of Tonson"s Miscellany, 1708.
14 James Douglas, second Duke of Queensberry and Duke of Dover (1662-1711), was appointed joint Keeper of the Privy Seal in 1708, and third Secretary of State in 1709. Harrison must have been "governor"
either to the third son, Charles, Marquis of Beverley (born 1698), who succeeded to the dukedom in 1711, or to the fourth son, George, born in 1701.
15 Anthony Henley, son of Sir Robert Henley, M.P. for Andover, was a favourite with the wits in London. He was a strong Whig, and occasionally contributed to the Tatler and Maynwaring"s Medley. Garth dedicated The Dispensary to him. Swift records Henley"s death from apoplexy in August 1711.
16 Sir William Ashurst, Sir Gilbert Heathcote, and Mr. John Ward were replaced by Sir Richard h.o.a.re, Sir George Newland, and Mr. John Ca.s.s at the election for the City in 1710. Scott was wrong in saying that the Whigs lost also the fourth seat, for Sir William Withers had been member for the City since 1707.
17 Sir Richard Onslow, Bart., was chosen Speaker of the House of Commons in 1708. Under George I. he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, and was elevated to the peerage as Baron Onslow in 1716. He died in the following year.
18 "The upper part of the letter was a little besmeared with some such stuff; the mark is still on it" (Deane Swift).
19 John Bolton, D.D., appointed a prebendary of St. Patrick"s in 1691, became Dean of Derry in 1699. He died in 1724. Like Swift, Bolton was chaplain to Lord Berkeley, the Lord Lieutenant, and, according to Swift, he obtained the deanery of Derry through Swift having declined to give a bribe of 1000 pounds to Lord Berkeley"s secretary. But Lord Orrery says that the Bishop of Derry objected to Swift, fearing that he would be constantly flying backwards and forwards between Ireland and England.
20 See Letter 2, note 16.
21 "That is, to the next page; for he is now within three lines of the bottom of the first" (Deane Swift).
22 See Letter 4, note 15.
23 Joshua Dawson, secretary to the Lords Justices. He built a fine house in Dawson Street, Dublin, and provided largely for his relatives by the aid of the official patronage in his hands.
24 He had been dead three weeks (see Letters 3 and 5).
25 In The Importance of the Guardian Considered, Swift says that Steele, "to avoid being discarded, thought fit to resign his place of Gazetteer."
26 As Swift never used the name "Stella" in the Journal, this fragment of his "little language" must have been altered by Deane Swift, the first editor. Forster makes the excellent suggestion that the correct reading is "s.l.u.ttikins," a word used in the Journal on Nov. 28, 1710.
Swift often calls his correspondents "s.l.u.ts."
27 G.o.dolphin, who was satirised in Sid Hamel"s Rod (see Letter 2, note 3).
28 No. 230.
29 "This appears to be an interjection of surprise at the length of his journal" (Deane Swift).