While Claudia, blushing still for past Disgrace,
March'd filent on with a flow folemn Pace:
Nor yet from fome was all Distrust remov'd,
Tho' Heav'n fuch Virtue by Such Wonders
prov❜d.

I am, Sir,

Your very humble Servant,

Mr. SPECTATOR,

You

Philagnotes.

OU will oblige a languishing Lover if you will please to print the enclosed Verfes in your next Paper. If you remember the Metamorphofis, you know Procris, the fond • Wife of Cephalus, is faid to have made • her Husband, who delighted in the 'Sports of the Wood, a Present of an unerring Javelin. In procefs of time he was fo much in the Forest, that this Lady fufpected he was pursuing fome Nymph, under the Pretence of following a Chace more innocent. • Under this Sufpicion the hid herselfamong the Trees, to obferve his Motions. While the lay conceal'd, her Husband, tired with the Labour of C Hunting, came within her hearing. As he was fainting with Heat, he cri

ed

ed out, Aura veni; Ob charming Air • approach.

THE unfortunate Wife, taking 'the Word Air to be the Name of a 'Woman, began to move among the Bushes; and the Husband believing it C a Deer, threw his Javelin and kill'd her. This History painted on a Fan, which I prefented to a Lady, gave 'occafion to my growing poetical,

Come gentle Air! th' Eolian Shepherd said,
While Procris panted in the fecret Shade;
Come gentle Air! the fairer Delia cries,
While at her Feet her Swain expiring lies.
Lo the glad Gales o'er all her Beauties ftray,
Breathe on ber Lips, and in her Bofom play.
In Delia's Hand this Toy is fatal found,

Nor did that fabled Dart more furely wound.
Both Gifts deftructive to the Givers prove,
Alike both Lovers fall by thofe they love:
Yet guiltless too this bright Destroyer lives,
At random wounds, nor knows the Wounds fhe
gives.

She views the Story with attentive Eyes,
And pities Procris, while her Lover dies.

N° 528. Wednesday, November '5.

Dum potuit folite gemitum virtute repreffit.

Ovid.

Mr. SPECTATOR,

Who now write to you,

I

am a Woman loaded with Injuries; and the Aggravation of my Misfortune is, that they are fuch which are overlooked by the genera lity of Mankind, and tho' the moft afflicting imaginable, not regarded as fuch in the general Senfe of the • World.

I have hid my Vexation. 'from all Mankind; but have now ta'ken Pen, Ink, and Paper, and am refoly'd to unbofom my felf to you, and lay before you what grieves me and all the Sex. You have very often mentioned particular Hardships done. < to this or that Lady; but, methinks, 'you have not in any one Speculation 'directly pointed at the partial Freedom Men take, the un reasonable Con'finement

finement Women are obliged to, in the only Circumftance in which we are neceffarily to have a Commerce with them, that of Love. The Cafe of Celibacy is the great Evil of our Nation; and the Indulgence of the vicious Conduct of Men in that State, with the Ridicule to which Women are expofed, though ever fo virtuous, if long unmarried, is the Root of the greatest Irregularities of this Nation. To fhew you, Sir, that tho' you never have given us the Catalogue of a Lady's Library as you promised, we read Books of our own chufing, I fhall infert on this occafion a Paragraph or two out of Echard's Roman Hiftory. In the 44th Page of the fe cond Volume the Author obferves, that Auguftus, upon his Return to Rome at the end of the War, received Complaints that too great a Number of the young Men of Quality • were unmarried. The Emperor thereupon affembled the whole Equeftrian Order; and having separated the Married from the Single, did particular Honours to the former; but he told the latter, that is to fay Mr. SPECTATOR, he told the Batche'lors,

८

F4

lors, "That their Lives and Actions "had been fo peculiar, that he knew "not by what Name to call 'em; not "by that of Men, for they performed "nothing that was manly; not by that "of Citizens, for the City might pe"rifh notwithstanding their Care; nor "by that of Romans, for they defigned "to extirpate the Roman Name." Then 6 proceeding to fhew his tender Care and hearty Affection of his People, he further told them, "That their "Course of Life was of fuch pernici"ous Confequence to the Glory and "Grandeur of the Roman Nation, that "he could not chufe but tell them, "that all other Crimes put together "could not equalize theirs: For they "were guilty of Murder, in not suffer"ing those to be born which should "proceed for them; of Impiety, in "caufing the Names and Honours of "their Ancestors to ceafe; and of Sa"crilege, in deftroying their Kind, "which proceed from the immortal “Gods, and Human-Nature, the prin"cipal thing confecrated to "Therefore in this Refpect they dif "folved the Government, in difobey"ing its Laws; betrayed their Coun

'em:

try,