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drolls, whom the common people of all countries admire, and seem to love so well that they could eat them, according to the old proverb; I mean those circumforaneous wits whom every nation calls by the name of that dish of meat which it loves best. In Holland they are termed Pickled Herrings; in France, Jean Pottages; in Italy, Maccaronies; and in Great Britain, Jack Puddings. These merry wags, from whatsoever food they receive their titles, that they may make their audiences laugh, always appear in a fool's coat, and commit such blunders and mistakes in every step they take, and every word they utter, as those who listen to them would be ashamed of.

But this little triumph of the understanding, under the disguise of laughter, is no where more visible than in that custom which prevails every where among us on the first day of the present month, when every body takes it in his head to make as many fools as he can. In proportion as there are more follies discovered, so there is more laughter raised on this day than on any other in the whole year. A neighbour of mine, who is a haberdasher by trade, and a very shallow conceited fellow, makes his boasts, that, for these ten years successively, he has not made less than an hundred April fools. My landlady had a falling out with him about a fortnight ago, for sending every one of her children upon some 'sleeveless errand, as she terms it. Her eldest son went to buy an halfpenny worth of inkle at a shoemaker's; the eldest daughter was dispatched half a mile to see a monster; and, in short, the whole family of innocent children made April fools. Nay, my landlady herself did not escape him. This empty fellow has laughed upon these conceits ever since.

This art of wit is well enough, when confined to one day in a twelvemonth; but there is an ingenious tribe of men sprung up of late years, who are for making April fools every day in the year. These gentlemen are commonly distinguished by the name

1

of Biters, a race of men that are perpetually employed in laughing at those mistakes which are of their own production.

Thus we see, in proportion as one man is more refined than another, he chuses his fool out of a lower or higher class of mankind; or, to speak in a more philosophical language, that secret elation and pride of heart which is generally called laughter, arises in him from his comparing himself with an object below him, whether it so happens that it be a natural or an artificial fool. It is indeed very possible, that the persons we laugh at may, in the main of their characters, be much wiser men than ourselves; but if they would have us laugh at them, they must fall short of us in those respects which stir up this passion.

I am afraid I shall appear too abstracted in my speculations, if I shew that when a man of wit makes us laugh, it is by betraying some oddness or infirmity in his own character, or in the representation which he makes of others; and that when we laugh at a brute, or even at an inanimate thing, it is at some action or incident that bears a remote analogy to any blunder or absurdity in reasonable creatures.

But, to come into common life, I shall pass by the consideration of those stage coxcombs that are able to shake a whole audience, and take notice of a particular sort of men who are such provokers of mirth in conversation, that it is impossible for a club or merry-meeting to subsist without them; I mean those honest gentlemen that are always exposed to the wit and raillery of

1 "A new fashioned way of being witty, and they call it a Bite. You must ask a bantering question or tell some damned lie in a serious manner, then she will answer or speak as if you were in earnest, and then cry you, 'Madam there's a Bite."" V. Swift's Works, vol. XIX. p. 4.-"I would not have you undervalue this," adds the stern satirist, "for it is the constant amusement in court and every where else among the great people: and I let you know it in order to have it obtain among you, and to teach you a new refinement." Rowe wrote a farce on this subject, and called it the 'Biter.' V. also Tatler No. 12, and Spectator 504.-G.

their well-wishers and companions; that are pelted by men, women, and children, friends, and foes; and, in a word, stand as Butts in conversation, for every one to shoot at that pleases. I know several of these Butts who are men of wit and sense, though by some odd turn of humour, some unlucky cast in their person or behaviour, they have always the misfortune to make the company merry. The truth of it is, a man is not qualified for a Butt, who has not a good deal of wit and vivacity, even in the ridiculous side of his character. A stupid Butt is only fit for the conversation of ordinary people: men of wit require one that will give them play, and bestir himself in the absurd part of his be haviour. A Butt with these accomplishments frequently gets the laugh on his side, and turns the ridicule upon him that attacks him. Sir John Falstaff was an hero of this species, and gives a good description of himself in his capacity of a Butt, after the following manner; Men of all sorts (says that merry knight) take a pride to gird at me. The brain of man is not able to invent any thing that tends to laughter more than I invent, or is invented on me. I am not only witty in myself, but the cause

that wit is in other men'

C.

No. 50. FRIDAY, APRIL 27.

Nunquam aliud natura, aliud sapientia dixit.

Juv.

Good sense and nature always speak the same.

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WHEN the four Indian kings were in this country about a twelvemonth ago, I often mixed with the rabble, and followed them a whole day together, being wonderfully struck with the

1 'The Spectator is written by Steele, with Addison's help; it is often very pretty. Yesterday it was made of a noble hint I gave him long ago for his Tatlers, about an Indian king, supposed to write his travels into England. 1 repent he ever had it. I intended to have written a book on that subject. I believe he has spent it all in one paper, and all the underhints there are mine too; but I never see him or Addison.' From a letter of Swift to Mrs. Johnson, dated London, April 28, 1711-See Swift's Works, vol. xxii. p. 224, cr. 8vo. 1769.

Some account has been given of the four Indian kings in an antecedent note on Tat. No. 171, to which the reader is referred. For several years after this time, it was common at masquerades almost coeval with this paper, to assume the characters and dresses of Indian kings, as appears from a passage of a periodical work in 1717, conducted by Mr. Theobald, under the title of the Censor. See Censor, vol. ii. No. 58, p. 194. The curious may see in the British Museum four beautiful pictures of these Indian chiefs in their peculiar dresses, and probably the representations they give are as faithful as they are elegant. There was an opinion that they were the figures of four Chinese Emperors, and some similarity in the names to those we meet with in the history of China favoured the supposition; but on the removal of the frames, and the plated glasses placed before them, which create some deception, and cover parts of the inscriptions, they prove to be, not coloured mezzotintos, or printed paintings in the ingenious method discovered about this time by James Le Blon, as was at first supposed, but fine pictures on ivory. The emperor of the Mohocks holds the wampum in his hand, a pledge of the amity of the six Indian nations, and his name as well as the names of his three royal com

a Swift tells Mrs. Johnson (Letter 21, April 14, 1711), that the hint, on which this speculation is formed, came from him; and that he intended. to have written a book upon it. Mr. Addison judged much better to work up his materials in a single paper. See note on No. 470 of the Spectator.

H.

sight of every thing that is new or uncommon. I have, since their departure, employed a friend to make many inquiries of their landlord, the upholsterer, relating to their manners and converpanions correspond to those of the Indian kings given Tat. No. 171, and note, with no other variations in the orthography of the sounds, than their uncouthness may well be supposed to account for. The real name of the artist, for his cipher upon them was taken for that of Le Blon, is certainly known by the following indorsement, 'Drawn by the life, May 2, 1710, by Bernard Lens, jun.'

These fine pictures are not whole lengths; but from the following advertisements in the Tatler in folio, it appears that the four Indian kings were painted at full lengths by John Verelst, and that his paintings of them were in the collection of pictures belonging to queen Anne.

'Whereas an advertisement was published in the Supplement of yesterday, that the effigies of the four Indian kings were drawn from Mr. Verelst's original pictures, these are to give notice that Mr. Verelst has not permitted any person to take any draught or sketch from them. If he should, he will take care to have it correctly done by a skilful hand, and to inform the public thereof in the Tatler.' Signed John Verelst. At the Rainbow and Dove, by Ivy-bridge, in the Strand.-Tat. in fol. No. 172, May 16, 1710.

About half a year after, the following advertisement appeared at the end of Tat. No. 250 in folio, Nov. 14, 1710. This is to give notice, that the mezzotinto prints by John Simmonds, in whole lengths, of the four Indian kings, that are done from the original pictures drawn by John Verelst, which her majesty has at her palace at Kensington, are now to be delivered to subscribers, and sold at the Rainbow and Dove, the corner of Ivy-bridge, in the Strand.' This notice was re-printed with some variation in the Tat. in folio, at the ends of Nos. 253, 256, and 257.

Besides the prints of Simmonds, there were, it seems, other prints of the Indian chiefs, said to have been drawn from Verelst's original pictures, disowned by that painter as not originating from him, and represented in his advertisement as incorrect, and the workmanship of an unskilful hand.

Walpole, in his anecdotes of Painting, &c., gives some account of John, under the name of Simon Verelst, and says, 'he lived to a great age, certainly as late as 1710, and died in Suffolk-street,' i. e. Ivy-bridge lane. He was a Dutch flower-painter of capital excellence in that branch of the art of painting; and likewise attempted portraits, labouring them exceedingly, and finishing them with the same delicacy with his flowers, which he always introduced into them. His works were much admired, and his

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