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• Wives. A Gentleman who was Advocate for the • Ladies, took this Occafion to tell us the Story of a famous Siege in Germany, which I have fince found re⚫lated in my hiftorical Dictionary, after the following manner. When the Emperor Conrade the Third had befieged Guelphus, Duke of Bavaria, in the City of Hensburg, the Women finding that the Town could not poffibly hold out long, petitioned the Emperor that they might depart out of it, with so much as each of them could carry. The Emperor knowing they ⚫ could not convey away many of their Effects, granted them their Petition; When the Women, to his great Surprize, came out of the Place with every one her • Husband upon her Back. The Emperor was fo moved 6 at the Sight, that he burst into Tears, and after having very much extolled the Women for their conjugal Affection, gave the Men to their Wives, and received the Duke into his Favour.

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THE Ladies did not a little triumph at this Story, afking us at the fame Time, whether in our Confcien⚫ces we believed that the Men of any Town in Great • Britain would, upon the fame Offer, and at the

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fame Conjuncture, have loaden themselves with their • Wives; or rather, whether they would not have been glad of fuch an Opportunity to get rid of them? To this my very good Friend Tom Daperwit, who took 6 upon him to be the Mouth of our Sex, replied, that they would be very much to blame if they would not ⚫ do the fame good Office for the Women, confidering that their Strength would be greater, and their Burdens lighter. As we were amufing ourselves with Difcourfes of this Nature, in order to pass away the Evening which now begins to grow tedious, we fell into ⚫ that laudable and primitive Diverfion of Questions and • Commands. I was no fooner vefted with the regal Authority, but I enjoyned all the Ladies, under pain of my Displeasure, to tell the Company ingenuously, in case they had been in the Siege above-mentioned, and had the fame Offers made them as the good Women of ⚫ that Place, what every one of them would have brought ⚫ off with her, and have thought most worth the faving? • There were several merry Anfwers made to my Question, 'which

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which entertained us till Bed-time. This filled my Mind with fuch a huddle of Ideas, that upon my going to fleep, I fell into the following Dream.

I faw a Town of this Ifland, which fhall be namelefs, invested on every fide, and the Inhabitants of it fo ftraitned as to cry for Quarter. The General refused any other Terms than thofe granted to the abovementioned Town of Henberg, namely, that the married Women might come out with what they could bring along with them. Immediately the Gates flew open, and a Female Proceffion appeared. Multitudes of the Sex following one another in a row,and staggering under their respective Burdens. I took my Stand upon an Eminence in the Enemies Camp, which was appointed for the general Rendezvous of these Female Carriers, being · very defirous to look into their feveral Ladings. The ⚫ firft of them had a huge Sack upon her Shoulders, which ⚫ fhe fet down with great Care: Upon the opening of it, • when I expected to have feen her Husband fhot out of it, I found it was filled with China-Ware. The next appeared in a more decent Figure, carrying a handsome young Fellow upon her Back I could not forbear commending the young Woman for her conjugal Affection, when, to my great Surprize, I found that she had left the good Man at home, and brought away her Gallant. I faw the third, at fome diftance, with a little withered Face peeping over her Shoulder, whom I could not fufpect for any but her Spoufe, till upon her fetting him down I heard her call him dear Pugg, and found him to be her Favourite Monkey. A fourth brought a huge Bale of Cards along with her; and the fifth a Bolonia Lap-Dog; for her Husband, it seems, being a very burly Man, the thought it would be lefs • Trouble for her to bring away little Cupid. The next was the Wife of a rich Ufurer, loaden with a Bag of • Gold; fhe told us that her Spoufe was very old, and • by the Course of Nature could not expect to live long; ⚫ and that to fhew her tender Regard for him, fhe had 'faved that which the poor Man loved better than his Life. The next came towards us with her Son upon her Back, who, we were told, was the greatest Rake in the Place, but fo much the Mother's Darling, that fhe

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left her Husband behind with a large Family of hope⚫ful Sons and Daughters, for the Sake of this graceless • Youth.

It would be endless to mention the feveral Perfons with their feveral Loads that appeared to me in this ftrange Vifion. All the Place about me was covered with Packs of Ribbands, Brocades, Embroidery, and 'ten thousand other Materials, fufficient to have fur⚫ nifhed a whole Street of Toy-fhops. One of the Women, having an Husband who was none of the heavieft, was bringing him off upon her Shoulders, at the fame Time that fhe carried a great Bundle of Flanders-lace under her Arm; but finding herself fo over-loaden, that she could not fave both of them, fhe dropp'd the good Man, and brought away the Bundle.. In fhort, I found but one Husband among this great Mountain of Baggage, who was a lively Cobler, that 'kick'd and fpurr'd all the while his Wife was carrying him on, and, as it was faid, had scarce paffed a Day in. his Life without giving her the Difcipline of the Strap.

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I cannot conclude my Letter, Dear SPEC. with⚫out telling thee one very odd Whim in this my Dream, I faw, methought, a dozen Women employed in bringing off one Man; I could not guess who it fhould be, till upon his nearer Approach I discover'd thy fhort Phiz. TheWomen all declared that it was for the Sake of thy Works, and not thy Perfon, that they brought thee off, and that it was on Condition that thou 'fhould't continue the Spectator. If thou thinkeft this • Dream will make a tolerable one, it is at thy Service, • from, Dear SPEC.

Thine, fleeping and waking,
WILL. HONEYCOMB.

THE Ladies will fee, by this Letter, what I have often told them, that WILL is one of those old fashioned Men of Wit and Pleasure of the Town, that fhews his Parts by raillery on Marriage, and one who has often tried his Fortune that way without Success. I cannot however difmifs his Letter, without obferving, that the true Story on which it is built does Honour to the Sex, and that in order to abuse them, the Writer is obliged to have Recourse to Dream and Fiction. E 3

Friday,

No. 500. Friday, October 3.

Hue natas adjice feptem,

Et totidem juvenes, & mox generofque nurusque. Quærite nunc, babeat quam noftra fuperbia causam ; Ov. Met.

8 1 R,

Yo

YOU who are fo well acquainted with the Story of Socrates, must have read how, upon his making a Difcourfe concerning Love, he pressed his Point with fo much Succefs, that all the Batchelors in his Audience took a Refolution to marry by the first Opppotunity, and that all the married Men immediately took Horfe and galloped home to their Wives. I am apt to think your Difcourfes, in which you have drawn so many agreeable Pictures of Marriage, have had a very good Effect this way in England. We are obliged to you, at least for having taken off that fenfeless Ridicule, which for many Years the Witlings of the Town have turned upon their Fathers and Mothers. For my own Part, I was born in Wedlock, and don't • care who knows it: For which reafon, among many others, I should look upon myself as a most infufferable Coxcomb, did I endeavour to maintain that • Cuckoldom was infeparable from Marriage, or to make ufe of Husband and Wife as Terms of Reproach. Nay, Sir, I will go one Step further, and declare to 6 you before the whole World, that I am a married Man, and at the fame Time I have fo much Affurance 6 as not to be ashamed of what I have done.

AMONG the feveral Pleasures that accompany this ⚫ftate of Life, and which you have defcribed in your for6 mer Papers, there are two you have not taken notice of, and which are feldom caft into the Account, by those 'who write on this Subject. You must have observed, in your Speculations on human Nature, that nothing is more gratifying to the Mind of Man than Power or Domi

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← nion; and this I think myself amply poffeffed of, as I am the Father of a Family. I am perpetually taken up in giving out Orders, in prefcribing Duties, in hearing Parties, in adminiftring Juftice, and in diftributing Re⚫ wards and Punishments. To fpeak in the Language of ⚫ the Centurion, I say unto one, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my Servant, Do This, and he doth it. In fhort, Sir, I look upon my Family as a Patriarchal Sovereignty, in which I am my felf both King and Prieft. All great Governments are nothing elfe but Clufters of these little private Royalties, and therefore I confider the Masters of Families as fmall Deputy-Governors prefiding over the ⚫ feveral little Parcels and Divifions of their Fellow Subjects. As I take great pleasure in the Adminiftration of my Government in particular, fo I look upon myfelf not only as a more ufeful, but as a much greater and happier Man than any Batchelor in England of my own Rank and Condition.

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THERE is another accidental Advantage in Marriage, which has likewife fallen to my Share, I mean the having a Multitude of Children. These I cannot but regard as very great Bleflings. When I fee my little Troop before me, I rejoice in the Additions which I have made to my Species, to my Country, and to my Religion, in having produced fuch a Number of reasonable Creatures, Citizens, and Christians. I am pleased to fee my felf thus perpetuated; and as there is no Production comparable to that of a human Creature, I am more proud of having been the Occa'fion of ten fuch glorious Productions, than if I had ⚫ built an hundred Pyramids at my own Expence, or published as many Volumes of the finest Wit and Learning. In what a beautiful Light has the Holy Scripture reprefented Abdon, one of the Judges of Ifrael, who had forty Sons and thirty Grandfons, that rode on threefcore and ten Afs-Colts, according to the Magni'ficence of the Eaftern Countries? How muft the Heart ' of the old Man rejoice, when he saw fuch a beautiful • Proceffion of his own Defcendants, fuch a numerous • Cavalcade of his own raifing? For my own Part I can fit in Parlour with great Content, when I take

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