in league with the rogues. Precaution is always prudence.

Alarmifts (feverally.) Let me take charge of your watch, Sir.Give me your gold, Sir.-I'll keep your pocket-book-thefe bank-notes are better detroyed, Sir.Will you not take out your buckles too?

John Bull. You are really very kind, gentlemenbut now I begin to fee the men plainer; I think I know them. O yes, perfectly. They are only the people that come from the Dipper's meeting. You may return me my property, gentlemen.

of.

Alarmifts. That, Sir, is impoffible; 'tis all difpofed

John Bull. Difpofed of! How difpofed of? I might as well have given it to thofe poor fellows. 'Tis all one to me whom I am robbed by.

Alarmifts. True, Sir; but it is not all one to us.

Chronicle.

CHINESE LETTER

FROM FI-TI-LI, IN LONDON, TO HIS FRIEND LINGGHING-SING, AT PEKIN

I

[Tranflated from the Original.]

Ling-ching-fing, my friend,

Am forry that I cannot give thee a more favourable account of thefe iflanders than what thou wilt find in this letter. I expected to meet with a very polished people; but I fear they are far, very far indeed, from a ftate of civilization. One of their principal marks of barbarifm is their fondness for war; for I understand that they are always either engaged in hoftilities with fome nation or other, or employed in preparations to attack their neighbours.

In this their paffion there is, one thing very curious; which is, that at the beginning of a war, they always

*This Letter appeared a few days after Lord Howe's victory on the 1ft of June.

think it the fineft, the most glorious, and the most neceffary thing in the world: but, at the end of feven or eight years, and by the time they have spent all their money, they begin to fcratch their heads, and to discover that they have been fighting about they know not what, or at best about fome bubble that they have loft fight of during the conteft.

The fun has now performed one great revolution and a half fince the governors of this ifland, which is the corn-market of half Europe, forbade their fubjects to fell any wheat to a neighbouring nation called the French. They faid they were very kindly difpofed towards the French; they did not mean them any harm; they only wished to ftarve them. This the French, however, did not understand; and, added to fome other provocations, it brought on a war between the two countries, which continues to be carried on with the greatest fury.

A few days ago, news was brought, that their fleet. had fought with that of the enemy, and had taken fix of their great war-junks. I thought that, upon the obtaining of fuch an advantage, they would have gone quietly, as we should do in China, to compliment and congratulate their triends, and that they would have afterwards retired to reft with a mixed fentiment of pleafure and pain; for the fix damaged junks of the French were purchased with the blood of a thousand of their countrymen. But, inftead of that, for three fucceffive nights, they ran about the ftreets, fhouting and roaring like madmen; letting off fire-pans of all fizes; firing crackers, which they learned to make of us Chinese; and breaking the windows, and fetting fire to the houfes of the more peaceable inhabitants.* What aftonished me moft was, that, during the whole three nights, their government made no attempt to check this riot and devaftation: and yet (would you believe it, Ling-ching-fing?)

** Among others, the houfe of Earl Stanhope was attacked: the windows were broken, and an attempt made to fet it on fire, by a Church and King mob.

these

these islanders fwear they will not lay down their arms, till the French fhall accept a government of their making!

They fay, indeed, as an excuse for the inactivity of their magiftrates, that the windows broken belong to those who are diffatisfied with the abuses that exist in the country. Now, ought they not rather to have broken the windows of those degenerate men who are fatisfied with abuses? But every thing in this country runs counter to the current of plain fenfe and reafon. In China, as thou knoweft, when any discontent arifes, the Emperor enquires into its caufe, and orders the Mandarins to be punished, who have oppreffed his children, or infringed their rights. Here, when a great part of the nation complains that the Mandarins of ftate have affumed more power than belongs to them, and encroached upon the rights of the people, what means doft thou think that they take to cure the difcontent?-Why, the great Mandarins affume more powers, and encroach ftill further upon the rights of the people! Now, is not this very ftrange, Ling-ching-fing, my friend?

When I left Pekin, thou defiredft me to make enquiry into the nature of the religion profeffed by these iflanders. My fmall acquaintance with their barbarous idiom has not yet permitted me to inveftigate this matter fo profoundly as I could wifh; but I much fear that they are addicted to the groffeft Polytheism. It is true, I have not heard them pofitively admit the existence of more than two or three gods; but I have found, by my own obfervation, that they have a great number of deities, whom they invoke upon any fudden emergency or difafter: fuch as their god Cur-fit, and their god Sin-kit. Their most favourite deity, however, feems to be the god Dam-mee; and, if their having him for ever in their mouths be a fign of devotion, the English are the moft pious people in the universe.

May the one and only God, the great Tien, preferve thee, and fend thee male children, Ling-ching-fing, my 'friend!-(Gazetteer.) FI-TI-LI.

(93)

A VINDICATION

OF THE KING OF GREAT BRITAIN FROM AN ODIOUS COMPARISON WITH THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

SEMPER ego auditor tantum numquamne reponam! Swelling with indignation, I have read, in a late paper, letters from a dangerous and wicked correfpondent, ftating our glorious conftitution to be the fame-with a few deviations, as he expreffes it-as a fanatical transatlantic republic, which, he fays, has tranfplanted every ufeful root-and, among the reft, the Habeas Corpusof our conftitution; leaving us, of courfe, nothing but the branches. This fcholaftic perfon I muft refute, after the Socratic mode, by a few plain fhort interrogatories, such as true loyalty fuggeft to me: for, with refpect to his " New People"-" Growing Governments"-"Permanent Eftates"-"Standing Councils" "Hereditary Effences"-and fuch like perfumery and haberdashery, I leave him to retail them to his own cuf tomers, who are probably more intelligent in fuch wares than I pretend or defire to be.

I will begin with what they call a Prefident; whom this correfpondent ftates to be within one step of the throne. How impudent the very idea!

Is their Prefident the fovereign Lord of America? Are the lands his gift, and the people his fubjects?

Do we there hear of the Prefident's highway? the Prefident's peace? or has he homage, fealty, and allegiance, fworn to him?

Is he not deprived of the glory of quelling fedition; putting down treafon; and annihilating infurrectionbecaufe none exift? Why do they not exist in America, as well as here? Has not America been chiefly peopled by the dregs of our community-the convicts, and the factious Diffenters?

What wholefome reftraint has he over the licentioufnefs of the prefs? What fort of a poltroon is his Attorney General, if he has one?

Has he the right of bringing in Heffians, Swifs, or

British

British troops, and of hiring 120,000 Auftrians, and 62,000 Pruffians, to fupport rational liberty-i. e. his own authority?

Has he Exchequer-bills, mitres, and coronets, at his difpofal?

Would any young Washington get 100,000l. per an num, for marrying, and his debts paid, over and over, and every time the laft?

Has he the power to diffolve the congrefs, and create hereditary fenators without end?

Does he nominate fheriffs, and of course juries, to try those who murmur againft his infallibility?"

Is he head of the church? or, indeed, is there any eftablished church? and, if not, can there be any religion in that ill-fated country?

Has he a parliament of his own to fupplicate him for liberty of speech?

Can he make war or peace, even with the most defpicable horde upon the frontier of that degraded nation?

Where are the monuments of his magnificent patronage? who has he raised to immense opulence, by means of multiplying places? Which of his minifters enjoy 20 or 30,000l. per annum, for complying with his wifhes?

Could he make, in time of war, a first Lord of the Admiralty of a man who does not know the jib-boom from the hen-coop, nor the South-Sea from Lough Lomond?

Has he royal fish? If afturgeon comes upon the coaft, does he get the whole of it? If a whale, is it enough that he gets the head, and his wife the tail for whalebone? For with us

De fturgeone obfervet quoa rex illum habebit integrum: de balena vero fufficit, fi rex habeat caput et regina caudam.-Pryn. Aur. Reg. 127.

What has a Prefident to make him refpected by the vulgar mafs? How many millions of money does he get, to diftinguish him from other men? How many palaces has he? How many battle-axes, kettle-drummers, trumpeters, pages, equerries, &c. attend him on

ftate