an injury. He could not have been moved by personal interest; since his conscious inferiority as well as the nature of his pursuits, remove him far from the possibility of being ever brought into collision with either of those gentlemen. He could not have been impelled by diabolical envy, or the malicious agony of blasted ambition; since his country has already distinguished him far, very far beyond his desert. And of the malevolence of heart which could intentionally do a wicked,awanton and unprovoked injury, he is persuaded that either of the gentlemen, if they knew him, would most freely and cheerfully acquit him. If he be asked why he published the letters describing those characters? He answers.....

First, for the same reason that he would, if he could, present to the town, a set of landscape paintings, representing all the lovely prospects which belong to their beautiful city to furnish them with the amusement and pleasure, which arise from surveying an accurate picture of a well known original: and this implies, that he could not have believed himself, adding new information, as to the originals themselves. Secondly, he hoped that the abstracted and miscel laneous remarks, which were blended with the description of those characters, might not be, without their use, to the many literary young men who are growing up in Virginia.

If the letters of the British Spy have gone beyond these purposes; if they have given pain to the gentlemen described, (for as to doing them. an injury, it is, certainly, out of the question) there is no man in the community, disposed to

regret it, more sensibly, than the man who furnished those letters for publication.

But while honor and justice compel the writer of this article, to give these explanations, and make these acknowledgments to the gentlemen immediately interested, he begs he may not be considered as descending to the meanness, of begging mercy on his own "glass house." On the contrary, the person who has published the polite hint in question, is welcome to commence his assault as soon as he pleases. He can scarcely point out one defect in the person, manner, or mind of this writer, of which he is not already conscious. And if he meant by his menace, any thing more....if he meant to insinuate a suspicion to the public, that the honesty, integrity, or moral purity of the man who furnished the letters of the British Spy for publication, are assailable on any ground of truth....if such was his intention, he has intended an injury, at which this writer laughs in proud security....an injury, for which his own heart, if it be a good one, will not forgive him so soon, as will the heart of the man whom he has attempted to injure.

The writer of this article, tenders, in return, this hint to the hinter: that before he commences his hostile operations, he will be sure of his man. As to the persons who really did furnish the British Spy, the finger of conjecture has been erro、 neously, pointed at various persons who reside in this state. It would be unjust and barbarous, to punish the innocent for the guilty, if guilt can be justly charged on the British Spy.

H

LETTER X..

Richmond, December 10.

IN one of my late rides into the surrounding country, I stopped at a little inn, to refresh myself and my horse; and, as the landlord was neither a Boniface, nor" mine host of the garter," I called for a book, by way of killing time, while the preparations for my repast, were going forward. He brought me a shattered fragment of the second volume of the Spectator, which he told me, was the only book in the house, for "he never troubled his head about reading;" and by the way of conclusive proof, he farther informed me, that this fragment, the only book in the house, had been sleeping, unmolested, in the dust of his mantle-piece, for ten or fifteen years. I could. not meet my venerable countryman, in a foreign land, and in this humiliating plight, nor hear of the inhuman and Gothic contempt with which he had been treated, without the liveliest emotion. So I read my host a lecture on the subject, to which he appeared to pay as little attention, as he had before done, to the Spectator, and with the sang froid of a Dutchman, answered me, in the cant of the country, that he had other fish to fry," and left me.

It had been so long since I had had an opportunity of opening that agreeable collection, that the few numbers which were now before me, appeared almost entirely new; and I cannot describe to you, the avidity and delight, with which I devoured those beautiful and interesting speculations. Is it not strange, my dear S......., that such

a work should have, ever lost an inch of ground? A style so sweet and simple; and yet so ornamented! A temper so benevolent, so cheerful, so exhiliarating! A body of knowledge, and of original thought, so immense and various! So strikingly just, so universally useful! What person, of any age, sex, temper, calling, or pursuit, can possibly converse with the Spectator, without being conscious of immediate improvement? To the spleen, he is as perpetual, and never-failing an antidote, as he is to ignorance and immorality. No matter for the disposition of mind in which you take him up ; you catch, as you go along, the happy tone of spirits which prevails throughout the work; you smile at the wit, laugh at the drollery, feel your mind enlightened, your heart opened, softened and refined, and when you lay him down, you are sure to be in a better humour, both with yourself and every body else. I have never mentioned the subject to a reader of the Spectator, who did not admit this to be the invariable process; and in such a world of misfortunes, of cares, and sorrows, and guilt as this is, what a prize would this collection be, if it were rightly estimated! Were I the sovereign of a nation, which spoke the English language, and wished my subjects cheerful, virtuous and enlightened, I would furnish every poor family in my dominions (and see that the rich furnished themselves) with a copy of the Spectator; and ordain that the parents or children, should read four or five numbers, aloud, every night in the year. For one of the peculiar perfections of the work is, that while it contains such a mass of ancient and

modern learning, so much of profound wisdom,, and of beautiful composition, yet there is scarcely a number throughout the eight volumes, which is not level to the meanest capacity. Another perfection is, that the Spectator, will never become tiresome to any one whose taste and whose heart remain uncorrupted.

I re

I do not mean that this author, should be read to the exclusion of others; much less that he should stand in the way of the generous pursuit of science, or interrupt the discharge of social or private duties. All the counsels of the work itself, have a directly reverse tendency. It furnishes a store of the clearest argument, and of the most amiable and captivating exhortations, "to raise the genius, and to mend the heart." gret, only, that such a book should be thrown by, and almost entirely forgotten, while the gilded blasphemies of infidels, and the noon-tide trances" of pernicious theorists, are hailed with rapture, and echoed around the world. For such, I should be pleased to see the Spectator universally substituted; and, throwing out of the question it's morality, it's literary information, it's sweetly contagious serenity, and the pure and chaste beauties of its style; and considering it merely as a curiosity, as concentering the brilliant sports of the finest cluster of geniuses, that ever graced the earth, it surely deserves perpetual attention, respect and consecration.

There is, methinks, my S......., a great fault in the world, as it respects this subject; a giddy instability, a light and fluttering vanity, a prurient longing after novelty, an impatience, a disgust, 2