enable me to entertain a friend. You are either a great deal diffident or not at all so, otherwise you would see, judge, try if my eighteen foot square be a gasconade. I wish I could take what rooms you say you could spare; for aught I know it might not only serve you and me but both our successors. I really at first apprehended you had discovered a bit of extravagance of mine when you mention your chimneypiece; for I had sent for one of marble to my closet. I thought you [who] said so much of the Scotch could not so easily forget the thistle motto. It is plain in your case what has been often said to me by Sir Edward Seymour' does not hold true, that no one ever got anything from that nation but what stuck to them; [for] your groom did not stick to you though he robbed you. Pray let me know if your great vessel of Alicant be bottled. I have some in bottles which I will pretend to put in competition with it.

I am afraid your inclinations are not as good as your horse's condition to travel. Pray let me know if I may hope to see you manage these difficulties, and when; if you will let me hope for it in a reasonable time, I will delay going to my winter quarters, which for a month. past nothing but my expectation of you has made me defer. Mrs. Chetwode who is much your admirer and humble servant, bade me tell you, your not coming hither is owing to your fears of being upbraided with being an old bachelor. You great men never say a word of news to little ones, otherwise you would have mentioned my Lord Bolingbroke as I desired, for I am more attached to him than, I believe, you know of. I have not to add, but to desire toujours avoir l'honneur de votre amitié, for I am, with all imaginable respect,

Your faithful friend and obedient servant.

1 Chetwode was probably acquainted with that statesman, who died in 1707, through his wife (supra, p. 243, n. 2). Her father mentions leases which he held from Sir Edward in his will.

2

I.e., to his residence in the county of Meath (supra, p. 241, n. 2).

CCCXIX. [Hawkesworth.]

SIR,'

SWIFT TO SIR ARTHUR Langford

3

Trim, October 30, 1714.

I WAS to wait on you the other day, and was told by your servant that you are not to be seen till towards evening, which, at the distance I am at this time of the year," cannot easily be compassed. My principal business was, to let you know, that since my last return from England many persons have complained to me, that I suffered a conventicle to be kept in my parish, and in a place where there never was any before. I mentioned this to your nephew Rowley in Dublin, when he came to me with this message from you; but I could not prevail with him to write to you about it. I have always looked upon you as an honest gentleman, of great charity and piety in your way; and I hope you will remember at the same time, that it becomes you to be a legal man, and that you will not promote or encourage, much less give a beginning to a thing directly contrary to the law.

You know the Dissenters in Ireland are suffered to have their conventicles only by connivance, and that only in places where they formerly used to meet. Whereas this conventicle of yours is a new thing, in a new place entirely of your own erection, and perverted to this ill use from the design you outwardly seemed to have intended it for. It has been the weakness of the Dissenters to be too sanguine and assuming upon events in the State which appeared to

There has been already notice of Sir Arthur Langford, an ancestor of the Lords Langford, as one of Swift's parishioners at Laracor (supra, vol. i, p. 181, n. 1).

As appears from the superscription Swift had left Dublin and come to Trim. The reference is to the greater distance of Summerhill, Sir Arthur Langford's seat, from that town than from Swift's vicarage.

3

Of his devotion to the Presbytery Sir Arthur Langford, who died in less than two years, gives ample proof in his will, bequeathing to trustees £4,000 of his "first and readiest money" for its use as well as many smaller legacies for specific purposes.

Hercules Rowley, who represented the county of Londonderry in the Irish Parliament, and was ancestor of the Lords Langford.

give them the least encouragement; and this, in other turns of affairs, has proved very much to their disadvantage. The most moderate Churchmen may be apt to resent, when they see a sect, without toleration by law, insulting the established religion. Whenever the legislator shall think fit to give them leave to build new conventicles, all good Churchmen will submit: but till then we can hardly see it without betraying our Church.

I hope, therefore, you will not think it hard if I take those methods which my duty obliges me, to prevent this growing evil as far as it lies in my power, unless you shall think fit, from your own prudence, or the advice of some understanding friends, to shut up the doors of that conventicle for the future.' I am, with true friendship and esteem, Sir,

Your most obedient humble servant,

CCCXX. [Scott.]

B.

SWIFT TO MISS ESTHER VANHOMRIGH

Philipstown, November 5, 1714.2

I MET your servant when I was a mile from Trim, and could send him no other answer than I did, for I was going abroad by appointment; besides, I would not have gone to Kildrought to see you for all the world. I ever told you

1 Swift does not appear to have succeeded in closing the conventicle, as in his will Sir Arthur Langford desires to be buried in his chapel at Summerhill, and leaves a rent charge of £30 towards the maintenance of a Presbyterian minister there.

2 Swift had set out that morning from Trim to pay his promised visit to Chetwode (supra, p. 249), and was stopping on his way at Philipstown, then the assize town of the King's County.

3 Whether there had been any communication between Swift and Vanessa since he left England does not appear, but probably she had learned that he had relinquished his idea of returning to London that winter (supra, p. 234), and thereupon had resolved to follow him to Ireland. She had evidently arrived after he had gone to Trim, and had taken up her abode at Kildrought, now known as Celbridge, where she is said to have inherited a house from her father (supra, vol. i, p. 299, n. 1). Celbridge lies about eleven miles to the west of Dublin, in the direction of, although not on the main road to, Trim.

you wanted discretion. I am going to a friend upon a promise, and shall stay with him about a fortnight, and then come to town, and I will call on you as soon as I can, supposing you lodge in Turnstile Alley,' as your servant told me, and that your neighbours can tell me whereabouts. Your servant said you would be in town on Monday;' so that I suppose this will be ready to welcome you there. I fear you had a journey full of fatigues. Pray take care of your health in this Irish air, to which you are a stranger. Does not Dublin look very dirty to you, and the country very miserable? Is Kildrought as beautiful as Windsor, and as agreeable to you as the Prebend's lodgings there? Is there any walk about you as pleasant as the avenue, and the Marlborough Lodge? I have rode a tedious journey today, and can say no more. Nor shall you know where I am till I come, and then I will see you. A fig for your letters and messages. Adieu.

5

Addressed-To Mrs. Vanhomrigh, at her lodgings in Turnstile Alley, near College Green, Dublin.

This Alley, afterwards known as Parliament Row, adjoined the Houses of Parliament in College Green, Dublin.

2 The 9th.

3 In the year 1711 ("Prose Works," ii, 222) Swift mentions that Vanessa was about to pay a visit to Ireland, but she had probably not done so.

It is not possible to compare the stately grandeur of Windsor with the scenery round Celbridge, but the latter place is famous for its natural beauty. It is situated on the river Liffey, which is there crossed by a bridge, and was originally known as Cilldroichid, the church of the bridge, a name of which Kildrought and Celbridge are respectively a corruption and misinterpretation. See Joyce's "Irish Names of Places."

" When Vanessa had been at Windsor with Swift two years before (supra, vol. i, p. 344), he was occupying the residence of one of the prebendaries ("Prose Works," ii, 380).

The residence of the Duchess of Marlborough in right of the rangership of Windsor Park, now known as Cumberland Lodge.

7 The journey from Trim to Philipstown is one of twenty-five Irish

miles.

CCCXXI. [Copy.']

SWIFT TO KNIGHTLEY CHETWODE

Woodbrooke, November 6 [1714] past one in the afternoon.

NOT to disturb you in the good work of a godfather nor spoil your dinner, I only design Mrs. Chetwode and you would take care not to be benighted; but come when you will you shall be heartily welcome to my house. The children's tutor is gone out and so there was no pen and ink to be had.

Endorsed-A pencil note from Woodbrooke where he came in Knightley Chetwode's absence dining out.

CCCXXII. [Original.3]

JOHN ARBUTHNOT TO SWIFT

DEAR BROTHER,

November, 1714.

I SEND you the scrap of a letter begun to you by the whole Society, because I suppose you even value the fragments of your friends. The honest gentleman, at whose lodgings we wrote, is gone for France. I really value your judgement extremely in choosing your friends. I think worthy Mr. Ford is an instance of it, being an honest, sensible, firm, friendly man, et qualis ab inceptu processerat, etc. Though, by the way, praising your judgement is a

1 In the Forster Collection (supra, p. 241, n. 1).

2 Swift had evidently arrived early at Woodbrooke, which is only about ten Irish miles from Philipstown, and had found his host and hostess out attending a christening feast in the neighbourhood. This note was probably sent in the carriage which was to bring them home.

3 In the British Museum. See Preface.

4 The Scriblerus Club (supra, p. 145).

Ford, who had been relieved of the editorship of the "Gazette" on the arrival of George I (supra, p. 216), was apparently "the honest gentleman" who had gone to France. This letter is, however, written