am likewise to inform my _Female Criticks_, that they stand
indebted to the entertaining Pen of Mrs. _Eliza Haywood_ for the
following _History_ of Clarina. It was sent to me, by herself, on
communicating to some of my Friends the Design I had of writing a
Weekly Paper, under the title of the ROVER, the Scope of which is in
some Measure explain'd in her Address to me, and this Project I may
yet perhaps put in Execution."

The novelette submitted to Curll for inclusion in his projected
periodical relates how an Irish housekeeper named Aglaura craftily
promotes a runaway match between her son Merovius and the young heiress
Clarina, who, deserted by her husband and disowned by her father, falls
into the utmost misery. The story has no possible bearing either on Pope
or on "The Dunciad," but was evidently seized by the shifty publisher as
the nearest thing to hand when he came to patch up another pamphlet
against Pope. Nothing could be more characteristic of Curll than his
willingness to make capital out of his own disgrace. So hurried was the
compilation of "The Female Dunciad" that he even printed the letter
designed to introduce Mrs. Haywood's tale to the readers of the "Rover."
Pope, who assiduously read all the libels directed against himself,
hastened to use the writer's confession of her own shortcomings in a
note to "The Dunciad, Variorum" of 1729.[14]

Mrs. Haywood admires at some length the Rover's intention of "laying a
Foundation for a Fabrick, whose spacious Circumference shall at once
display the beautiful Images of Virtue in in all her proper Shapes, and
the Deformities of Vice in its various Appearances.... An Endeavour for
a Reformation of Manners, (in an Age, where Folly is so much the
Fashion, that to have run thro' all the courses of Debauchery, seem
requisite to complete the fine Gentleman) is an Attempt as _daring_ as
it is _noble_; and while it engages the Admiration and Applause of the
worthy and judicious _Few_, will certainly draw on you the Ridicule and
Hatred of that _unnumber'd Crowd_, who justly dread the Lash of a
Satire, which their own dissolute Behaviour has given sting to. But I,
who am perfectly acquainted with the Sweetness of your Disposition, and
that Tenderness with which you consider the Errors of your Fellow
Creatures, need not be inform'd, that while you expose the Foulness of
those Facts, which renders them deservedly Objects of Reproach, you will
[not] forget to pi