peruse me, by explaining the word _Incubus_; which Pliny and others,
more learnedly, call _Ephialtes_.--I, modestly, state it to mean the
_Night-Mare_, for the information of the Ladies. The chief symptom
by which this affliction is vulgarly known, is a heavy pressure upon
the stomach, when lying in a supine posture in bed. It would terrify
some of my fair readers, who never experience'd this characteristick
of the _Incubus_, were I to dwell on its effects; and it would
irritate others, who are in the habit of labouring under its
sensations.

[6] An old Gentlewoman, a great admirer of the BLACK LETTER, (as many
_old Gentlewomen_ are) presented the Author of these Tales with the
_Original MS._ of this Sonnet; advising the publication of a
_facsimile_ of the Knight's hand-writing. It is painful, after this,
to advance, that the Sonnet, so far from being genuine, is _one_ of
the clumsiest literary forgeries, that the present times have
witnessed. It appears, in this authentick Story, that Sir Thomas
Erpingham was married in the reign of Henry the Fifth; and it is
evidently intended, that _Moderns_ should believe he writ these
love-verses almost immediately after his marriage; not only from the
ardour with which he celebrates the beauty of his wife, but from the
circumstance of a man writing any love-verses upon his wife at
all;--but the style and language of the lines are most glaringly
inconsistent with their pretended date. The fact is, we have here
foisted upon us a close _imitation of_ COWLEY, (_vide the_ MISTRESS)
who was not _born_ till the year 1618,--two centuries after the era
in question. Chaucer died, A. D. 1400; and Henry the Fifth (who was
king only 9 years, 5 months, and 11 days) began his reign scarcely
13 years after the death of that Poet. Sir Thomas, then, must, at
least, have written in the obsolete phraseology of Chaucer,--and,
probably, would have imitated him,--as did Lidgate, Occleve, and
others;--nay, Harding, Skelton, &c. who were fifty or sixty years
subsequent to Chaucer, were not so modern in their language as their
celebrated predecessor. Having, _in few words_, prove'd (it is
presume'd) this Sonnet to be spurious, an apology may be thought
necessary for not saying _a great deal more_;--but this Herculean
task is left, i