the substances, let us now attend to the shadow on
the cockpit, and this it seems is the reflection of a man drawn up to
the ceiling in a basket, and there suspended, as a punishment for having
betted more money than he can pay. Though suspended, he is not
reclaimed; though exposed, not abashed; for in this degrading situation
he offers to stake his watch against money, in another wager on his
favourite champion.

The decorations of this curious theatre are, a portrait of Nan Rawlins,
and the King's arms.

In the margin at the bottom of the print is an oval, with a fighting
cock, inscribed ROYAL SPORT.

Of the characteristic distinctions in this heterogeneous assembly, it is
not easy to speak with sufficient praise. The chimney-sweeper's absurd
affectation sets the similar airs of the Frenchman in a most ridiculous
point of view. The old fellow with a trumpet at his ear, has a degree of
deafness that I never before saw delineated; he might have lived in the
same apartment with Xantippe, or slept comfortably in Alexander the
copper-smith's first floor. As to the nobleman in the centre, in the
language of the turf, he is a mere pigeon; and the peer, with a star and
garter, in the language of Cambridge, we must class as--a mere quiz. The
man sneezing,--you absolutely hear; and the fellow stealing a bank
note,--has all the outward and visible marks of a perfect and
accomplished pick-pocket; Mercury himself could not do that business in
a more masterly style.

Tyers tells us that "Pope, while living with his father at Chiswick,
before he went to Binfield, took great delight in cock-fighting, and
laid out all his school-boy money, and little perhaps it was, in buying
fighting cocks." Lord Orrery observes, "If we may judge of Mr. Pope from
his works, his chief aim was to be esteemed a man of virtue." When
actions can be clearly ascertained, it is not necessary to seek the
mind's construction in the writings: and we must regret being compelled
to believe that some of Mr. Pope's actions, at the same time that they
prove him to be querulous and petulant, lead us to suspect that he was
also envious, malignant, and cruel. How far this will tend to confirm
the assertion, that when a boy, he was an amateur of this royal sport, I
do, says Mr. Ireland, not pretend to decide: but were a child, in whom I
had any interest, cursed with such a propensity, my first object would
be to correct it: if that were impracticable, and he retaine