se of
his daughter's honour; and when he was very active against the king, about
the time of the revolution, he said, that, in gratitude, he should do
his utmost to make his majesty's daughter a queen, as the king had made
his own a countess. The king continued to visit her, which gave great
uneasiness to the queen, who employed her friends, particularly the
priests, to persuade him to break off the correspondence. They
remonstrated with him on the guilt of the commerce, and the reproach it
would bring on the catholic religion; she, on the contrary, employed the
whole force of her ridicule against the priests and their counsels.
They, at length, prevailed, and he is said to have sent her word to
retire to France, or that her pension of 4,000_l_. a year should be
withdrawn. She then, probably, repented of having been the royal
mistress, and "cursed the form that pleased the king."

See Manning and Bray's Surrey, ii. 788. where the countess's issue is
also given. See, also, Christian's note on Blackstone's Com. iv. p. 65.
It is remarkable, that when Johnson was asked, at a late period of his
life, to whom he had alluded, under the name of Sedley, he said, that he
had quite forgotten. See note on Idler, No. 36.--ED.

LONDON; A POEM:

IN IMITATION OF

THE THIRD SATIRE OF JUVENAL

WRITTEN IN 1738.

--Quis ineptae
Tam patiens urbis, tam ferreus ut teneat se? JUV.

[a]Though grief and fondness in my breast rebel,
When injur'd Thales bids the town farewell,
Yet still my calmer thoughts his choice commend,
I praise the hermit, but regret the friend;
Resolv'd at length, from vice and London far,
To breathe, in distant fields, a purer air,
And, fix'd on Cambria's solitary shore,
Give to St. David one true Briton more.
[b]For who would leave, unbrib'd, Hibernia's land,
Or change the rocks of Scotland for the Strand?
There none are swept by sudden fate away,
But all, whom hunger spares, with age decay:
Here malice, rapine, accident, conspire,
And now a rabble rages, now a fire;
Their ambush here relentless ruffians lay,
And here the fell attorney prowls for prey;
Here falling houses thunder on your head,
And here a female atheist talks you dead.
[c]While Thales waits the wherry, that contains
Of dissipated wealth the small remains,
On Thames's banks, in silent thought, we stood
Where Greenwich smiles upon the silver flood;
Struck with the seat that gave Eliza[A] birth,
We kneel, and kiss the consecrated earth;