\ 
136 letter from Areticus. Dec. 19: 
_“ These differed likewise in their garb from men of 
sense, manners, and cultivation, as much as they 
did in morals, habits, and behaviour; inso much that 
I at first supposed them people trained to amuse the 
public by the oddity of their drefs, and the folly of 
their conduct, till I discovered they were too un- 
principled and wicked ‘to be licenced fools in so 
sage a state. 
‘« First, I perceived there were no sort of ditho- 
nourable arts, nor mean lies, that they stuck at, to be- 
tray and ruin the fair credulous part of the creation, 
whom it is the duty of our sex to protect, invoking 
punifhment from the immortal gods if they broke 
their faith, whilst this very horde were often cut- 
ting one another’s throats on being accused of ae 
ving told a lye to a male. 
‘* 2dly, Idiscovered that these pretended men of fa~ 
fhion and honour, consumed the labour of the industri- 
ous citizen, wherever they could inspire confidence and 
obtain credit, being just only to their own horde in de- 
fraying what they call debts of honour, which I found, 
to my infinite surprise, to be game debts, and tavern 
scores ;—the one probably for fear of being drove 
out of the only company they have a taste for,—the 
other for fear of not finding credit again in their fa 
vourite haunts. In this, I perceived, they had no 
more merit than our roving banditti of the desert, 
who are true to one another’ from the same motives, 
although they prey upon all the rest of mankind. 
‘« Except these two virtues, as they calledthem, and 
boasted of as proofs of honour, I could learn no other 
ef which they were pofsefsed, and thought myself 
