ection, turned away
with contempt, and left me to consider how the second salutation should
be received. The next fellow was better treated, for I soon found that I
must purchase by civility that regard which I had expected to enforce by
insolence.

There was yet no smoke of bonfires, no harmony of bells, no shout of
crowds, nor riot of joy; the business of the day went forward as before;
and, after having ordered a splendid supper, which no man came to
partake, and which my chagrin hindered me from tasting, I went to bed,
where the vexation of disappointment overpowered the fatigue of my
journey, and kept me from sleep.

I rose so much humbled by those mortifications, as to inquire after the
present state of the town, and found that I had been absent too long to
obtain the triumph which had flattered my expectation. Of the friends
whose compliments I expected, some had long ago moved to distant
provinces, some had lost in the maladies of age all sense of another's
prosperity, and some had forgotten our former intimacy amidst care and
distresses. Of three whom I had resolved to punish for their former
offences by a longer continuance of neglect, one was, by his own
industry, raised above my scorn, and two were sheltered from it in the
grave. All those whom I loved, feared, or hated, all whose envy or whose
kindness I had hopes of contemplating with pleasure, were swept away,
and their place was filled by a new generation with other views and
other competitions; and among many proofs of the impotence of wealth, I
found that it conferred upon me very few distinctions in my native
place.

I am, Sir, &c.

SEROTINUS.

No. 166. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 19, 1751.

_Semper, eris pauper si pauper es, Aemiliane:
Dantur opes nullis nunc nisi divitibus_. MART. Lib. v. Ep. xxxi.

Once poor, my friend, still poor you must remain,
The rich alone have all the means of gain. EDW. CAVF.
[Transcriber's note: Difficult to make out in original--possibly CAVE?]

No complaint has been more frequently repeated in all ages than that of
the neglect of merit associated with poverty, and the difficulty with
which valuable or pleasing qualities force themselves into view, when
they are obscured by indigence. It has been long observed, that native
beauty has little power to charm without the ornaments which fortune
bestows, and that to want the favour of others is often sufficient to
hinder us from obtaining it.

Every day discov