cheerfully--shake hands with the
hangman, and so--farewell. Gay wrote the most delightful ballads, and made
merry over the same hero. Contrast these with the writings of our present
humourists! Compare those morals and ours--those manners and ours!

We can't tell--you would not bear to be told the whole truth regarding
those men and manners. You could no more suffer in a British drawing-room,
under the reign of Queen Victoria, a fine gentleman or fine lady of Queen
Anne's time, or hear what they heard and said, than you would receive an
ancient Briton. It is as one reads about savages, that one contemplates
the wild ways, the barbarous feasts, the terrific pastimes, of the men of
pleasure of that age. We have our fine gentlemen, and our "fast men";
permit me to give you an idea of one particularly fast nobleman of Queen
Anne's days, whose biography has been preserved to us by the law
reporters.

In 1691, when Steele was a boy at school, my Lord Mohun was tried by his
peers for the murder of William Mountford, comedian. In Howell's _State
Trials_, the reader will find not only an edifying account of this
exceedingly fast nobleman, but of the times and manners of those days. My
lord's friend, a Captain Hill, smitten with the charms of the beautiful
Mrs. Bracegirdle, and anxious to marry her at all hazards, determined to
carry her off, and for this purpose hired a hackney-coach with six horses,
and a half-dozen of soldiers, to aid him in the storm. The coach with a
pair of horses (the four leaders being in waiting elsewhere) took its
station opposite my Lord Craven's house in Drury Lane, by which door Mrs.
Bracegirdle was to pass on her way from the theatre. As she passed in
company of her mamma and a friend, Mr. Page, the Captain seized her by the
hand, the soldiers hustled Mr. Page and attacked him sword in hand, and
Captain Hill and his noble friend endeavoured to force Madam Bracegirdle
into the coach. Mr. Page called for help: the population of Drury Lane
rose: it was impossible to effect the capture; and bidding the soldiers go
about their business, and the coach to drive off, Hill let go of his prey
sulkily, and he waited for other opportunities of revenge. The man of whom
he was most jealous was Will Mountford, the comedian; Will removed, he
thought Mrs. Bracegirdle might be his: and accordingly the Captain and his
lordship lay that night in wait for Will, and as he was coming out of a
house in Norfolk Street, whi