no doubt they could not injure the Duke of
Marlborough nearly so much in the public eyes as the malignant attacks of
Swift did, which were carefully directed so as to blacken and degrade
him), because they were writ openly and fairly by Mr. Esmond, who made no
disguise of them, who was now out of the army, and who never attacked the
prodigious courage and talents, only the selfishness and rapacity, of the
chief.

The colonel then, having writ a paper for one of the Tory journals, called
the _Post-Boy_ (a letter upon Bouchain, that the town talked about for two
whole days, when the appearance of an Italian singer supplied a fresh
subject for conversation), and having business at the Exchange, where Mrs.
Beatrix wanted a pair of gloves or a fan very likely, Esmond went to
correct his paper, and was sitting at the printer's, when the famous Dr.
Swift came in, his Irish fellow with him that used to walk before his
chair, and bawled out his master's name with great dignity.

Mr. Esmond was waiting for the printer too, whose wife had gone to the
tavern to fetch him, and was meantime engaged in drawing a picture of a
soldier on horseback for a dirty little pretty boy of the printer's wife,
whom she had left behind her.

"I presume you are the editor of the _Post-Boy_, sir?" says the doctor, in
a grating voice that had an Irish twang; and he looked at the colonel from
under his two bushy eyebrows with a pair of very clear blue eyes. His
complexion was muddy, his figure rather fat, his chin double. He wore a
shabby cassock, and a shabby hat over his black wig, and he pulled out a
great gold watch, at which he looks very fierce.

"I am but a contributor, Dr. Swift," says Esmond, with the little boy
still on his knee. He was sitting with his back in the window, so that the
doctor could not see him.

"Who told you I was Dr. Swift?" says the doctor, eyeing the other very
haughtily.

"Your reverence's valet bawled out your name," says the colonel. "I should
judge you brought him from Ireland."

"And pray, sir, what right have you to judge whether my servant came from
Ireland or no? I want to speak with your employer, Mr. Leach. I'll thank
ye go fetch him."

"Where's your papa, Tommy?" asks the colonel of the child, a smutty little
wretch in a frock.

Instead of answering, the child begins to cry; the doctor's appearance had
no doubt frightened the poor little imp.

"Send that squalling little brat about his business, and