n to the sale of their works.

"Having therefore settled these conditions, which (I do assure you) were
not very advantageous to me, he assigned me a subject for ballad, which
was to be finished in two hours; and I retired to my garret in order
to perform his injunction. As the theme happened to suit my fancy,
I completed a pretty sort of an ode within the time prescribed, and
brought it to him, big with hope of profit and applause. He read it in
a twinkling, and, to my utter astonishment, told me it would not do;
though indeed he owned I wrote a good hand, an spelled very well, but
my language was too high flown, and of consequence not at all adapted
to the capacity and taste of his customers. I promised to rectify that
mistake and in half an hour humbled my style to the comprehension of
vulgar readers; he approved of the alteration, and gave me some hopes
of succeeding in time, though he observed that my performance was very
deficient in the quaintness of expression that pleases the multitude:
however, to encourage me, he ventured the expense of printing and paper,
and, if I remember aright, my share of the sale amounted to fourpence
halfpenny.

"From that day I studied the Grub Street manner with great diligence,
and at length became such a proficient that my works were in
great request among the most polite of the chairmen, draymen,
hackney-coachmen, footmen, and servant maids: nay, I have enjoyed the
pleasure of seeing my productions adorned with cuts, pasted upon the
walls as ornaments in beer cellars and cobblers' stalls; and have
actually heard them sung in clubs of substantial tradesmen--but empty
praise (you know, my dear friend) will not supply the cravings nature.
I found myself in danger of starving in the midst of all my fame; for of
ten songs I composed, it was well if two had the good fortune to please.
For this reason I turned my thoughts to prose, and, during a tract of
gloomy weather, published an apparition, on the substance of which I
subsisted very comfortably a whole month; I have made many a good meal
upon a monster; a rape has often afforded me great satisfaction; but
a murder, well timed, was my never-failing resource. What then? I
was almost a slave to my employers, who expected to be furnished at
a minute's warning with prose and verse, just as they thought the
circumstances of the times required, whether the inclination was absent
or present. Upon my sincerity, Mr. Random, I have been so mu