doing justice to the Merit of my Friend.

I shall take the liberty, before I have ended this Letter, to say why I
believe the _Drummer_ a performance of Mr. ADDISON: and after I have
declared this, any surviving writer may be at ease; if there be any one
who has hitherto been vain enough to hope, or silly enough to fear, it
may be given to himself.

Before I go any further, I must make my Public Appeal to you and all the
Learned World, and humbly demand, Whether it was a decent and reasonable
thing, that Works written, as a great part of Mr. ADDISON's were, in
correspondence [_coadjutorship_] with me, ought to have been published
without my review of the Catalogue of them; or if there were any
exception to be made against any circumstance in my conduct, Whether an
opportunity to explain myself should not have been allowed me, before any
Reflections were made on me in print.

When I had perused Mr. TICKELL's _Preface_, I had soon so many
objections, besides his omission to say anything of the _Drummer_,
against his long-expected performance: the chief intention of which (and
which it concerns me first to examine) seems to aim at doing the deceased
Author justice, against me! whom he insinuates to have assumed to myself,
part of the merit of my friend.

He is pleased, Sir, to express himself concerning the present Writer, in
the following manner--

_The Comedy called_ The Tender Husband, _appeared much about the same
time; to which Mr. ADDISON wrote the _Prologue: _Sir RICHARD STEELE
surprised him with a very handsome_ Dedication _of this Play; and has
since acquainted the Public, that he owed some of the most taking scenes
of it, to Mr. ADDISON_. Mr. TICKELL's _Preface_. Pag. 11.

_He was in that Kingdom_ [Ireland], _when he first discovered Sir RICHARD
STEELE to be the Author of the_ Tatler, _by an observation upon_ VIRGIL,
_which had been by him communicated to his friend. The assistance he
occasionally gave him afterwards, in the course of the Paper, did not a
little contribute to advance its reputation; and, upon the Change of the
Ministry_ [in the autumn of 1710], _he found leisure to engage more
constantly in that Work: which, however, was dropped at last, as it had
been taken up, without his participation_.

_In the last Paper which closed those celebrated Performances, and in
the_ Preface _to the last Volume, Sir RICHARD STEELE has given to Mr.
ADDISON, the honour of the most applauded Pieces in that Colle