The English Spy, page 2 by Bernard Blackmantle
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basking at his ease in the sunshine of public patronage, he feels that his heart is rendered invulnerable to yourpoisoned shafts. Read, and you shall find I have not been parsimonious of the means to grant you food and pleasure: errors there are, no doubt, and plenty of them, grammatical and typographical, all of which I might have corrected by an errata at the end of my volume; but I disdain the wish to rob you of your office, and have therefore left them just where I made them, without a single note to mark them out; for if all the thistles were rooted up, what would become of the asses? or of those
"Who pin their easy faith on critic's sleeve, And, knowing nothing, ev'ry thing believe?"
Fully satisfied that swarms of literary blow flies will pounce upon the errors with delight, and, buzzing with the ecstasy of infernal joy, endeavour to hum their readers into a belief of the profundity of their critic erudition;--I shall nevertheless, with Churchill, laughingly exclaim--"Perish my muse"
"If e'er her labours weaken to refine The generous roughness of a nervous line."
Bernard Blackmantle.
CONTENTS. Page INTRODUCTION 3
PREFACE, IN IMITATION OF THE FIRST SATIRE OF PERSIUS 5
REFLECTIONS, ADDRESSED TO THOSE WHO CAN THINK.
Reflections of an Author--Weighty Reasons for writing-- Magister Artis Ingeniique Largitor Venter--Choice of Subject considered--Advice of Index, the Bookseller--Of the Nature of Prefaces--How to commence a new Work 7
A FEW THOUGHTS ON MYSELF 14
A SHANDEAN SCENE, BETWEEN LADY MARY OLD-- STYLE AND HORATIO HEARTLY 17
SCHOOL--BOY REMINISCENCES. ON EARLY FRIEND-- SHIP 22
CHARACTER OF BERNARD BLACKMANTLE. BY HORATIO HEARTLY 25
ETON SKETCHES OF CHARACTER 32
THE FIVE PRINCIPAL ORDERS OF ETON--DOCTOR, DAME, COLLEGER, OPPIDAN, AND CAD. A Sketch taken opposite the Long Walk 42
ETON DAMES; AN ODE, NEITHER AMATORY, ILL-- NATURED, NOR PATHET