Heaven pardon me for publishing the Trials of Sodomy, in an Elzevir letter! but I humbly hope, my printing Sir Richard Blackmore's Essays will atone for them. I beg that you will take what remains of these laft, (which is near the whole impreffion, prefents excepted,) and let my poor widow have in exchange the fole property of the copy of Madam Mafcranny.

[Here Mr. Pemberton interrupted, and would by no means confent to this article; about which fome difpute might have arifen unbecoming a dying person, if Mr. Lintot had not interpofed, and Mr. Curll vomited.]

What this poor unfortunate man spoke afterwards, was fo indiftinct, and in fuch broken accents, (being perpetually interrupted by vomitings,) that the reader is intreated to excufe the confufion and imperfection of this

account.

Dear Mr. Pemberton, I beg you to beware of the indictment at Hicks's-hall for publishing Rochester's bawdy poems; that copy will otherwise be my best legacy to my dear wife, and helpless child.

The cafe of impotence was my best support all the laft long vacation.

[In this last paragraph Mr. Curll's voice grew more free, for his vomitings abated upon his dejections, and he Spoke what follows from his clofe-ftool.]

For the copies of noblemens and bishops last will and teftaments, I folemnly declare, I printed them not

with

with any purpose of defamation; but merely as I thought those copies lawfully purchased from Doctors Commons, at one fhilling a-piece. Our trade in wills turning to small account, we inay divide them blindfold.

For Mr. Manwaring's Life, I afk Mrs. Oldfield's pardon: neither his nor my Lord Hallifax's lives, though they were of fervice to their country, were of any to me: but I was refolved, fince I could not print their works while they lived, to print their lives after they were dead.

While he was fpeaking these words, Mr. 'Oldmixon entered. "Ah! Mr. Oldmixon, faid poor Mr. Curll, to what a condition have your works reduced me! I die a martyr to that unlucky preface. However, in thefe my laft moments I will be juft to all men; you fhall have your third fhare of the Court Poems, as was ftipulated. When I am dead, where will you find another bookseller? Your Proteftant packet might have supported you, had you writ a little less fcurriloufly; there is a mean in all things.'

Here Mr. Lintot interrupted. Why not find another bookfeller, brother Curll? and then took Mr. Oldmixon

afide

* Oldmixon, of all hiftorians, was perhaps the most unprincipled : his critical hiftory of England is full of calumny and falfehood; yet his abuse of the Stuarts recommended him fo much to the favour of the Court, that he was rewarded with the Collectorship of the Customs at Bridgewater. BANNISTER.

afide and whispered him: "Sir, as foon as Curll is dead, I fhall be glad to talk with you over a pint at the Devil,"

Mr. Curll now turning to Mr. Pemberton, told him, he had several taking title-pages, that only wanted treatises to be wrote to them; and earnestly defired, that when they were written, his heirs might have some share of the profit of them,

After he had faid this, he fell into horrible gripings, upon which Mr. Lintot advised him to repeat the Lord's prayer. He defired his wife to step into the shop for a Common-prayer book, and read it by the help of a candle without hefitation. He clofed the book, fetched a groan, and recommended to Mrs. Curl to give forty fhillings to the poor of the parish of St. Dunstan's, and a week's wages advance to each of his gentleman-authors, with some small gratuity in particular to Mrs. Centlivre.

The poor man continued for fome hours with all his difconfolate family about him in tears, expecting his final diffolution; when of a fudden he was furprisingly relieved by a plentiful foetid ftcol, which obliged them all to retire out of the room. Notwithftanding, it is judged by Sir Richard Blackmore, that the poifon is ftill latent in his body, and will infallibly destroy him by flow degrees in lefs than a month. It is to be hoped, the other enemies of this wretched ftationer will not further pursue their revenge, or fhorten this fhort period of his miferable life.

A further AcCOUNT of the moft DEPLORABLE CONDITION of MR. EDMUND CURLL, Bookfeller.

THE

E public is already acquainted with the manner of Mr. Curll's impoisonment by a faithful, though unpolite hiftorian of Grub-street. I am but the continuer of his hiftory; yet hope a due diftinction will be made between an undignified scribbler of a sheet and half, and the author of a three-penny stitched book, like myself.

"Wit, faith Sir Richard Blackmore, proceeds from a concurrence of regular and exalted ferments, and an affluence of animal fpirits rectified and refined to a degree of purity." On the contrary, when the igneous particles rife with the vital liquor, they produce an abstraction of the rational part of the soul, which we commonly call madness. The verity of this hypothefis is justified by the symptoms with which the unfortunate Mr. Edmund Curll, bookfeller, hath been afflicted, ever fince his fwallowing the poifon at the Swan-tavern in Fleet-street. For though the neck of his retort, which carries up the animal fpirits to the head, is of an extraordinary length; yet the faid animal fpirits rife muddy, being contaminated with

Blackmore's Effays, vol. i.

WARTON.

with the inflammable particles of this uncommon poison.

The symptoms of his departure from his ufual temper of mind were at firft only speaking civilly to his customers, finging a pig with a new purchased libel, and refufing two and nine-pence for Sir Richard Blackmore's Effays,

As the poor man's frenzy increased, he began to void his excrements in his bed, read Rochefter's bawdy poems to his wife, gave Oldmixon a flap on the chops, and would have kiffed Mr. Pemberton's a by

violence.

But at last he came to such a pass, that he would dine upon nothing but copper-plates, took a clyfter for a whipt fyllabub, and made Mr. Lintot eat a fuppofitory, for a radish, with bread and butter.

We leave it to every tender wife to imagine, how forely all this afflicted poor Mrs. Curll: at first she privately put a bill into several churches, defiring the prayers of the congregation for a wretched ftationer diftempered in mind. But when she was fadly convinced, that his misfortune was public to all the world, fhe writ the following letter to her good neighbour Mr. Lintot;

A true copy of Mrs. Curll's letter to Mr. Lintot.

"WORTHY MR. LINTOT,

"YOU and all the neighbours know too well the frenzy with which my poor man is vifited. I

never