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das Werkchen also drucken (1701), um sich zur Befolgung der darin enthaltenen Weisheitsregeln gleichsam gezwungen zu sehen. Dieser seltsame Entschluss zog ihm indessen tausend Verdriefslichkeiten zu, indem man bei jeder Gelegenheit sein Betragen nach dem Ideal des christlichen Helden abmass, worüber er gewöhnlich seinen lustigen Waffenbrüdern zum Gespött ward. Um sein Gemüth von diesen Kränkungen abzuziehen, schrieb er seine 1702 mit allgemeinem Beifall aufgeführte Komödie the Funeral, or grief à la mode. Er ward hierauf Sekretär des Lords Cutts, dem er seinen christian Hero dedicirt hatte, und Kapitän in des Lord Lucas Füselier Regiment. 1703 wurde sein tender Husband or the accomplished Fools, und 1704 the lying Lovers or the Ladies friendship gespielt. 1709 fing er an, unter dem angenommenen Namen Bickerstaff den Tatler herauszugeben, eine Zeitschrift, deren Form, Manier und Ton so vielen Beifall fand, dafs sie mit den veränderten Titeln Spectator, Guardian, Rambler, Idler, World, Adventurer, Connoisseur etc. bis auf die neusten Zeiten fortgesetzt ist. Das erste Stück erschien den 12ten April 1709 das letzte den 2ten Jan. 1711. Steele nannte sich anfangs nicht, wurde aber bald von Addison als Herausgeber erkannt, da er dessen Remarks on Virgil einrückte, worauf dieser grofse Schriftsteller mehrere seiner Aufsätze in den Tatler aufnehmen liefs, ohne sie durch ein besonderes Unterscheidungszeichen zu charakterisiren. Die beste Ausgabe führt den Titel: Richard Steele's Tatler, with illustrations and notes historical, biographical and critical by Dr. Percy, 1786. 6 Vol. 8. Hierauf arbeitete unser Verfasser an dem Spectator, von welchem er sich in dem letzten Stück vom 6ten Dec. 1712 als den Herausgeber nennt, und in Vereinigung mit den gröfsten Geistern damaliger Zeit, einem Addison, Pope, Parnell, Gay, Tickell etc. an dem Guardian, für dessen Redacteur er gleichfalls gehalten wird. Das erste Stück dieser an innerm Gehalt weder dem Tatler noch dem Spectator nachstehenden Zeitschrift, erschien den 12ten März 1713, das letzte oder Nro. 175 den isten Octbr. desselben Jahres. Addison's Stücke sind mit einer Hand unterzeichnet. Zu den vorzüglichsten Ausgaben gehören folgende: London 1714, 2 Vols. 8. Dublin 1744, 2 Vols. 8. London 1775, 3 Vols. 8. Von 1713 an gab Steele mehrere Schriften politischen Inhalts heraus, als the Englishman, eine Wochenschrift, the Crisis, Apology for himself and his wri tings etc. worin er sich als einem erklärten Gegner des letzten

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Ministeriums der Königinn Anna und eifrigen Anhänger der
Whig Partei zeigte. Diese Gesinnung musste Georg's I.
Aufmerksamkeit auf sich ziehn, und wirklich wurde er sogleich
nach des Königs Regierungsantritt mit Würden überhäuft. Er
erhielt den Baronetstitel, und die Aemter eines Aufsehers der
Königl. Ställe zu Hamptoncourt, eines Direktors der Königl.
Schauspieler und eines Friedensrichters der Grafschaft Mid-
dlesex. Ausserdem wurde er bald darauf zum Parliaments-
gliede für Boroughbrigg in Yorkshire, und nach Unterdrückung
der Schottischen Rebellion zum Commissär der in Schottland
confiscirten Güter ernannt. Zu den wichtigern Schriften aus
der letzten Periode seines Lebens sind folgende zu rechnen:
the romish ecclesiastical History of late years, London 1714
8.; the Lover und the Reader, zwei periodische Schriften, 1714;
an Account of the state of the roman catholic religion, angeb-
lich aus einem Italiänischen Manuskript übersetzt, und dem
Pabst dedicirt, London 1715, 8.; the Spinster, ein Pamphlet,
1719; the Reader, eine periodische Schrift, 1720; the conscious
lovers, eine mit überaus grofsem Beifall im Jahr 1722 aufge-
führte Komödie; the ladies library, written by a lady, London
1722, 3 Vols. 12.
Nach der Erscheinung des letztern Werks
begab er sich nach seinem Landgut Langunnor bei Camarthen
in Südwallis, wo er an den Folgen paralytischer Zufälle im
Jahr 1729 starb. Seine dramatischen Werke sind zu London
1760 vereinigt erschienen, unter folgendem Titel: Richard
Steele's dramatic works. Die zuverlässigsten Nachrichten
von seinem Leben finden sich im ɓten Bände der bibliotheca
britannica, im Journal étranger vom May 1755 und in den Heads
of the illustrious persons of great Britain.

THE STORY OF INKLE AND YARIKO*).

Dat veniam corvis, vexat censura columbas **).

Juv. Sat. II.v.38.

Arietta is visited by all persons of both sexes, who have 1 any pretence to wit and gallantry. She is in that time of

life which is neither affected with the follies of youth, or

*) Spectator, Vol. I. no. 11. **) Nach der Uebersetzung von Bahrdt:

Die Tauben fängt man ein,
Die Raben läfst man laufen.

infirmities of age; and her conversation is so mixed with gaiety and prudence, that she is agreeable both to the young, and the old. Her behaviour is very frank, without being in the least blameable: and as she is out of the track of any amorous or ambitious pursuits of her own, her visitants entertain her with accounts of themselves very freely, whether they concern their passions or their interests. I made her a visit this afternoon, having been formerly introduced to the honour of her acquaintance, by my friend Will Honeycomb, who has prevailed upon her to admit me sometimes into her assembly, as a civil inoffensive man. I found her accom panied with one person only, a common-place talker, who, upon my entrance, arose, and after a very slight civility sat down again; then turning to Arietta, pursued his discourse, which I found was upon the old topic of constancy in love. He went on with great facility in repeating what he talks every day of his life; and with the ornaments of insignificant laughs and gestures enforced his arguments by quotations out of plays and songs, which allude to the perjuries of the fair, and the general levity of women. Methought he strove to shine more than ordinarily in his talkative way, that he might insult my silence, and distinguish himself before a woman of Arietta's taste and understanding. She had often an inclination to interrupt him, but could find no opportunity, till the larum ceased of itself; which it did not till he had repeated and murdered the celebrated story of the Ephesian matron.

When she had a little recovered herself from the serious anger she was in, she replied in the following manner:

Sir, when I consider how perfectly new all you have said on this subject is, and that the story you have given us is not quite two thousand years old, I cannot but think it a piece of presumption to dispute with you: but your quotations put me in mind of the fable of the lion and the man. The man walking with that noble animal, shewed him, in the ostentation of human superiority, a sign of a man killing a lion. Upon which the lion said very justly: we lions are none of us painters, else we could shew a hundred men killed by lions, for one lion killed by a man. You men are writers, and can represent us women as unbecoming as you please in your works, while we are unable to return the injury. Such a writer I doubt not was the celebrated Petronius who invented the pleasant aggravations of the frailty of the Ephesian

lady; but when we consider this question between the sexes, which has been either a point of dispute or raillery ever since there were men and women, let us take facts from plain people, and from such as have not either ambition or capacity to embellish their narrations with any beauties of imagination. I was the other day amusing myself with Ligon's account of Barbadoes *); and, in answer to your well-wrought tale, I will give you (as it dwells upon my memory) out of that honest traveller, in his fifty fifth page, the history of Inkle and Yariko.

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Mr. Thomas Inkle, of London, aged twenty years, barked in the Downs **) on the good ship called the Achilles, bound for the West-Indies, on the 16th of June, 1674, in order to improve his fortune by trade and merchandise. Our adventurer was the third son of an eminent citizen, who had taken particular care to instil into his mind an early love of gain, by making him a perfect master of numbers, and consequently giving him a quick view of loss and advantage, and preventing the natural impulses of his passions, by prepossession towards his interests. With a mind thus turned, young Inkle had a person every way agreeable, a ruddy vigour in his countenance, strength in his limbs, with ringlets of fair hair loosely flowing on his shoulders. It happened, in the course of the voyage, that the Achilles, in some distress, put into a creek on the main of America, in search of provisions. The youth, who is the hero of my story, among others went ashore on this occasion. From their first landing they were observed by a party of Indians, who hid themselves in the woods for that purpose.. The English unadvisedly marched a great distance from the shore into the country, and were intercepted by the natives, who slew the greatest number of them. Our adventurer escaped among others, by flying into a forest. Upon his coming into a remote and pathless part of the wood, he threw himself, tired, and breathless, on a little hillock, when an Indian maid rushed from a thicket

*) Barbadoes, eine den Engländern gehörige Insel in WestIndien. **) Downs, diejenigen Sandhügel, welche das Meer am Ufer macht. In besonderem Verstande sind die Dünen die Gegend längs den östlichen Küsten von Kent und Sussex, wo die Schiffe vor Anker liegen und durch die Sandbänke Goodyins vor den Wellen gesichert werden.

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behind him. After the first surprize, they appeared mutually agreeable to each other. If the European was highly charmed with the limbs, features and wild graces of the naked American, the American was no less taken with the dress, complexion, and shape of an European, covered from head to foot. The Indian grew immediately enamoured of him, and consequently solicitous for his preservation. She therefore conveyed him to a cave, where she gave him a delicious repast of fruits, and led him to a stream to slake his thirst. In the midst of those good offices, she would sometimes play with his hair, and delight in the opposition of its colour to that of her fingers: then open his bosom, then laugh at him for covering it. She was, it seems, a person of distinction, for she every day came to him in a different dress, of the most beautiful shells, bugles, and bredes. She likewise brought him a great many spoils, which her other lovers had presented to her, so that his cave was richly adorned with all the spotted skins of beasts, and most party-coloured feathers of fowls, which that world afforded. To make his confinement more tolerable, she would carry him in the dusk of the evening, or by the favour of moonlight, to unfrequented groves and solitudes, and shew him where to lie down in safety, and sleep amidst the falls of waters and melody of nightingales. Her part was to watch and hold him awake in her arms, for fear of her countrymen, and awake him on occasions to consult his safety. In this manner did the lovers pass away their time, till they had learned a language of their own, in which the voyager communicated to his mistress, how happy he should be to have her in his country, where she should be cloathed in such silks as his waistcoat was made of, and carried in houses drawn by horses, without being exposed to wind or weather. All this he promised her the enjoyment of without such fears and alarms as they were there tormented with. In this tender correspondence these lovers lived for several months, when Yarico, instructed by her lover, discovered a vessel on the coast to which she made signals; and in the night, with the utmost joy and satisfaction, accompanied him to a ship's crew of his countrymen,* bound for Barbadoes.

When a vessel from the main arrives in that island, it seems the planters, come to the shore, where there is an immediate market of the Indians, and other slaves, as with us of

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