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London, and withheld from the person to whom they are addressed, I should be glad to be honoured with your confidential opinion and commands in what way I ought to forward it, consistent with my public duty as an officer of the Customs, and the respect due to my Board.

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3. Two Letters from the Post Office Agent at Holyhead, to the Secretary of the Post Office.1

Most Private.

MY DEAR SIR,

Holyhead, March 31st, 1812.

The Surveyor of the Customs consulted me yesterday on having discovered in the Custom House, a few days. since, a Large deal box, directed to "Miss Hitchener Hurst per pier, Brighton Sussex England," which had been landed from one of the Packets from Ireland.—It contained, besides a great quantity of Pamphlets and printed papers, an open letter, of a tendency so dangerous to Government, that I urged him to write without further loss of time, a confidential letter, either to the Secretary of State, or to Mr. Percival, [sic] and enclose the

1 These two letters and that from the Postmaster General which follows them are in the possession of Lord Carlingford, attached to a copy of the Proposals for an Association and one of the Declaration of

Rights. Mr. Fellowes's letters were forwarded by Mr. Freeling to the Earl of Chichester, then joint Postmaster General with the Earl of Sandwich.

letter, and one of each of the Pamphlets and printed Declarations (as they are styled), which he accordingly did by yesterday's Post, to Mr. Percival.

As the Letter in question, which the Surveyor gave me to read, contained a paragraph injurious to the revenue of the P. Office-I think it my duty to make you acquainted with it-it is as follows:

"Percy has sent you a box full of inflammable matter, therefore I think I may send this."

"I sent you two letters in news Papers, which I hope you received safe from the Intrusion of the Post Masters. -I sent a Pamphlet to my Father some time since in the same way."

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Disperse the Declarations, Percy says the Farmers are fond of having them stuck on their walls."

Mr. Thomas, the gentleman who gave me this information, having acted by my advice, in order to avoid the delay of reporting to the Custom House and the possibility of its being considered as a common seizure, of which there are a great many every year has requested that I would not mention it and I therefore request you to consider this as confidential. I will send you a Pamphlet in the course of a day or two. But I trust in the mean time this communication may enable the office to detect any future correspondence between the parties under the cover of a News Paper.

I have the honour to remain, Dear Sir,

Your faithful Humble Servant,

Francis Freeling, Esq.

WILLIAM DOUCE FELLOWES.

It is a very common custom with the people in Ireland

to write in News Papers, I open all that come through my hands, and have charged many from being written in.

The Person whose letter I have quoted from, appears to be English, and to have lately gone to Ireland, I have no doubt but an extensive correspondence will be attempted in the way mentioned-there is no signature to the letter-or address.

MY DEAR SIR,

April 1st, 1812.

I send you the Pamphlet, and Declaration of Rights, which I mentioned in my letter of yesterday, and remain yours faithfully,

Francis Freeling, Esq.

WILLIAM DOUCE FELLOWES.

4. Letter from the Postmaster General, to the Secretary of

the Post Office.

DEAR FREELING,

Stanmer, April 5, 1812.

I return the Pamphlet and Declaration the writer of the first is son of Mr. Shelley member for the Rape of Bramber,' and is by all accounts a most extraordinary Man. ... He has been in Ireland some time, and I heard of his speaking at the Catholic Convention.

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Miss Hichener of Hurstperpoint keeps a school there, and is well spoken of her Father keeps a Publick

1 This is a mistake. Shelley's father was Member for Shoreham.

House in the neighbourhood, he was originally a Smugler, and changed his Name from Yorke to Tichener, before he took the publick House.

I shall have a watch upon the Daughter and discover whether there is any connection between her and Shelley. I shall come to Town on Wednesday.

As I am to see Mr. Scott tomorrow, I shall keep the Brighton Papers untill I have seen him.

Your's most sincerely

CHICHESTER.

I send my Receipt enclosed, you will be so good as to pay the Salary to Messrs. Hoare's.'

1 The foregoing papers, forming Appendix VI, have not been corrected or amended, as far as this edition is concerned. Harriet's letter to Miss Hitchener I have left just as I found it; and the letters of Mr. Fellowes and the Earl of Chichester I have given verbatim et literatim from the

originals, kindly lent to me by Lord Carlingford. The Earl of Chichester's spelling and punctuation are not altogether beyond reproach; and his Lordship cannot be regarded as in any sense an accurate letter-writer. I have omitted an unpleasant inaccuracy from his first paragraph.

PROSE.-VOL. III.

C C

VII.

THE FOUR AGES OF POETRY.

BY THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK.1

Qui inter hæc nutriuntur non magis sapere possunt, quam bene olere qui in culinâ habitant.-PETRONIUS.

POETRY, like the world, may be said to have four ages, but in a different order: the first age of poetry being the age of iron; the second, of gold; the third of silver; and the fourth of brass.

The first, or iron age of poetry, is that in which rude bards celebrate in rough numbers the exploits of ruder chiefs, in days when every man is a warrior, and when the great practical maxim of every form of society, "to keep what we have and to catch what we can," is not yet disguised under names of justice and forms of law, but is the naked motto of the naked sword, which is the only judge and jury in every question of meum and tuum. In these days, the only three trades flourishing (besides that of priest, which flourishes always) are those of king, thief, and beggar: the beggar being, for the most part, a king deject, and the thief a king expectant. asked of a stranger is, whether he is a beggar or a thief: the stranger, in reply, usually assumes the first, and awaits

1 Published in Ollier's Literary Miscellany, 1820. See Note to Defence of Poetry, Vol. III, p. 98.

The first question

See the Odyssey, passim: and Thucydides, I. 5. (PEACOCK'S NOTE.]

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