It was well meant; the Duchess said it was very obscure, and I found out that it was not to be understood at all, nor by any alteration to be made intelligible; so out it went.
"We have this afternoon been reading Polybius.

We were mightily pleased with the account of the Roman wars with the Gauls; but we did not think his account of the Achaians, and his remarks upon the historian Philarchus, so entertaining, as for aught we knew it might be judicious.
"I know you will be very uneasy unless I tell you what picture the Duchess hath in hand.

It is a round landscape of Paul Brill, which Mr.
Dormer[11] lent her, in which there are figures very neatly finished.

It is larger than any she hath yet done; by the dead colouring I guess (though her Grace is not very sanguine) it will in the end turn out very well." J.G.
"I do not understand which of our correspondents this letter is fit for; for there is neither wit, folly, nor solid sense, nor even a good foundation for nonsense, which is the only thing that I am well versed in.

There were all these good things in the delightful letter you sent us; but as all the different hands are not known, they are unanswerable: for the future, then, pray sign or come,--the latter is best; for whoever can write so well must speak so; but now I think we had better always write for the good of posterity." C.Q.
JOHN GAY TO DEAN SWIFT.
Middleton Stoney, November 9th, 1729.
"I have been in Oxfordshire with the Duke of Queensberry for these three months, and have had very little correspondence with any of our friends.
"I have employed my time in new writing a damned play, which I wrote several years ago, called 'The Wife of Bath.' As it is approved or disapproved of by my friends, when I come to town, I shall either have it acted, or let it alone, if weak brethren do not take offence at it.
The ridicule turns upon superstition, and I have avoided the very words bribery and corruption.