[35]
ally the Author of the Romance himself: But a Gentleman who sat on the opposite Side of the Table, who had come piping-hot from reading the History of King William's and Queen Anne's Wars, and who was thought, at the Bottom, to envy the President the Honour both of the Romance and Explanation too, gave an entire new Turn to it all. He acquainted the Club, That Mr. President was altogether wrong in every Supposition he had made, except that one, where the Great Watch-Coat was said by him to represent Europe, or at least a great Part of it:—So far he acknowledged he was pretty right; but that he had not gone far enough backwards into our History to come at the Truth. He then acquainted them, that the dividing the Great Watch-Coat did, and could, allude to nothing else in the World but the Partition-Treaty; which, by the Bye, he told them, was the most unhappy and scandalous Transaction in all King William's Life: It was that false Step, and that only, says he, rising from his Chair, and striking his Hand upon the Table with great Violence; it was that false Step, says he, knitting his Brows
