the tradesmen, and retired shopkeepers of London and Middlesex; in short, persons without the education and sentiments of gentlemen and ladies, thrust into circumstances in which, with the allowable partiality of self-estimation, they fancy themselves to belong to that rank, and ape the fashionable amusements of their betters: where, perhaps, the widow of a rich grocer, or the dashing daughter of mine host, now a gemman and an Esquire, by noise and glare, and affectation, hope to make you forget the signs of the three sugar-loaves, or the hog in armour: to such impotent attempts of inveterate and incurable vulgarity, to pass for gentility, the description in question either applies generally, as was intended, or does not apply at all. One thing, I observed, that the wise and good characters in that production, have not been applied by friends.
