JOHN GAY TO DEAN SWIFT.

Bath, July 6th, 1728.

"In five or six days I set out upon an excursion to Herefordshire, to
Lady Scudamore's, but shall return here the beginning of August.... The
weather is extremely hot, the place is very empty; I have an inclination
to study, but the heat makes it impossible."[2]

* * * * *

"I suppose Mr. Gay will return from the Bath with twenty pounds more
flesh and two hundred pounds less in money," Swift wrote to Pope on July
16th. "Providence never designed him to be above two-and-twenty, by this
thoughtlessness and cullibility. He has as little foresight of age,
sickness, poverty, or loss of admirers, as a girl of fifteen."[3] From
this it may be deduced that Gay, whenever he was free from an attack of
colic, persevered in the pleasures of the table and of his favourite
quadrille.


JOHN GAY TO ALEXANDER POPE.

August 2nd, 1728.

"I have heard more than once from our friend at Court, who seemed, in
the letter she writ, to be in high health and spirits. Considering the
multiplicity of pleasures and delights that one is overrun with in those
places, I wonder how anyone has health and spirits enough to support
them. I am heartily glad she has, and whenever I hear so, I find it