repeated these very words in the morning, with only a small
mistake of the quantity of the latter, which she chose to call
Priapus instead of Priapus; and her husband swore that, though he
might possibly have named Mercury to her (for he had heard of such
an heathen god), he never in his life could anywise have put her
in mind of that other deity, with whom he had no acquaintance.

Another remarkable incident was, that during her whole pregnancy
she constantly longed for everything she saw; nor could be
satisfied with her wish unless she enjoyed it clandestinely; and
as nature, by true and accurate observers, is remarked to give us
no appetites without furnishing us with the means of gratifying
them; so had she at this time a most marvellous glutinous quality
attending her fingers, to which, as to birdlime, everything
closely adhered that she handled.

To omit other stories, some of which may be perhaps the growth of
superstition, we proceed to the birth of our hero, who made his
first appearance on this great theatre the very day when the
plague first broke out in 1665. Some say his mother was delivered
of him in an house of an orbicular or round form in Covent-garden;
but of this we are not certain. He was some years afterwards
baptized by the famous Mr. Titus Oates.

Nothing very remarkable passed in his years of infancy, save that,
as the letters TH are the most difficult of pronunciation, and the
last which a child attains to the utterance of, so they were the
first that came with any readiness from young master Wild. Nor
must we omit the early indications which he gave of the sweetness
of his temper; for though he was by no means to be terrified into