The periodical literature of the day was of little value. The few papers that existed were either brief news-sheets, or were repositories for questions and answers, supplied by the readers, and of feeble verse. The only periodical which was in any sense a forerunner of the _Tatler_ was Defoe's _Review_, in which part of the space was set apart for "Advice from the Scandalous Club," where men, not parties, and things rather than persons, were censured. When the quantity of matter was too great for the available space, a monthly "Supplementary Journal" was published. Afterwards Defoe gave a friendly greeting to Steele's new work, which dealt with the social questions and follies of the day in a style that was more thorough, and at the same time more genial, than his own. The first number of the _Tatler_ was published on April 22, 1709, and it appeared three times a week. It was a single folio sheet, price one penny, and four numbers were given away gratuitously. The reader found there items of news, accounts of popular entertainments, poetry, and learning. As time went on the news articles were dropped, and each number was gradually confined to one subject. Isaac Bickerstaff was described as "an old man, a philosopher, a humourist, an astrologer, and a censor." The other characters described from time to time are not essential to the general plan of the paper. "The general purpose of the whole," as Steele wrote at the close, "has been to recommend truth, innocence, honour, and virtue, as the chief ornaments of life." He was satisfied if one vice had been destroyed, or a morning's cheerfulness given to an honest mind. As censor he thought fit to speak under a mask, because he knew that his own life was "at best but pardonable."