P. 6, lines 3-4. Ridpath: George Ridpath (d. 1726), Whig journalist. Abel Roper (1665-1726), publisher of the _Tory Post Boy_. P. 7, line 10. Pinkethman: William Pinkethman (or Penkethman) (d. 1725), a comic actor said to have once eaten three chickens in two seconds. See TE, 4, 220, 377. line 12. Maypole: This remarkable barometer of intellectual history was razed by the Puritan parliament in 1644. A new one, 134 feet tall, was set up at the Restoration; it, or a successor, had decayed to a height of twenty feet in 1717 when Sir Isaac Newton acquired it and presented it to James Pound to use as a telescope mount. P. 8, line 2. Newer Square: Cavendish Square, according to Horace Walpole's annotation. line 6. The bridge at Putney Ferry was completed in 1729. P. 9, lines 4-5. Thomas Tickell's poetical _Epistle from a Lady in England to a Gentleman at Avignon_ went through five editions in 1717. lines 6-7. "Caleb D'Anvers" was the pseudonym under which appeared _The Craftsman_, the opposition journal directed by Bolingbroke and Pultney. Bramston's expression of ignorance must be ironic. P. 10, lines 1-2. Arthur Onslow, who became Speaker in 1728, insisted that all members bow to the Speaker's Chair when entering or leaving the House (Thomas, p. 356). line 12. The "Kentish Petition" was presented to the Tory-controlled Parliament on 8 May 1701 by five gentlemen of Kent. It urged Parliament to grant speedily to King William the subsidies that would enable him to pursue his European wars against Louis XIV. Parliament did not consider its words soft; it voted the petition seditious, scandalous, and insolent, and arrested the five gentlemen, who thereupon became popular heroes, at least among the Whigs. See Defoe's _History of the Kentish Petition_ (1701) and Ellis, pp. 53-56, 65-66. P. 11, lines 3-8. Pultney: William Pultney (1684-1764), later Earl of Bath. The leader of the "Patriot" opposition to Walpole in the House of Commons. Hervey reluctantly concedes that his abilities were outstanding (pp. 790-91). P. 12, line 4. the Rod: that is, the rod of the Serjeant-at-Arms, the officer responsible for keeping order in the House of Commons. line 6. the Bar: The Bar marked the outer limit of the House, and, as the lines imply, was where offenders stood to be reprimanded. lines 11-12. The "one cause" is presumably Walpole's patronage. The Cornish constituencies were notoriously corrupt even by eighteenth-century standards, and Walpole cultivated the Scots assiduously. A Scottish "laird" is a landowner, not a "lord" in the English sense. P. 13, line 12. Flying-Squadron: apparently a group which claimed to vote by principle rather than from attachment to any party. Sir Joseph Jekyll was considered its leader. See Sedgwick, _House of Commons_, 2, 175; Realey, p. 54; and OED, "Squadron 7," "Squadrone b.," and "Squadronist."