The story is the usual heroical story of valorous deeds and peerless loves; the author is careful to assert that he is perfectly original: "All ... is genuine, nothing stole, nothing strained." He has been especially careful to avoid imitating the French and the elegancies of "that ceremonious nation." After such a declaration we are rather surprised to hear Periander thus answer a lady who, in the usual way, had asked him for his inevitable story: "Madam," said he, "your expressions speak you no less rich in virtue than beauty.... I should be more savage then the beasts that Orpheus charmed into civility, should I remain inexorable to the intreaties of so sweet an orator, whose perfections are such that I cannot but account it as great a glory to obey you, as it would make me sensible of shame to refuse any thing you should command, though it were to sacrifice my life and honour, which are the only jewels I ever prized in my prosperity, and which is all that Fortune hath left to my disposal in my adversity." Then he tells his story, which we had better not listen to, for it begins: "Know you then that in the city of Corinth, there dwelt a gentleman called Eleutherius ...," and we know full well what such beginnings threaten. The romance goes on describing bloody feuds and matchless beauties. Here is in characteristic style a portrait of a matchless beauty: "The pillow blest with a kiss from her cheeks, as pregnant with delight, swelled on either side.... A lock that had stollen from its sweet prison, folded in cloudy curls, lay dallying with her breath, sometimes striving to get a kiss, and then repulsed flew back, sometimes obtaining its desired bliss, and then as rapt with joy, retreated in wanton caperings.... Her breasts at liberty displayed were of so pure a whiteness as if one's eye through the transparent skin, had viewed the milky treasures they inclosed." Oh! for a Boileau, shall we exclaim, to cut off the flowers of such paper gardens! for a Defoe to show how prose fiction should be written! But Boileau is abroad and Defoe's time is yet to come. Wait, besides, for this is nothing and we have better in store; that was love, here is war: