I think I told you that this good woman was a person of no small note
and consequence throughout our whole village and township; --that her
fame had spread itself to the very out-edge and circumference of that
circle of importance, of which kind every soul living, whether he has a
shirt to his back or no, ----has one surrounding him; --which said
circle, by the way, whenever ’tis said that such a one is of great
weight and importance in the _world_, ----I desire may be enlarged or
contracted in your worship’s fancy, in a compound ratio of the station,
profession, knowledge, abilities, height and depth (measuring both ways)
of the personage brought before you.
In the present case, if I remember, I fixed it about four or five miles,
which not only comprehended the whole parish, but extended itself to two
or three of the adjacent hamlets in the skirts of the next parish; which
made a considerable thing of it. I must add, That she was, moreover,
very well looked on at one large grange-house, and some other odd houses
and farms within two or three miles, as I said, from the smoke of her
own chimney: ----But I must here, once for all, inform you, that all
this will be more exactly delineated and explain’d in a map, now in the
hands of the engraver, which, with many other pieces and developements
of this work, will be added to the end of the twentieth volume, --not to
swell the work, --I detest the thought of such a thing; --but by way of
commentary, scholium, illustration, and key to such passages, incidents,
or innuendos as shall be thought to be either of private interpretation,
or of dark or doubtful meaning, after my life and my opinions shall have
been read over (now don’t forget the meaning of the word) by all the
_world_; ----which, betwixt you and me, and in spite of all the
gentlemen-reviewers in _Great Britain_, and of all that their worships
shall undertake to write or say to the contrary, --I am determined shall
be the case. --I need not tell your worship, that all this is spoke in
confidence.
CHAPTER XIV
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