The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza HaywoodWhicher, George Frisbie
General
The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood
Whicher, George Frisbie
Haywood, Eliza Fowler, 1693?-1756
"Sometimes, when surrounded by my Friends, such as Anthony Hammond,
Esq; Mr. Philip Horneck, Mr. Philips, Mr.----, Mrs. Centlivre, Mrs.
Fowk, Mrs. Eliza Haywood, and other celebrated Wits, of which my
House, for some Years has been the general Rendezvous, a good Bowl of
Punch before me, and the Glass going round in a constant Circle of
Mirth and Good Humour, I have, in a Moment, beheld Sights which has
froze my very Blood, and put me into Agonies that disordered the whole
Company" (p. 131).
The last anecdote in the first section is a repetition at some length of
the story of Campbell's adventures in Holland, not as related in Defoe's
"Life and Adventures," but according to the version in Mrs Haywood's
"Dumb Projector." The beginning, which has to do with a grave old
gentleman who was bit by a viper, is told in almost the same words;
indeed some letters that passed between the characters are identically
the same, and the end, though much abbreviated, contains a number of
sentences taken word for word from the earlier telling of the story.
Finally, Mrs. Haywood was the first and hitherto the only writer of the
Campbell pamphlets who had printed letters supposedly addressed to the
prophet by his clients. The device was peculiarly hers. The "Original
Letters sent to Mr. Campbel by his Consulters" in the "Secret Memoirs"
are similar to those already composed by her for "A Spy upon the
Conjurer." There is no reason to think that she did not invent the later
epistles as well as the former.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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