=188=: 28. =The Pope's Procession.= November 17, the anniversary of the accession of Queen Elizabeth, was long celebrated by parades and processions in which the pope and Catholic traditions were turned into ridicule. These parades were often the occasion of popular tumult; but, in 1711, some of the more violent Whigs planned an especially offensive demonstration, which had to be suppressed by the authorities. Swift writes on the evening of the day: "This is Queen Elizabeth's birth-day" [he was in error there; it was not her birth, but her accession, that was celebrated], "usually kept in this town by apprentices, etc.; but the Whigs designed a mighty procession by midnight, and had laid out a thousand pounds to dress up the pope, devil, cardinals, Sacheverel, etc., and carry them with torches about, and burn them.... But they were seized last night, by order of the secretary; you will have an account of it, for they bawl it about the streets already. They had some very foolish and mischievous designs; and it was thought they would have put the rabble upon assaulting my lord treasurer's house, and the secretary's; and other violences. The militia was raised to prevent it, and now, I suppose, all will be quiet."--_Journal to Stella_, November 17, 1711. Addison naturally rather minimizes the disturbance by the absurd question of Sir Roger. =189=: 10. =Baker's Chronicle.= See note, p. 226. The _Chronicle_ was a favourite authority with Sir Roger; in the next paper we find him quoting it at length. =189=: 16. =Squire's.= A coffee-house in Holborn, near Gray's Inn, specially frequented by the benchers of the inn. =189=: 23. =The Supplement.= A newspaper of the time, issued on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. XXVIII. SIR ROGER IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. =Motto.= "Yet we must go whither Numa and Ancus have gone before."--Horace, _Epistles_, I. vi. 27. =190=: 2. =Paper upon Westminster Abbey=, _Spectator_, No. 26. That paper with this one perhaps show Addison, in two different moods, at his very best. =190=: 17. =The Widow Trueby's Water.= The "strong waters" of that time, like many of the patent medicines of ours, owed their vogue largely to the fact that they were made of distilled spirits. See Addison's account of some of the quack medicines of the day in _Tatler_, No. 224. =191=: 11. =The sickness being at Dantzic.= The great plague there in 1709. =191=: 14. =A hackney-coach.= Hackney-coaches, or carriages for hire in the streets, were introduced into London during the latter half of the seventeenth century. By Addison's time they had become common; in 1710, by statute, the number to be licensed in London was fixed at eight hundred. The fare was a mile and a half for a shilling. The coachmen were an uncivil and pugnacious class, which accounts for Sir Roger's preference for an elderly one. Graphic pictures of the manners of coachmen may be found in Gay's _Trivia_, ii. 230-240, 311-315; iii. 35-50.