which have made you the most able and unbiassed patriot. A vigorous imagination, an extensive apprehension, and a ready judgment have distinguished you in all the illustrious parts of administration, in a reign attended with such difficulties, that the same talents without the same quickness in the possession of them would have been incapable of conquering. The natural success of such abilities has advanced you to a seat in that illustrious House where you were received by a crowd of your relations. Great as you are in your honours and personal qualities, I know you will forgive a humble neighbour the vanity of pretending to a place in your friendship, and subscribing himself, My Lord, Your Lordship's most obliged and most devoted Servant, RICHARD STEELE. FOOTNOTES: [1] Charles Montague, grandson of the first Earl of Manchester, was born in 1661, at Horton, in Northamptonshire, and was educated at Westminster, and at Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1687 he joined with Prior in writing the "County and the City Mouse," a burlesque on Dryden's "Hind and Panther." Montague was amongst those who signed the invitation sent to William of Orange. After the Revolution, he was made a Lord of the Treasury (March 1692), Chancellor of the Exchequer (1694), and First Lord of the Treasury in 1698. These last two offices he held together until 1699. Among the important schemes which he carried out were a re-coining of the money, the founding of the Bank of England and the new East India Company, and the issue of Exchequer bills. In 1700 he was made Auditor of the Exchequer, and was created Baron Halifax. A Tory House of Commons twice attacked him, but without success. In 1706 he took a leading part in the negotiations which led to the Union with Scotland. He voted for the sentence upon Dr. Sacheverell in 1710, and in the subsequent peace negotiations he opposed the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht. In October 1714 he again became First Lord of the Treasury, and was created Viscount Sunbury and Earl of Halifax; but he died in May 1715. He was the patron of numerous men of letters, and was lauded by many as a second Mæcenas. Pope says he was "fed with soft dedication all day long." In 1711 Steele and Addison dedicated the second volume of the _Spectator_ to Lord Halifax. THE TATLER BY ISAAC BICKERSTAFF, ESQ. =No. 194.= [STEELE.[2] From _Tuesday, July 4_, to _Thursday, July 6, 1710_. Militat omnis amans.--OVID, Amor. El. ix. 1. _From my own Apartment, July 5._