Whereas several walking-dead persons arrived within the bills of mortality, before and since the 15th instant, having been informed of my warrant[321] given to the Company of Upholders, and being terrified thereat (it not having been advertised that privilege or protection would be allowed), have resolved forthwith to retire to their several and respective abodes in the country, hoping thereby to elude any commission of interment that may issue out against them; and being informed of such their fallacious designs, I do hereby give notice, as well for the good of the public as for the great veneration I have for the before-mentioned useful society, that a process is gone out against them, and that, in case of contempt, they may be found or heard of at most coffee-houses in and about Westminster.
I must desire my readers to help me out from time to time in the correction of these my essays; for as a shaking hand does not always write legibly, the press sometimes prints one word for another; and when my paper is to be revised, I am perhaps so busy in observing the spots of the moon, that I have not time to find out the _errata_ that are crept into my lucubrations.
[314] "Sir Richard Steele joined in this paper" (Tickell).
[315] This paper seems to have been occasioned by a pirated edition of the _Tatler_ which came out just at this time. The following advertisement concerning it, was subjoined to the next paper in the original edition of the _Tatler_ in folio, and often repeated in the subsequent numbers:
"Whereas I am informed, that there is a spurious and very incorrect edition of these papers printed in a small volume; these are to give notice, that there is in the press, and will speedily be published, a very neat edition, fitted for the pocket, on extraordinary good paper, a new brevier letter, like the Elzevir editions, and adorned with several cuts by the best artists. To which is added a preface, index, and many notes, for the better explanation of these lucubrations, by the author, who has revised, amended, and made many additions to the whole. _N. B._--Notice shall be given in this paper, when I conclude my first volume." (No. 102, Advertisement.)
This spurious edition was sold by Hills. It was thus advertised in the _Post Boy_, by A. Boyer, 1st to 3rd December 1709: "This day is published one hundred _Tatlers_, by Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq., on a fine paper, in a neat pocket volume. Price, bound, 4s., which is less than half the price of a set in folio. Sold by H. Hills, in Blackfriars, near the Water-side."