The Merry-Thought: or the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany | Page 4

I care,?Since I can find another Mare?
_L. M. August._
Another target of the pamphlet was _The Spectator_ in general and Addison in particular. In his dedication, J. Roberts first insists that the graffiti in his collection are notable examples of wit.[12] He next goes out of his way to associate the contents of _The Merry-Thought_ with _The Spectator_:
_But I may venture to say, That good Things are not always respected as they ought to be: The People of the World will sometimes overlook a Jewel, to avoid a T--d.... Nay, I have even found some of the _Spectator's_ Works in a Bog-house, Companions with Pocky-Bills and Fortune-telling Advertisements...._
[Footnote 12: Roberts was almost certainly the collector of the graffiti printed in _The Merry-Thought_ as well as the author of the dedication, but the dedication was itself signed with the name "Hurlo Thrumbo." Similarly, the title-page listed Hurlo Thrumbo as the publisher of the work. In 1729 _Hurlothrumbo: or, The Super-Natural_, a play by a half-mad dancer and fiddler, Samuel Johnson of Cheshire (1691-1773), had set all of London talking. The irrational, amusing speeches and actions of Hurlothrumbo, the play's title-character, gained instant fame, and two years later Roberts, by attributing his collection to the labors of that celebrity, had every reason to expect that the book would attract immediate attention. For a detailed account of the relationship between Johnson's play and _The Merry-Thought_, see George R. Guffey, "Graffiti, Hurlo Thrumbo, and the Other Samuel Johnson," in _Forum: A Journal of the Humanities and Fine Arts_ (University of Houston), XVII (1979), 35-47.]
In a series of essays in _The Spectator_ (Nos. 58-61; May, 1711), Addison had earlier, of course, been at pains to distinguish between "true wit" and "false wit." Particularly abhorrent to him was the rebus. The first part of _The Merry-Thought_ alone contains seven rebuses from "_Drinking-Glasses, at a private Club of Gentlemen_" (pp. 12-13), as well as several examples of other kinds of "wit" which Addison would have disdained.
During the twenty-five years that followed the publication of the _Merry-Thought_ series, a few additional pieces of graffiti were published in England and America.[13] In 1761 _The New Boghouse Miscellany_ appeared, but the contents of this book had little in common with the _Merry-Thought_ pamphlets. Only the scatological humor of the subtitle:
_A Companion for the Close-stool._ Consisting of Original Pieces in Prose and Verse by several Modern Authors. Printed on an excellent soft Paper; and absolutely necessary for all those, who read with a View to Convenience, as well as Delight. Revised and corrected by a Gentleman well skilled in the Fundamentals of Literature, near Privy-Garden
and the generally anti-intellectual thrust of its preface were reminiscent of the _Merry-Thought_ pamphlets. Not until the last half of the twentieth century would the graffito in English receive the kind of attention that had been paid it in England in the 1730s.
[Footnote 13: See, for example, _The Scarborough Miscellany_ (London, 1732), pp. 34, 35; _The Connoisseur_, April 11, 1754, p. 87; _The New American Magazine_, No. 12, December, 1758.]
University of California
Los Angeles
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
_The Merry-Thought: or, The Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany_ is reproduced from a copy of the third edition in the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library. A typical type page (p. 20) measures 173 x 87 mm.
[Illustration:?{tavern surmounted by cherub carrying banner reading "ha! ha! ha!"}]
The
MERRY-THOUGHT:
or, the
Glass-Window and Bog-House
MISCELLANY.
Taken from
The Original Manuscripts written in _Diamond_?by Persons of the first Rank and Figure in _Great?Britain_; relating to Love, Matrimony, Drunkenness,?Sobriety, Ranting, Scandal, Politicks, Gaming,?and many other Subjects, _Serious_ and _Comical_.
Faithfully Transcribed from the Drinking-Glasses and?Windows in the several noted _Taverns_, _Inns_, and?other _Publick Places_ in this Nation. Amongst which?are intermixed the Lucubrations of the polite Part?of the World, written upon Walls in Bog-houses, _&c._
_Published by_ HURLO THRUMBO.
_Gameyorum, Wildum, Gorum,?Gameyorum a Gamy,?Flumarum a Flumarum,?A Rigdum Bollarum?A Rigdum, for a little Gamey._
Bethleham-Wall, Moor-Fields.
The Third Edition; with very Large Additions and Alterations.
_LONDON:_
Printed for J. ROBERTS in _Warwick-Lane_; and Sold by?the Booksellers in Town and Country. [Price 6 _d._]
_N. B._ Some Pieces having been inadvertently inserted in the Second Part of this Miscellany, whoever it is that shall hereafter send any Thing which reflects on the Character, &c. of any Person, whether it be a Nobleman, or a Link-Boy, shall receive no Favour from our Hands.
The
DEDICATION
To The
Honourable and Worthy Authors?of the following Curious Pieces.
Gentlemen and Ladies,
_Would it not be great Pity, that the profound Learning and Wit of so many illustrious Personages, who have favoured the Publick with their Lucubrations in Diamond Characters upon _Drinking-Glasses_, on _Windows_, on _Walls_, and in _Bog-houses_, should be left to the World? Consider only, Gentlemen and Ladies, how many Accidents might rob us of these sparkling Pieces, if the industrious Care of the Collector had not taken this Way of preserving them, and handing them to Posterity. In the first Place, some careless Drawer breaks the