ἢν δὲ πολλῷ ᾖ οὕτερος ἀγεννέστερος, προσπίπτων προσκυνέει τὸν ἕτερον. Herodotus, Histories, 1.134

My Lords and Gentlemen,

You will recall that in my last essay I recounted a joke told by some men of Upminster about the womenfolk of Essex. I had thought that I had done little more than to record the mores and disrespectful nature of the plebeian element of that countie. On the contrary, I have stirred up a hornets’ nest of Wokery amongst those who contend that matters of a jocular nature concerning womenfolk should be neither uttered nor committed to the page nor be impressed upon the senses in any manner whatsoever.

Mr Tonson’s chambers have been beset by a mob demanding that he should no longer publish my works. There has been a clamour to remove me from my small sinecure in the Stamp Office¹It is not known what office was held by the Somnambulist. It is likely that whatever office it was, it was secured for him by Sir Richard Steele who had been a Commissioner of the Stamp Office and with whom the Somnambulist was clearly on intimate terms. Whatever office was held by the Somnambulist it appears to have occupied little of his time. Abigail, herself once a maid of Essex, has even been pressed to quit my service by surly youths who beset her in the street.

Mr Tonson has had no truck with the mob and Abigail is a most loyal creature. The Stamp Office, however, is most vexed by my holding up a mirror to the World as it is. 

Since the departure of Sir Richard Steele the Stamp Office²This was in 1713 has been infested by Wokery. On account of my last essay, it has demanded of me that needs must I attend lectures in what they have styled “Training in Wokeplace Bias”. I have replied that in my four years as a gentleman commoner at Oxford I saw fit to attend no lectures and I see fit to attend none now. I have accordingly tendered my resignation. Fortunately, £700 per annum from my estates is sufficient for my meagre needs and Mr Tonson assures me that the proceeds from the publication of my Treatise will make up the rest. He has consulted Sir Tobias Younge who has vouchsafed to him that he will hold the Stamp Office to account in the Court of Publick Opinion and that by so doing Mr Tonson assures me that at least 100 copies will be added to the first impression alone of my Treatise.

But my travails are as nothing compared to the outrage which His Majestie’s Government is seeking to impose upon these Islands. Last Friday I ordered three geese and a side of beef from the butcher for the forthcoming Christmas Feast. On Saturday the jackanapeses who purport to hold high office in this Realm have decreed that because the Foul Pestilence is again abroad, we must stay in our abodes. They have ordered that we must foreswear all seasonal wassailing. We may not even consort in the coffee houses in accordance with the Rule of Half a Dozen or in Bubbles of Companionability. Not since the days of Master Cromwell³A reference to the 1645 Cromwellian Directory of Public Worship which is popularly believed to have “abolished” Christmas have the English people had to endure such a constraint upon their antient liberty to spread Plague wheresoever they please. I fear that soon we will be ordered to abase ourselves before His Majestie’s Ministers in the manner of the antient Persians recounted by Herodotus.

It is on this sombre and most unseasonable note that

I remain your humble and obedient servant,

The Somnambulist.