![The case between the proprietors of news-papers, and the coffee-men of London and Westminster, fairly stated. Being remarks on their case lately publish’d. Wherein The False Pretences, Wild Project, and Groundless Complaints of that insolent set of Men are duly examin’d, properly expos’d, and thoroughly confuted; and their Calumny of Abuses and Impositions justly retorted. With a proposal for remedying the flagrant, scandalous and growing Impositions of the Coffee-Men upon the Publick. To which is annex’d, I. Henley the orator and the Butchers […] II. A Whip for the Post-Boy […] III. An Inspection into the Spectator and other News-Papers […] IV. Polly Peachum’s Child […] V. The Reigning Devil, or Hell Upon Earth: Giving an Account of the Women Mollies […] VI. The Cormorant of St. Paul’s […] VII. A Solution and farther Observation not to be nam’d but understood by those that are Masters of the Art of Thinking (London, printed for R. Walker, [1729]), 23, [1]pp.; 8°. BL: 12330. f.26(6). ESTCT19980. Extract, pp. 5–13](https://images.tandf.co.uk/common/jackets/crclarge/978131509/9781315094632.jpg "The case between the proprietors of news-papers, and the coffee-men of London and Westminster, fairly stated. Being remarks on their case lately publish’d. Wherein The False Pretences, Wild Project, and Groundless Complaints of that insolent set of Men are duly examin’d, properly expos’d, and thoroughly confuted; and their Calumny of Abuses and Impositions justly retorted. With a proposal for remedying the flagrant, scandalous and growing Impositions of the Coffee-Men upon the Publick. To which is annex’d, I. Henley the orator and the Butchers […] II. A Whip for the Post-Boy […] III. An Inspection into the Spectator and other News-Papers […] IV. Polly Peachum’s Child […] V. The Reigning Devil, or Hell Upon Earth: Giving an Account of the Women Mollies […] VI. The Cormorant of St. Paul’s […] VII. A Solution and farther Observation not to be nam’d but understood by those that are Masters of the Art of Thinking (London, printed for R. Walker, [1729]), 23, [1]pp.; 8°. BL: 12330. f.26(6). ESTCT19980. Extract, pp. 5–13")
ABSTRACT
This is extracted from a 23-page satirical response to the paper scuffle between The Case of the Coffee-men (above, pp. 89–130) and The case between the proprietors of news-papers, and the subscribing coffee-men, fairly stated (above, pp. 131–51). The similarity between its title and that of the latter tract suggests that it may be a satirical spoiler intended to be mistaken for the other text. The first half is occupied with an account of the contest between the newspaper proprietors and the coffee-men, with both sides subject to ridicule. The satirist notes the 154number of new weekly papers of entertainment that are offered to the public, and their increasing reliance on gossip and scandal, which suggests to the writer that the coffee-men’s plan to start their own newspapers is poorly conceived. The satirist suggests further that both the coffee-men and newspaper proprietors rely on each other s business: that newspapers both disseminate and produce news in the coffee-room; and that coffee-houses rely on newspapers to attract custom. In this way both coffee-houses and newspapers profit from the circulation of lies and gossip. The coffee-men are further attacked for their custom of employing ‘tempting, deluding, ogling, pretty young Hussies to be their Bar-Keepers’ (pp. 166–7). The second half of the pamphlet is bulked out with a farrago of miscellaneous news and gossip, concerning, amongst other things, an altercation between the Dissenting minister John ‘Orator’ Henley (1692–1756) and the butchers of Newport Market; the state of the Post-Boy newspaper edited by Abel Boyer; the revival of the Universal Spectator by Henry Baker in 1728; London’s underground homosexual culture of ‘Women Mollies’; and an allegorical reading of a recent sighting of a cormorant (a symbol for the devil) perched on the cross atop the dome of St Paul’s cathedral.
