invention of the perfected spectacles as theirs, and ended in offering to bet “20 guineas to their 10, that neither they nor Mr Marshall can make a better telescope than we can.” This, though rather a descent from the high horse previously occupied by them, was sufficient to rouse the anger of an interested yet hitherto passive spectator, and Mr Marshall presently (May 8) indignantly growled forth:—
THE best method now used for Grinding Spectacles and other glasses, was by me at great charge and pains found out, which I shewed to the Royal Society in the year 1693, and by them approved; being gentlemen the best skilled in optics, for which they gave me their certificate to let the world know what I had done. Since which I have made spectacles, telescopes, and microscopes, for all the Kings and Prince’s Courts in Europe. And as for the 2 new spectacle makers, that would insinuate to the world that they were my best workmen for several years: the one I never employed, the other I found as I doubt not but many gentlemen have and will find them both, to be only boasters and not performers of what they advertise, &c. &c.
After pursuing this strain till he had run down, Mr Marshall concludes by saying, “What I have inserted is nothing but truth.” At the same time Yarwell and Sterrop overwhelmed the raisers of this hornets’ nest with a new attention, in which among other things was the following:—
Mr Willdey and Brandreth have the folly to believe that abundance of words is sufficient to gain applause, and therefore throw ’em out without regard to truth and reason, but as that is an affront to the understanding of gentlemen that use the goods they sell, they being persons of discerning judgment, there needs no other answer to what they have published than to compare one part with another. They set forth with a lying vaunt that their two-foot telescope would perform the same that a common four-foot one would do, and when ’twas replied that was false, and a four-foot one offered to try, they poorly shift off with crying