THE FIRST PROPHET OF FLEET STREET [To the Editor of
THE SPECTATOR] Stn,—Strange as it may seem, the following words were written, nearly 18o years ago, by, of all people in the world, Doctor Samuel Johnson, who might almost have foreseen the present air menace to his beloved London. In his Rasselas, Prince of Abbissinia, a crack-brained, would-be flyer, speaks thus :
" If men were all virtuous I should with great alacrity teach them to fly. But what would be the security of the good if the bad could, at pleasure, invade them from the sky? Against an army sailing through the clouds neither walls, nor mountains nor seas could affoid any security. A flight of northern savages might hover in the wind and alight with irresistible violence upon the capital of a fruitful region.'
It will be remembered that Rasselas was written in the evenings of one week to defray the funeral expenses of the Doctor's dearly-loved mother. He was paid £100 for it.—
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