Editing Christopher Smart (section)

===''The Midwife''===
[[Image:The Midwife titlepage.JPG|thumb|right|Title page of ''The Midwife'']]
''The Midwife'', first published on 16 October 1751 and lasting until April 1753, was produced primarily by Smart while he worked on ''The Student''.<ref name="Sherbo p. 70">{{harvnb|Sherbo|1967|p=70}}</ref> This magazine was popular enough to be published in four editions.<ref>{{harvnb|Mounsey|2001|p=99}}</ref> To hide his identity for practical and humorous reasons, he adopted the persona of a midwife, also known as a "Mrs. Midwife" in slang, and called this persona "Mrs. Mary Midnight".<ref name="Sherbo p. 70" />

When his poem "Night Piece" was attacked by [[William Kenrick (writer)|William Kenrick]] in ''Kapelion, or Poetical Ordinary'', possibly out of a prearranged publicity stunt, Smart used ''The Midwife'' in December 1750, to attack back at Kenrick and promised an ''Old Woman's Dunciad'' to be written against the other poet.<ref name="Sherbo p. 72">{{harvnb|Sherbo|1967|p=72}}</ref> However, Kenrick beat Smart to the use of the title and printed his own in January 1751.<ref name="Sherbo p. 72" /> This feud lasted as attacks published in a few issues of ''The Midwife'', but it soon died out when Smart focused his attention to writing a prologue and epilogue for a production of ''Othello'' and using the magazine to promote it.<ref>{{harvnb|Sherbo|1967|p=73}}</ref>

His attention slowly shifted away from ''The Midwife'' when he wrote for, and won, the "Seatonian Prize" for his ''On the Immensity of the Supreme Being'' and when he began working with Newbery's children's magazine, ''The Lilliputian Magazine''.<ref>{{harvnb|Sherbo|1967|pp=74–75}}</ref> However, Smart returned to this character full force when he established ''The Old Woman's Oratory; or Henley in Petticoats'' in December 1751.<ref>{{harvnb|Sherbo|1967|p=75}}</ref> The ''Oratory'' included Smart playing as Mrs. Midnight, various songs and dances, animal acts, and "miscellany" acts.<ref>{{harvnb|Mounsey|2001|p=119}}</ref> The ''Oratory'' was successful, and was completely redone on 21 January 1752.<ref>{{harvnb|Mounsey|2001|p=128}}</ref> However, not everyone enjoyed the show, and Horace Walpole described the performance as "the lowest buffoonery in the world even to me who am used to my uncle Horace."<ref>{{harvnb|Sherbo|1967|p=80}}</ref> Late in 1752, Smart finished and published a collection of his works as ''Poems on Several Occasions'', which resulted in the end of the ''Oratory'' and ''The Midwife''.<ref>{{harvnb|Mounsey|2001|pp=130–131}}</ref>