PERSONAL

The Muse's Darling, Confidant and Friend.-HALIFAX, CHARLES MONTAGU, EARL, C. 1700, An Epistle to Charles, Earl of Dorset.

Dorset, the Grace of the Courts, the Muses'
Pride,

Patron of Arts, and Judge of Nature, died.
The scourge of Pride, tho' sanctify'd or great,
Of Fops in Learning, and of Knaves in State:
Yet soft his Nature, tho' severe his Lay;
His Anger moral, and his Wisdom gay.
Blest Satirist! who touch'd the Mean so true,
As show'd, Vice had his hate and pity too.
Blest Courtier! who could King and Country
please,

Yet sacred keep his Friendships and his Ease.
Blest Peer! his great Forefathers' ev'ry grace
Reflecting, and reflected in his Race;

Where other Buckhursts, other Dorsets shine, And Patriots still, or Poets, deck the Line. -POPE, ALEXANDER, 1706, On Charles Earl of Dorset, Epitaphs.

He was the finest gentleman in the voluptuous court of Charles the second, and in the gloomy one of King William. He had as much wit as his first master, or his contemporaries Buckingham and Rochester, without the royal want of feeling, the duke's want of principles, or the earl's want of thought.-WALPOLE, HORACE, 1758-1806, A Catalogue of the Royal and Noble Authors of England, Scotland and Ireland, vol. IV, p. 15.

A huge stout figure rolls in now to join the toasters in Shire Lane. In the puffy, once handsome face, there are signs of age, for its owner is past sixty; yet he is dressed in superb fashion; and in an hour or so, when the bottle has been diligently circulated, his wit will be brighter and keener than that of any young man present. I do not say it will be repeatable, for the talker belongs to a

past age, even coarser than that of the Kitkat. He is Charles Sackville, famous as a companion of the merriest and most disreputable of the Stuarts, famous—or, rather, infamous-for his mistress, Nell Gwynn, famous for his verses, for his patronage of poets, and for his wild frolics in early life, when Lord Buckhurst.THOMPSON, MRS. KATHERINE AND J. C. (GRACE AND PHILIP WHARTON), 1860, The Wits and Beaux of Society.

A small poet, but a generous patron of poets. DENNIS, JOHN, 1894, The Age of Pope, p. 65.

GENERAL

To my Lord Brunker's, by appointment, in the Piazza, in Covent-Guarding; where I occasioned much mirth with a ballet I brought with me, made from the seamen at sea to their ladies in town; saying Sir W. Pen, Sir G. Ascue, and Sir J. Lawson made them.-PEPYS, SAMUEL, 1664-65, Jan. 2.

Yet, my Lord, you must suffer me a little to complain of you, that you too soon withdraw from us a contentment, of which we expected the continuance, because you gave it us so early. It is a revolt, without occasion, from your party, where your merits had already raised you to the highest commands, and where you have not the excuse of other men, that you have been ill-used, and therefore laid down arms. I know no other quarrel you can have to verse, than that which Spurina had to his beauty, when he tore and mangled the features of his face, only because they pleased too well the sight. It was an honour which seemed to wait for you, to lead out a new colony of writers from the mother-nation: and, upon the first spreading of your ensigns, there had

been many in a readiness to have followed so fortunate a leader.-DRYDEN, JOHN, 1668, Essay of Dramatic Poesy, Dedication, Works, vol. xv, p. 278.

A person that hath been highly esteemed for his admirable vein in poetry, and other polite learning, as several things of his composition, while Lord Buckhurst, shew. -WOOD, ANTHONY, 1691-1721, Athena Oxonienses, vol. I, f. 348.

Now, my lord, that the muses' commonweal is become your province; what may we not expect? This, I say, not with intent to apply that of Quintilian, or Augustus Cæsar, parum diis visum est esse eum maximum poetarum; that were a common topick: but because, when some years ago I tryed the publick with observations concerning the stage; it was principally your countenance that buoy'd me up, and supported a righteous cause against the prejudice and corruption then reigning. RYMER, THOMAS, 1693, A Short View of the Tragedy of the Last Age.

In Dorset's sprightly muse but touch the lyre, The smiles and graces melt in soft desire, And little loves confess their am'orous fire. -GARTH, SIR SAMUEL, 1699, The Dispensary, canto iv.

His wit was abundant, noble, bold. Wit, in most writers is like a fountain in a garden, supplied by several streams brought through artful pipes, and playing sometimes agreeably: but the Earl of Dorset's was a source rising from the top of a mountain, which forced its own way, and, with inexhaustible supplies, delighted and enriched the country through which it passed. This extraordinary genius was accompanied with so true a judgment in all parts of fine learning, that whatever subject was before him, he discoursed as properly of it, as if the peculiar bent of his study had been applied that way; and he perfected. his judgment by reading and digesting the best authors, though he quoted them very seldom. There is a lustre in his verses, like that of the sun in Claude Loraine's landscapes; it looks natural, and is inimitable.-PRIOR, MATTHEW, 1718, Poems, Dedication, pp. 35, 36.

Donne had no imagination, but as much wit, I think, as any writer can possibly have. Oldham is too rough and coarse. -Rochester is the medium between him and the Earl of Dorset.-Lord Dorset is

the best of all those writers.- "What! better than Lord Rochester?" - Yes, Rochester has neither so much delicacy or exactness as Lord Dorset.-POPE, ALEXANDER, 1734-36, Spence's Anecdotes, ed. Singer, p. 102.

From the specimens lord Dorset has given us of his poetical talents, we are inclined to wish, that affairs of higher consequence had permitted him to have dedicated more of his time to the Muses. Though some critics may alledge, that what he has given the public is rather pretty than great; and that a few pieces. of a light nature do not sufficiently entitle him to the character of a first rate poet; yet, when we consider, that notwithstanding they were merely the amusement of his leisure hours, and mostly the productions of his youth, they contain marks of a genius, and as such, he is celebrated by Dryden, Prior, Congreve, Pope, &c.-CIBBER, THEOPHILUS, 1753, Lives of the Poets, vol. III, p. 122.

He was a man whose elegance and judgment were universally confessed, and whose bounty to the learned and witty was generally known. To the indulgent affection of the publick, Lord Rochester bore ample testimony in this remark: I know not how it is, but Lord Buckhurst may do what he will, yet is never in the wrong. If such a man attempted poetry, we cannot wonder that his works were praised. Dryden, whom, if Prior tells. truth, he distinguished by his beneficence, and who lavished his blandishments on those who are not known to have so well deserved them, undertaking to produce authors of our own country superior to those of antiquity, says, I would instance your Lordship in satire, and Shakespeare in tragedy. Would it be imagined that of this rival to antiquity, all the satires were little personal invectives, and that his longest composition was a song of eleven stanzas? The blame, however, of this exaggerated praise falls on the encomiast, not upon the author; whose performances are, what they pretend to be, the effusions of a man of wit; gay, vigorous, and airy. His verses to Howard shew great fertility of mind, and his "Dorinda" has been imitated by Pope.JOHNSON, SAMUEL, 1779-81, Dorset, Lives of the English Poets.

The point and sprightliness of Dorset's

pieces entitle him to some remembrance, though they leave not a slender apology for the grovelling adulation that was shown to him by Dryden in his dedications. CAMPBELL, THOMAS, 1819, Specimens of the British Poets.

The munificent earl might, if such had been his wish, have been the rival of those of whom he was content to be the benefactor; for the verses which he occasionally composed, unstudied as they are, exhibit the traces of a genius which, assiduously cultivated, would have produced something great. In the small volume of his works may be found songs which have the easy vigour of Suckling, and little satires which sparkle with wit as splendid as that of Butler.-MACAULAY, THOMAS BABINGTON, 1843, Critical and Historical Essays.

Plays with poetry without excess or assiduity, with a rapid pen, writing today a verse against "Dorinda," to-morrow a satire against Mr. Howard, always easily and without study, like a true gentleman. He is an earl, a chamberlain, and rich; he pensions and patronises poets as he would flirts to amuse himself, without binding himself.-TAINE, H. A., 1871, Historg of English Literature, vol. I.

It is recorded of Lord Dorset that he refused all offers of political preferment in early life that he might give his mind more thoroughly to study. He was the friend and patron of almost all the poets from Waller to Pope; Dryden adored him in one generation, and Prior in the next: nor was the courtesy that produced

this affection mere idle complaisance, for no one was more fierce than he in denouncing mediocrity and literary pretension. Of all the poetical noblemen of the Restoration, Lord Dorset alone reached old age, yet with all these opportunities and all this bias toward the art, the actual verse he has left behind him is miserably small. A splendid piece of society verse, a few songs, some extremely foul and violent satires, these are all that have survived to justify in the eyes of posterity the boundless reputation of Lord Dorset.-GOSSE, EDMUND, 1880, English Poets, ed. Ward, vol. II, p. 411.

His munificence to men of letters speaks for itself, and tempts us to accept in the main the favourable estimate of Prior, overcoloured as it is by the writer's propensity to elegant compliment, his confessed obligations to Dorset, and its occurrence in a dedication to his son. . . Prior's eulogiums on Dorset's native strength of understanding, though it is impossible that they should be entirely confirmed, are in no way contradicted by the few occasional poems which are all that he has left us. Not one of them is destitute of merit, and some are admirable as "the effusions of a man of wit" (in Johnson's words), "gay, vigorous, and airy." "To all you Ladies" is an admitted masterpiece; and the literary application of the Shakespearian phrase "alacrity in sinking" comes from the satirical epistle to the Hon. Edward Howard.-GARNETT, RICHARD, 1897, Dictionary of National Biography, vol. L, p. 87.

PERSONAL

DEAR BOB, I have not anything to leave thee, to perpetuate my memory, but two helpless girls. Look upon them sometimes, and think of him that was, to the last moment of his life, thine. FARQUHAR, GEORGE, 1707, Letter to Wilks.

Mr. Farquhar had now been about a twelve-month married, and it was at first reported, to a great fortune; which indeed he expected, but was miserably disappointed. The lady had fallen in love with him, and so violent was her passion, that she resolved to have him at any rate; and as she knew Farquhar was too much dissipated in life to fall in love, or to think of matrimony unless advantage was annexed to it, she fell upon the stratagem of giving herself out for a great fortune, and then took an opportunity of letting our poet know that she was in love with him. Vanity and interest both uniting to persuade Farquhar to marry, he did not long delay it, and, to his immortal honour let it be spoken, though he found himself deceived, his circumstances embarrassed, and his family growing upon him, he never once upbraided her for the cheat, but behaved to her with all the delicacy, and tenderness of an indulgent husband. . . . If he was not a man of the highest genius, he seems to have had excellent moral qualities.-CIBBER, THEOPHILUS, 1753, Lives of the Poets, vol. III, p. 133. The time is at the close of the seventeenth century; the scene is at the Mitre Tavern, in St. James's Market, kept by one Mrs. Voss. On the threshold of the open door stand a couple of guests. . . . The one is a gay, rollicking young fellow, smartly dressed, a semi-military look about him, good humor rippling on his face, combined with an air of astonishment and delight. . . . His sight and hearing are wholly concentrated on that enchanted and enchanting girl who, unmindful of aught but the "Scornful Lady," continues still reading aloud that rattling comedy by Beaumont and Fletcher. . Cap

tain Farquhar, at whatever passage in the play, betrayed his presence by his involuntary applause. The girl looks towards him more pleased than abashed; and when the captain pronounced that there was in her stuff for an exquisite actress, the fluttered thing clasped her

hands, glowed at the prophecy, and protested in her turn, that of all conditions it was the one she wished most ardently to fulfil. DORAN, JOHN, 1863, Annals of the English Stage, vol. 1, ch. xix.

Through his influence, Anne Oldfield became an actress, and was for years one of the queens of the stage. Farquhar seems to have been seriously in love with her; but, perhaps fortunately for them both, she preferred a richer and more illustrious lover. As for Farquhar, he married a woman who, having lost her heart to him, caused the report to be carried to his ears that a lady of great fortune was dying of an unrequited attachment to him. Impelled either by pity or by self-interest, or both together, he married her to discover that she was as penniless as himself. Yet it is told to his credit that he never reproached her for the deceit about her fortune, but made her a kind and devoted husband as long as she lived.-RICHARDSON, ABBY SAGE, 1882, Old Love-Letters, p. 9.

We can follow him pretty closely through his day. He is a queer mixture of profanity and piety, of coarseness and loyalty, of cleverness and density; we do not breed this kind of beau nowadays, and yet we might do worse, for this specimen is, with all his faults, a man. He dresses carefully in the morning, in his uniform or else in his black suit. When he wants to be specially smart, as, for instance, when he designs a conquest at a birthdayparty, he has to ferret among the pawnbrokers for scraps of finery, or secure on loan a fair, full-bottom wig. But he is not so impoverished that he cannot on these occasions give his valet and his barber plenty of work to do preparing his face with razors, perfumes and washes. He would like to be Sir Fopling Flutter, if he could afford it, and gazes a little enviously at that noble creature in his French clothes, as he lounges luxuriantly past him in his coach with six before and six behind.-GOSSE, EDMUND, 1891, Gossip in a Library, p. 150.

LOVE AND A BOTTLE

1699

Is fluent rather than sparkling in its dialogue.-WARD, ADOLPHUS WILLIAM, 1875-99, A History of English Dramatic Literature, vol. III, p. 482.

THE CONSTANT COUPLE

1700

As I freely submit to the criticisms of the judicious, so I cannot call this an ill play, since the town has allowed it such success. When they have pardoned my faults 'twere very ill manners to condemn their indulgence. Some may think (my acquaintance in town being too slender to make a party for the play) that the success must be derived from the pure merits of the cause. I am of another opinion: I have not been long enough in town to raise enemies against me; and the English are still kind to strangers. I am below the envy of great wits, and above the malice of little ones. I have not displeased the ladies, nor offended the clergy; both which are now pleased to say, that a comedy may be diverting without smut and profaneness.-FARQUHAR, GEORGE, 1700, The Constant Couple, Preface.

Sir Harry Wildair, a character in George Farquhar's comedy "The Constant Couple," is supposed to be a portrait of the author himself.-FREY, ALBERT R., 1888, Sobriquets and Nicknames, p. 323.

SIR HENRY WILDAIR

1701

The character of Wildair appears to me to be one of the most naturally buoyant pieces of delineation that ever was written-buoyant without inanity; reckless, wanton, careless, irrepressibly vivacious and out-pouring, without being obstreperous and oppressive, and all the while totally free from a tinge of vulgarity in the composition.-CLARKE, CHARLES COWDEN, 1872, On the Comic Writers of England, Gentleman's Magazine, n. s. vol. 8, p. 50.

THE INCONSTANT 1702

The romantic interest and impressive catastrophe of this play, I thought, had been borrowed from the more poetical and tragedy-practised muse of Beaumont and Fletcher; but I find they are taken from an actual circumstance which took place in the author's knowledge, at Paris.HAZLITT, WILLIAM, 1818, Lectures on the English Comic Writers, p. 102.

Unlike the "Provoked Wife" and nearly all of its contemporaries, "The Inconstant" has survived to the present day,

and was re-produced only a few seasons ago by Augustin Daly, with John Drew and Ada Rehan in the cast.-ROBINS, EDWARD, JR., 1895, Echoes of the Playhouse, p. 99.

THE TWIN RIVALS

1702

The most material objection against this play is the importance of the subject, which necessarily leads into sentiments too grave for diversion, and supposes vices too great for comedy to punish. 'Tis said, I must own, that the business of comedy is chiefly to ridicule folly; and that the punishment of vice falls rather into the province of tragedy; but if there be a middle sort of wickedness, too high for the sock, and too low for the buskin, is there any reason that it should go unpunished? What are more obnoxious to human society, than the villainies exposed in this play, the frauds, plots and contrivances upon the fortunes of men, and the virtue of women? But the persons are too mean for the heroic: then what must we do with them? Why, they must of necessity drop into comedy; for it is unreasonable to imagine that the lawgivers in poetry would tie themselves up from executing that justice which is the foundation of their constitution; or to say, that exposing vice is the business of the drama, and yet make rules to screen it from persecution.-FARQUHAR, GEORGE, 1702, The Twin Rivals, Preface.

THE RECRUITING OFFICER
1706

In the "Recruiting Officer" Farquhar took his revenge. He threw himself entirely upon his animal spirits, and produced accordingly one of his very best plays. In everything connected with it he was fortunate; for he went only upon grounds of truth and observation, and his own impulses. The humours were drawn from

what he had seen while he was on the re

cruiting party to which we have alluded; his hospitable friends "round the Wrekin, to whom it was dedicated, furnished some of the characters.-HUNT, LEIGH, 1840, ed. The Works of Wycherley, Congreve, Vanbrugh, and Farquhar, p. lviii.

THE BEAUX STRATAGEM

1707

The reader may find some faults in this play, which my illness prevented the