Ver. 243. With that a tear.] It is to be observed that our poet hath made He was his hero, in imitation of Virgil's, obnoxious to the tender passions. indeed so given to weeping, that he tells us, when Goodman the player swore, if he did not make a good actor, he'd be damn'd; "the surprise of being commended by one who had been himself so eminent on the stage, and in so positive a manner, was more than he could support. In a word (says he) it almost took away my breath, and fairly drew tears from my eyes."-P. 149 of his Life, 8vo. Ver. 250. Now flames the Cid, and now Perolla burns,1 Great Cæsar roars and hisses in the fires; 1 "Jam Deïphobi dedit ampla ruinam In the first notes on the Dunciadʼit was said, that this author was particularly excellent at tragedy. "This (says he) is as unjust as to say I could not dance on a rope." But certain it is that he had attempted to dance on this rope, and fell most shamefully, having produced no less than four tragedies (the names of which the poet preserves in these few lines) the three first of them were fairly printed, acted, and damned; the fourth suppressed, in fear of the like treatment. In the former editions thus: "Now flames old Memnon, now Rodrigo burns, In one quick flash see Proserpine expire, And last, his own cold Eschylus took fire. Then gush'd the tears, as from the Trojan's eyes, When the last blaze," &c. 2 A comedy threshed out of Molière's Tartuffe, and so much the translator's favourite, that he assures us all our author's dislike to it could only arise from disaffection to the government: Qui méprise Cotin, n'estime point son roi, Et n'a, selon Cotin, ni Dieu, ni foi, ni loi."-BOIL. He assures us, that when he had the honour to kiss his Majesty's hand upon presenting his dedication of it, he was graciously pleased, out of his royal bounty, to order him two hundred pounds for it. And this he doubts not grieved Mr. P." 3 See Virgil, Æn. ii., where I would advise the reader to peruse the story of Troy's destruction, rather than in Wynkyn. But I caution him alike in both to beware of a most grievous error, that of thinking it was brought about by I know not what Trojan horse; there never having been any such thing. For, first, it was not Trojan, being made by the Greeks; and, secondly, it was not a horse, but a mare. This is clear from many verses in Virgil: : Uterumque armato milite complent, Can a horse be said Utero gerere? Again, How is it possible the word fœta can agree with a horse? And indeed can it be conceived that the chaste and virgin Goddess Pallas would employ her self in forming and fashioning the male of that species? But this shall be proved to a demonstration in our Virgil Restored.—SCRIBLERUS. AMBROSE PHILIPS' "THULE." Ver. 258. Then snatch'd a sheet of Thule.] An unfinished poem of that name, of which one sheet was printed many years ago, by Amb. Philips, a northern author. It is a usual method of putting out a fire, to cast wet sheets upon it. Some critics have been of opinion that this sheet was of the nature of the asbestos, which cannot be consumed by fire: but I rather think it an allegorical allusion to the coldness and heaviness of the writing. [The "sheet" is a fragment of about a hundred lines, first published in the Freethinker, and now included in Philips' Poems. It exhibits his usual soft and pleasing style of versification, but wants vigour.] THEOBALD AND OZELL. Ver. 286. Tibbald or Ozell.] Lewis Tibbald (as pronounced) or Theobald (as written) was bred an attorney, and son to an attorney (says Mr. Jacob of Sittenburn, in Kent. He was author of some forgotten plays, translations, and other pieces. He was concerned in a paper called the Censor, and a translation of Ovid. "There is a notorious idiot, one hight Whachum, who, from an under-spur-leather to the law, is become an under-strapper to the play-house, who hath lately burlesqued the Metamorphoses of Ovid by a vile translation, &c. This fellow is concerned in an impertinent paper called the Censor."— DENNIS, Rem. on Pope's Hom., p. 9, 10. "Mr. John Ozell (if we may credit Mr. Jacob) did go to school in Leices tershire, where somebody left him something to live on, when he shall retire from business. He was designed to be sent to Cambridge, in order for priesthood; but he chose rather to be placed in an office of accounts, in the City, being qualified for the same by his skill in arithmetic, and writing the necessary hands. He has obliged the world with many translations of French plays."-JACOB, Lives of Dram. Poets, p. 198. Mr. Jacob's character of Mr. Ozell seems vastly short of his merits, and he ought to have further justice done him, having since fully confuted all sarcasms on his learning and genius, by an advertisement of Sept. 20, 1729, in a paper called the Weekly Medley, &c. "As to my learning, everybody knows that the whole bench of bishops, not long ago, were pleased to give me a purse of guineas, for discovering the erroneous translations of the Common-prayer in Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian, &c. As for my genius, let Mr. Cleland show better verses in all Pope's works, than Ozell's version of Boileau's Lutrin, which the late Lord Halifax was so pleased with, that he complimented him with leave to dedicate it to him, &c., &c. Let him show better and truer poetry in the Rape of the Lock, than in Ozell's Rape of the Bucket (la Secchia Rapita). And Mr. Toland and Mr. Gildon publicly declared Ozell's translation of Homer to be, as it was prior, so likewise superior to Pope's.-Surely, surely, every man is free to deserve well of his country!"-JOHN OZELL. We cannot but subscribe to such reverend testimonies as those of the bench of bishops, Mr. Toland, and Mr. Gildon. [The union of Toland with the bench of bishops-he being a well-known infidel is ridiculous enough. Yet Toland deserves credit for having preserved some characteristic traits and information relative to Milton. Ozell, "well known for his translations," as the obituary notices record it, died October 7, 1743.] HEIDEGGRE. Ver. 200. Something betwixt a Heideggre and owl.] A strange bird from Switzerland, and not (as some have supposed) the name of an eminent person who was a man of parts, and, as was said of Petronius, Arbiter Elegantiarum. [John James Heidegger, a Swiss, was a sort of metropolitan Beau Nash, celebrated for managing operas and masquerades. The English nation, it was said, had appointed him Director of their pleasures, and his post was worth £5,000 per annum. He was a favourite at Court and with all the nobility. Heidegger was remarkable for his ugliness and obesity, but was goodnatured enough-being prosperous-to join in the laugh at his personal appearance. There is a story of his having laid a wager with Lord Chesterfield that an uglier face than his own could not be found in London. The Earl produced an old woman, whom he and the umpires considered to be duly qualified. Appearances were against the Swiss, but on his insisting that he should wear the woman's head-dress, while he gave her his periwig, the odds were declared to be decidedly in his favour. Heidegger lived to a great age, about ninety, and died Sept. 4, 1749.] INDEX LEARNING. Ver. 279. How index learning turns no student pale, Yet holds the eel of science by the tail. [This illustration Pope borrowed from his friend Swift.—Tale of a Tub, sec. seven:-" The most accomplished way of using books at present is twofold: either, first, to serve them as some men do lords, learn their titles exactly, and then brag of their acquaintance; or, secondly, which is indeed the choicer, the profounder, and politer method, to get a thorough insight into the index, by which the whole book is governed and turned, like fishes by the tail."] WITHERS, WARD, GILDON, AND HOWARD. Ver. 295. Where wretched Withers, Ward, and Gildon rest, George Withers was a great pretender to poetical zeal, and abused the greatest personages in power, which brought upon him frequent correction. The Marshalsea and Newgate were no strangers to him."-WINSTANLY, Lives of Poets. Charles Gildon, a writer of criticisms and libels of the last age, bred at St. Omer's with the Jesuits; but renouncing popery, he published Blount's books against the divinity of Christ, The Oracles of Reason, &c. ., He sig nalized himself as a critic, having written some very bad plays: abused Mr. P. very scandalously in an anonymous pamphlet of the Life of Mr. Wycherley, printed by Curll; in another, called The New Rehearsal, printed in 1714; in a third, intituled The Complete Art of English Poetry, in two volumes; and others. Hon. Edward Howard, author of the British Princes, and a great number of wonderful pieces, celebrated by the late Earls of Dorset and Rochester, Duke of Buckingham, Mr. Waller, &c. [Pope had probably never looked into the prison strains of old George Wither, for he could not have been insensible to the beauty of many passages in the "Shepherd's Hunting," which was produced in the Marshalsea. In that prison, "though walled about with disrespect," the Muse solaced his confinement : "In my days of former bliss, Her divine skill taught me this, Through the meanest object's sight; By the murmur of a spring, She could more infuse in me Than all Nature's beauties can In some other wiser man." Hence the unfortunate bard cherished his only earthly bliss,— "Poesy, thou sweet'st content, That e'er heaven to mortals lent: Whose dull thoughts cannot conceive thee, Though thou be to them a scorn That to nought but earth are born, Let my life no longer be Then I am in love with thee!" Wither, after a busy and chequered life, died in 1667. How a genuine old poet of indomitable spirit came to be associated with two such modern scribblers as Gildon and Howard, it would be difficult to conjecture.] GAMING AT THE COURT. Ver. 310. Gaming and Grub-street skulk behind the king.] When the statute against gaming was drawn up, it was represented, that the king, by ancient custom, plays at hazard one night in the year; and therefore a clause was inserted, with an exception as to that particular. Under this pretence, the groom-porter had a room appropriated to gaming all the summer the court was at Kensington, which his Majesty accidentally being acquainted of, with a just indignation, prohibited. It is reported, the same practice is yet continued wherever the court resides, and the hazard-table there open to all the professed gamesters in town. " Greatest and justest sovereign know you this? [The practice alluded to, we need scarcely remark, has long since been discontinued. Gaming as here described is unknown in the English court, and but little known in English society.] MRS. NEEDHAM. Ver. 323. To Needham's.] A matron of great fame, and very religious in her way: whose constant prayer it was, that she might "get enough by her profession, to leave it off in time, and make her peace with God." But her |