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have made it. So far the plan was reasonable; but the Paftorals are introduced by a Proeme, written with fuch imitation as they could attain of obfolete language, and by confequence in a ftyle that was never spoken nor written in any age or in any place.

But the effect of reality and truth became confpicuous, even when the intention was to fhew them groveling and degraded. These Pastorals became popular, and were read with delight, as juft reprefentations of rural manners and occupations, by thofe who had no interest in the rivalry of the poets, nor knowledge of the critical difpute.

In 1713 he brought a comedy called The Wife of Bath upon the stage, but it received no applause; he printed it, however; and feventeen years after, having altered it, and, as he thought, adapted it more to the publick taste, he offered it again to the town; but though he was flushed with the fuccefs of the Beggar's Opera, had the mortification to fee it again rejected.

In the last year of queen Anne's life, Gay was made fecretary to the earl of Clarendon, ambaffador to the court of Hanover. This was a station that naturally gave him hopes of kindness from every party; but the Queen's death put an end to her favours, and he had dedicated his Shepherd's Week to Bolingbroke, which Swift confidered as the crime that obftructed all kindnefs from the houfe of Hanover.

He did not, however, omit to improve the right which his office had given him to the notice of the royal family. On the arrival of the princess of Wales, he wrote a poem, and obtained fo much favour, that both the Prince and Princefs went to fee his What d'ye call

it,

:

it, a kind of mock-tragedy, in which the images were comick, and the action grave; fo that, as Pope relates, Mr. Cromwell, who could not hear what was faid, was at a lofs how to reconcile the laughter of the audience with the folemnity of the scene.

Of this performance the value certainly is but little ; but it was one of the lucky trifles that give pleasure by novelty, and was fo much favoured by the audience, that envy appeared against it in the form of criticism; and Griffin a player, in conjunction with Mr. Theobald, a man afterwards more remarkable, produced a pamphlet called The Key to the What dye call it; which, fays Gay, calls me a blockhead, and Mr. Pope a knave.

But Fortune has always been inconftant. Not long afterwards (1717) he endeavoured to entertain the town with Three Hours after Marriage; a comedy writ-ten, as there is fufficient reason for believing, by thé joint affiftance of Pope and Arbuthnot. One purpose of it was to bring into contempt Dr. Woodward the Foffilift, a man not really or juftly contemptible. It had the fate which fuch outrages deserve : the scene in which Woodward was directly and apparently ridiculed, by the introduction of a mummy and a crocodile, difgufted the audience, and the performance was driven off the stage with general condemnation.

Gay is reprefented as a man eafily incited to hope, and deeply depreffed when his hopes were difappointed. This is not the character of a hero; but it may naturally imply fomething more generally welcome, a foft and çivil companion. Whoever is apt to hope good from others is diligent to please them; but he that believes his powers ftrong enough to force their own way, commonly tries only to pleafe himfelf.

He

He had beem fimple enough to imagine that those who laughed at the What d' ye call it would raise the fortune of its author; and, finding nothing done, funk into dejection. His friends endeavoured to divert h m. The earl of Burlington fent him (1716) into Devonfhire; the year after, Mr. Pulteney took him to Aix ; and in the following year lord Harcourt invited him. to his feat, where, during his vifit, the two rural lovers were killed with lightning, as is particularly told in Popes's Letters.

Being now generally known, he publifhed (1720) his Poems by fubfcription with fuch fuccefs, that he raised a thousand pounds; and called his friends to a confultation, what use might be beft made of it. Lewis, the steward of lord Oxford, advised him to intruft it to the funds, and live upon the intereft; Arbuthnot bade him intruft it to Providence, and live upon the principal; Pope directed him, and was feconded by Swift, to purchase an annuity.

Gay in that disastrous year had a prefent from young Craggs of fome South-fea-ftock, and once fuppofed himself to be mafter of twenty thousand pounds. His friends perfuaded him to fell his fhare; but he dreamed of dignity and splendour, and could not bear to obftruct his own fortune. He was then importuned to fell as much as would purchase an hundred a year for life, which, fays Fenton, will make you fure of a clean fhirt and a fhoulder of mutton every day. This counfel was rejected; the profit and principal were lost, and Gay funk under the calamity fo low that his life became in danger.

By the care of his friends, among whom Pope appears to have fhewn particular tenderness, his health was restored; and, returning to his ftudies, he wrote a tragedy called The Captives, which he was invited to read before the princefs of Wales. When the hour came, he saw the princefs and her ladies all in expectation, and advancing with reverence, too great for any other attention, stumbled at a stool, and falling forwards, threw down a weighty Japan fcreen. The princess started, the ladies fcreamed, and poor Gay after all the disturbance was ftill to read his play.

The fate of The Captives, which was acted at DruryLane in 1723, I know not; but he now thought himfelf in favour, and undertook (1726) to write a volume of Fables for the improvement of the young duke of Cumberland. For this he is faid to have been promifed a reward, which he had doubtless magnified with all the wild expectations of indigence and vanity.

Next year the Prince and Princefs became King and Queen, and Gay was to be great and happy; but upon the fettlement of the household he found himself appointed gentleman ufher to the princefs Louifa. By this offer he thought himself infulted, and fent a mes fage to the Queen, that he was too old for the place. There feem to have been many machinations employed afterwards in his favour; and diligent court was paid to Mrs. Howard, afterwards countess of Suffolk, who was much beloved by the King and Queen, to engage her intereft for his promotion; but folicitations, verses, and flatteries, were thrown away; the lady heard them, and did nothing.

All the pain which he fuffered from the neglect, or, as he perhaps termed it, the ingratitude of the court,

may be fupposed to have been driven away by the unexampled fuccefs of the Beggar's Opera. This play, written in ridicule of the mufical Italian Drama*, was firft offered to Cibber and his brethren at Drury-Lane, and rejected; it being then carried to Rich, had the effect, as was ludicrously faid, of making Gay rich, and Rich gay.

Of this lucky piece, as the reader cannot but wish to know the original and progrefs, I have inferted the relation which Spence has given in Pope's words.

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"Dr. Swift had been obferving once to Mr. Gay, "what an odd pretty fort of a thing a Newgate Pafto"ral might make. Gay was inclined to try at fuch a thing for fome time; but afterwards thought it "would be better to write a comedy on the fame plan. "This was what gave rife to the Beggar's Opera. He "began on it; and when firft he mentioned it to Swift, "the Doctor did not much like the project. As he "carried it on, he fhewed what he wrote to both of ❝us, and we now-and then gave a correction, or a "word or two of advice; but it was wholly of his

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own writing. When it was done, neither of us "thought it would fucceed.-We fhewed it to Con

* This is afferted by all who have taken occasion to speak of the Beggar's Opera, but I think without foundation. The subjects of ridicule in the Italian opera were and are, first, the dialogue, which being in recitative is not only tirefome but abfurd; fecondly, the disparity in the airs between the fentiment of the poetry and the mufic, the one being generally fimple, and oftentimes mean, the other elaborate and protracted by long divifions on infignificant words. The Beggar's Opera has nothing of this in it: the Dialogue is common speech, and the airs old ballad-tunes, fome of them compofed by Purcell, and others felected with great judgment from Durfey's Pills to purge Melancholy. The trueft burlesque of the Italian opera, that can be conceived of, is the Dragon of Wantley, written by Harry Carey, and composed by Lampe.

VOL. III.

P

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greve;