poems had fallen flat, and who was evidently conscious of their many faults, requested Pope, soon after their acquaintance began, to revise some of his compositions. In a letter dated February 1706, he thanks Pope for pruning and revising his 'paper to Mr. Dryden.' In March of the same year he asks Pope to look over' that d-d Miscellany of Madrigals' of his, meaning the volume just mentioned, and see if there were any poems in it that might be altered and reprinted. Pope did as he was requested, and soon after writes back that he has tried his hand on some of the Songs. Other communications pass,-Pope drawing Wycherley's attention to the repetitions, irregularities, &c., which abound in his poems; and at length, in November 1707, he tells him, that if he will not methodise his poems in good earnest, he had better destroy the whole frame, and reduce them into single thoughts in prose, like Rochefoucauld.' There is not the slightest trace of Wycherley's having taken offence at this proposal. Pope's Pastorals, the third of which was addressed to Wycherley, were published in 1709, in Tonson's Miscellany; the volume contained also a copy of verses by Wycherley 'to my friend Mr. Pope,' and poetical effusions from a crowd of small versifiers, among whom was Ambrose Philips. Writing to Wycherley in May 1709, Pope says that such collections as Tonson's Miscellany have been well described by Strada: 'Nullus hodie mortalium aut nascitur, aut moritur, . . . aut nubit, aut est, aut non est . cui non illi extemplo cudant Epicedia, Genethliaca, Protreptica, Panegyrica, Nænias, Nugas.' This was the class of poets who

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were in Pope's thoughts when he wrote of 'fulsome dedicators,' of poets who were at the same time 'dull' and 'vain ;' he could not have been thinking of the battered old dramatist who had taken such kindly notice of him, a youth without connections or fortune, and who was neither a dedicator, nor dull, nor vain. Yet, if the Essay on Criticism was written not later than 1709, it was at this very time, so Mr. Elwin requires us to believe, that Pope introduced into that poem an outrageous attack on the friend to whom he was dedicating one of his Pastorals, and from whom he was receiving a warm and generous eulogy! But Mr. Elwin believes the Essay to have been written in 1711; a hypothesis which we shall consider further

on.

In the same month (May 1709) Wycherley mentions some hint which, like a true friend and a true Christian,' Pope had given him ; it seems to have referred to the amendment of his morals, and setting his house in order now that he was come to old age. There is no doubt that Wycherley was a most fit subject for such advice.

From the letters of 1710 we find that Wycherley had again placed a number of his poems in Pope's hands for revision. The substance of a letter dated in April of that year is, 'Slash, cut, maul as freely as you please.' Pope answers in effect, 'I have marked and slashed a great deal; shall I go on?' In Wycherley's answer a slight shade of coolness is perceptible; nothing beyond that. It amounts to, 'What you have done is good; but please for the future mark repetitions only, and in the margin, not in the text.'

Pope replies (May 1710) that he hopes his freedom has not given offence; he thinks Wycherley had better take the papers back, and at some future time they can examine them together; he still thinks that most of them would make a better figure as single maxims and reflections in prose.

At this point the correspondence ends. The biographers of Pope speak of a rupture between the two as the result of the younger poet's 'freedom of speech, and most of them lay the blame on Pope. Bowles says, that Wycherley bore the corrections at first with great temper, but that when Pope at last 'seriously advised him to turn the whole into prose,' the impertinence of the suggestion was too much for Wycherley to bear, and he broke off all intercourse. Carruthers too, usually so fair and accurate, misrepresents this matter; for he says (Life, p. 31, Bohn) that Pope's suggestion to destroy the whole frame' and convert poetry into prose, 'brought the farce of poet and critic to an end;' whereas the correspondence went on, as we have seen, without a check for two years and a half after this suggestion had been made. And so far was Wycherley from resenting this particular suggestion, that he adopted and profited by it. In his Posthumous Works, published in 1728, appeared three hundred and eight maxims in prose, after the manner of Rochefoucauld, exactly as Pope had advised; these maxims are said by Mr. Carruthers to be polished and terse. However, a coolness did undoubtedly ensue on Pope's letter of May 2, 1710; but it did not last long, and it seems to have been entirely on Wycherley's side. We obtain an insight

into the nature of the breach, such as it was, from Pope's correspondence with Cromwell. In two letters dated in the summer of 1710, Pope inquires after his old friend with the empressement, as it seems to us, of genuine affection. Before October he had found out that Wycherley was offended with him.

He writes to Cromwell on October 12, that there is nothing worth seeking in this world except a friend, a happiness I once hoped to have possessed in Mr. Wycherley; but Quantum mutatus ab illo !' A fortnight later, having heard more about Wycherley's feelings towards him from Cromwell, at whose house the dramatist was staying, Pope writes that he pardons his jealousy, and 'shall never be his enemy, whatever he says of me.' He speaks with strong regard of his old friend in other parts of this same letter; and although Mr. Elwin may maintain that there is nothing to show that the whole letter is not an artificial production, framed at a later period in order to suggest a certain view of Pope's moral character, it may be urged against him that there is nothing to show that it is so; and that in unbiassed ears the expressions used sound like the genuine accents of nature.

In the following month Pope writes to Cromwell that he is heartily sorry for poor Mr. Wycherley's illness,' and is disposed partly to attribute to this cause 'his chagrin' at the unceremonious way in which his verses had been treated. A year passes over; the Essay on Criticism appears in print, containing these lines, the application of which to Wycherley Mr. Elwin thinks obvious;' and now the reconciliation takes place. Cromwell writes to Pope (October 26, 1711),

that Wycherley, while with him at the Bath, 'hearing from me how welcome his letters would be, presently writ to you,' and afterwards sent a second letter. He goes on to mention several kind and affectionate expressions which Wycherley had used about Pope and the newly published Essay, the last of which is, -'We dined and drank together; and I saying To our loves, he replied, It is Mr. Pope's health.' Intimacy seems to have been at once re-established; Pope visited him twice in his last illness; and sent an account of that, and of Wycherley's strange marriage just before, to his correspondent Edward Blount.

The impression that we desire to create, that it was not morally possible that Pope should have intended the harsh lines for Wycherley, cannot perhaps be fully produced except after the perusal of all the correspondence bearing on the relations between the two men in connection with a careful study of the entire context in which the lines occur. Yet of the extreme improbability of the charge, enough, we think, has been said to make our readers sensible.

We have now done with Mr. Elwin; for though there are severe remarks about Pope by the score in the Introduction and notes to this poem, which we have not noticed, our limits oblige us to be content with having put the reader in a position to judge for himself of the temper and fairness with which this editor approaches (and will, it is to be feared, approach in volumes yet to appear) the acts and words of our poet. Why Mr. Elwin ever undertook to edit a poet who is the object of his implacable aversion, we ask ourselves with unfailing astonishment and perplexity.