insignificant nature. The authorised correspondence did not, however, appear till 1737. The delay may be explained by the fact that Pope had "connived," to use his own word, at the publication of an edition by Cooper of the original P. T. version, which had caused all the "bother." Apparently, the alleged omissions, interpolations, and inaccuracies could be viewed with complacency as long as the author himself was profiting by the sales.

1 Curll was extremely angry at this proceeding, and tried to get an injunction against Cooper.

CHAPTER XLVIII

1735

Quarto Edition of the Poems-Last Days with Lord Peterborough-Oxford, and SpenceSwift's Failing Health-CorrespondenceDeath of Peterborough

IN

N the course of the summer Pope brought out the quarto edition of his "Poetical Works." In July he sent a copy to Caryll, with a letter in which he says that Mrs. Patty has been his neighbour for some days at Marble Hill, as she was staying with the newly married couple, Lady Suffolk and Mr. Berkeley.

"I intend ere long," he adds, "to take a little ramble, and stay three weeks with a friend whom I have known ten years, without writing three letters to, and shall probably never write another to, yet esteem as much as any friend he has-I mean Lord Cobham." This shockingly constructed sentence

"2

1 The second and fourth "Satires of Dr. Donne " were published in this edition, versified and modernised by Pope. The fourth satire does not seem to have been printed before, but the second had been printed in 1733 under the title of "The Impertinent; or, a Visit to the Court." It was evidently intended to apply to Lord Hervey.

2 This is the last published letter from Pope to Caryll, who died on April 6, 1736.

was evidently intended for a hit at poor Caryll, who was inclined to think himself neglected if his illustrious friend failed to write to him or to visit him at stated intervals.

Pope had made the acquaintance of his ardent admirer, Lord Orrery, in the autumn of 1733, and a fairly regular correspondence was now being carried on between the pair. The poet was endeavouring to persuade Swift to return his letters, and he fancied that in Orrery he might find a useful tool. On July 12 Pope wrote to thank his lordship for sending a good account of the dean's health.

"I am just losing," he explains, "perhaps have this moment lost, my Lord Peterborough. And Lord Bolingbroke, whom I have loved longer than any man now living, is gone away. And another whom I had just begun to love, whose character I had some years esteemed, and whom I find I must love if he and I live, for there is no helping it, though I am weary of loving and taking leases when the life is almost run out-another lord, I say, whose name I dare not tell you, is to stay a year in Ireland."

Pope cautiously alludes to the malicious reports about him, and says that he is not quite at the bottom of the business, but finds that a certain person had contributed to that suspicion (of instigating the printing of the letters) by exceeding a commission that had been given him, not so much by Pope himself as by his friends. If he proved absolutely guilty it would be necessary for the poet to be merciful and screen him, or he would never discover the whole of it. This is the only hint at

a line of defence which Pope evidently contemplated, but was compelled to drop for want of evidence. It was good enough to satisfy Lord Orrery, no doubt, but a direct denial of all complicity was found to be the best course when the authorised edition of the "Letters" was published.

In August Pope was at Bevis Mount with the dying Lord Peterborough. On August 25 he wrote the following interesting account of the situation in which he found his famous host to Patty Blount, who was still with the newly married couple at Marble Hill:

"I found my Lord Peterborough on his couch, where he gave me an account of the excessive sufferings he had passed through, with a weak voice, but spirited. He talked of nothing but the great amendment of his condition, and of finishing the building and gardens for his best friend to enjoy after him;1 that he had one care more when he went to France, which was to give a true account to posterity of some parts of history in Queen Anne's reign, which Burnet had scandalously misrepresented; and of some others, to justify her against the imputation of intending to bring in the Pretender, which (to his knowledge) neither her ministers, Oxford and Bolingbroke, nor she, had any design to do. He next told me, he had ended his domestic affairs, through such difficulties from the law that gave him as much torment of the mind as his distemper had done of body to do right to the person to whom he had obligations beyond expression: that he had found it necessary

1 His wife, Anastasia Robinson, the famous singer.

to declare his marriage to all his relations, but (since the person who had married them was dead), to remarry her in the church at Bristol, before wit

"I lay in the next room to him, where I found he was awake, and calling for help most hours of the night, sometimes crying out for pain. In the morning he got up at nine, and was carried into his garden in a chair he fainted away twice there. He fell about twelve into a violent pang, which made his limbs all shake, and his teeth chatter; and for some time he lay cold as death. His wound. was dressed (which is done constantly four times a day), and he grew gay, and sat down to dinner with ten people. After this he was in torment again for a quarter of an hour, and, as soon as the pang was over, was carried again into the garden to the workmen, talked again of his history, and declaimed with great spirit against the meanness of the present great men and ministers, and the decay of the public spirit and honour. It is im

1 Lord Peterborough had married Mrs. Robinson as early as 1723, but had kept the affair a secret, though he constituted himself her champion and protector. Senesino, her colleague, was forced to declare, on his knees, that Anastasia was a nonpareil of beauty and virtue. Lord Stanhope joked about her, and was challenged for his pains. The whole town," to quote Lady Mary Wortley's description, "is divided into parties on this important point. Innumerable have been the disorders between the two sexes on so great an account, besides half the house of peers being put under arrest. By the providence of Heaven, and the wise care of his Majesty, no bloodshed ensued. However, things are now tolerably accommodated, and the fair lady rides through the town in triumph in the shining berlin of her hero, not to reckon the essential advantage of £100 a month, which it is said he allows her." All this happened in 1724, and Lady Peterborough had to wait eleven years before her lord would acknowledge the marriage.