when his Effay was published.

The

Lady's name and adventures I have

fought with fruitless enquiry.

I can therefore tell no

more than

I have learned from Mr. Ruffhead, who writes with the confidence of one who could truft his information. She was a woman of eminent rank and large fortune, the ward of an unkle, who, having given her a proper education, expected like other guardians that she should make at least an equal match, and fuch he proposed to her, but found it rejected in favour of a young gentleman of inferior condition.

Having difcovered the correfpondence between the two lovers, and finding the young lady determined to abide by her

Own

own choice, he fuppofed that feparation might do what can rarely be done by arguments, and fent her into a foreign country, where fhe was obliged to converfe only with thofe from whom her unkle had nothing to fear.

Her lover took care to repeat his rows; but his letters were intercepted and carried to her guardian, who directed her to be watched with ftill greater vigilance; till of this reftraint the grew impatient, that the bribed a womanfervant to procure her a fword, which the directed to her heart.

fo

From this account, given with evident intention to raise the Lady's character, it does not appear that he had any claim to praife, nor much to compaffion.

C 2

paffion. She feems to have been impatient, violent, and ungovernable. Her unkle's power could not have lafted long; the hour of liberty and choice would have come in time. But her defires were too hot for delay, and fhe liked felf-murder better than fufpenfe.

Nor is it difcovered that the unkle, whoever he was, is with much juftice. delivered to pofterity as a falfe Guardian ; he feems to have done only that for which a guardian is appointed; he endeavoured to direct his niece till fhe fhould be able to direct herfelf. Poetry has not often been worfe employed than in dignifying the amorous fury of a raving girl.

Not

Not long after he wrote the Rape of the Lock, the moft airy, the most inge

nious, and the most delightful of all his compofitions, occafioned by a frolick of gallantry, rather too familiar, in which Lord Petre cut off a lock of

Mrs. Arabella Fermor's hair. This,

whether ftealth or violence, was fo much refented, that the commerce of the twofamilies, before very friendly, was interrupted. Mr. Caryl, a gentleman, who, being secretary to King James's Queen, had followed his Miftrefs intoFrance, and as the author of Sir Solomon Single, a comedy, and some tranflations, was entitled to the notice of a wit, folicited Pope to endea

vour a reconciliation by a ludicrous. poem, which might bring both the parties to a better temper. In compliance with Caryl's requeft, though his name was for a long time marked only by the first and last letter, C―l, a poem of two cantos was written (1711), as is faid, in a fortnight, and fent to the of fended Lady, who liked it well enough to fhew it; and, with the ufual procefs of literary tranfactions, the author, dreading a furreptitious edition, was forced to publifh it.

The event is fail to have been fuch as was defired; the pacification and diverfion of all to whom it related, except Sir George Brown, who complained

with