by Dryden's friend and brother-poet, Lord Roscommon, in some lines of commendation which were prefixed to the poem on its publication :— 'Let free impartial men from Dryden learn And weighty truths, solid convincing sense, A drama, the 'Duke of Guise,' a joint work of Dryden and Nathaniel Lee, was brought out in December 1682. The two rival theatres had now found it necessary to combine, and this was the first new play brought out by the united company. In the prologue Dryden announced the play to be a parallel : Our play's a parallel; the Holy League Begot our covenant; Guisards got the Whig.' In spite of Dryden's zealous championship of the court, his salary remained unpaid, and his pecuniary distress was great. In a letter to Laurence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, a Commissioner of the Treasury, probably written in the latter part of 1683, he prays for the payment of the arrears of his salary, amounting to about 1300l., and asks also for some small appointment. He says in this letter, 'I have three sons growing to man's estate; I breed them all up to learning, beyond my fortune; but they are too hopeful to be neglected, though I want.' Of these sons, Charles, the eldest, born in 1665 or 1666, entered Trinity College, Cambridge, as a Westminster Scholar, in June 1683; the second, John, born 1667 or 1668, was now at Westminster; and the youngest, Erasmus Henry, born in May 1669, had been admitted to the Charterhouse by the nomination of the King in February 1683. It was probably in consequence of Dryden's appeal to Rochester that an Exchequer warrant for the payment of half a year's salary and a quarter's pension was issued on the 6th of May, 1684; and there is reason to believe that in time all arrears were paid to him. He received also in December 1683 the appointment of Collector of Customs in London, which may have been a profitable appointment. Various literary labours occupied the poet at this time. In 1683 he contributed a life and a preface to a new translation of Plutarch by various hands, and he translated, by order of the King, Maimbourg's 'History of the League.' In 1684 and 1685 he published successively two volumes of poetical Miscellanies, containing, with some poems by other authors, translations of his own from Virgil, Horace, and Ovid. To the second volume his eldest son was a contributor. On the 5th of February, 1685, Charles the Second died, and the crown passed to his brother James. Before the King's death Dryden had written an opera, ‘Albion and Albanius,' to celebrate the triumph of the court party over the opposition; this had not yet been publicly acted, but it had been several times rehearsed at court with approval. 'Albion and Albanius' was published after James's accession. But before this publication Dryden produced an ode to the memory of Charles under the title of 'Threnodia Augustalis,' in which both Charles and James were extravagantly lauded. As, on the restoration of Charles the Second, Dryden, to win royal favour, had broken away from all the associations of his youth, and had appeared without delay as the eager champion of monarchy, so now, when a declared Roman Catholic was seated on the throne, and to be a Roman Catholic seemed the best way to advancement, he was soon convinced that it was right to be a Roman Catholic. Before his conversion James had continued him in the posts of Poet Laureate and Historiographer Royal; and shortly after it, in March 1686, the additional pension of 100l. a year, which had been granted him by Charles, was renewed by letters patent. Lord Macaulay, who has represented this pension granted by James as the reward of Dryden's conversion, wrote before it was known to be merely a renewal of an old pension granted to Dryden by his predecessor, and he has certainly exaggerated its effects in producing that conversion; but it would be difficult to prove that Lord Macaulay has been unjust in ascribing Dryden's change of religion to interested motivesa. a History of England, vol. ii. p. 96. During the greater part of the year 1686 Dryden was engaged in writing 'The Hind and the Panther,' an elaborate defence in verse of his new religion. This poem is in the form of a dialogue between a milkwhite Hind, representing the Church of Rome, and a Panther, representing the Church of England; and the Hind has of course the best of the discussion. The author of 'Religio Laici' and of 'The Spanish Friar,' could not bring himself to treat the Church to which he so lately belonged with entire disrespect; and the Panther is described as sure the noblest next the Hind, Her faults and virtues lie so mixed, that she Nor wholly stands condemned nor wholly free.' The various dissenting bodies are introduced into the poem under the names of different animals. This, the most imaginative and the longest of Dryden's poems, was published in April 1687. Dryden's first ode for St. Cecilia's day was written in November 1687, at the request of a musical society formed four years before the celebration of the feast of St. Cecilia, the guardian saint of music b. On June 10, 1688, the Queen gave birth to a son, an event which was hailed with joy by all the friends of the Court, while the Protestant party declared the child an imposture. The birth of the Prince was celebrated by Dryden in a poem entitled 'Britannia Rediviva,' which was very hastily composed, and is one of his least successful efforts. There was a very short interval between the birth of b A perfect text of so celebrated a poem is of much literary importThe editors have generally substituted uprooted for Dryden's better word unrooted in the line ance. 'And trees unrooted left their place.' This is one of very many similar corrections in the Globe edition of Dryden's Poems. James's unfortunate heir and the Revolution, which drove James into exile, placed William and Mary on the throne, and destroyed Dryden's prospects of advancement. His newlyadopted religion made it impossible for him to take the oaths required of all holders of office, and to recant now would have been at once indecent and unprofitable. His offices of Poet Laureate and Historiographer Royal, his place in the Customs, and his pension of 100l. a year, were now all lost by him. It was stated by Prior, and has been often repeated on his authority, that the Earl of Dorset, who was now appointed Lord Chamberlain, made the poet an allowance from his own purse equivalent to the official salary he had lost. This is a mistake; but there is no doubt that Dorset at different times made Dryden handsome presents of money, and the poet, in his 'Discourse on Satire,' dedicated to Dorset in 1693, gratefully acknowledges his generosity. Sheffield, Earl of Mulgrave, was also bountiful to him in his reduced circumstances. In his fallen fortunes Dryden turned once more to the drama. In 1690 he produced two plays. The first was a tragedy called 'Don Sebastian.' Though one of his best dramas, it was not very successful, and Dryden attributed the failure of it to its length, or in his own language, to his having exceeded 'the proper compass of a play.' A comedy, 'Amphitryon,' produced in the same year, had better success. At the time of Charles the Second's death Dryden was engaged in writing, as a sequel to 'Albion and Albanius,' an opera, 'King Arthur, or the British Worthy.' This work, much altered to suit the altered times, was now brought out with great success. About the representation of his next play there was some difficulty. The story of 'Cleomenes, King of Sparta,' was of an exiled king seeking protection at a foreign court. King William was absent in Holland, and Mary, the Regent, feeling that the play was disagreeably suggestive of her father's position at St. Germains, objected to its being acted. Her objections were, however, overcome by Dryden's friends, and Cleomenes' was produced in May 1692. Dryden had been seized with a severe fit of illness while hastening to finish 'Cleomenes,' and he was compelled to call in the aid of a young friend, Southerne, to finish it for him. Southerne, Dryden's junior by twenty-eight years, had acquired sudden celebrity by his first play, 'The Loyal Brother, or the Persian Prince,' produced in 1682, when he was only twenty-three. It had been brought on the stage with a prologue and epilogue by Dryden; and Dryden again had written the prologue for Southerne's second play, ‘The Disappointment, or the Mother in Fashion,' which had also been a success. A check came to Southerne's success in 1692, shortly after Dryden had honoured him by seeking his assistance for 'Cleomenes.' His fourth play, the 'Wives' Excuse,' was not well received on the stage, and Dryden now consoled his young friend by some lines of condolence and compliment. He ascribed the want of success to the story and the absence of a favourite actor: Yet those who blame thy tale commend thy wit, Like his, thy thoughts are true, thy language clean, Even lewdness is made moral in thy scene. The hearers may for want of Nokes repine, One more play, 'Love Triumphant, or Nature will Prevail,' was produced by Dryden in the beginning of 1694, and he relinquished play-writing. 'Love Triumphant' was a failure. A letter written by one who was evidently a bitter enemy of Dryden, and who calls him 'huffing Dryden,' says that the play was 'damned by the universal cry of the town.' 'Don Sebastian' was dedicated to the Earl of Leicester, elder brother of Algernon Sydney; 'Amphitryon' to Sir William Leveson Gower of Trentham; 'King Arthur' to George Saville, Marquis of Halifax; 'Cleomenes' to Lawrence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, son of the Lord Chancellor Clarendon, and uncle to Queen Mary; and 'Love Triumphant' to the Earl of Salisbury. These were all friends |