ing believed. The ftory of his fufferings reached the ear of the countess of Hertford, who engaged in his fupport with the tenderness and hu manity peculiar to that amiable lady. She demanded an audience of the queen, and laid before her the whole feries of his mother's cruelty, expofed the improbability of her accufation of murder, and pointed out all the circumstances of her unequall'd barbarity.

The interpofition of this lady was fo fuccefsfal, that he was foon after admitted to bail, and on the 9th of March 1728, pleaded the king's pardon*.

Mr. Savage during his imprisonment, his trial, and the time in which he lay under fentence of death, behaved with great fortitude, and confirmed by his unfhaken equality of mind, the esteem of those who before admired him for his abilities. Upon weighing all the circumstances relating to this unfortunate event, it plainly appears that the greatest guilt could not be imputed to Savage. His killing Sinclair, was rather rafh than totally difhonourable, for though Marchant had been the aggreffor, who would not procure his friend from being over-powered by numbers?

Some time after he had obtained his liberty, he met in the street the woman of the town that had fwore against him: She informed him that the was in diftrefs, and with unparalleled affurance defired him to relieve her. He, instead of infulting her mifery, and taking pleasure in the calamity of one who had brought his life into danger, reproved

* Lord Tyrconnel delivered a petition to his majesty in Savage's behalf: And Mrs. Oldfield follicited Sir Robert Walpole on his account. This joint-intereft procured him his pardon.

her

her gently for her perjury, and changing the only guinea he had, divided it equally between her and himself.

Compaffion feems indeed to have been among the few good qualities poffeffed by Savage; he never appeared inclined to take the advantage of weakness, to attack the defenceless, or to prefs upon the falling: Whoever was diftreffed was certain at last of his good wifhes. But when his heart was not foftened by the fight of mifery, he was obftinate in his refentment, and did not quickly lofe the remembrance of an injury. He always harboured the fharpeft refentment against judge Page; and a fhort time before his death, he gratified it in a fatire upon that severe magiftrate.

When in conversation this unhappy fubject was mentioned, Savage appeared neither to confider himself as a murderer, nor as a man wholly free from blood. How much, and how long he regretted it, appeared in a poem publifhed many years afterwards, which the following lines will fet in a very ftriking light.

Is chance a guilt, that my disast'rous heart,
For mischief never meant, must ever fmart?
Can felf-defence be fin? -Ah! plead no more!
What tho' no purpos'd malice ftain'd thee o'er ;
Had Heav'n befriended thy unhappy fide,
Thou had's not been provok'd, or thou had'ft
[died.

Far be the guilt of home-shed blood from all,
On whom, unfought, imbroiling dangers fall.
Still the pale dead revives and lives to me,
To me through pity's eye condemn'd to fee.
Remembrance veils his rage, but fwells his fate,
Griev'd I forgive, and am grown cool too late,

Young

Young and unthoughtful then, who knows one [day, What rip'ning virtues might have made their way? He might, perhaps, his country's friend have [prov'd,

Been gen'rous, happy, candid and belov'd;
He might have fav'd some worth now doom'd to

And I, perchance, in him have murder'd all.

[fall,

Savage had now obtained his liberty, but was without any fettled means of fupport, and as he had loft all tenderness for his mother, who had thirfted for his blood, he refolved to lampoon her, to extort that pension by fatire, which he knew the would never grant upon any principles of honour, or humanity. This expedient proved fuccefsful; whether shame ftill furvived, though compaffion was extinct, or whether her relations had more delicacy than herself, and imagined that some of the darts which fatire might point at her, would glance upon them: Lord Tyrconnel, whatever were his motives, upon his promife to lay afide the defign of expofing his mother, received him into his family, treated him as his equal, and engaged to allow him a penfion of 200 l. a year.

This was the golden part of Mr. Savage's life; for fome time he had no reafon to complain of fortune; his appearance was fplendid, his expences large, and his acquaintance extenfive. • He was

courted, fays the author of his life, by all who ⚫ endeavoured to be thought men of genius, and careffed by all that valued themfelves upon a fine tafte. To admire Mr. Savage was a proof of ⚫ difcernment, and to be acquainted with him was a title to poetical reputation. His presence was ⚫ fufficient to make any place of entertainment po

'pular;

<pular; and his approbation and example conftitu- ted the fashion. So powerful is genius, when 'it is invested with the glitter of affluence. Men willingly pay to fortune that regard which they owe to merit, and are pleased when they have at once an opportunity of exercifing their vanity, and practifing their duty. This interval of profperity • furnished him with opportunities of enlarging his knowledge of human nature, by contemplating life from its highest gradation to its loweft.

4

In this gay period of life, when he was furrounded by the affluence of pleafure, 1729, he publifhed the Wanderer, a Moral Poem, of which the defign is comprised in these lines.

I fly all public care, all venal ftrife,

To try the Still, compared with Active Life.
To prove by these the fons of men may owe,
The fruits of blifs to bursting clouds of woe,
That ev'n calamity by thought refin'd
Infpirits, and adorns the thinking mind.

And more diftinétly in the following paffage :

By woe the foul to daring actions fwells,
By woe in plaintless patience it excells;
From patience prudent, clear experience

[Springs,

And traces knowledge through the courfe of

[things.

[fuccefs,

Thence hope is form'd, thence fortitude,

Renown

-Whate'er men covet or carefs.

This performance was always confidered by Mr. Savage as his mafter-piece; but Mr. Pope, when he asked his opinion of it, told him, that he read it once over, and was not difpleafed with it, that it

gave

gave him more pleasure at the fecond perufal, and delighted him ftill more at the third. From a poem fo fuccefsfully written, it might be reafonably expected that he should have gained confiderable advantages; but the case was otherwife; he fold the copy only for ten guineas. That he got fo fmall a price for fo finished a poem, was not to be imputed either to the neceffity of the writer, or to the avarice of the bookfeller. He was a flave to his paffions, and being then in the purfuit of fome trifling gratification, for which he wanted a fupply of money, he fold his poem to the first bidder, and perhaps for the first price which was propofed, and probably would have been content with lefs, if leís had been offered. It was addreffed to the earl of Tyrconnel, not only in the firft lines, but in a formal dedication, filled with the highest ftrains of panegyric. These praises in a fhort time he found himfelf inclined to retract, being difcarded by the man on whom he had bestowed them, and whom he faid, he then discovered, had not deserved them.

Of this quarrel, lord Tyrconnel and Mr. Savage affigned very different reafons. Lord Tyrconnel charged Savage with the moft licentious behaviour, introducing company into his houfe, and practifing with them the most irregular frolics, and committing all the outrages of drunkennefs. Lord Tyrconnel farther alledged againft Savage, that the books of which he himself had made him a prefent, were fold or pawned by him, fo that he had often the mortification to see them exposed to fale upon ftalls.

Savage, it feems, was fo accuftomed to live by expedients, that affluence could not raise him above them. He often went to the tavern and trufted the payment of his reckoning to the liberality of his company; and frequently of company to whom he was very little known. This conduct indeed, feldom drew him into much inconvenience, or his converfation