and fent a meffage to the queen, that he was too old for the place. There feem to have been many machinations employed afterwards in his favour; and diligent court was paid to Mrs. Howard, afterwards countess of Suffolk, who was much beloved by the king and queen, to engage her intereft for his promotion; but folicitations, verfes, and flatteries, were thrown away; the lady heard them, and did nothing.

All the pain which he fuffered from neglect, or, as he perhaps termed it, the ingratitude of the court, may be fuppofed to have been driven away by the unexampled fuccefs of the Beggar's Opera. This play, written in ridicule of the mufical Italian Drama, was first offered to Cibber and his brethren at Drury-Lane, and rejected; it being then carried to Rich, had the effect, and was ludicrously faid, of making Gay rich, and Rich gay.

Of this lucky piece, as the reader cannot but wish to know the original and progress, I have inferted the relation which Spence has given in Pope's words.

Dr. Swift had been obferving once to Mr. "Gay, what an odd pretty fort of a thing a New"gate Paftoral might make. Gay was inclined to "" try fuch a thing for fome time, but afterwards

thought it would be better to write a comedy on "the fame plan. This was what gave rife to the

Beggar's Opera. He began on it; and when "firft he mentioned it to Swift, the Doctor did "not much like the project. As he carried it on, "he fhewed what he wrote to both of us, and we

now and then gave a correction, or a word or "two of advice; but it was wholly of his own "writing-When it was done, neither of us "thought

"thought it would fucceed.-We fhewed it to "Congreve; who, after reading it over, faid, It "would either take greatly, or be damned con-

foundedly. We were all, at the first night of it, "in great uncertainty of the event'; till we were "very much encouraged by overhearing the duke "of Argyle, who fat in the next box to us, fay, "It will do-it muft do! I fee it in the eyes of " them.' This was a good while before the first "act was over, and fo gave us eafe foon; for that "duke (befides his own good tafte) has a particular "knack, as any one now living, in difcovering the

taste of the public. He was quite right in this, "as ufual; the good-nature of the audience ap"peared ftronger and stronger every act, and "ended in a clamour of applaufe."

Its reception is thus recorded in the notes to the Dunciad

"This piece was received with greater applaufe ❝than was ever known. Befides being acted in "London fixty-three days without interruption, "and renewed the next feafon with equal applause, "it fpread into all the great towns of England; "was played in many places to the thirtieth and "fortieth time; at Bath and Bristol fifty. &c. It "made its progrefs into Wales, Scotland, and "Ireland, where it was performed twenty-four"days fucceffively. The ladies carried about with "them the favourite fongs of it in fans, and houses "were furnifhed with it in fcreens. The fame "of it was not confined to the author only. The "perfon who acted Polly, till then obfcure, be-"came all at once the favourite of the town; her "pictures were engraved, and fold in great numbers; her life written, books of letters and

"verfes to her published, and pamphlets made even of her fays and jefts. Furthermore, it "drove out of England (for that season) the Italian Opera, which had carried all before it for ten

years."

Of this performance, when it was printed, the reception was different, according to the different opinion of its readers. Swift commended it for the excellence of its morality, as a piece that "placed all kinds of vice in the strongest and most "odious light;" but others, and among them Dr. Herring, afterwards archbishop of Canterbury, cenfured it as giving encouragement not only to vice but to crimes, by making a highwayman the hero, and difmiffing him at laft unpunished. It has been even faid, that, after the exhibition of the Beggar's Opera, the gangs of robbers were evidently multiplied.

Both thefe decifions are furely exaggerated. The play, like many others, was plainly written only to divert, without any moral purpofe, and is therefore not likely to do good; nor can it be conceived, without more fpeculation than life requires or admits, to be productive of much evil. Highwaymen and house-breakers feldom frequent the playhouse, or mingle in any elegant diverfion; nor is it poffible for any one to imagine that he may rob with fafety, because he fees Macheath reprieved upon the stage.

This objection however, or fome other rather political than moral, obtained fuch prevalence, that when Gay produced a fecond part under the name of Polly, it was prohibited by the Lord Chamberlain; and he was forced to recompenfe his repulfe by a fubfcription, which is faid to have been fo

liberally

liberally bestowed, that what he called oppreffion ended in profit. The publication was fo much favoured, that though the first part gained him four hundred pounds, near thrice as much was the profit of the fecond.

He received yet another recompence for this fuppofed hardship, in the affectionate attention of the duke and dutchefs of Queensberry, into whofe house he was taken, and with whom he paffed the remaining part of his life. The * duke, confidering his want of ceconomy, undertook the manage-ment of his money, and gave it to him as he wanted it. But it is fuppofed that the discountenance of the Court funk deep into his heart, and gave him more difcontent than the applauses or tenderness of his friends could overpower. He foon fell into his old diftemper, an habitual colic, and languifhed,. though with many intervals of eafe and cheerfulnefs, till a violent fit at last seized him, and carried him to the grave, as Arbuthnot reported, with more precipitance than he had ever known. He died on the fourth of December 1732, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. The letter which brought an account of his death to Swift was laid by for fome days unopened, because when he received it he was. impreft with the preconception. of fome misfor

tune.

After his death, was published a fecond volume of Fables more political than the former. His. opera of Achilles was acted; and the profits were: given to two widow fifters, who inherited what he left, as his lawful heirs; for he died without a will, though he had gathered three thoufand pounds.

*

There have appeared likewife under his name a comedy called the Diftreft Wife, and the Rehearsal at Gotham, a piece of humour.

The character given him by Pope is this, that "he was a natural man, without defign, who spoke "what he thought, and juft as he thought it;' and that "he was of a timid temper, and fearful of "giving offence to the great ;" which caution however, fays Pope, was of no avail.

As a poet, he cannot be rated very high. He was, as I once heard a female critic remark, "of "a lower order." He had not in any great degree the mens divinior, the dignity of genius. Much however muft be allowed to the author of a new fpecies of compofition, though it be not of the highest kind. We owe to Gay the Ballad Opera; a mode of comedy which at first was fuppofed to delight only by its novelty, but has now by the experience of half a century been found fo well accommodated to the difpofition of a popular audience, that it is likely to keep long poffeffion of the ftage. Whether this new drama was the product of judgment or of luck, the praife of it muft be given to the inventor; and there are many writers read with more reverence, to whom fuch merit of originality cannot be attributed.

His first performance, the Rural Sports, is fuch as was eafily planned and executed; it is never contemptible, nor ever excellent. The Fan is one of thofe mythological fictions which antiquity delivers ready to the hand, but which, like other things that lie open to every one's ufe, are of little value. The attention naturally retires from a new tale of Venus, Diana, and Minerva.

* Spence.