gave me a seat of honour near his throne, and said that it was only just that I should obtain my father's kingdom, and whilst I stayed with him I should have the usage of a prince, and he would treat me as though I were his son.

When he had made these courteous speeches he began by degrees to smell the ointment, and became intensely disgusted. After a little time, not being able to endure it, he went into another room, and sent for Moobaruk and for me. He then, when we came, began chiding Moobaruk, and asked him if he was the cause of the lady's being in such a state. Moobaruk said: "Your highness must know how incapable I have been rendered of doing evil, and how that I am (wretch that I own myself to be) wholly innocent of any will or power to transgress."

Then the king turned to me, and said: "This then is, I suppose, your doing?"

Then he swore at me, and abused me in strange language; and it seemed to me, from the way that he spoke, that I should come to some mischief, as I saw him so violently enraged. I washed my hands of life, and, regardless of what happened, I seized the poignard that was in Moobaruk's waistcloth, and plunged it into King Sadik's side. He shook, and staggered. I felt distress, thinking that I had killed him. I stood and looked on, but when I saw no blood flowing I supposed that the wound was not of much consequence. Presently he rolled and wallowed on the ground, and curling himself into the shape of a ball flew up to the sky. An instant afterwards he came down, uttering a noise like a thousand claps of thunder, and this was followed by some strange words, and he then gave me such a kick that I thought my breath would have left my body, and I fell down unconscious in a fit. When I awoke I found myself in a wild desert wood, where was to be seen no sign of animal life, but thickets of underwood, shrubs, acacias, and wild plums. I pondered as to where I should go, and as to how I should again get sight of my charmer, and what I should do. I wandered about, and of every person I saw, I inquired about King Sadik; but I saw that my words were strange to all, and that they thought me insane. Day by day I found that life became more hateful to me, and at last I resolved to destroy myself. I got up a high mountain, and went where was a precipitous descent, and was about to throw myself down, when the veiled hajee dressed in green came behind me, and seizing my arm, told me that it was against the laws of God to commit such an act, and that if I went to Roumania I should fall into the company of some holy men, who would give me good news; and soon after this, having obeyed his injunctions, I have had the good fortune to meet with you.

(Concluded.)

THOMAS SHADWELL.

THOMAS SHADWELL was consigned to oblivion by a satire on one sheet and a half, price twopence. Unfortunately for Shadwell's reputation, the satire on that sheet and a half happens to be at once the most severe and the most perfect in the English language. It is superior to Pope's "Dunciad" in that its sting is concentrated to one point, and spends its force upon a single object. It is superior to Byron's "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers" for the additional reason that, while its taunts are cruel and never miss the mark, the poetry is so smooth, the lines so carefully laid, the flow so dignified, that the petulance of the satirist is successfully concealed, and he appears in the character of a disinterested censor delivering a harsh but merited rebuke, rather than as an incensed bard reviling a rival poet. That Dryden's feeling for Shadwell was not that of unmixed contempt, but that a sentiment of jealousy had its place among the motives prompting the production of "MacFlecnoe; or, a Satire on the True-Blue Protestant TS," is quite possible to prove.

It is customary to hear the names of Shadwell and Settle coupled together as those of men of similar propensities, and of authors equally devoid of faculty. Indeed, since Dryden first held them up to the ridicule of mankind, their names serve at times as the synonyms for literary incapacity. Nay, it is probable, inasmuch as Dryden has described Settle as possessing some unconscious gift of achieving rhyme-a facility for committing "a blundering kind of melody"-unto which Shadwell had not attained, that Settle is supposed by many to have been the better poet of the two. Such a supposition is erroneous and unjust. Settle was probably the most wretched poetaster of his time, as a reference to his "Pindaric Ode on the Propagation of the Gospel" will prove. And although we have sounded lower depths in these latter days, and have become in consequence more tolerant of versified trash, we dare not affirm that Dryden's attacks upon the City laureate were undeserved or too severe. Poor Elkannah Settle! It is sad to think of thee after thou hadst attained to a vigorous old age, appearing at Mrs. Minns's puppet-show at Bartholomew Fair, incased in a green dragonthine own device-who erewhile hadst paid court to the Muses nine, and hadst invented ingenious dialogue for the Lord Mayor's Show! Mrs. Minns! Green dragon! it reads like an incident from Dickens, and not like the dull record of historic truth. Our

feeling for Elkannah, however, is a mere pretence of pity-a veriest semblance of compassion, for truly Mr. Settle was much more in his element when wagging his dragon-tail to the delight of the grinning oafs at Bartholomew Fair, than when attempting in his Pope Joans and his Empresses of Morocco to make out a passport to posterity.

No surer method to damage any reputation could possibly have been devised than to connect the name of him who possessed it with that of Settle. But for Dryden to couple Shadwell's with it was the refinement of inhumanity-a piece of cruelty extraordinary-for it so happened that Dryden had written in conjunction with Shadwell a series of observations ridiculing Settle's Empress of Morocco; a circumstance from which (as from some others to be hereinafter set forth) it would appear that Dryden did not at all periods entertain the same profound contempt for his friend's powers as is expressed in "MacFlecnoe," in the second part of "Absalom and Achitophel," and in a hundred allusions scattered through his introductions, prologues, epilogues, dedications, vindications, and notes. Indeed, on this point we are not confined to the negative evidence of inference, because Dryden, while differing with his rival as to the value of his subject-matter, and the propriety of his method, acknowledges candidly his superior ability in his own line. The opinion of Colley Cibber and of Rochester is to the same effect. The latter, indeed (at whose instigation poor. Settle had been urged into the unequal contest with Dryden), has said-with what truth will presently appear—

Of all our modern wits none seem to me
Once to have touched upon true comedy,
Save hasty Shadwell and slow Wycherley.

It is satisfactory to find, then, that at one period Dryden entertained so high an opinion of Shadwell's merit that he constituted him his collaborateur-satisfactory at least to those who hold that Shadwell was a dramatic author of very considerable power. There is a difficulty in determining at what period precisely, and on what question particularly, the difference between these poets flamed into actual warfare. The biographers of Dryden assign various causes more or less impossible, the most singular of them being the very strong disgust which he felt on account of Shadwell's tergiversation. This critical observation is very refreshing when read in the light thrown upon it by the events preceding Dryden's removal from the office of laureate, and his rival's appointment to the post thus vacated. Of all the reasons alleged, that put forward by Malone, and afterwards by Sir Walter Scott,

is the most feasible-namely, that their tastes were so dissimilar as to render permanent agreement impossible.

Shadwell was never tired of professing his "passionate” admiration for Ben Jonson, and in his comedies he followed with the fidelity of a true disciple the manner of his master. Dryden, on the other hand, had but a slender faith in Jonson, and although he never expressed contempt for a predecessor so famous, he showed by his practice that he had discovered or adopted a superior manner. To speak broadly, but we trust intelligibly, Dryden was a wit, and trusted most of all to the sparkle of his dialogue; Shadwell was a humorist, and trusted most of all to the originality of his characters. Which of these two approaches most nearly the true method in dramatic art is not a question with us just at present. Undoubtedly all the comic dramatists of the Restoration were with Dryden. But if the Elizabethan dramatists afforded an example at all, it was surely a sufficiently splendid one to suggest imitation in a later age, and (let it be admitted at once) by an inferior man. In whatever manner the quarrel originated, its intensity never abated. But at epistolary satire Shadwell had no chance with so able an opponent as Dryden, who, having once started his game, seemed never to grow weary of the chase.

As readers of Dryden are aware, the charge which he most frequently brings against his enemy is that of dulness and stupidity.

Shadwell never deviates into sense,

is a line the terseness and rigour of which insure for it an everlasting currency, and which is, and will be, quoted with fervour by those who have never seen a word of Shadwell's in their lives; while

and,

Lambent dulness played about his face;

Trust nature: do not labour to be dull,

are sentences equally remarkable for their crispness and for the false impression they produce. But as Cibber has very well remarked in replying to an insinuation touching his morality, made by Pope: "Any accusation in smooth verse will always sound well, though it is not tied down to have a tittle of truth in it; when the strongest defence in poor humble prose, not having that harmonious advantage, takes nobody by the ear."

In addition to the sarcasms showered upon Shadwell's hypothecated obtusity, "MacFlecnoe" and the other satires teem with allusions to the dramatist's peculiarities of personal appearance,

and the singularity of his most characteristic habits. Into the justice of this ridicule we do not purpose to inquire. It is unworthy of Dryden, though characteristic of the age, and is none the less reprehensible because it may happen to be founded in fact. The biographers of Dryden, however, seem to convert Shadwell's ungainly presence into a serious charge against him, and are never weary of directing attention to his obesity and slovenliness. Sir Walter Scott invariably alludes to him as Dryden's "corpulent adversary," except when coupling his name with Settle's, on which occasion he is a "poor wight" consigned to a "painful immortality." There is no effort made by Sir Walter, although he quotes the complimentary criticisms of others, to give to such statements the weight of his adhesion: to show that between Settle and Shadwell there was a great gulf fixed. No! both are embraced under the scathing and contemptuous epithet, "poor wights," and are equally to share the dishonours of "a painful immortality."

If, however, some excuse may be urged on behalf of a partisan, taking for granted the ungainly corpulence of an author whom he has not seen, and casting new ridicule upon it, there is no such excuse to be made for one who brings against a book which he has seen an allegation, which a moment's reflection would have proved without foundation. As an example of such allegations take the following remark, which, coming from one so universally venerated as Sir Walter Scott, strikes with a tenfold force: "Shadwell," he says, "by way, I suppose, of insinuating to his readers an accurate notion of the characters or humours which he meant to represent, is at great pains to give a long and minute account of each individual in the dramatis persona." Now in that short sentence are several erroneous statements and cruel insinuations; but three principal ones. First, Shadwell is not "at pains to give," &c., his "accounts" are the roughest inventories of mental or moral peculiarities; and although generally accurate, are never minute. In the second place, his accounts" are not long-the three specimens given by Sir Walter (and it is to be presumed he did not select the shortest he could find), average three lines each. In the third place, they are not given for the purpose of insinuating accurate notions, which is only another way of saying that Shadwell was unable to give life and personality to the characters in his work by means of dialogue and action, and was forced by the very poverty of his inventive faculty to the unworthy expedient of cataloguing the characteristics of his persons in the bill of the play. Like those very old masters, who, under each object depicted on the canvas, were accustomed to write verbal explana

66