make posterity acquainted with the history of the false statements about the "Odyssey," and concludes: "With respect to Mr. Pope, I have found him what you always affirmed him to be a most insincere person."

ΟΝ

CHAPTER XXXIV

1728

"The Dunciad "

N May 18, 1728, appeared the first edition of "The Dunciad," but without the author's name or the inscription to Swift. Pope was always willing to wound, and seldom afraid to strike, but he shrank from the natural consequences of his own violence. As a measure of protection, it was stated on the title-page that the book was printed in Dublin and reprinted in London, while the publisher bore the unknown name of A. Dodd. There was a frontispiece representing an owl sitting on a pile of books, which consisted of "Dennis's Works," "Cibber's Plays," "Shakespeare Restored," and Blackmore's "Prince Arthur." The Prefatory Address from the Publisher to the Reader is a curious composition, and deserves some examination, since it was certainly written by Pope.

The publisher observes that when any scandal is vented against a man of the highest distinction and character, the public afford it a quiet, and even favourable, reception, whereas if a known scoundrel is touched upon a whole legion is up in arms. For the last two months the town had been per

secuted with pamphlets, letters, and essays against the writings and character of Mr. Pope, yet not one of those who had received pleasure from his works-by a modest computation about a hundred thousand-had stood up to say a word in his defence. The only exception was the author of the following poem. The publisher professes to be in ignorance of his identity, but observes that he had evidently lived in peculiar intimacy with Mr. Pope, whose style he had to some extent imitated. The reader was evidently intended to draw the inference that Swift was the author. It is further stated that this work was the labour of full six years of the author's life, and that he had retired himself from all the avocations and pleasures of the world to attend diligently to its correction and perfection. The time and date of the action were evidently laid in the preceding reign, when the office of City Poet expired upon the death of Elkanah Settle,' and the author had chosen the year of Sir George Thorold's mayoralty-1720-but the writers satirised had been clapped in as they rose, and changed from day to day, so that there might be some obscurity in the chronology.

From an account afterwards published by Savage, as the mouthpiece of Pope, it would appear that

' Elkanah Settle (1648-1724) was appointed City Poet in 1691. He was known as a writer of heavy, bombastic dramas, of which the most successful was Cambyses, King of Persia. Dryden, alarmed at his popularity, satirised him in the second part of “Absalom and Achitophel." In his later years Settle fell upon evil times. He was reduced to writing burlesques for Bartholomew Fair, and is said to have played the part of a dragon in one of his own "drolls." He died in the Charterhouse.