DEDICATION

OF

CLEO MENE S,

THE SPARTAN HERO. 7

TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

THE EARL OF ROCHESTER,

KNIGHT OF THE MOST NOBLE ORDER OF THE GARTER, ' &c. &.

Ir is enough for your Lordship to be con

scious to yourself of having performed a just and honourable action, in redeeming this play from the

1 This tragedy was written in 1691; and, as appears from Motteux's GENTLEMAN'S JOURNAL, was first represented in April, 1692, and printed in that year. It was performed at the Theatre Royal in Drury-Lane.

Of this nobleman some account has already been given in p. 63. After his being deprived of the office of Lord Treasurer, he was, as has been mentioned, made President of the Council. On the accession of King James, he was again made Lord Treasurer, but was soon a second time deprived of the Treasurer's staff. Having at the Revolution strenuously opposed the vote-that the throne had become vacant, though maternal uncle to the Queen, he could not expect any favour from King William. However, before the end of his reign, Lord Rochester was admitted into the Privy Council, and in 1701 was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

persecution of my enemies; but it would be ingratitude in me not to publish it to the world. That it has appeared on the stage, is principally owing to you; that it has succeeded, is the approbation of your judgment by that of the publick. It is just the inversion of an act of parliament; your Lordship first signed it, and then it was passed amongst the lords and commons. The children of old men are generally observed to be short-lived, and of a weakly constitution; how this may prove I know not, but hitherto it has promised well; and if it survive to posterity, it will carry the noble name of its patron along with it, or rather, it will be carried by yours to afterages. Ariosto, in his VOYAGE OF ASTOLPHO TO THE MOON, has given us a fine allegory of two swans, who, when Time had thrown the writings of many poets into the river of Oblivion, were ever in a readiness to secure the best, and bear them aloft into the Temple of Immortality.Whether this poem be of that number, is left to the judgment of the swan who has preserved it; and though I can claim little from his justice, I may presume to value myself upon his charity.

It will be told me, that I have mistaken the Italian poet; who means only, that some excellent writers, almost as few in number as the swans, have rescued the memory of their patrons from forgetfulness and time, when a vast multitude of crows and vultures, that is, bad scribblers, parasites, and flatterers, oppressed by the weight of

the names which they endeavoured to redeem, were forced to let them fall again into Lethe, where they were lost for ever. If it be thus, my Lord, the table would be turned upon me; but I should only fail in my vain attempt; for either some other immortal swan will be more capable of sustaining such a weight, or you who have so long been conversant in the management of great affairs, are able with your own pen to do justice to yourself, and, at the same time, to give the nation a clearer and more faithful insight into those transactions, wherein you have worthily sustained so great a part. For to your experience in state affairs you have also joined no vulgar erudition, which all your modesty is not able to conceal; for to understand critically the delicacies of Horace, is a height to which few of our noblemen have arrived; and that this is your deserved commendation I am a living evidence, as far at least as I can be allowed a competent judge on that subject. Your affection to that admirable Ode which Horace writes to his Mæcenas, and which I had the honour to inscribe to you," is not the only proof of this assertion. You may please to remember, that in the late happy conversation which I had with your Lordship at a noble relation's of yours, you took me aside, and pleased

9 The 29th Ode of the third book. Our author's translation of this Ode first appeared in the Second Part of his MISCELLANIES, published in 1685.

yourself with repeating to me one of the most beautiful pieces in that author. It was the Ode to Barine, wherein you were so particularly affected with that elegant expression,' Juvenumque prodis publica cura. There is, indeed, the virtue of a whole poem in those words; that curiosa felicitas which Petronius, so justly ascribes to our author. The barbarity of our language is not able to reach it; yet, when I have leisure, I mean to try how near I can raise my 'English to his Latin; though in the mean time, I cannot but imagine to myself with what scorn his sacred manes would look on so lame a translation as I could make. His recalcitrat undique tutus might more reasonably be applied to me, than he himself applied it to Augustus Cæsar. I ought to reckon that day as very fortunate to me, and distinguish it, as the ancients did, with a whiter stone, because it furnished me with an occasion of reading my CLEOMENES to a beautiful assembly of ladies, where your Lordship's three fair daughters' were pleased to grace it with their presence; and, if I

The Earl of Rochester had three daughters; Anne, the first wife of James, the second Duke of Ormond;, Henrietta, the wife of James, Earl of Dalkeith, eldest son of James, Duke of Monmouth; and Mary, who was married to Francis, Lord Conway. But the Duchess of Ormond having died in 1685, could not be one of the ladies here alluded to. Lady Hyde, who is mentioned in the next sentence, must therefore have been taken into the account here.

2

may have leave to single out any one in particular, there was your admirable daughter-in-law, shining not like a star, but a constellation of herself; a more true and brighter Berenice. Then it was, that whether out of your own partiality and indul gence to my writings, or out of complaisance to the fair company, who gave the first good omen to my success by their approbation, your Lordship was pleased to add your own; and afterwards to represent it to the Queen, as wholly innocent of those crimes which were laid unjustly to its charge.

2

Jane, the wife of Henry, Lord Hyde, and daughter of Sir William Gower. This is the second time of her appearance in the character of BERENICE. See p. 202,

n: 9.

What the objections were which were made to this tragedy, has not been recorded. Motteux, in his GENTLEMAN'S JOURNAL for April, 1692, says, "I was in hopes to have given you in this letter an account of the acting of Mr.Dryden's CLEOMENES: it was to have appeared upon the stage on Saturday last, and you need not doubt but that the town was big with the expectation of the performance; but orders came from her Majesty to hinder its being acted so that none can tell when it shall be played." In the following month, we find this further notice on the subject: "I told you in my last that none could then tell when Mr. Dryden's CLEOMENES would appear. Since that time the innocence and merit of the play have raised it several eminent advocates, who have prevailed to have it acted, and you need not doubt but it has been with great applause."bas

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King William being at this time in the Netherlands, the order came from the Queen only. Her Majesty,