prince, and a foreigner, but from a Christian King, their native sovereign, who expects a return in specie from them; that the kindness which he has graciously shewn them may be retaliated on those of his own persuasion.

As for the poem in general, I will only thus far satisfy the reader,-that it was neither imposed on me, nor so much as the subject given me by any man. It was written during the last winter, and the beginning of this spring; though with long interruptions of ill health, and other hindrances. About a fortnight before I had finished it, his Majesty's Declaration for liberty of conscience came abroad; which, if I had so soon expected, I might have spared myself the labour of writing many things which are contained in the third part of it. But I was always in some hope, that the church of England might have been persuaded to have taken off the penal laws and the test, which was one design of the poem, when I proposed to myself the writing of it.

It is evident that some part of it was only occasional, and not first intended: I mean that defence of myself, to which every honest man is bound, when he is injuriously attacked in print; and I refer myself to the judgment of those who have read the ANSWER to the Defence of the late King's Papers, and that of the Duchess, (in which last I was concerned) how charitably I have been represented

4 The winter of 1686.

there. I am now informed both of the author and supervisors of his pamphlet; and will reply, when I think he can affront me: for I am of Socrates's

opinion, that all creatures cannot. In the mean time, let him consider whether he deserved not a more severe reprehension than I gave him formerly, for using so little respect to the memory of those whom he pretended to answer; and at his leisure, look out for some original Treatise of Humility, written by any protestant in English (I believe I may say in any other tongue); for the magnified piece of Duncombe on that subject, which either he must mean or none, and with which another of his fellows has upbraided me, was

5 See p. 532, n. 2.-In the preface to "The Hind and the Panther transversed to the story of the City and Country Mouse," we find the following remark on this passage: "'Tis hard to conceive how any man would censure the Turks for gluttony, a people that debauch in coffee, are voluptuous in a mess of rice, and keep the strictest Lent, without the pleasures of a carnival to encourage them. But it is almost impossible to think that any man who had not almost renounced his senses, should read Duncombe for Allen. He had been told that Mr. Allen had written a Discourse on Humility; to which he wisely answers, that "that magnified piece of Duncombe's was translated from the Spanish of Rodrigues; and to set it beyond dispute, makes the infallible guide affirm the same thing. There are few mistakes, but we may imagine how a man fell into them, and at least what he aimed at; but what likeness is there between Duncombe and Allen? Do they so much as rhyme ?"

translated from the Spanish of Rodriguez; though with the omission of the 17th, the 24th, the 25th, aud the last chapter, which will be found in comparing of the books.

He would have insinuated to the world, that her late Highness died not a Roman catholick; he declares himself to be now satisfied to the contrary; in which he has given up the cause; for matter of fact was the principal debate betwixt us. In the mean time, he would dispute the motives of her change; how preposterously let all men judge, when he seemed to deny the subject of the controversy, the change itself. And because I would not take up this ridiculous challenge, he tells the world I cannot argue; but he may as well infer that a catholick cannot fast, because he will not take up the cudgels against Mrs. James," to confute the protestant religion.

I have but one word more to say concerning the poem as such, and abstracting from the matters either religious or civil, which are handled in

6 The person here meant was Mrs. Eleanor James, who wrote and published "A Vindication of the Church of England, in answer to a Pamphlet, entitled A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty."-She was the wife of Mr. James, a printer, who left many curious books to the library of Sion College, after it had been destroyed by the fire of London. There is a portrait of Mrs. James in the library, in the full Sunday dress of a citizen's wife of that day. She survived her husband many years, and carried on the printing business on her own account.

it. The First Part, consisting most in general characters and narration, I have endeavoured to raise, and give it the majestick turn of heroick poesy. The Second, being matter of dispute, and chiefly concerning church authority, I was obliged to make as plain and perspicuous as possibly I could; yet not wholly neglecting the numbers, though I had not frequent occasions for the magnificence of verse. The Third, which has more of the nature of domestick conversation, is, or ought to be, more free and familiar than the two former.

There are in it two episodes, or fables, which are interwoven with the main design; so that they are properly parts of it, though they are also distinct stories of themselves. In both of these I have made use of the commonplaces of satire, whether true or false, which are urged by the members of the one church against the other: at which I hope no reader of either party will be scandalized; because they are not of my invention, but as old, to my knowledge, as the times of Boccace and Chaucer on the one side, and as those of the Reformation on the other."

The incongruity in the structure of THE HIND AND THE PANTHER is thus censured by Prior and Montague: "Fables were first began and raised to the highest perfection in the eastern countries, where they wrote in signs and spoke in parables, and delivered the most useful precepts in delightful stories, which for their aptness were entertaining to the most judicious, and led the vulgar into

understanding, by surprizing them with their novelty, and fixing their attention. All their fables carry a double meaning; the story is one and entire; the characters the same throughout, not broken, nor changed, and always conformable to the nature of the creatures they introduce. They never tell you, that the dog which snapped at a shadow, lost his troop of horse; that would be unintelligible; a piece of flesh is proper for him to drop, and the reader will apply it to mankind. They would not say that the daw, who was so proud of her borrowed plumes, looked very ridiculous, when Rodrigues came and took away all the book but the 17th, 24th, and 25th chapters, which she stole from him: but this is his new way of telling a story, and confounding the moral and fable together.

"Before the word was written, said the Hind,

"Our Saviour preach'd the faith to all mankind."

What relation has the Hind to our Saviour? or what notion have we of a Panther's Bible? If you say-he means the church, how does the church feed on lawns, or range in the forest? Let it be always a church, or always the cloven-footed beast, for we cannot bear his shifting the scene every line. If it is absurd in comedies to make a peasant talk in the strain of a hero, or a country wench use the language of a court, how monstrous is it to make a priest of a hind, and a parson of a panther? to bring them in disputing with all the formalities of the school? Though as to the arguments themselves, those, we confess, are suited to the capacity of the beasts; and if we would suppose a Hind expressing herself about these matters, she would talk at that rate."