the FABLES, no separate edition of it having hitherto been discovered. It was inserted there, not to complete the stipulated number of verses, as has been suggested, (for the volume contains above eleven thousand five hundred verses exclusive of this poem and ALEXANDER'S FEAST,) but to do honour to his kinsman, by being connected with his admirable Ode and the popular Tales which compose the book in which it was introduced.-No kind of cordiality subsisted at any period between Sir Robert Driden,' the elder brother of this gen buried at Chesterton, where a monument was erected to his memory by his nephew, Robert Pigott, with a Latin inscription, containing an high eulogium on him. 7 It has been observed in a former page, that Sir Robert Driden, beside his political differences with our author, was offended with him for his departure from the family name. In the latter end of the reign of Charles the Second a new ground of offence was given; for, in 1679, he made a still wider deviation from it, spelling his name Dreyden, as appears from the following advertisement in the London Gazette, No. 1472, Monday, December 29, 1679, which I did not see till the sheet was worked off, in which the Rose-Alley ambuscade is mentioned: "Whercas John Dreyden, Esq. was on Thursday the 18th instant, at night, barbarously assaulted and wounded in Rose-street, in Covent-Garden, by diverse men unknown: if any person shall make discovery of the said offenders to the said Mr. Dreyden, or to any Justice of the Peace, he shall not only receive fifty pounds, which is deposited in the hands of Mr. Blanchard, goldsmith, next door to Temple-Bar, for the said purpose, but if he be a principal or an accessory in the said fact, his Majesty is graciously pleased to promise him his pardon for the same." tleman, and our author; and probably from the downfall of usurpation to the reign of King William, there was scarce any correspondence between him and either of his kinsmen; for in the early part of their lives having been bred stern republicans, they doubtless rejoiced little in the restoration of monarchy. After the Revolution, however, the nation being secured by the Declaration of Rights against a repetition of those arbitrary and illegal measures which had been adopted by King James, and the ferment in which England had been kept for some years, being allayed, Mr. Driden, it may be supposed, became more moderate; and in the latter part of the poet's life appears to have This fancy of our author continued for some years; for in the titlepage of the second edition of his ESSAY OF DRAMATICK POESY, in 1684, which he corrected with great care, we find his name spelt in the same wayJohn Dreyden, Esq. The following extract from an old newspaper, relative to the same transaction, with which I was furnished by Dr. Charles Burney, junior, having lain hid under a mass of papers, from which this life has been formed, was not discovered till it was too late to introduce it in its proper place: "Dec. 19, 1679. "Last night, Mr. Dryden, the famous poet, going from a Coffee-house in Covent-Garden, was set upon by three persons unknown to him, and so rudely by them handled, that, as it is said, his life is in no small danger. It is thought to have been the effect of private grudge, rather than upon the too common design of unlawful gain: an unkind trespass, by which not only he himself, but the commonwealth of learning, may receive an injury." 8 lived with him on very amicable terms. From traditional accounts, which have been well authenticated, it appears, that his kinsman was a man of amiable manners, extremely benevolent, and highly deserving of the praises lavished upon him in this Epistle; in which the description of an honest English Member of Parliament was intended, as Dryden himself informs us, not only as a portrait of his worthy relation, but as a memorial to posterity of the author's principles. His kinsman's sister, Honour Driden," who lived with him, and whom we have seen our author had wooed in his younger days, gave an additional attraction to the house of Chesterton, which he often visited in his latter years. In the common accounts of the family of Dryden, it has been related, that this gentleman and four of his brothers entered into a vow never to marry; but Lady Dryden, the widow of the last Sir John Dryden, used to say, (probably from the information of her husband, who died in March, 1770, 8 See his Letter to the Right Hon. Charles Montague. This lady, who according to the tradition of her own family, was extremely sensible and engaging, continued single all her life, in consequence of an carly disappointment. After her brother's death, she removed to Shrewsbury, where she lived for some years with her elder sister, Anne, the widow of Walter Pigott, Esq. of Chetwynd, in Shropshire. They were both remarkable for charity and piety, and fasting in Lent with great strictness. Honour Driden died some years after her brother, and was buried in St. Chad's church in Shrewsbury. at the age of sixty-seven,) that this circumstance had been erroneously ascribed to these gentlemen, by Collins, in his Baronetage, or whoever furnished him with that anecdote; and that in truth it belonged to another family in Northamptonshire.— Mr. John Driden survived our author above seven years, and by his last will, among numerous legacies to various relations, bequeathed five hundred pounds to our poet's son, Charles; but he having died before the testator, it became a lapsed legacy and it has been a constant tradition in the family of Pigott, descended from one of the sisters of this gentleman, that in return for the immortality conferred on him by his kinsman's verses, he 'The will of Mr. John Driden of Chesterton, which is not in the Prerogative-office, was" scaled, delivered, and published the 2d of January, 1707," three days only before the death of the testator. At that time Charles Dryden was dead; but this will, by which a very large real and personal property was disposed of, was doubtless drawn up some years before for it begins thus :-" The last Will and Testament of John Driden of Chesterton, in the county of Huntingdon, Esq., made in the day of "blanks being left for the date, which were never filled up: and it contains other proofs that the testator did not, when it was written, account himself near death.—Of this will his sister Honour, his brother Erasmus, and his nephew Robert Pigott, were made executors. Beside legacies to various persons, amounting to about sixteen thousand pounds, he bequeathed the George Inn at Northampton to trustees, to found a school for the children of the poor of that town; a circumstance re presented him with the sum of £.500. A fine portrait of our author, painted by Kneller,' which corded in the following inscription on a white marble tablet, set up in the front of that Inn, by his nephew and heir, Robert Pigott: JOHANNES DRIDEN, ar. In hoc agro natus, Vir gravis, probus, sagax, colendus, ex ipsa vel caupona procreari. Robertus Pigott, R. P. The family of Pigott in Shropshire, ever since their nnexion with our author's kinsman, have had a child christened by the name of Dryden; but not one of them has arrived to maturity. *The poet in this portrait, which is a half-length, wears a large wig, and holds a sprig of laurel in his hand. It remained in the house of Chesterton till about the year 1777, when the estate was sold to Waller, Esq. by the late Robert Pigott, Esq. grandson of Robert Pigott above mentioned; about which time this portrait was removed from the old mansion where it had so long hung, and the owner of it, Mrs. Frances Pigott, of Bath, (for it was bequeathed to her by her father,) has not been able since to discover into whose hands it has fallen. |