of successful fraud, detection and disgrace will assuredly at last overtake them. tleman, with whom she appears to have been intimately acquainted. Curll, in his Key to the DUNCIAD, 1728,. says, that Mr. Cromwell gave them to her; but in a note on that poem, in 1729, (Book ii. 1. 66, " Which Curll's Corinna," &c.) Pope thus represents this transaction: "This name, [Corinna,] it seems, was taken by one Mrs. Thomas,] who procured some private letters of Mr. Pope's while almost a boy, to Mr. Cromwell, and sold them, without the consent of either of those gentlemen, to Curll, who printed them in 12mo. in 1727. He has discovered her to be the publisher, in his Key, p. 11. But our poet had no thought of reflecting on her in this passage: on the contrary, he has been informed she is a decent woman, and in misfortunes. We only take this opportunity," &c.-The words in Italicks were omitted by Pope, in the subsequent editions; probably in consequence of Curll's informing him in an advertisement at the end of her Letters and Memoirs, printed in 1731, (under the title of PYLADES and CORINNA,) that she was the author of an abusive pamphlet against him, entitled "Codrus, or the DUNCIAD Dissected," which she published in 1728, under the name of " Mr. Phillips." ་་ For some years after the death of Dryden, she appears to have kept up a friendly intercourse with his family and relations; for she addressed a letter and a paper of verses to his kinswoman, Mrs. Creed, on the death of her daughter Jemima, who, I find from a MS. document now before me, was buried at Tichmarsh in February, 1705-6. -Her scheme, however, of gaining some money by a fictitious account of Dryden's funeral, seems to have been formed on her being confined in the Fleet in 1727 (if not before); and probably it was then put into Curll's This unfortunate woman, it appears from her own account, was put into the Fleet in the year hands, though he did not think proper to produce it till three years afterwards, in the Memoirs of Congreve. This may be collected from a slight circumstance. In a poem on our author's death, which she wrote immedi ately after that event, (for it appeared in the Collection entitled LUCTUS BRITANNICI, published on that occasion, in June, 1700,) are the following lines: "But ah! Britannia, thou complain'st too late; In 1727, she printed the second edition of her Poems, in which this on Dryden is introduced; but having then probably written the narrative which will be found in a following page, in which she represents him as dying in excruciating dolours, she very prudently omitted the last couplet above quoted, with which these dolours were completely at variance. According to her own account, she was put into the Fleet in 1727. Under an Act of Insolvency, a warrant was issued for her release, in June 1729; but in consequence of her extreme indigence, she remained in confinement till near the middle of the next year, as appears from the following original letter, written by her in a very neat hand, which was found in a presentation copy of her volume of Poems, purchased a few years ago by my friend Mr. Bindley. It has no superscription, but was probably addressed to Sir Joseph Jekyll, Master of the Rolls; Your Honour being the appropriate address to the person 1727, where she continued till near the time of her death in February, 1730-31; for though an filling that high office. In part of the preceding century noblemen were addressed by that title; but that mode of address, at the time this letter was written, was wholly obsolete. It however might have been directed to the son of a Peer. "May it please your Honour, "That the most unfortunate of her sex presumes to lay her little offering at your feet; which, having been accepted by Majesty, [her volume of Poems in 1727 was dedicated to Caroline, Princess of Wales, at this time become Queen,] she flatters her selfe, may afford your Honour, at a leisure hour, some entertainment also. "She begs leave to lay her unhappy case before your Honour's charitable consideration, having bin deprived of a competent fortune by an unjust executor, [George Gwinnet, the elder,] who carried her through Civil and Common Law, Chancery, and the House of Lords; till length of time consumed the profits of the suit, and she was landed in a prison; where, for several years, she has suffered more than thought can conceive, or words express. And tho' she received liberty by the gracious Act in July session, has languished here ever since under extream sickness and want, being so destitute of all ne cessaries, that she is not able to go through the streets, much less can she hope to get into any business, for the support of life, without a few modest fig-leaves to cover her; which having no means to raise, nor friend or relation living, she is compelled to claim an author's right, of presenting her book; a method she little thought to have used, and is ashamed to own now: but who, oh! who, can blame a drowning wretch, for laying hold of any branch? Act of Insolvency was passed in the middle of the year 1729, from inability, probably, to pay the gaoler's fees, she was confined for near a year afterwards. While she was in the Fleet, she sent a long letter to the pretended author of Congreve's Life, dated May 15th, 1729; and afterwards two "There are but two volumes left of the whole impres sion, which she has bought at shop price, (as in the titlepage,) and is her whole stock to begin the world. She implores your Honour's acceptance of one, and favourable answer by the bearer, towards enabling a poor bird, let out of a cage, to pick up its daily food; which charity will sure find an eternal reward; and that it may, shall be the constant prayer of "Your Hon" "Fleet Prison, April 16th, 1730. "Most obedient, and "E. THOMAS. "That your Honour may not think your compassion abused by an idle creature, accustomed to this practice, I have sent by the bearer some vouchers, being attested copics of the originals, laid before Sir Robert Walpole. Mr. Jodrell, late Clerk of the Parliament, knew my parents, before I was born, and my selfe ever since; and with his son the Counsellor, still living, had the bounty to act for me during the whole ten years' suit, without accepting one fec." This unfortunate woman, after her release from imprisonment, took a lodging in Flect-street, where she died a few months afterwards, February 3, 1730-31, and was buried in St. Bride's church-yard, at the expence of Margaret, Lady Delawar, to whom some occasional verses in her volume of poems are addressed. other letters, on the 16th and 18th of June'; containing, amidst a curious mixture of truth and falsehood, the following account of Dryden's funeral, which has been adopted by all his biographers, and obtained credit for above half a century. "On the Wednesday morning following, being May-Day, 1700, under the most excruciating dolours, he died. Dr. Sprat, then Bishop of Rochester, sent on the Thursday to Lady Elzabeth, that he would make a present of the ground, which was £.40.' with all the other Abbey-fees, to his deceased friend." Lord Halifax' sent also • Unluckily this lady, in a poem on our author's death, published a few weeks after that event, gives a very dif ferent account. See the verses quoted from it-“ All like himself he died," &c. in p. 353, n. Her first account doubtless was the truth, for it corresponds with that given by Mrs. Creed. Corinna, when she introduced these excruciating dolours, forgot, or did not know, that a mortification is attended with no pain. The poem containing the couplet above referred to, is found in LUCTUS BRITANNICI, 1700, p. 13, where it is printed anonymously, being only said to be written by a young lady; but it is ascertained to be the production of Mrs. Thomas, by being also found in her Poems, published by herself in 8vo. in 1727. This probably was set down at random, the whole of the fees for interment only, independent of the ground which may be required for a monument, not amounting, I have reason to believe, to more than this sum. 6 Sprat was not Dryden's friend; on the contrary was an intimate friend of Martin Clifford, who is supposed to |