and ennobled. Emperors descended from vassal kings, elevated their progenitors to the imperial dignity; so that, in future, the same honours were paid to them as if they had in reality been emperors of China. The example was generally followed, and all now worship their ancestors according to the rank which they themselves hold. BIOGRAPHIA DRAMATICA. GEORGE ALEXANDER STEVENS, WAS born in London, somewhere about Hol born. He was the son of a tradesman, and brought up with a view to some mechanical employment; but the obscurity of his birth has cast a veil over the carly part of his life. Whether dissipation, prodigality, wânt, idleness, profligacy, or inclination, led him to employ his talents in publick, we are unable to determine; but the first notice we meet with concerning him is, as a strolling player, in one of the provincial companies, whose chief head-quarters were at Lincoln, where he performed sometime. His own account of himself, extracted from a poem, called Religion, or, The Libertine Repentant, 8vo. 1751, affords us reason to suppose that the tenor of his life had not been much influenced by the rules of piety or virtue; for thus he describes himself: "By chance condemn'd to wander from my birth, An erring exile o'er the face of earth ; Wild through the world of vice,-licentious race ! This poem was written during a fit of illness, and, probably, made no longer impression than until health returned. The next year, 1752, he was playing in Dublin. The year following he came to London, and obtained an engagement at Covent garden theatre; where he acted without any applause, to which, indeed, his performances on the stage were in no respect entitled. In 1754 he published a poem, called The Birth Day of Folly, in imitation of The Dunciad; but proceeded in the design no further than the first book. In January 1755, the theatre in the Haymarket was opened with an entertainment ridiculing Macklin's British Inquisition, and called The Female Inquisition: by a lady. It was supposed to be written by our author, who delivered a proemium and peroration; but, though aided by the assistance of Miss Isabella Wilkinson's exhibitions on the wire, it ended without any advantage to the adventurers, after being four times repeated. At this period Mr. Stevens was celebrated at seve eral convivial societies then in being, of which there was a great number; as, the Choice Spirits, High Boriace, Comus's Court, &c. and wrote many of the songs for which he has since been applauded. His finances were generally at a low ebb, and his person in durance. He experienced the extremes of mirth and jollity, as well as want and dependance; and led a life, if unstained by crimes, yet despicable for its meanness and irregularity. He usually wrote pieces of humour for Shuter to deliver at his benefit. For Shuter he composed the first sketch of his Lecture on Heads, which is said to have owed its origin to his meeting, in one of his strolling excursions with a country mechanick who described the members of the corporation with great force of humour. Whether the humour of the piece was not congenial with that of Shuter, or whether he was inadequate to the task, it is certain it was at first scarcely noticed. Luckily for the author, he was prompted to enlarge his plan; and, having furnished himself with a complete apparatus, he went into the country, and repeated his Lecture with so much success, at various places in Great Britain, Ireland, and America, that he was soon enabled to amass and remit home several large sums of money; by which he secured himself in affluence during the rest of his life. After the Lecture on Heads had apparently been repeated often enough to lose some of its effect, he composed another entertainment of the like kind, called The Supplement, being a new Lecture upon Heads, Portraits, and Whole Lengths. It began in February, 1766; but, notwithstanding the Lecturer's acknowledged reputation, it was coldly received, and ended with six nights performance. It was tried again the next year, but with little more success, being repeated only seven nights. In 1772, owing to a pirated edition of his songs being published at Whitehaven, he printed a genuine collection of them at Oxford, in Octavo. In 1773 appeared The Trip to Portsmouth, a comick sketch, acted at the Haymarket, consisting of a few detached scenes, begun and finished in five days. He performed in this piece for the last time himself, and afterwards repeated his Lecture on Heads both in London and several other places; when, at length, finding his faculties become impaired, he sold the property in his work to Mr. Lee Lewes, a comedian of some eminence, who endeavoured, but without success, to catch the spirit of the original author. The Lecture on Heads will, probably, never again meet with the favour it formerly obtained. It was the misfortune of Stevens, that his mind and body did not keep pace with each other in their decay. He sunk by degrees into a state of all others the most distressing to those who have any connexions, either of friendship or consanguinity, with a person so unhappily circumstanced. He retained his bodily faculties after his mind had lost its powers, and exhibited a miserable spectacle of idiotism and fatuity. At length, after several years remaining in this condition, he died at Baldock, in Herfordshire, September 6th, 1784. THOMAS HULL, Was born in 1728, in the Strand, where his father was in considerable practice as an apothecary. He was educated at the Charter-house, with a view to the church; but afterward embraced his father's profession; which, however, |