chef-d'œuvre once for all. He accordingly called on the Doctor one morning, and running about the room in a fit of joy, told him his fortune was made. "How so?" says the Doctor. "Why," says Jack," the Duchess of Marlborough, you must know, has long had a strange penchant for a pair of white mice; now, as I knew they were sometimes to be had in the East Indies, I commissioned a friend of mine, who was going thither, to get them for me, and he is this morning arrived with two of the most beautiful little animals in nature." After Jack had finished this account with a transport of joy, he lengthened his visage, by telling the Doctor all was ruined, for without two guineas to buy a cage for the mice, he could not present them. The Doctor unfortunately, as he said himself, had but half-a-guinea in the world, which he offered him. But Pilkington was not to be beat out of his scheme: he perceived the Doctor's watch hanging up in his room, and, after apologizing for the indelicacy of the proposal, hinted, that if he could spare that watch for a week, he could raise a few guineas on it, which he would repay with gratitude. Goldsmith would not be the means of spoiling a man's fortune for such a

trifle. He accordingly took down the watch, and gave it to him; which Jack immediately took to the pawnbroker's, raised what he could on it, and never looked after the Doctor, till he sent to borrow another half-guinea from him on his death-bed; which the other very generously sent him.

SIMONIDES.

SIMONIDES, a poet of Ceos, was avaricious and venal. While he was at Syracuse, every thing necessary for his subsistence was furnished him very profusely, from day to day, at the King's expense. He sold the chief part, and urged this as a reason for his conduct to those who asked why he acted so,—that he was willing to shew his own frugality and Hiero's magnificence. He has been reproached with having been the first who "hired out the Muses." Callimachus says, "My Muse is not mercenary, like that of Simonides." Pindar, also, rallied him on the same. Perhaps this latter poet introduced an innovation which consisted in making verses for a set price. He would not sing upon trust, nor depend upon the generosity of his hero. Perhaps, he insisted upon being

paid before hand, or took earnest.

a proverb for his mercenary spirit.

He became

It is reported that he used to say, "I have two coffers, one for salaries, the other for favours; I open them from time to time; I always find that of salaries full, and that of favours empty."

ROBERT GREENE'S " ORPHARION.'

THIS is a volume of much intrinsic merit, as our readers will be convinced, by the following translation of a well-known Ode by Anacreon. Herrick has, also, attempted it in his "Hesperides," (1648,) but Greene's version is more poetic, though more antiquated. This was the first time, we imagine, that any thing from Anacreon made its appearance in an English dress.

Cupid, abroade, was lated in the night,

His winges were wet with ranging in the raine,-
Harbour he sought; to mee hee tooke his flight
To dry his plumes: I heard the boy complaine;
I opte the doore, & graunted his desire;
I rose myself, & made the wagge a fire.

Looking more narrow by the fier's flame,

I spied his quiver hanging by his backe:

Doubting the boy might my misfortune frame,
I would have gone for feare of further wrack,
But that I drad, did me poore wretch betide,
For forth he drew an arrow from his side.

He pierst the quick, and I begun to start
A pleasing wound, but that it was too hie.

His shaft procurde a sharp, yet sugred smart.
Away he flewe; for why? his winges were dry;
But left the arrow steeking in my brest,

That sore I greevde I welcomd such a guest."

HUGHES.

"HUGHES died in February, 1719-20, on the first night his Siege of Damascus' was acted. He wrote the prologue and epilogue for it in bed; and the dedication to Lord-Chancellor Cowper, only ten days before his death. He was about forty-five years' old. It was the sight of that play, in manuscript, that recommended him to the notice of Lord Cowper, who made him Secretary to the Commissioners of the Peace, a month after he had read it; and when Lord Parker succeeded him in the chancellorship, although Lord Cowper was too angry with him to desire him to continue any one else, he did desire him to continue Mr. Hughes. Lord Parker did so, and told him,

"that Lord Cowper had recommended him to him; but that he had a previous recommendation, which was his own merit.'

"He was never in any circumstances until his secretaryship, which was but a few years before his death. Mr. Strahan only received one hundred and twenty-five pounds for tickets for his play, and had not the pleasure of delivering that to him, but to his mother. He left above five hundred pounds to his family, who much wanted it."-SPENCE.

6

"In answer to an observation of Swift, that Hughes is among the mediocrists, in prose and verse,' Pope replies, As to Hughes, what he wanted in genius he made up as an honest man; but he was of the class you think him.'

It has been said that Pope, in this case, acted with duplicity, because he praises the 'Siege of Damascus,' in a letter to Hughes, written the very day he died; and in a subsequent letter to his brother, praises both the work and its author. Dr. Johnson gives his sanction to this character of Hughes, and has, also, been censured for doing so. We have here a proof that Pope's opinion of Hughes' talents was not a

VOL. II.