fulfil the real purposes of biographer and critic, ought I not to act as honestly and conscientiously in my own case, as I would in the instance of another person? I think I ought: it is what the title of my book professes; how I am to execute it I do not know, and how my best endeavours may be received I can form no guess. In the mean time I will strive to arm myself with an humble but honest mind, resolving, as far as in me lies, not to speak partially of my works because they are my own, nor slightingly against my conscience from apprehension that readers may be found to differ from me, where my thoughts may seem more favourable than their's. The latter of these consequences may perhaps frequently occur, and when it does, my memoirs must encounter it, and acquit themselves of it as they can; for myself, it cannot be long before I am alike insensible to censure or applause.

This play, of which I have been speaking, laid by me for a considerable time; till Lord Halifax one day, when we were at Bushey Park, desired me to shew it to him; he read it, and immediately proposed to carry it to Garrick, and recommend it to him for representa

tion. Garrick was then at Hampton, and I went with Lord Halifax across the park to his house. This was the first time I found myself in company with that extraordinary man. He received his noble visitor with profound obeisance, and in truth there were some claims upon his civility for favours and indulgencies. granted to him by Lord Halifax as Ranger of Bushey Park. I was silently attentive to every minute particular of this interview, and soon discovered the embarrassment, which the introduction of my manuscript occasioned; I saw my cause was desperate, though my advocate was sanguine, and in truth the first effort of a raw author did not promise much to the purpose of the manager. He took it however with all possible respect, and promised an attentive perusal, but those tell-tale features, so miraculously gifted in the art of assumed emotions, could not mask their real ones, and I predicted to Lord Halifax, as we returned to the lodge, that I had no expectation of my play being accepted. A day or two of what might scarce be called suspense confirmed this prediction, when Mr. Garrick having stated his despair of accommodating a play on such a

plan to the purposes of the stage, returned the manuscript to Lord Halifax with many apologies to his Lordship, and some few qualifying words to its author, which certainly was as much as in reason could be expected from him, though it did not satisfy the patron of the play, who warmly resented his non-compliance with his wishes, and for a length of time forbore to live in habits of his former good neighbourhood with him.

When I published this play, which I soon after did, I was conscious that I published Mr. Garrick's justification for refusing it, and I made no mention of the circumstances above stated.

George Ridge Esquire of Kilmiston in the county of Hants, had two sons and one daughter by Miss Brooke, niece to my grandfather Bentley with this family we had lived as friends and relations in habits of the greatest intimacy. It was upon an excursion, as I have before related, to this gentleman's house that I founded my school-boy poem written at Bury, and our families had kept up an interchange of annual visits for a course of time. From these meetings I had been for several

years unluckily excluded by my avocations to college or London, till upon Mr. Ridge's coming to town accompanied by his wife and daughter, and taking lodgings in the near neighbourhood of Mount-Street, where I held my melancholy abode, I was kindly entertained by them, and found so many real charms in the modest manners and blooming beauty of the amiable daughter, that I passed every hour I could command in her society, and devoted all my thoughts to the attainment of that happiness, which it was in her power to bestow upon my future days. As soon therefore as I obtained, through the patronage of Lord Halifax, a small establishment as Crown-Agent for the province of Nova Scotia, I began to hope the object I aspired to was within my reach, when upon a visit she made with her parents to mine at Fulham, I tendered my addresses, and had the unspeakable felicity to find them accepted, and sanctioned by the consent of all parties concerned; thus I became possessed of one, whom the virtues of her heart and the charms of her person had effectually endeared to me, and on the 19th day of February 1759, (being my birth-day) I was married by

my father in the church of Kilmiston to Elizabeth, only daughter of George and Elizabeth Ridge.

Lord Halifax upon some slight concessions from the Duke of Newcastle had reassumed his office of First Lord of Trade and Plantations, and I returned with my wife to Fulham, taking a house for a short time in Duke. Street Westminster, and afterwards in Abing don Buildings.

2

In the following year, upon the death of the king, administration it is well known took a new shape, and all eyes were turned towards the Earl of Bute, as dispenser of favours and awarder of promotions. Mr. Dodington, whom I had visited a second time at Eastbury with my wife and her father Mr. Ridge, obtained an English peerage, and Lord Halifax was ho noured with the high office of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and was preparing to open his majesty's first parliament in that kingdom: I had reason to believe myself at this time very much in his confidence, and in the conduct of a certain private transaction, which I am not called upon to explain, I had done him faithful ser vice; happy for him it would have been, and