calling the performers parrots, who folely depended upon the words which the author put into their mouths for their reputation and fupport. A life of this kind daily wore off that fpirit of independence and refpect for character, without which man is poor indeed. Jones foon entirely loft fight of fame, as well as establishment, and only roufed himself for the provifion of the day. The mifery attending this fituation can readily be conceived; and our author muft have felt it at times, though he had not refolution to alter his conduct. Hence he experienced all the viciffitudes of an indigent and degraded condition; "the thifting tides of fear and hope, the peril and efcape, the famine and the feaft;" the noify moment of intoxication, and the brooding melancholy hours of defpondence and defpair. His diftreffes daily gaining on him, and no effort on his part exerted to relieve him, he frequently fell under the gripe of the law, and the Spunging-houfe was a place that not infrequently claimed his habitation. Here he generally drew upon his mufe for his fupport; and, as he could affume fome addrefs and foftnefs in his manners, he generally found out the weak fide of the daughter or wife of the bailiff, and flattered them fo with a copy of verfes, either on their beauty or talents, as to make his quarters both comfortable and convenient. Many flories have been told of his addreis in those matters. Sometimes he would make himself useful by drawing petitions and memorials for perfons under the fame roof with him; fometimes he would athft at the tap; and fometimes would be fo far con fided in, as to be appointed guardian of the inner door. Two anecdotes he used to relate with no little pride, as proofs of the prevalency of his talents. The one was his borrowing two guineas of the bailiff whilft in his house, under an arreft for ten pounds; and the other of his writing fome verles on the daughter of a bailiff, who, like a fecond Lucy, gave her lover his liberty, at the expence of her father's purfe and refentment. It would be difficult to trace Jones through all the labyrinths of his fortune. A life fo totally unguarded muft hang upon the events of the hour, and, if known, muft form a repetition of fcenes as difgufting in the exhibition as difgraceful to the actor. It is fufficient to know, that after experiencing many reverses of fortune, which his impracticable temper and unaccountable imprudence drew on him, his fituation at laft excited the pity of Mr. H-d-n, the mafter of the Bedford coffeehoufe; a man who, to the virtues of frugality and attention in his bufinefs, difplayed, upon all proper occafions, a very feeling heart, and was well known to be particularly attentive to the wants of diftreted gentlemen, decayed artifts, &c. This man, knowing Jones's ftory, and ftruck with the fhabbiness of his appearance as he took his morning perambulation round the Piazzas, made him an offer of a room in his house, and board every day that he was not otherwife beiter engaged. Jones accepted this propotal with gratitude, and for fome time kept within the regula tions of a private family. But the natural love of a more mixed and enlarged fociety, the fpirit of domineering, of contraft, of diffipation. foun foon prevailed; and eloping one morning early from his lodgings, he did not return that night; the next night came, and Mr. H-d-n again miffed his inmate.. This roufed his inquiries, when it appeared, that Jones, after being in a ftate of inebriety for two days, was found run over by a waggon on the night of the third, in St. Martin's Lane, without his hat or his coat. In this disgraceful and mutilated fituation, he was taken to the workhouse of that parish, where he died a few days after (April, 1770), a ftrong and miferable example of the total want of that prudence, which to men with or without talents, is fo abfolutely neceflary to conduct them through all the affairs of life. As a man, Jones, from the report of those who knew him in the early parts of life, poffeffed many amiable qualities. He was generous, affable, good-natured, and complying; and perhaps his only fault was in being too much adicted to the pleafures of the table. He received his firft patronization under lord chief juftice Singleton, and the principal inhabitants of Drogheda too unSpoiled, but the patronage of lord Chesterfield in time fapped the ftrength of his mind. To be felected by fuch a character as his lordfhip from the common mafs of authors, without education or family connections; to be tranfplanted afterwards by him to England, as a foil more congenial to his talents; to have the entrée of his lordship's houfe; to be fupported by him in fubfcriptions and private recommendations; these raised a fudden tide of profperity, which overflowed the bounds of our author's dif cretion, and drove him into the ocean of life without rudder or compaís. He was, however, under fome kind of restriction in his conduct till he broke altogether with lord Chefterfield. The awe of his lordfhip's high character, the expectations he raised upon his protection, and the neceffity there was for an appearance both in drefs and conversation when before him ;-all these checked even fuch a character as Jones; and it was always readily perceived amongst his intimates when he was about to pay a vifit to Chefterfieldhoufe, by fome feasonable and preparatory deviation which he made from his general conduct. When this barrier was once broke down, he rushed into all the extravagancies of his natural and acquired vices. The great eye of the public was no cenfor for him: it might obferve, but it obferved in filence; and Jones eftimated his pleasures (as he called them) above his reputation. To provide for the fenfual enjoyments of the day, was all his care; and this once obtained, he was philofopher enough" to let to-morrow take care of itself." We fhall wind up this part of his character with the observation of one who feems to have known him well. "His temper (fays he) was, in con fequence of the dominion of his pallions, uncertain and capricious, eafily engaged and easily disgusted; and as economy was a virtue which could never be taken into his catalogue, he appeared to think himself born rather to be fupported by others, than under a duty to fecure to himself the profits which his writings and the munificence of his patrons from time to time afforded.” As an author, his character comes more critically before us: but in deU 4 veloping veloping this character, we must always have an eye on his origin. Bred in the humble line of a provincial bricklayer, with a very little better education than is generally attached to that line, much could not neceffarily be augured from the efforts of his mind. To get a little forward in life by the narrow gleanings of his profeffion, or perhaps by fome ftroke of enterprize, to arrive at the rank of a mafler builder, fpeaking generally, would be termed a fortunate wind-up for fuch a character:-but when we fee a young man, in the very outlet of life, without family, fortune, or connections-without the incitement of example, or that collifion of fimilar minds which roufes and invigorates the feeds of ambitious fame;-to fee fuch a man at once abandon a profeffion which was his daily fupport, and courageoufly throw himfelf under the protection of the mufes, we must at least allow him a genius, and a force of mind very peculiar to his fituation in life. Such were Jones's efforts when, after first obtaining the patronage of lord Chesterfield, he fat down to his tragedy of the Earl of Effex. It is idle to liften to the little tales of malice and rivalfhip which were propagated at that time, of this play not being his own, and that he was greatly allifted in it by lord Chefterfield and Colley Cibber: whoever has read the play with any degree of accuracy, will look in vain for the marks of two fuch writers ;they will neither fee the long-experienced dramatic contrivance of the latter, nor the elegant pointed periods of the former; they will fee a story more naturally than artfully drawn from the hiftory of their country, combined with fuch inci dents as were most likely to produce effect and illuftrate the fable; aided by language appropriate enough to the characters, but more forcible than elegant, and iffuing more from the firft heat of the mind, than the ftudied lucubrations of the scholar. Confidering, therefore, the merits of this tragedy, and from the thres acts of his "Cave of Idra," with the reports we have heard of his "Harold" (a tragedy, which, in the unaccountable confufion of events, is now, perhaps, for ever loft to the stage), we muft pronounce Jones no inconfiderable dramatift: nay, we are warranted to fay more That had he cultivated his talents in this line with becoming affiduity and prudence, there is every reason to think he would ftand in the first line of modern tragedy writers. Of his lighter pieces of poetry we cannot fay as much. They are moftly written upon occafional and perishable fubjects it is true, but then there is little of that point and general reflection which preferve fuch trifles from oblivion. Gray's "Verfes on a Cat being drowned in a tub of gold fishes," feems to promise little from the title; but when we see trifling incident embellished with neat allufions to the faults of ambition, and the falfe friendships of the world, we read it over and over with avidity, and efteem it as one of the poetical gems of a great mafter. On the whole, Jones's talents must be estimated by the line he set out in, viz. a journeyman bricklayer with a moderate share of education; and, confidering that he neglected the means that were offered him to improve this fituation, and refted almost folely on those talents which nature nature originally gave him, he must be confidered as a very extraordinary genius. Account of Nell Gwynn, from the notes to the new tranflation Grammont's memoirs. Ο of drefs. Her fon, the duke of St. Alban's, was born before the left the stage, viz. May 8, 1670. Bishop Burnet peaks of her in thefe terms: Gwynn, the indifereeteft and wildeft creature that ever was in a court, continued to the end of the king's life in great favour, and was maintained at a vaft expence. The duke of Buckingham told me, that when fhe was first brought to the king, the afked only 500 pounds a year, and the king refused it. But when he told me this, about four years after, he faid the had got of the king above fixty thousand pounds. She acted all perfons in fo lively a manner, and was fuch a constant diverfion to the king, that even a new miftrefs could not drive her away; but after all, he never treated her with the decen F the early part of Nell's life little is known but what may be collected from the lampoons of the times; in which it is taid, that the was born in a night-cellar, fold fish about the streets, rambled from tavern to tavern, entertaining the company after dinner and fapper with fongs (her voice being very agreeable); was next taken into the house of madam Rofs, a noted courtezan, and was afterwards admitted into the theatre, where thecies of a miftrefs." Hiftory of his became the mifirefs of both Hart and Lacey, the celebrated actors. Other accounts fay the was born in a cellar in the coil-yard in DruryLane, and that he was firft taken notice of when felling oranges in the play-house She belonged to the king's company at Drury-lane; and, according to Downes, was received as an actrefs a few years af ter that houfe was opened, in 1663. The first notice I find of her is in the year 1668, when the performed in Dryden's play of Secret Love; after which, fhe may be traced every year until 1678, when I conjecture The quitted the ftage. Her forte appears to have been comedy. In an epilogue to Tyranniclove, ipoken by her, the fays, -I walk, because I die Out of my calling in a tragedy. And from the fame authority it may be collected that her person was fmalt, and the was negligent in her Own Times, vol. i. p. 369. The fame author notices the king's attention to her on his death-bed. Cibber, who was diffatisfied with the bithop's account of Nell, fays, "If we confider her in all the dif advantages of her rank and education, the does not appear to have had any criminal errors more remurkable than her fex's frailty, to answer for; and if the fame author, in his latter end of that prince's life, feems to reproach his memory with too kind a concern for her fupport, we may allow, it becomes a bithop to have had no eyes or tafte for the frivolous charms or playful badinage of a king's miftrefs; yet if the common fame of her may be believed, which in my memory was not doubted, the had lefs to be laid to her charge, than any other of thofe ladies who were in the fame ftate of preferment: the never meddled in matters of ferious moment, or was the tool of working politicians; never broke into those amorous infidelities which others, in that grave author, are accufed of; but was as yifibly diftinguifhed by her particular perfonal inclination to the king, as her rivals were by their titles and grandeur "Cibber's Apology, 8vo. p. 450. One of madame Sevigne's letters exhibits no bad portrait of Mrs. Gwynn." Madamoifelle de K(Kerouaille, afterwards duchefs of Portsmouth) has not been difappointed in any thing the propofed. She defired to be miftrefs to the king, and fhe is fo: he lodges with her almost every night, in the face of all the court: fhe has had a fon, who has been acknowledged and prefented with two duchies: the amafies treafure; and makes herfelf feared and refpected by as many as fhe can. But she did not foresee that the fhould find a young actrefs in her way, whom the king dotes on; and the has it not in her power to withdraw him from her. He divides his care, his time, and his health, between thefe two. The actress is as haughty as mademoifelle; fhe infults her, the makes grimaces at her, he attacks her, the frequently fieals the king from her, and boafis whenever he gives her the preference. She is young, indifcreet; confident, wild, and of an agreeable humour; the fings, the dances, the acts her part with a good grace. She has a fon by the king, and hopes to have him acknowledged. As to mademoifelle, fhe reafons thus: This duchefs, fays fhe, pretends to be a perfon of quality: the fays he is related to the beft families in France; whenever any perfon of diftinction dies, he puts herfelf in mourning: if the be a lady of fuch quality, why does the demean her felf to be a courtezan? the ought to die with fhame. As for me, it is my profeffion: I do not pretend to any thing better. He has a fon by me: I pretend that he ought to acknowledge him; and I am well affured he will; for he loves me as well as mademoiselle. This creature gets the upper hand, and dilcountenances and embarrasses the duchefs extremely." Letter 92. Mr. Pennant fays, "The refided at her houfe, in what was then called Pall-Mall. It is the firft good one on the left hand of St. James's Square, as we enter from Pall-Mall. The back room on the ground-floor was (within memory) entirely of looking-glafs, as was faid to have been the ceiling. Over the chimney was her picture; and that of her fifter was in a third room." London, p. 101. At this houfe the died, in the year 1691, and was pompously interred in the parish church of St. Martin's in the Fields, Dr. Tennison, then vicar, and afterwards archbishop of Canterbury, preached her funeral fermon. This fermon, we learn, was afterwards brought forward at court by lord Jerfey, to impede the doctor's preferment; but queen Mary, having heard the objection, answered, "What then?" in a fort of dif compofure to which he was but little fubject, "I have heard as much: this is a fign that that poor unfortunate woman died penitent: for if I can read a man's heart through his looks, had not the made a pious and Chriftian end, the doctor could never have been induced to fpeak well of her." Life of Dr. Thomas Tennifon, p. 20. Cibber alfo fays, he had been unqueftionably informed, that our fair offen der's |