young fops and young fellows of the value and advantages [pg 14]of learning! He has indeed rescued it out of the hands of pedants and fools, and discovered the true method of making it amicable and lovely to all mankind. In the dress he gives it, it is a welcome guest at tea-tables and assemblies, and is relished and caressed by the merchants on the 'Change. Accordingly there is not a lady at Court, nor a banker in Lombard Street who is not verily persuaded that Captain Steele is the greatest scholar and best casuist of any man in England. Lastly, his writings have set all our wits and men of letters on a new way of thinking, of which they had little or no notion before: and, although we cannot say that any of them have come up to the beauties of the original, I think we may venture to affirm, that every one of them writes and thinks much more justly than they did some time since."

Gay's agreeable personality secured him many friends. Not later than the spring of 1711 he made the acquaintance of Henry Cromwell, whom he later described as "the honest hatless Cromwell with red breeches," by whom he was introduced to Pope, who was at this time a member of Addison's circle, and generally recognised as a rising man of letters. Pope evidently liked Gay, who was his senior by nearly three years, but was as a child in worldly wisdom. On July 15th, 1711, Pope wrote to Cromwell, "Pray give my service to all my friends, and to Mr. Gay in particular";^[10] and again, nine days later, addressing the same correspondent, he said: "My humble services, too, to Mr. Gay, of whose paper ['The Present State of Wit'] I have made mention to [Erasmus] Lewis."^[11] Gay, ever anxious to please those whom he liked and, perhaps, especially those who might be of use to him, when writing the verses, "On a Miscellany of Poems to Bernard Lintott" (which appeared in that publisher's Miscellany issued in May, 1712), eagerly took advantage to ingratiate himself with a number of people, in so far as he could do this [pg 15]by means of compliments. Gay tells the publisher that if he will only choose his authors from "the successful bards" praised by the author, then "praise with profit shall reward thy pains"; and—

So long shall live thy praise in books of fame,
And Tonson yield to Lintott's lofty name;

but, since an author should not praise one publisher at the expense of another, he has already had a kindly word for that more celebrated publisher, Jacob Tonson—"Jacob's mighty name." It may be mentioned in passing that Gay's "Poems on Several Occasions" bear the joint imprint of Lintott and Tonson. Gay waxed eloquent in these verses, when writing of the other contributors to the Miscellany, and bestowed praise upon his brother-poets in no measured quantity:—

Where Buckingham will condescend to give
That honour'd piece to distant times must live;
When noble Sheffield strikes the trembling strings,
The little loves rejoice and clap their wings.
Anacreon lives, they cry, th' harmonious swain }
Retunes the lyre, and tries his wonted strain,     }
'Tis he,—our lost Anacreon lives again.            }
But when th' illustrious poet soars above
The sportive revels of the god of love,
Like Maro's muse he takes a loftier flight,
And towers beyond the wond'ring Cupid's sight.

If thou wouldst have thy volume stand the test,
And of all others be reputed best,
Let Congreve teach the list'ning groves to mourn,
As when he wept o'er fair Pastora's urn.^[12]

Let Prior's muse with soft'ning accents move,
Soft as the strain of constant Emma's love:
Or let his fancy choose some jovial theme.
As when he told Hans Carvel's jealous dream;
Prior th' admiring reader entertains,
With Chaucer's humour, and with Spenser's strains.^[13]
Waller in Granville lives; when Mira sings
[pg 16] With Waller's hands he strikes the sounding strings.
With sprightly turns his noble genius shines,
And manly sense adorns his easy lines.

On Addison's sweet lays attention waits,
And silence guards the place while he repeats;
His muse alike on ev'ry subject charms,
Whether she paints the god of love, or arms:
In him pathetic Ovid sings again,
And Homer's "Iliad" shines in his "Campaign."
Whenever Garth shall raise his sprightly song,
Sense flows in easy numbers from his tongue;
Great Phoebus in his learned son we see,
Alike in physic, as in poetry.

When Pope's harmonious muse with pleasure roves,
Amidst the plains, the murm'ring streams and groves.
Attentive Echo, pleased to hear his songs,
Thro' the glad shade each warbling note prolongs;
His various numbers charm our ravish'd ears,      }
His steady judgment far out-shoots his years,      }
And early in the youth the god appears.              }

It was in reference to these complimentary lines (which Pope saw in manuscript) that, on December 21st, 1711, Pope wrote to Cromwell: "I will willingly return Mr. Gay my thanks for the favour of his poem, and in particular for his kind mention of me."^[14] That letter is interesting also as being the last exchanged between Pope and his old friend; and it is instructive, as showing how the acquaintance between the poets was already ripening, that Pope turned to Gay in his distress at the defection of his earlier friend. "Our friend, Mr. Cromwell, too, has been silent all this year. I believe he has been displeased at some or other of my freedoms, which I very innocently take, and most with those I think my friends," he wrote to Gay on November 13th, 1712. "But this I know nothing of; perhaps he may have opened to you, and if I know you right, you are of a temper to cement friendships, and not to divide them. I really very much love Mr. Cromwell, [pg