45. 15.-Cadenus. Of course an anagram for Decanus = Dean. 46. 14.-Ariadne. The daughter of Minos, king of Crete, and the lover of Theseus. She gave him the famous clew of thread for the labyrinth. See Gayley.

49. 19.-Sheridan. Thomas Sheridan (1687-1738), a schoolmaster and close friend of Swift. The latter made his acquaintance in 1713, upon arriving in Dublin to take the Deanery. He became Swift's constant companion, and the Dean took his place in the school when Sheridan was ill. Swift got him a living in 1725. He had a deserved reputation for wit in conversation.

He wrote

of himself, "I am famous for giving the best advice and following the worst." Swift asked Sheridan to let him know when he (Swift) showed any sign of avarice. Sheridan accordingly wrote full data on a paper, and gave it to Swift. This alienated the two friends.

49. 29. The extract from Voltaire's letter may be thus translated: "Mr. Swift is Rabelais in his good senses and in good company. He has not, to be sure, Rabelais' mirth, but he has all the keenness, the reasonableness, the discretion in choosing, the good taste which our curé of Meudon has not. His verses have a queer savour, and are all but inimitable; tasteful jesting falls to his share in verse and in prose; but to understand him well one should take a trip into his country."

For other criticism of Swift by Thackeray, see Esmond, Book III, Chapter V. Esmond says, "I have always thought of him and of Marlborough as the two greatest men of that age.”

CONGREVE AND ADDISON.

51. 2.-Reform Bill. The Reform Bill was passed in 1832. "In its final shape the Reform Act absolutely disfranchised fortyone boroughs and took away one member from thirty others. Thereby, and by its alteration of the franchise, it accomplished a great transference of power, in favour of the middle classes in the towns. Though it did not establish a democracy, it took a long step in that direction." (Gardiner's Student's History of England, p. 905.)

51. 15.-Pitt. William Pitt the Younger, a great parliamentary orator and statesman (1759-1806).

51. 15.-Mirabeau. Honoré Gabriel Riquetti, Count; born 1749, died 1791. A great orator of the French Revolution.

51. 21.-Old Sarum. This place returned two members to Parliament. It was "only a green mound, without a habitation upon it." (Gardiner.)

52. 10.-Prince Eugene. François Eugène de Savoie (16631736). A great general, and ally with Marlborough against Louis in the battle of Blenheim in 1704. He was originally offended because Louis refused to give him a commission in the army; ⚫ later Louis offered to make him a marshal, but he declined.

52. 16.-Busby. Richard Busby (1606-1695), the famous head-master of Westminster school. A very large number of his pupils reached places of distinction. Thackeray's pun is on the rod of Aaron, which budded and bore almonds. See the book of Numbers, xvii. 8.

He

52. 19.-Tickell. Thomas Tickell, the poet, was born at Bridekirk, Cumberland, in 1686, and died at Bath, in 1740. was a fellow of Oxford and a contributor to the Spectator.

52. 19.-John Dennis. A dramatic scribbler and satirist. He figured in many literary squabbles. Pope put him in the Dunciad. He was born in London in 1657, and died 1734.

53. 12.-"Accourez," etc. "Hasten hither, chaste nymphs of Permessus! Sounds spring from my lyre, and the trees are rejoiced. Mark well their rise and fall: and you, winds, be still! I shall speak of Louis!"

53. 13.-Boileau. Nicholas Boileau-Despréaux (1636–1711). A famous man of letters, who exercised an enormous influence on French literature, and powerfully affected English literature during the age of Anne. His L'Art Poetique (1674) was his most influential work.

53. 34. "In England literature is more honoured than here." 54. 10.-Poets'-corner. Did this suggest to Lowell his phrase

for similar volumes, "the cemetery of the British poets"?

54. 17.-Charles Montague (1661-1715). He wrote verses and satirised poets and artists. He was made First Lord of the Treasury in 1698.

55. 1.-L'heureux temps. "O the happy time when these fables were!"

57. 12.-Will's.

The well-known coffee-house where Dryden

ruled literary London. See also note to 180, 28.

58. 5.-The beautiful Bracegirdle. Anne Bracegirdle (1663?— 1748), a famous actress. In 1693 she made her appearance in Congreve's Old Bachelor, and from that time her chief successes were attained in his plays. His personal relations with her were the talk of the town, but her high reputation for virtue has never been successfully assailed, though she had enemies in her own time and unfavourable critics since. She was equally notable for her beauty and for her great benevolence. "Some young

gentlemen of the town, with whom Esmond had made acquaintance, had promised to present him to that most charming of actresses, and lively and agreeable of women, Mrs. Bracegirdle, about whom Harry's old adversary Mohun had drawn swords, a few years before my poor Lord and he fell out. The famous Mr. Congreve had stamped with his high approval, to the which there was no gainsaying, this delightful person: and she was acting in Dick Steele's comedies and finally, and for twenty-four hours after beholding her, Mr. Esmond felt himself, or thought himself, to be as violently enamoured of this lovely brunette, as were a thousand other young fellows about the city. To have once seen her was to long to behold her again."-Thackeray's Esmond, Book II, Chapter V.

59. 4.-Comic Muse. The English Comic Drama of the Restoration, from 1660 to 1700, is famous for its brilliant dialogue, and for its audacious immorality-being in the latter respect worse than England has had to endure either before or since the time of Charles II.

59. 5.-Nell Gwynn. Eleanor Gwyn was born in abject poverty about 1650; though the exact year of her birth is not definitely known. She originally frequented the theatres as an orange-girl. When fifteen years old she went on the stage, and made a decided hit in song and dance. Later she took leading parts. Pepys admired her greatly; "pretty witty Nell," he writes under date of April 3, 1665. On January 23, 1667, he writes, "Knipp took us all in, and brought to us Nelly, a most

pretty woman, who acted the great part of Coelia to-day very fine, and did it pretty well: I kissed her, and so did my wife; and a mighty pretty soul she is." She became the mistress of Lord Buckhurst, and in 1669 the mistress of Charles II. In 1671 she was made a lady of the privy chamber to Queen Catharine, where her beauty, wit, imperturbable good-nature, and generosity made her popular. She assisted her old friends among the poor actors and actresses. She bore two sons to the king: the surviving one Iwas made Duke of St. Albans. In 1687 she died. Her funeral sermon was preached by Dr. Tenison, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. The best memoir of her is by Peter Cunningham (1850). In spite of her well-known character, she had hosts of friends during her life, and not a few panegyrists since. Anthony Hope's novel, Simon Dale, gives a good account of her life, character, and of the times in which she lived.

59 8.-Jeremy Collier (1650-1726). His Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage (1698) had an immense influence in the direction of the long-needed moral reform; though unfortunately the drama that followed in Queen Anne's time was as flat as it was harmless.

60. 7.-Laïs. A celebrated Greek courtesan, born at Corinth about 180 B.C. She was both greedy and beautiful. She placed her favours at such a figure that this proverb became current : "Not everybody can go to Corinth." The satirists chided her with taking to drink in her old age. There was another person

of the same name and occupation born at Sicily.

61. 6. Cicerone. Italian from "Cicero," so called because of the officious talkativeness of the ordinary guide.

61. 27.-Cavalier seul. "Gentleman forward."

62. 23. Poet bids his mistress. The allusion is to Herrick's famous lyric, beginning

"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,

Old time is still a-flying."

62. 25.-Treillage. Arbour.

62. 30.-Pas.

Step.

62. 32.-Châlet. A little Swiss house in the gingerbread style, like a cuckoo clock.

"How to be happy."

63. 25. Segreto, etc. 63. 26.-Falernian. The most celebrated wine of the ancient There were three varieties-light, sweet, and dry. It was something like sherry.

Romans.

64. 10.-Mirabel or Belmour. Mirabell is a character in The Way of the World, and Bellmour figures in the Old Bachelor.

64. 12.-Scapin and Frontin. Scapin is a rascally valet in Molière's comedy, Les Fourberies de Scapin. Frontin is a personage of the old comedy; a bold valet, a saucy, witty intriguer, as his name indicates, meaning "cheeky." He gets control of his master, whom he is good enough to protect in the pranks where effrontery is the trump-card.

64. 14.-Chivalry story. For a good account of this species of the English novel, see Professor Cross's excellent book, The Development of the English Novel, Chapter I.

65. 2.-Millamant. Mrs. Millamant appears in The Way of

the World.

69. 5.-Richelieu at eighty. died in 1642, but Thackeray is 69. 9.-Grammont's French dandies. Philibert, Count de Grammont (1621-1707). He served in the French armies, and was famous for his intrigues. His Mémoires (1713) were published by his brother-in-law. He took part in the siege of Lerida in 1647. Lerida is the capital of the province of Lerida, Spain, and is the key of Aragon and Catalonia; hence a strategic point in military manœuvres. Grammont, or Gramont, as the French spell the name, dictated his famous Mémoires at the age of eighty. 72. 34. Celui, etc. "Of all the English the man who has carried the glory of the comic drama furthest is the late Mr. Congreve. He wrote only a few pieces, but they are all excellent specimens of their class. . . . You see everywhere the language of honest men who act like scoundrels; which proves that he thoroughly understood the people with whom he lived, and that he moved in what is called good society."

Richelieu was born in 1585, and merely using a strong figure.

74. 32. Shadwell. Thomas Shadwell (1642 ?-92), the poetlaureate, and dramatist contemporary with Dryden. He is scarcely read at all to-day, and is remembered only because Dryden attacked him so wittily in MacFlecknoe, and in Absalom and