LETTER XVIII. TO MR. JACOB TONSON. Wednesday afternoon. From the Coffee-house. Nov. 25th. MR. TONSON, I HAVE the remainder of my Northamptonshyre rents come up this weeke, and desire the favour of you to receive them for me, from the carrier of Tocester, who lodges at the Castle in Smithfield. I suppose it is the same man from whom you lately receiv'd them for my wife. Any time before ten o'clock to-morrow morning will serve the turne. If I were not deepely ingaged in my studyes, which will be finish'd in a day or two, I wou'd not put you to this trouble. I have inclos'd my tenant's letter to me, for you to shew the carrier, and to testify the summ, which is sixteen pounds and about tenn shillings; whiclı the letter sets down. Pray, Sir, give in an acquittance for so much receiv'd, as I suppose you did last time. I am, Your very faithfull Servant, JOHN DRYDEN. • The only circumstance mentioned in this letter, on which a conjecture concerning the year when it was written can be grounded, is the writer's intimation that his studies would be finished in a day or two; which perhaps relates to the conclusion of his Virgil. I have therefore supposed it to be written in 1696. SIR, LETTER XΙΧ. TO MR. JACOB TONSON. [f. Jan. 1696-7.] ACCORDING to my promise, I have sent you all that is properly yours of my translation.' I desire, as you offer'd, that it shou'd be transcribed in a legible hand; and then sent back to me, for the last review. As for some notes on the margins, they are not every where; and when they are, are imperfect; so that you ought not to transcribe them, till I make them compleat. I feare you can scarcely make any thing of my foul copy; but it is the best I have. You see, my hand fails me, and therefore I write so short a letter. What I wrote yesterday was too sharp; but I doubt it is all true. Your boy's coming upon so unseasonable a visit, as if you were frighted for yourself, discomposed me. The translation perhaps was sent to the press, when the first eight books of the Eneid were finished. This letter probably accompanied the last two books: for the ninth and tenth had been previously sent. Sec p. 49. The work having been published early in July, 1697, I have assigned January, 1696-7, as a probable date to it. * This letter does not appear. It could not be the sharp letter already printed, which has been numbered xiii., because, when that was written, only seven books of the Æneid were translated. Transcribe on very large paper, and leave a very large margin. Send your boy for the foul copies, and he shall have them; for it will not satisfy me to send them by my own servant. I cannot yet find the first sheet of the first Eneid. If it be lost, I will translate it over againe:* but perhaps it may be amongst the loose papers. The fourth and ninth Eclogues, which I have sent, are corrected in my wife's printed Miscellany." LETTER XX. TO MR. JACOB TONSON. Tuesday morning, July the 6th, 1697. MR. TONSON,. I DESIRE you wou'd let Mr. Pate know, I can print no more names of his subscribers than I have money for, before I print their names. He has * These few words furnish a strong proof of the equa. bility of Dryden's temper. 3 I suppose Lady Elizabeth Dryden's copy of the first part of his Miscellany, published in 1684, which contained a translation of the Eclogues of Virgil. This person in the last age was frequently called " the learned tradesman."-" Sir Andrew Fountaine," (says Swift, in his JOURNAL, Oct. 6, 1710,) " came this morning, and caught me writing in bed. I went into the City with him, and we dined at the Chop-house, with Will Pate, the learned woollen-draper: then we sauntered at Chinashops and booksellers; went to the tavern, and drank two my acknowledgment of ten guineas receiv'd from him; and, as I told you, I owe him for above three yards of fine cloath: let him reckon for it; and then there will remain the rest for me, out of the ten more names wch he has given in. If he has not money by him, let him blott out as many of his names as he thinks good; and print onely those for which he pays or strikes off, in adjusting the accounts betwixt me and him. This is so reasonable on both sides, that he cannot refuse it but I wou'd have things ended now, because I am pints of white wine," &c. Mr. William Pate was educated at Trinity Hall in Cambridge, where he took the degree of B. C. L. He died in 1746, and was buried at Lee, in Kent, where the following epitaph is inscribed upon his tombstone: Hic jacent reliquiæ Viri Propter ingenii fœcunditatem Quam ob morum urbanitatem suavitatemque, Dilecti. Hunc lapidem, Sequenti apopthegmate aurco incisum, Tumulo imponi jussit : Nervos atque artus esse sapientia MDCC XLVI. to deal with a draper, who is of my own perswasion,' and to whom I have promis'd my custome. I have sent to my tailour, and he sends me word, that I had three yards and half elle of cloath from Mr. Pate: I desire he wou'd make his price; and deduct so much as it comes to, and make even for the rest with ready money; as also that he would send word, what the name was, for whom Sam Atkins left him to make account for. DEAR SONS, Sept. the 3d, our style, [1697.] BEING now at Sir William Bowyer's' in the country, I cannot write at large, because I find my self somewhat indisposed with a cold, and am Our author, it should be remembered, at this time, was a Roman Catholick. * The original of this letter is preserved in the Lambeth Library, No. 933; GIBSON'S PAPERS, vol. i. p. 56. It was kindly imparted to the publick by the Reverend Dr. Vyse, who furnished Dr. Johnson with a transcript of it. At Denham-Court in Buckinghamshire. Sir William Bowyer married a kinswoman of Lady Elizabeth Dryden; Frances, daughter of Charles, Lord Cranbourne, eldest son of William, the second Earl of Salisbury. |