duced subsequently the celebrated "Essay on Dramatic Poetry," and ended in a disruption of their friendship. Dryden now published his first heroic drama, "The Indian Emperor," which, Scott says, was probably the first of his performances which drew upon him in an eminent degree the attention of the public. Then followed the comedy of "Secret Love," when his reputation as a dramatist was so established that he entered into an advantageous arrangement with Tom Killigrew to furnish him with three plays a year. Dryden was not very scrupulous in the observance of this contract, for he not only failed to produce the required number for Killigrew, but he wrote for the rival house conducted by Sir William Davenant. Though busily employed on the drama, he found time to give to the world his "Annus Mirabilis" in 1667, which was his first poem of consideration, and the first step towards accomplishing the revolution in the poetry of his country, which he so largely aided in working. This felicitous celebration, in a stately and harmonious verse and with fine descriptive power, of the war with the Dutch and the great fire of London, brought him, no doubt, under the favourable notice of the king and the duke of York. The death of Davenant in 1668, left the office of laureate vacant—who was to fill it? Milton, Butler, and Waller alone remained to be placed in competition with the rising poet. The last of these was too much of a fine gentleman to trouble himself about the matter, and would have preferred the fame of keeping the best table to wearing the greenest bays. Butler was too cynical to be a favourite; and the greatest of them all—aged, sightless, and infirm—had withdrawn himself in proud though poor independence and the dignity of uncompromising principles, and had given for £20 to British literature a jewel that was yet to be one of the brightest in its crown, and to place upon his brows laurels which no king could bestow and no time shall wither. And so the man who had already written the most remarkable and elaborate criticism on the canons of poetry, the best heroic poem on the passing history of the day, the most successful dramas, and the largest number of occasional dissertations, was rightly deemed the fittest person to represent the various literary tendencies of his time, and to superintend and direct the tone of English literature. To the laureateship conferred upon him in 1670 was added the post of royal historiographer, the two having an income of £200 a year assigned to them, though not very regularly paid. This, with his wife's means and his own, added to his profits from a share in the theatre and his dramas, gave him an annual income of about £500, though Scott rates it between £600 and £700. Dryden was now at the height of prosperity and popularity. The first dramatic writer of his day, he had raised the French exotic of rhyming heroic tragedy to the highest state of luxuriance that cultivation could force it to, the ablest critic, the most vigorous prose writer, a favourite at court, the companion of wits, the autocrat of "Wills," he from whose snuff-box to have been presented a pinch was a graduation in literature to young authors. But his elevation brought its perils; and as he who stands in the sunshine will cast a shadow, so envy and jealousy were the shades that attended him. Small witlings were perpetually discharging their puny missiles. A greater attack was now organized. Buckingham, the malignest wit of his day, and Butler, the most caustic, determined to assail Dryden in his very pride of place, the heroic drama; other coadjutors are mentioned, such as Sprat and Clifford, who possibly assisted. The result was the celebrated farce of the Rehearsal. The object was at once to assail the rhyming tragedy and its great champion, Dryden, with all the force of wit, ridicule, and burlesque exaggeration. The poet, under the name of Bayes, was exhibited by a humorous and unmistakable travestie of all his personal peculiarities of speech and deportment, while his style, as well as the most striking passages of his dramas, were parodied with the most dexterous and withering ridicule. And so it was put on the stage, and night after night the town thronged to the rival theatre during the winter of 1671, convulsed with merriment at the expense of the laureate. This farce no doubt gave the death-blow to rhyming tragedy, though the ability of Dryden prolonged its existence for a time, till even he saw his error and abandoned it. Meantime he had the discretion to conceal his anger, and wisely abstained from aggravating the annoyance by taking any public notice of it. But, like Loredano, he put down the duke in his tablets, and at the fitting time he did not fail to make the account balance. As long as the "Absalom and Achitophel" shall be read, the character of Zimri, as a delineation of the offender, will remain a monument of the terrible vengeance which has hung him up "to fester in the infamy of years." Whether the Rehearsal exercised any present influence upon his views, certain it is that his next play, a tragi-comedy, "Marriage a la Mode," was written partly in blank verse and partly in prose. A comedy was his next production, followed by "Amboyna," a tragedy, written for the purpose of increasing popular odium against the Dutch, after which, upon the death of Milton, he accomplished the strange feat of transmuting Paradise Lost into an opera, which he called "The State of Innocence, and the Fall of Man," a more monstrous incongruity than which one can scarcely imagine, and which can only be accounted for by the fact that Dryden did not yet comprehend the grandeur of the epic which he thus desecrated. We do not propose to detail the several dramatic compositions of Dryden during the succeeding years that he wrote for the theatres; the best of them is pronounced to be "All for Love" and "The Spanish Friar;" the former, too, is remarkable as being the first-fruits of his conversion to the belief that blank verse, and not rhyme, is the true vehicle for the heroic drama. It was now that Rochester set up Elkanah Settle, in an evil hour for the poor fellow, as a rival to Dryden. Settle's play—the Emperor of Morocco—was acted, puffed, and applauded. Dryden forgot himself so much as to notice the performance, which he demolished in a savage criticism. When Settle was disposed of, other rivals were encouraged by Rochester. A poem now appeared, entitled "An Essay on Satire," which there is some reason to believe was partly written by Dryden: at all events, Rochester, who was most severely handled, attributed it to the laureate, and he took the ignoble and cowardly vengeance of having the poet waylaid and beaten at night on his way home.
A new field now opened for Dryden, and one for which he seemed especially suited. The country was deeply agitated by political controversy, and old party feelings broke out with renewed acrimony. The principal subject of antagonism was the succession to the throne; the tories and catholics supporting the rights of the duke of York, the whigs and protestants favouring the pretensions of the duke of Monmouth, while the king himself had lost much of his popularity on all hands. Literature was of course enlisted in the contention, and most of the writers of the day were ranged on the one side or the other. Dryden's position naturally attached him to the court party, and at the instigation of the king he threw himself into the arena. The result was the publication in November, 1681, of the celebrated satirical poem, "Absalom and Achitophel." A composition of singular power, full of vigorous satire, forcible delineation, and life-like sketches, and withal managed with masterly skill—its effect on the popular mind was instantaneous and powerful. It was in the hands of every one, and went through four editions within the year. "There is no need," says Dr. Johnson, "to inquire why those verses were read which, to all the attractions of wit, elegance, and harmony, added the co-operation of all the factious passions, and filled every mind with the triumph of resentment." The controversy now raged fiercer than ever, and Dryden was furiously assailed, especially by his old enemy Settle. Again Dryden came to the support of the royal cause by the publication of "The Medal, a Satire against Sedition." Again Settle retorted, and Dryden finally disposed of him in the second part of "Absalom and Achitophel." One other there was who earned a castigation, and received it at the hands of this terrible satirist. Shadwell, the poet of the whigs was speedily pilloried in the mock heroics of the famous "M'Flecknoe." For the same political purposes Dryden wrote, in 1682, the tragedy of "The Duke of Guise," the second part of "Absalom and Achitophel," and the "Religio Laici." Notwithstanding all these services rendered to the king, Dryden received but scant requital. His salary was nominally raised to £300 a year; but it was so ill paid that on the death of Charles four years of it were in arrear, and he appears to have been so straitened as to be forced to constant literary toil. On the accession of James, that monarch showed his gratitude to the author of the "Annus Mirabilis" and the "Absalom and Achitophel" by ignoring his brother's addition of £100 a year, and stopping the laureate's butt of wine. A change, however, took place alike in the religion of the poet and the liberality o the monarch. Dryden renounced protestantism and professed the faith of James, who had shortly before restored the pension
