CUNNINGHAM. 45 fruitless, without the slightest intimation of his intentions, he secretly left his family, and embarked for England, where he obtained a precarious and unprofitable existence in various companies of strolling knights of the sock and buskin. The frequency of want, however, at length made him sensible of his imprudence; but pride prevented his return to his friends; and ere he had time to form the resolution of obeying the calls of duty, he received in telligence that his father had become insolvent. This unwelcome news was followed by that of his decease in circumstances of distress. Still, an asylum was gene rously offered to our author in the house of an affec tionate brother, Mr. P . Cunningham, one of the best statuaries in Ireland, who repeatedly urged him to return; but the idea of a state of dependence being repugnant to his feelings, he rejected every overture that was made to him, and the profession he had embarked in originally from choice, he now found himself obliged to persist in from necessity. After having experienced the many and various vicissitudes which are the inseparable companions of those votaries of Thespis, known by the title of “would-be actors,” we find him in the year 1761, a per former at Edinburgh, at which period and place he began to emerge from obscurity, by giving to the world his “Elegy on a Pile of Ruins,” which, although obviously an imitation of Gray's elegy, contains many passages con ceived in the true spirit of poetry, and obtained for him considerable reputation. During his theatrical engage ment at Edinburgh, although insignificant as an actor, he was of much value to the manager by furnishing several prologues, and other occasional addresses, a l l o f which were received with applause. About this period h e received a n invitation from several booksellers i n London, who proposed t o engage him i n such works o f literature a s might procure him a more easy and honourable employment than h e had hitherto followed; and willing t o avail himself o f any opportunity that might arise t o extricate him from a profession i n which nature
