hance of reaping
laurels in the field of victory, for the equally uncertain, and more
barren laurels of poetry. The earl of Rochester, in his Session of the
Poets, has thus maliciously recorded, and without the least grain of
wit, the deplorable circumstances of Otway.

Tom Otway came next, Tom Shadwell's dear Zany,
And swears for heroics he writes best of any;
Don Carlos his pockets so amply had filled,
That his mange was quite cured, and his lice were all killed.
But Apollo had seen his face on the stage, }
And prudently did not think fit to engage }
The scum of a playhouse, for the prop of an age. }

Mr. Otway translated out of French into English, the History of the
Triumvirate; the First Part of Julius Caesar, Pompey and Crassus, the
Second Part of Augustus, Anthony and Lepidus, being a faithful
collection from the best historians, and other authors, concerning the
revolution of the Roman government, which happened under their
authority, London 1686 in 8vo. Our author finding his necessities
press, had recourse to writing for the stage, which he did with
various success: his comedy has been blamed for having too much
libertinism mixed with it; but in tragedy he made it his business, for
the most part, to observe the decorum of the stage. He has certainly
followed nature in the language of his tragedy, and therefore shines
in the passionate parts more than any of our English poets. As there
is something familiar and domestic in the fable of his tragedy, he has
little pomp, but great energy in his expressions; for which reason,
though he has admirably succeeded in the tender and melting parts of
his tragedies, he sometimes falls into too great a familiarity of
phrase in those, which, by Aristotle's rule, ought to have been raised
and supported by the dignity of expression. It has been observed by
the critics, that the poet has founded his tragedy of Venice
Preservcd, on so wrong a plot, that the greatest characters in it are
those of rebels and traitors. Had the hero of this play discovered the
same good qualities in defence of his country, that he shewed for his
ruin and subversion, the audience could not enough pity and admire
him; but as he is now represented, we can only say of him, what the
Roman historian says of Catiline, that his fall would have been
glorious (si pro Patria sic concidisset) had he so fallen, in the
service of his country.

Mr. Charles Gildon, in his