parts should be allowed to suffer want. With
this his grace readily agreed, and promised to use his influence towards
remedying the poet's ill-fortune; but time went by, and his condition
remained unaltered. Whereon Wycherley conceived the idea of bringing
Butler and the duke together, that the latter might the more certainly
remember him. He therefore succeeded in making his grace name an
hour and place in which they might meet. So it came to pass they were
together one day at the Roebuck Tavern; but scarce had Buckingham opened
his lips when a pimp of his acquaintance--"the creature was likewise
a knight"--passed by with a couple of ladies. To a man of Buckingham's
character the temptation was too seductive to be neglected; accordingly,
he darted after those who allured him, leaving the needy poet, whom he
saw no more. Butler lived until 1680, dying in poverty. Longueville,
having in vain solicited a subscription to defray the expenses of the
poet's burial in Westminster Abbey, laid him to rest in the churchyard
of Covent Garden.

Wycherley, the friend of Butler, though a child of the Muses, was
superior to poverty. He was born in the year of grace 1640, and early
in life sent for his better education into France. Returning to England
soon after the king had come unto his own, young Wycherley entered
Queen's College, Oxford, from whence he departed without obtaining a
degree. He then betook himself to town, and became a law student. The
Temple, however, had less attraction for him than the playhouse. Indeed,
before leaving Oxford he had, written a couple of comedies--to wit,
"Love in a Wood," and "The Gentleman Dancing Master," a fact
entitling him to be considered a man of parts. Not satisfied with this
distinction, he soon developed tastes for pleasures of the town, and
became a man of fashion. His wit illuminated choice gatherings of
congenial spirits at coffee-houses; his epigrams were repeated by boon
companions in the precincts of the court.

In the year 1672 his comedy "Love in a Wood" was produced. It
immediately gained universal favour, and, moreover, speedily attracted
the attention of his majesty's mistress, the Duchess of Cleveland.
Wycherley was a man well to look upon: her grace was a lady eager
for adventure. Desiring his acquaintance, and impatient of delay, she
introduced herself to his notice in a manner eminently characteristic
of the age. It happened when driving one day through Pall Mall, she
en