ties of those who pressed
him to try his fortune on the stage. The Old Bachelor was seen in
manuscript by Dryden, one of whose best qualities was a hearty and
generous admiration for the talents of others. He declared that he had
never read such a first play, and lent his services to bring it into a
form fit for representation. Nothing was wanting to the success of the
piece. It was so cast as to bring into play all the comic talent, and to
exhibit on the boards in one view all the beauty, which Drury-Lane
Theatre, then the only theatre in London, could assemble. The result was
a complete triumph; and the author was gratified with rewards more
substantial than the applauses of the pit. Montagu, then a lord of the
treasury, immediately gave him a place, and, in a short time, added the
reversion of another place of much greater value, which, however, did
not become vacant till many years had elapsed.

In 1694 Congreve brought out the Double Dealer, a comedy in which all
the powers which had produced the Old Bachelor showed themselves,
matured by time and improved by exercise. But the audience was shocked
by the characters of Maskwell and Lady Touchwood. And, indeed, there is
something strangely revolting in the way in which a group that seems to
belong to the house of Laius or of Pelops is introduced into the midst
of the Brisks, Froths, Carelesses, and Plyants. The play was unfavorably
received. Yet, if the praise of distinguished men could compensate an
author for the disapprobation of the multitude, Congreve had no reason
to repine. Dryden, in one of the most ingenious, magnificent, and
pathetic pieces that he ever wrote, extolled the author of the Double
Dealer in terms which now appear extravagantly hyperbolical. Till
Congreve came forth,--so ran this exquisite flattery,--the superiority
of the poets who preceded the civil wars was acknowledged:--

"Theirs was the giant race before the flood."

Since the return of the Royal house, much art and ability had been
exerted, but the old masters had been still unrivalled:--

"Our builders were with want of genius curst.
The second temple was not like the first."

At length a writer had arisen who, just emerging from boyhood, had
surpassed the authors of the Knight of the Burning Pestle and of the
Silent Woman, and who had only one rival left to contend with:--

"Heaven, that but once was prodigal before,
To Shakespeare gave as much, she could not g