y man ever before attained,
there being scarcely any person eminent on any account to whom he
was not known, or whose character he was not in some degree able to
delineate. To the acquisition of this extensive acquaintance every
circumstance of his life contributed. He excelled in the arts of
conversation, and therefore willingly practised them. He had seldom any
home, or even a lodging, in which he could be private, and therefore
was driven into public-houses for the common conveniences of life and
supports of nature. He was always ready to comply with every invitation,
having no employment to withhold him, and often no money to provide for
himself; and by dining with one company he never failed of obtaining an
introduction into another.

Thus dissipated was his life, and thus casual his subsistence; yet did
not the distraction of his views hinder him from reflection, nor the
uncertainty of his condition depress his gaiety. When he had wandered
about without any fortunate adventure by which he was led into a tavern,
he sometimes retired into the fields, and was able to employ his mind in
study, to amuse it with pleasing imaginations; and seldom appeared to be
melancholy but when some sudden misfortune had just fallen upon him;
and even then in a few moments he would disentangle himself from his
perplexity, adopt the subject of conversation, and apply his mind wholly
to the objects that others presented to it. This life, unhappy as it may
be already imagined, was yet embittered in 1738 with new calamities. The
death of the queen deprived him of all the prospects of preferment with
which he so long entertained his imagination; and as Sir Robert Walpole
had before given him reason to believe that he never intended the
performance of his promise, he was now abandoned again to fortune. He
was, however, at that time supported by a friend; and as it was not his
custom to look out for distant calamities, or to feel any other pain
than that which forced itself upon his senses, he was not much afflicted
at his loss, and perhaps comforted himself that his pension would be now
continued without the annual tribute of a panegyric. Another expectation
contributed likewise to support him; he had taken a resolution to write
a second tragedy upon the story of Sir Thomas Overbury, in which he
preserved a few lines of his former play, but made a total alteration of
the plan, added new incidents, and introduced new characters; so that it
w