Clinch's peculiar talents. In 1777 came "The School for Scandal,"
Sheridan's masterpiece, which was followed by Sheridan's last dramatic
work, "The Critic." Never probably before was so splendid a success
gained so rapidly, so steadily increased in so short a time, to come so
abruptly to an end in the very pride of its triumph.

Quite suddenly the most famous English author then alive found
opportunity for the display of wholly new and unexpected talents, and
became one of the most famous politicians and orators alive. There
had, indeed, always been a certain political bent in Sheridan's mind.
He had tried his hand at many political pamphlets, fragments of which
were found among his papers by Moore. He had always taken the keenest
interest in the great questions which agitated the political life of
the waning eighteenth century. The general election of 1780 gave him
an opportunity of expressing this interest in the public field, and he
was returned to Parliament as member for the borough of Stamford. It
is difficult to find a parallel in our history for the extraordinary
success which attended Sheridan in his political life as it had already
attended him in his dramatic career.

Just on the threshold of his political career Sheridan lost the wife he
loved so well. He was profoundly afflicted, but the affliction
lessened and he married a Miss {222} Ogle. There is a story told in
connection with this second marriage which is half melancholy, half
humorous, and wholly pathetic. The second Mrs. Sheridan, young,
clever, and ardently devoted to her husband, was found one day,
according to this story, walking up and down her drawing-room
apparently in a frantic state of mind because she had discovered that
the love-letters Sheridan had sent to her were the same as those which
he had written to his first wife. Word for word, sentence for
sentence, passion for passion, they were the same letters. No doubt
Sheridan made his peace. It is to be presumed that he thought the
letters so good that they might very well serve a second turn; but this
act of literary parsimony was not happy. Parsimony of his written work
was, however, Sheridan's peculiarity. Verses addressed to his dear St.
Cecilia make their appearance again and again, under altered
conditions, in his plays. It is singular enough, as has been happily
said, that the treasures of wit which Sheridan was thought to possess
in such profusion should have been