gifted person breathed his last,
and was buried in Westminster Abbey. The last work he was occupied on was
a second volume of "Fables," which was published after his death. He had
become very popular, not merely for his powers, but for his presumed
political principles, a "little Sacheverel," as Arbuthnot, his faithful
friend and kind physician, calls him, and yet his modesty and simplicity
of character remained entire, and he died while planning schemes of
self-reformation, economy, and steady literary work. It is curious that
Swift, when the letter arrived with the news of Gay's death, was so
impressed with a presentiment of some coming evil, that he allowed it to
lie five days unopened on his table. And when the Duke and Duchess of
Queensberry erected a monument to his memory, Pope supplied an epitaph,
familiar to most readers of poetry, and which is creditable to both. Two
widow sisters survived Gay, amongst whom the profits of a posthumous
opera, entitled "Achilles," as well as the small fortune which he left,
were divided.

Gay's works lie in narrow compass, and hardly require minute criticism.
His "Beggars' Opera" has the charm of daring singularity of plan, of
great liveliness of song, and has some touches of light hurrying sarcasm,
worthy of any pen. Burke used to deny its merit, but he was probably
trying it b too lofty and ideal a standard. Hazlitt, on the other hand,
has praised it overmuch, and perhaps "monstered" some of its "nothings."
That it has power is proved by its effects on literature. It did not, we
believe, create many robbers, but it created a large robber school in
the drama and the novel; for instance, Schiller's "Robbers," Ainsworth's
"Rookwood," and "Jack Shepherd," and Bulwer's "Paul Clifford," and
"Eugene Aram," not to speak of the innumerable French tales and plays of
a similar kind. The intention of these generally is not, perhaps, after
all, to make an apology, far less an apotheosis of crime, but to teach us
how there is a "soul of goodness" in all things. And has not Shakspeare
long taught and been commended for teaching a similar lesson, although
we cannot say of Gay and his brethren that they have "bettered the
instruction?" Of "Trivia," we have spoken incidentally before; of "Rural
Sports," and the "Shepherd's Week," it is unnecessary to say more than
that the first is juvenile, and the second odd, graphic, and amusing.
None of them is equal to the "Fables," and therefore we have de