Companions.

R. [9]

[Footnote 1: The character of Sir Roger de Coverley is said to have been
drawn from Sir John Pakington, of Worcestershire, a Tory, whose name,
family, and politics are represented by a statesman of the present time.
The name, on this its first appearance in the 'Spectator', is spelt
Coverly; also in the first reprint.]

[Footnote 2: 'Soho Square' was then a new and most fashionable part of
the town. It was built in 1681. The Duke of Monmouth lived in the centre
house, facing the statue. Originally the square was called King Square.
Pennant mentions, on Pegg's authority, a tradition that, on the death of
Monmouth, his admirers changed the name to Soho, the word of the day at
the field of Sedgemoor. But the ground upon which the Square stands was
called Soho as early as the year 1632. 'So ho' was the old call in
hunting when a hare was found.]

[Footnote 3: John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, b. 1648, d. 1680. His
licentious wit made him a favourite of Charles II. His strength was
exhausted by licentious living at the age of one and thirty. His chief
work is a poem upon 'Nothing.' He died repentant of his wasted life, in
which, as he told Burnet, he had 'for five years been continually
drunk,' or so much affected by frequent drunkenness as in no instance to
be master of himself.]

[Footnote 4: Sir George Etherege, b. 1636, d. 1694. 'Gentle George' and
'Easy Etherege,' a wit and friend of the wits of the Restoration. He
bought his knighthood to enable him to marry a rich widow who required a
title, and died of a broken neck, by tumbling down-stairs when he was
drunk and lighting guests to their apartments. His three comedies, 'The
Comical Revenge,' 'She Would if she Could,' and 'The Man of Mode, or Sir
Fopling Flutter,' excellent embodiments of the court humour of his time,
were collected and printed in 8vo in 1704, and reprinted, with addition
of five poems, in 1715.]

[Footnote 5: Bully Dawson, a swaggering sharper of Whitefriars, is said
to have been sketched by Shadwell in the Captain Hackum of his comedy
called 'The Squire of Alsatia.']

[Footnote 6: The 'Rose' Tavern was on the east side of Brydges Street,
near Drury Lane Theatre, much favoured by the looser sort of play-goers.
Garrick, when he enlarged the Theatre, made the 'Rose' Tavern a part of
it.]

[Footnote 7: Captain Sentry was by some supposed to have been drawn from
Colonel Kempenfelt, the father of the Admiral wh