th
its history.

[7: None of the addresses sent in having given satisfaction, Lord Byron
was requested to write one, which he did.]

It was in 1778, after the purchase of the other moiety of this property,
that Sheridan set on its boards 'The Critic.' Though this was denounced
as itself as complete a plagiarism as any Sir Fretful Plagiary could
make, and though undoubtedly the idea of it was borrowed, its wit, so
truly Sheridanian, and its complete characters, enhanced its author's
fame, in spite of the disappointment of those who expected higher things
from the writer of 'The School for Scandal.' Whether Sheridan would have
gone on improving, had he remained true to the drama, 'The Critic'
leaves us in doubt. But he was a man of higher ambition. Step by step,
unexpectedly, and apparently unprepared, he had taken by storm the
out-works of the citadel he was determined to capture, and he seems to
have cared little to garrison these minor fortresses. He had carried off
from among a dozen suitors a wife of such beauty that Walpole thus
writes of her in 1773:--

'I was at the ball last night, and have only been at the opera, where I
was infinitely struck with the Carrara, who is the prettiest creature
upon earth. Mrs. Hartley I find still handsomer, and Miss Linley is to
be the superlative degree. The king admires the last, and ogles her as
much as he dares in so holy a place as an oratorio, and at so devout a
service as Alexander's Feast'

Yet Sheridan did not prize his lovely wife as he should have done, when
he had once obtained her. Again he had struck boldly into the drama, and
in four years had achieved that fame as a play-writer to which even
Johnson could testify so handsomely. He now quitted this, and with the
same innate power--the same consciousness of success--the same readiness
of genius--took a higher, far more brilliant flight than ever. Yet had
he garrisoned the forts he captured, he would have been a better,
happier, and more prosperous man. Had he been true to the Maid of Bath,
his character would not have degenerated as it did. Had he kept up his
connection with the drama, he would not have lost so largely by his
speculation in Drury Lane. His genius became his temptation, and he
hurried on to triumph and to fall.

Public praise is a syren which the young sailor through life cannot
resist. Political life is a fine aim, even when its seeker starts
without a shred of real patriotism to conceal his per