em, one which Dr.
Johnson glosses over in this way: "Mr. Savage, when he had discovered
his birth, had an incessant desire to speak to his mother, who always
avoided him in public, and refused him admission into her house.
One evening walking, as it was his custom, in the street that she
inhabited, he saw the door of her house by accident open, he entered
it, and, finding no person in the passage to hinder him, went upstairs
to salute her. She discovered him before he entered her chamber,
alarmed the family with the most distressful outcries, and when she
had by her screams gathered them about her, ordered them to drive
out of the house that villain who had forced himself in upon her and
endeavoured to murder her. Savage, who had attempted with the most
submissive tenderness to soften her rage, hearing her utter so
detestable an accusation, thought it prudent to retire."

Thus the Queen refused to interfere until the Countess of Hertford
pleaded the cause of the imprisoned poet. In the meantime Mistress
Oldfield interceded with the mighty Robert Walpole, and the result of
all this wire-pulling was that Savage received the king's pardon,[A]
being thus left free to continue the persecution of his alleged
mother, to beg from friends and strangers alike, and to follow a
mode of life which scandalised even his kindly biographer. And when
Oldfield, the latchets of whose shoes he was not worthy to tie, played
her last part and passed away from the earthly stage, Richard wore
mourning for her, as for a mother, "but did not celebrate her in
elegies;[B] because he knew that too great profusion of praise would
only have revived those faults which his natural equity did not allow
him to think less because they were committed by one who favoured him;
but of which, though his virtue would not endeavour to palliate them,
his gratitude would not suffer him to prolong the memory or diffuse
the censure."

[Footnote A: March 1728. It is cheerful to know that Mr. Gregory also
escaped hanging. It was contended during the trial, and afterwards,
that the testimony against both these defendants was more damning than
the facts warranted.]

[Footnote B: Nevertheless Savage did write a poem in Oldfield's
honour, although he did not sign his virtuous name thereto. The verses
are quoted by Chetwood. _Vide_ Chapter XI.]

Poor, crusty Samuel! what rot you could write now and then, and how
you did hate players and their craft. But may not the bew