her solicitation, were
directed to be left at Button's coffee-house; and Mr. Savage going
thither a few days afterwards, without expectation of any effect from
his proposal, found to his surprise seventy guineas[67], which had been
sent him in consequence of the compassion excited by Mr. Hill's
pathetick representation.

To this Miscellany he wrote a preface, in which he gives an account of
his mother's cruelty in a very uncommon strain of humour, and with a
gaiety of imagination; which the success of his subscription probably
produced.

The dedication is addressed to the lady Mary Wortley Montague, whom he
flatters without reserve, and, to confess the truth, with very little
art[68]. The same observation may be extended to all his dedications:
his compliments are constrained and violent, heaped together without the
grace of order, or the decency of introduction: he seems to have written
his panegyricks for the perusal only of his patrons, and to have
imagined that he had no other task than to pamper them with praises,
however gross, and that flattery would make its way to the heart,
without the assistance of elegance or invention.

Soon afterwards the death of the king furnished a general subject for a
poetical contest, in which Mr. Savage engaged, and is allowed to have
carried the prize of honour from his competitors: but I know not whether
he gained by his performance any other advantage than the increase of
his reputation; though it must certainly have been with further views
that he prevailed upon himself to attempt a species of writing, of which
all the topicks had been long before exhausted, and which was made at
once difficult by the multitudes that had failed in it, and those that
had succeeded.

He was now advancing in reputation, and though frequently involved in
very distressful perplexities, appeared, however, to be gaining upon
mankind, when both his fame and his life were endangered by an event, of
which it is not yet determined, whether it ought to be mentioned as a
crime or a calamity.

On the 20th of November, 1727, Mr. Savage came from Richmond, where he
then lodged, that he might pursue his studies with less interruption,
with an intent to discharge another lodging which he had in Westminster;
and accidentally meeting two gentlemen, his acquaintances, whose names
were Merchant and Gregory, he went in with them to a neighbouring
coffee-house, and sat drinking till it was late, it being in no ti