ned a scholarship at King's
college. Being, by this delay, such as is said to have happened very
rarely, superannuated, he was sent to St. John's college, by the
contributions of his friends, where he obtained a small exhibition.

At his college he lived for some time in the same chamber with the
well-known Ford, by whom I have formerly heard him described as a
contracted scholar and a mere versifier, unacquainted with life, and
unskilful in conversation. His addiction to metre was then such, that
his companions familiarly called him poet. When he had opportunities of
mingling with mankind, he cleared himself, as Ford likewise owned, from
great part of his scholastick rust.

He appeared early in the world as a translator of the Iliads into prose,
in conjunction with Ozell and Oldisworth. How their several parts were
distributed is not known. This is the translation of which Ozell boasted
as superiour, in Toland's opinion, to that of Pope: it has long since
vanished, and is now in no danger from the criticks.

He was introduced to Mr. Pope, who was then visiting sir John Cotton, at
Madingley, near Cambridge, and gained so much of his esteem, that he was
employed, I believe, to make extracts from Eustathius for the notes to
the translation of the Iliad; and, in the volumes of poetry published by
Lintot, commonly called Pope's Miscellanies, many of his early pieces
were inserted.

Pope and Broome were to be yet more closely connected. When the success
of the Iliad gave encouragement to a version of the Odyssey, Pope,
weary of the toil, called Fenton and Broome to his assistance; and,
taking only half the work upon himself, divided the other half between
his partners, giving four books to Fenton, and eight to Broome. Fenton's
books I have enumerated in his life; to the lot of Broome fell the
second, sixth, eighth, eleventh, twelfth, sixteenth, eighteenth, and
twenty-third, together with the burden of writing all the notes.

As this translation is a very important event in poetical history, the
reader has a right to know upon what grounds I establish my narration.
That the version was not wholly Pope's, was always known: he had
mentioned the assistance of two friends in his proposals, and, at the
end of the work, some account is given by Broome of their different
parts, which, however, mentions only five books as written by the
coadjutors; the fourth and twentieth by Fenton; the sixth, the eleventh,
and the eighteenth,