ragedy was acted,
in which the machinery of thunder was introduced, a new artificial
method of producing which he had formerly communicated to the
managers. Incensed by this circumstance, he cried out in a transport
of resentment, 'That is my thunder by G--d; the villains will play my
thunder, but not my plays.' This gave an alarm to the pit, which
he soon explained. He was much subject to these kind of whimsical
transports, and suffered the fervor of his imagination often to subdue
the power of his reason; an instance of which we shall now relate.

After he was worn out with age and poverty, he resided within the
verge of the court, to prevent danger from his creditors. One Saturday
night he happened to saunter to a public house, which he discovered in
a short time was out of the verge. He was sitting in an open drinking
room, and a man of a suspicious appearance happened to come in. There
was something about the man which denoted to Mr. Dennis that he was a
Bailiff: this struck him with a panic; he was afraid his liberty was
now at an end; he sat in the utmost solicitude, but durst not offer to
stir, lest he should be seized upon. After an hour or two had passed
in this painful anxiety, at last the clock struck twelve, when Mr.
Dennis, in an extasy, cried out, addressing himself to the suspected
person, 'Now sir, Bailiff, or no Bailiff, I don't care a farthing for
you, you have no power now.' The man was astonished at this behaviour,
and when it was explained to him, he was so much affronted with the
suspicion, that had not Mr. Dennis found his protection in age, he
would have smarted for his mistaken opinion of him.

In the year 1705 a comedy of Mr. Dennis's called Gibraltar, or The
Spanish Adventure, was acted unsuccessfully at Drury-Lane Theatre. He
was also author of a masque called Orpheus and Euridice.

Mr. Dennis, considered as a dramatic writer, makes not so good a
figure as in his critical works; he understood the rules of writing,
but it is not in the power of every one to carry their own theory into
execution. There is one error which he endeavoured to reform, very
material for the interest of dramatic poetry. He saw, with concern,
that love had got the entire possession of the tragic stage, contrary
to the authority of the ancients, and the example of Shakespear. He
resolved therefore to deviate a little from the reigning practice, and
not to make his heroes such whining slaves in their amours, which
no