s in our own time.

At the close of 1712 the Spectator ceased to appear. It was probably
felt that the shortfaced gentleman and his club had been long enough
before the town; and that it was time to withdraw them, and to replace
them by a new set of characters. In a few weeks the first number of the
Guardian was published. But the Guardian was unfortunate both in its
birth and in its death. It began in dulness, and disappeared in a
tempest of faction. The original plan was bad. Addison contributed
nothing till sixty-six numbers had appeared; and it was then impossible
to make the Guardian what the Spectator had been. Nestor Ironside and
the Miss Lizards were people to whom even he could impart no interest.
He could only furnish some excellent little essays, both serious and
comic; and this he did.

Why Addison gave no assistance to the Guardian, during the first two
months of its existence, is a question which has puzzled the editors and
biographers, but which seems to us to admit of a very easy solution. He
was then engaged in bringing his Cato on the stage.

The first four acts of this drama had been lying in his desk since his
return from Italy. His modest and sensitive nature shrank from the risk
of a public and shameful failure; and, though all who saw the manuscript
were loud in praise, some thought it possible that an audience might
become impatient even of very good rhetoric, and advised Addison to
print the play without hazarding a representation. At length, after many
fits of apprehension, the poet yielded to the urgency of his political
friends, who hoped that the public would discover some analogy between
the followers of Caesar and the Tories, between Sempronius and the
apostate Whigs, between Cato, struggling to the last for the liberties
of Rome, and the band of patriots who still stood firm round Halifax and
Wharton.

Addison gave the play to the managers of Drury Lane Theatre, without
stipulating for any advantage to himself. They, therefore, thought
themselves bound to spare no cost in scenery and dresses. The
decorations, it is true, would not have pleased the skilful eye of Mr.
Macready. Juba's waistcoat blazed with gold lace; Marcia's hoop was
worthy of a Duchess on the birthday; and Cato wore a wig worth fifty
guineas. The prologue was written by Pope, and is undoubtedly a
dignified and spirited composition. The part of the hero was
excellently played by Booth. Steele undertook to pack a house.