y; and his inimitable manner of
diverting and enlivening the company made it impossible for any one to
be out of humour when he was in it. Envy and detraction seemed to be
entirely foreign to his constitution; and whatever provocations he
met with at any time, he passed them over without the least thought of
resentment or revenge. As Homer had a Zoilus, so Mr. Rowe had sometimes
his; for there were not wanting malevolent people, and pretenders to
poetry too, that would now and then bark at his best performances; but
he was so conscious of his own genius, and had so much good-nature, as
to forgive them, nor could he ever be tempted to return them an answer.

"The love of learning and poetry made him not the less fit for business,
and nobody applied himself closer to it when it required his attendance.
The late Duke of Queensberry, when he was Secretary of State, made him
his secretary for public affairs; and when that truly great man came
to know him well, he was never so pleased as when Mr. Rowe was in
his company. After the duke's death, all avenues were stopped to his
preferment; and during the rest of that reign he passed his time with
the Muses and his books, and sometimes the conversation of his friends.
When he had just got to be easy in his fortune, and was in a fair way to
make it better, death swept him away, and in him deprived the world of
one of the best men, as well as one of the best geniuses, of the age.
He died like a Christian and a philosopher, in charity with all mankind,
and with an absolute resignation to the will of God. He kept up his
good-humour to the last; and took leave of his wife and friends,
immediately before his last agony, with the same tranquillity of mind,
and the same indifference for life, as though he had been upon taking
but a short journey. He was twice married--first to a daughter of
Mr. Parsons, one of the auditors of the revenue; and afterwards to a
daughter of Mr. Devenish, of a good family in Dorsetshire. By the first
he had a son; and by the second a daughter, married afterwards to Mr.
Fane. He died 6th December, 1718, in the forty-fifth year of his age,
and was buried on the 19th of the same month in Westminster Abbey, in
the aisle where many of our English poets are interred, over against
Chaucer, his body being attended by a select number of his friends, and
the dean and choir officiating at the funeral."

To this character, which is apparently given with the fondness of