her son, and made use of every art to
awaken her tenderness and attract her regard. But neither his letters,
nor the interposition of those friends which his merit or his distress
procured him, made any impression on her mind. She still resolved to
neglect, though she could no longer disown him. It was to no purpose
that he frequently solicited her to admit him to see her; she avoided
him with the most vigilant precaution, and ordered him to be excluded
from her house, by whomsoever he might be introduced, and what reason
soever he might give for entering it.

Savage was at the same time so touched with the discovery of his real
mother, that it was his frequent practice to walk in the dark evenings
for several hours before her door, in hopes of seeing her as she might
come by accident to the window, or cross her apartment with a candle in
her hand. But all his assiduity and tenderness were without effect, for
he could neither soften her heart nor open her hand, and was reduced
to the utmost miseries of want, while he was endeavouring to awaken the
affection of a mother. He was therefore obliged to seek some other means
of support; and, having no profession, became by necessity an author.

At this time the attention of the literary world was engrossed by the
Bangorian controversy, which filled the press with pamphlets, and the
coffee-houses with disputants. Of this subject, as most popular, he made
choice for his first attempt, and, without any other knowledge of the
question than he had casually collected from conversation, published
a poem against the bishop. What was the success or merit of this
performance I know not; it was probably lost among the innumerable
pamphlets to which that dispute gave occasion. Mr. Savage was himself
in a little time ashamed of it, and endeavoured to suppress it, by
destroying all the copies that he could collect. He then attempted a
more gainful kind of writing, and in his eighteenth year offered to the
stage a comedy borrowed from a Spanish plot, which was refused by the
players, and was therefore given by him to Mr. Bullock, who, having more
interest, made some slight alterations, and brought it upon the stage,
under the title of Woman's a Riddle, but allowed the unhappy author no
part of the profit.

Not discouraged, however, at his repulse, he wrote two years afterwards
Love in a Veil, another comedy, borrowed likewise from the Spanish, but
with little better success than before; f