was injured desisted, I shall not preserve what
Mr. Savage suppressed; of which the publication would indeed have been a
punishment too severe for so impotent an assault.

The great hardships of poverty were to Savage not the want of lodging or
food, but the neglect and contempt which it drew upon him. He complained
that, as his affairs grew desperate, he found his reputation for
capacity visibly decline; that his opinion in questions of criticism was
no longer regarded when his coat was out of fashion; and that those who,
in the interval of his prosperity, were always encouraging him to great
undertakings by encomiums on his genius and assurances of success, now
received any mention of his designs with coldness, thought that the
subjects on which he proposed to write were very difficult, and were
ready to inform him that the event of a poem was uncertain, that an
author ought to employ much time in the consideration of his plan, and
not presume to sit down to write in consequence of a few cursory ideas
and a superficial knowledge; difficulties were started on all sides,
and he was no longer qualified for any performance but "The Volunteer
Laureate."

Yet even this kind of contempt never depressed him: for he always
preserved a steady confidence in his own capacity, and believed nothing
above his reach which he should at any time earnestly endeavour to
attain. He formed schemes of the same kind with regard to knowledge and
to fortune, and flattered himself with advances to be made in science,
as with riches, to be enjoyed in some distant period of his life. For
the acquisition of knowledge he was indeed much better qualified than
for that of riches; for he was naturally inquisitive, and desirous of
the conversation of those from whom any information was to be obtained,
but by no means solicitous to improve those opportunities that were
sometimes offered of raising his fortune; and he was remarkably
retentive of his ideas, which, when once he was in possession of them,
rarely forsook him; a quality which could never be communicated to his
money.

While he was thus wearing out his life in expectation that the queen
would some time recollect her promise, he had recourse to the usual
practice of writers, and published proposals for printing his works by
subscription, to which he was encouraged by the success of many who had
not a better right to the favour of the public; but, whatever was the
reason, he did not find the