"'Whereas upon Mr. Dryden's binding himself to write three playes a yeere, hee the said Mr. Dryden was admitted and continued as a sharer in the king's playhouse for diverse years, and received for his share and a quarter three or four hundred pounds, communibus annis; but though he received the moneys, we received not the playes, not one in a yeare. After which, the house being burnt, the company in building another, contracted great debts, so that shares fell much short of what they were formerly. Thereupon Mr. Dryden complaining to the company of his want of proffit, the company was so kind to him that they not only did not presse him for the playes which he so engaged to write for them, and for which he was paid beforehand, but they did also at his earnest request give him a third day for his last new play called All for Love; and at the receipt of the money of the said third day, he acknowledged it as a guift, and a particular kindnesse of the company. Yet notwithstanding this kind proceeding, Mr. Dryden has now, jointly with Mr. Lee, (who was in pension with us to the last day of our playing, and shall continue,) written a play called Oedipus, and given it to the Duke's company, contrary to his said agreement, his promise, and all gratitude, to the great prejudice and almost undoing of the company, they being the only poets remaining to us. Mr. Crowne, being under the like agreement with the duke's house, writt a play called The Destruction of Jerusalem, and being forced by their refusall of it, to bring it to us, the said company compelled us, after the studying of it, and a vast expence in scenes and cloaths, to buy off their clayme, by paying all the pension he had received from them, amounting to one hundred and twelve pounds paid by the king's company, besides near forty pounds he the said Mr. Crowne paid out of his owne pocket.
"'These things considered, if notwithstanding Mr. Dryden's said agreement, promise, and moneys freely giving him for his said last new play, and the many titles we have to his writings, this play be judged away from us, we must submit. be judged away from us, we must submit.
| (Signed) | "'Charles Killigrew. |
| "'Charles Hart. | |
| "'Rich. Burt. | |
| "'Cardell Goodman. | |
| "'Mic. Mohun.'" |
[ [228] The interval between the two plays cannot have been quite three years. The first was produced in April, 1695, the second some time in 1697.
[ [229] Produced early in 1700.
[ [230] Mrs. Mountfort was now Mrs. Verbruggen.
[ [231] The passage is:—
"The Freedom man was born to, you've restor'd,
And to our World such Plenty you afford,
It seems, like Eden, fruitful of its own accord.