Pope, when very young, was impressed with such veneration for Dryden, that he persuaded some friends to take him to Will's Coffee-house, and was delighted that he could say that he had seen Dryden. Sir Charles Wogan, too, brought up Pope from the Forest of Windsor, to dress à la mode, and introduce at Will's Coffee-house. Pope afterwards described Dryden as "a plump man with a down look, and not very conversible;" and Cibber could tell no more "but that he remembered him a decent old man, arbitor of critical disputes at Will's." Prior sings of—
"the younger Stiles,
Whom Dryden pedagogues at Will's!"
Most of the hostile criticisms on his Plays, which Dryden has noticed in his various Prefaces, appear to have been made at his favourite haunt, Will's Coffee-house.
Dryden is generally said to have been returning from Will's to his house in Gerard-street, when he was cudgelled in Rose-street by three persons hired for the purpose by Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, in the winter of 1679. The assault, or "the Rose-alley Ambuscade," certainly took place; but it is not so certain that Dryden was on his way from Will's, and he then lived in Long Acre, not Gerard-street.
It is worthy of remark that Swift was accustomed to speak disparagingly of Will's, as in his Rhapsody on Poetry:—
"Be sure at Will's the following day
Lie snug, and hear what critics say;
And if you find the general vogue
Pronounces you a stupid rogue,