Gay fat, Maine fatter, and Cheney huge of size).
Gay had a passion for finery. To this foible Pope, in the early days of his acquaintance with the young man, made reference in a letter to Swift, December 8th, 1713: "One Mr. Gay, an unhappy youth, who writes pastorals during the time of Divine Service, whose case is the more deplorable, as he hath miserably lavished away all that silver he should have reserved for his soul's health, in [pg 9]buttons and loops for his coat." Gay was not only well aware of this weakness, but he deplored it, though he could never contrive to overcome it. He made allusion to it in some lines known as the "Epigrammatical Petition," addressed to Lord Oxford,[[7]] in June, 1714, and also in the prologue to "The Shepherd's Week":—
I sold my sheep and lambkins too,
For silver loops and garments blue:
My boxen hautboy sweet of sound,
For lace that edged mine hat around;
For Lightfoot and my scrip I got
A gorgeous sword, and eke a knot.
Gay now renewed his acquaintance with his old schoolfellow, Aaron Hill, who, it is said, though on doubtful authority, employed him as an amanuensis when setting on foot the project of answering questions in a paper, styled the British Apollo, or, Curious Amusements for the Ingenious.[[8]] The first number of this publication appeared on March 13th, 1708, and it was issued on Wednesdays and Fridays until March 16th, 1711. Gay referred to it in his pamphlet, "The Present State of Wit," published in May 1711: "Upon a review of my letter, I find I have quite forgotten the British Apollo, which might possibly have happened from its having of late retreated out of this end of the town into the country, where I am informed, however, that it still recommends itself by deciding wagers at cards and giving good advice to shopkeepers and their apprentices." Whether or no Gay ever contributed to the British Apollo, it seems likely that it was through the good offices of Hill that in May, 1708, Gay's poem, "Wine," was published by William Keble at the Black-Spread-eagle in Westminster Hall, who, about the same time, brought out a translation by Nahum Tate, the Poet Laureate, and Hill, of a portion of the thirteenth book of Ovid's "Metamorphoses."
"[pg 10]Wine," a subject on which Gay, even at the age of twenty-two, could write with some authority, secured a sufficient popularity to be paid the doubtful compliment of piracy in 1709, by Henry Hill, of Blackfriars, on whom presently the author neatly revenged himself in his verses, "On a Miscellany of Poems to Bernard Lintott," by the following reference:—