Warburton, by-the-by, exculpates Eusden from any worse fault, as a writer, than being too prolix and too prolific.—See Note to Dunciad, Bk. II. 291.]
[Footnote 9: Duck stands at the head of the prodigious school in English literature. All the poetical bricklayers, weavers, cobblers, farmer's boys, shepherds, and basket-makers, who have since astonished their day and generation, hail him as their general father.]
[Footnote 10: The antiquary may be pleased to know that the "Devil" tavern in Fleet Street, the old haunt of the dramatists, was the place where the choir of the Chapel Royal gathered to rehearse the Laureate odes. Hence Pope, at the close of Dunciad I.,
"Then swells the Chapel-Royal throat;
'God save King Cibber!' mounts in every note.
Familiar White's 'God save King Colley!' cries;
'God save King Colley!' Drury-Lane replies;">[
[Footnote 11:
"On his own works with laurel crowned,
Neatly and elegantly bound,—
For this is one of many rules
With writing Lords and laureate fools,
And which forever must succeed
With other Lords who cannot read,
However destitute of wit,
To make their works for bookcase fit,—
Acknowledged master of those seats,
Cibber his birthday odes repeats."
CHURCHILL, The Ghost.]
[Footnote 12: Swift charges Colley with having wronged Grub Street, by appropriating to himself all the money Britain designed for its poets:—
"Your portion, taking Britain round,
Was just one annual hundred pound;
Now not so much as in remainder,
Since Cibber brought in an attainder,
Forever fixed by right divine,
A monarch's right, on Grub-Street line."
Poetry, a Rhapsody, 1733.]