Wood, gave him reafon to hope for places and employments of value and credit;" but no fuch advantages did he ever obtain. It is reported that the king once gave him three hundred guineas; but of this temporary bounty I find no proof.

Wood relates that he was fecretary to Villiers duke of Buckingham, when he was Chancellor of Cambridge: this is doubted by the other writer, who yet allows the duke to have been his frequent benefactor. That both these accounts are falfe there is reafon to fufpect, from a story told by Packe, in his account of the life of Wycherley, and from fome verfes which Mr. Thyer has published in the author's remains..

"Mr.

"Mr. Wycherley," fays Packe, "had "always laid hold of any opportunity "which offered of reprefenting to the "duke of Buckingham how well Mr. "Butler had deferved of the royal fa

"mily, by writing his inimitable Hu"dibras; and that it was a reproach to "the court that a perfon of his loyalty and wit fhould fuffer in obfcurity,

and under the wants he did. The "duke always feemed to hearken to "him with attention enough; and, af-❝ter fome time, undertook to recom"mend his pretenfions to his majesty. "Mr. Wycherley, in hopes to keep "him steady to his word, obtained of "his grace to name a day, when he

"fortunate poet to his new patron. At "laft an appointment was made, and "the place of meeting was agreed to "be the Roebuck. Mr. Butler and "his friend attended accordingly: the “duke joined them; but, as the d---1 "would have it, the door of the room "where they fat was open, and his

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grace, who had feated himself near

❝it, obferving a pimp of his acquain"tance (the creature too was a knight) "trip by with a brace of ladies, im"mediately quitted his engagement, to "follow another kind of business, at "which he was more ready than in "doing good offices to men of defert; "though no one was better qualified "than he, both in regard to his for

"tune

"tune and understanding, to protect "them; and from that time to the day ❝of his death, poor Butler never found the least effect of his promife!"

Such is the story. The verfes are written with a degree of acrimony, fuch as neglect and difappointment

might naturally excite; and fuch as it would be hard to imagine Butler capable of expreffing against a man who. had any claim to his gratitude..

Notwithstanding this difcouragement and neglect, he ftill profecuted his defign; and in 1678 published the third. part, which still leaves the poem imperfect and abrupt.. How much more he originally intended, or with what

5

events

events the action was to be concluded, it is vain to conjecture. Nor can it be thought strange that he fhould ftop here, however unexpectedly. To write without reward is fufficiently unpleafing; and, if his birth be placed right by Mr. Longueville, he had now arrived at an age when he might well think it proper to be in jeft no longer.

He died in 1680; and Mr. Longue ville, having unfuccefsfully folicited a fubfcription for his interment in Weft minster Abbey, buried him at his own coft in the church-yard of Covent Garden. Dr. Simon Patrick read the fervice.

About fixty years afterwards, Mr. Barber, a printer, mayor of London,

and