Godfrey Kneller. Each member gave him his, and he is going to build a room for them at Barn Elms.-Spence. KIT-CAT TOASTS. ADDISON became a member of the Kit-cat Club in 1703. It was the custom of the wits who composed it to celebrate the several beauties they toasted in verse, which they wrote on their drinking glasses. Among these ingenious pieces, which were so many epigrams (preserved in Dryden's Miscel lanies), is one by Addison on the Lady Manchester, which is given at our page 228. The custom of toasting ladies after dinner, peculiar to the Kit-cat Club, and the society out of which it was originally formed, viz." The Knights of the Toast," is thus alluded to in No. 24 of the Tatler. Though this institution had so trivial a beginning, it is now elevated into a formal order, and that happy virgin, who is received and drank to at their meetings, has no more to do in this life but to judge and accept of the first good offer. The manner of her inauguration is much like that of the choice of a Doge in Venice; it is performed by ballotting; and when she is so chosen, she reigns indisputably for that ensuing year; but she must be elected anew to prolong her empire a moment beyond it. When she is regularly chosen, her name is written with a diamond on one of the drinking-glasses. The hieroglyphic of the diamond is to show her that her value is imaginary; and that of the glass, to acquaint her that her condition is frail, and depends on the hand which holds her." Kit-cat Memoirs, p. 5. EUSTACE BUDGELL. BUDGELL," a young Templar of some literature," author of many of the papers in the Spectator, was the first cousin to Mr. Addison, to whom he had been introduced on his coming to town. Mr. Addison, perceiving in young Budgell a love of polite learning, assisted him with his advice in the course of his study, and honoured him with his friendship. When Mr. Addison was appointed secretary to Lord Wharton, in April, 1710, he offered his friend Budgell the place of clerk in his office, which he accepted, and this was his first introduction to public notice. Mr. Budgell is said to have contributed to the Tatler; but his papers are not ascertained. In the Spectator he had the most considerable share after Steele and Addison. The papers marked with the letter X are all written by Mr. Budgell. He also wrote those papers in the Guardian distinguished by an asterisk. EPILOGUE TO THE DISTRESSED MOTHER. THIS admired epilogue is, in the last paper of the seventh volume of the Spectator, ascribed to Mr. Budgell. It was known, however, in Tonson's family, and told to Mr. Garrick, that Addison was himself the author of this epilogue;' and that when it was actually printed with his name he came early in the morning before the copies were distributed, and ordered it to be given to Mr. E. Budgell, that it might add weight to the solicitation which Addison was then making for a place for Mr. Budgell, whom he used to denominate "the man who calls me cousin." Dr. Johnson says "this was the most successful composition of the kind ever yet spoken in the English language. The first three nights it was recited twice, and not only continued to be demanded through the run, as it was termed, of the play, but whenever it is recalled to the stage-where by a peculiar fortune, though a copy from the French, it keeps its place-the Epilogue is still expected, and still spoken.' DEATH OF EUSTACE BUDGELL. THE termination of this gentleman's life was truly deplorable. From a variety of imprudences-upon which it would be painful to dwell—he was reduced to great distress in his circumstances. His miserable condition preyed so on his mind, that he became visibly deranged. He in 1736 took a The Epilogue (printed at p. 229 of the present volume) is believed to have been written by Budgell, and merely corrected by Addison. 2 He publicly alludes to this in the preface to his Memoirs of the Family of the Boyles,' published 1732. "Suffer me, my Lord, under all my misfortunes, to reflect with some little satisfaction, perhaps with a secret pride, that I have not been thought unworthy the friendship of a Halifax, an Addison, and an Orrery." It is in this volume that Budgell records the famous conversation before Lords Halifax and Godolphin, (cited in a succeeding page,) which led to the writing of "the Campaign." boat at Somerset-stairs, having previously loaded his pocket with stones. He ordered the waterman to shoot the bridge and while the boat was passing under the arch, threw himself into the river and perished immediately. Till after the death of Addison there was no stain on the character of Budgell, and it is not improbable that his career would have been prosperous and honourable, if the life of his cousin had been prolonged. But when the master was laid in the grave, the disciple broke loose from all restraint, descended rapidly from one degree of vice and misery to another, ruined his fortune by follies, attempted to repair it by crimes, and at length closed a wicked and unhappy life by self-murder. Yet, to the last, the wretched man, gambler, lampooner, cheat, forger, as he was, retained his affection and veneration for Addison, and recorded those feelings in the last lines which he traced before he hid himself from infamy under London Bridge: "What Cato did, and Addison approved, Cannot be wrong.' This however, as far as respects Addison's approval, was a mere delusion of his own brain. SMITH.1 ONE evening, when Smith was sitting with a friend at a tavern, he was called down by the waiter; and, having staid some time below, came up thoughtful. After a pause, said he to his friend, "He that wanted me below was Addison, whose business was to tell me that a History of the Revolution was intended, and to propose that I should undertake it. I said, 'What shall I do with the character of Lord Sunderland?' and Addison immediately returned, 'When, Rag,' were you drunk last ?' and went away." CRAGGS. MR. Craggs (one of Addison's early companions, and to whom, a few days before his death, he dedicated his works) was ashamed of the meanness of his birth, which Mr. Addison has properly styled a vicious modesty; for his father, though by merit raised to be postmaster-general, and home agent 1 Author of Phædra-Translation of Longinus, &c. 2 Captain Rag was a name which he got at Oxford by his negligence of dress. to the Duke of Marlborough, had been only a barber-the reflection of which tormented him through life. WHISTON. STANHOPE AT COURT. MR. Addison was my particular friend, and with his friend, Sir Richard Steele, brought me, upon my banishment from Cambridge, to have many astronomical lectures at Burton's Coffee-house, near Covent Garden, to the agreeable enter tainment of a good number of curious persons, and the procuring me and my family comfortable support. One of my principal auditors was the Lord Stanhope, whom I knew well and esteemed as a person of uncommon natural probity. Yet, after he had been sometime a courtier, I freely asked him whether he had been able to keep up his integrity at Court, to which he made no reply, whence I concluded that he had not been able to do it, for he would never tell me a lie. This opinion is confirmed by another passage, which I had from the best authority. One day, in company, leaning on his arm in a musing posture, he suddenly started up, and in a kind of agony said: "Well, I am now satisfied, that a man cannot set his foot over the threshold of a court, but he must be as great a rogue as ever was hanged at Tyburn." This was honest Will. Whiston,' who was expelled from Cambridge (Oct. 30, 1710) for heterodoxy, that is, for attacking the commonly received doctrine of the Trinity. In the Guardian, No. 107, will be found a paper by Addison, dated July 11, 1713, in the names of WHISTON and DITTON, evidently written at the time their joint volume on the longitude was at press. The following pungent lines, published in the name of Gay, and smacking much more of Swift, were written upon them. ODE FOR MUSIC ON THE LONGITUDE. Recitativo. The longitude mist on By wicked Will. Whiston, Ritornello. So Ditton and Whiston May both be besh-t on. BROTHER Hopkins, mentioned in Addison's letter to Wortley Montagu, (see page 370,) has long puzzled his biographers. There was a Thomas, alias Vulture' Hopkins, and his son Edward, M. P. in 1701, 1703, &c., both members of the Kit-cat club, but no doubt the allusion is to CHARLES HOPKINS, son of Bishop Hopkins, and author of the "Court Conquest," besides numerous poems and translations printed in "Nichols' Select Collection of Poems," 8 vols., 1780— 1782. He appears to have been on terms of intimacy with Congreve, Dryden, Wycherley, Southerne, and other leading wits of the time. The term "brother" might arise from his brotherhood with Addison in some political or bon-vivant society. We cannot forbear adding the naïve account given of him by the pious writer of the Memoir of Bishop Hopkins prefixed to his works. "Charles, after a career of dissipation, to which he gave dignity and zest, as revellers of old threw pearls into their wine, by associating with Dryden, Congreve, Wycherley, Southerne, and the other prime wits of the time, died at the early age of thirty-six. Of a naturally amiable temper, and agreeable manner, he appears to have been led by his easy gaiety of heart, and excess of good nature, to mix too freely in circles where the semblance of these qualities is the smiling mask of degrading and enervating vices, and to have been a hanger-on of wits, whose leisure he may have amused by that cheerfulness and flow of spirits which constitute good fellowship. It is painful to think of the son of a prelate, not more conspicuous for his genius than for the dignity and purity of his life, dying thus, in the vigour of his manhood, a broken down debauchee, leaving behind him no record of more than average talents, except some volumes of trifling |