[This, Dryden's first play, was produced on February 5, 1663, as is evident from the Prologue, line 15, and from an entry in Evelyn's Diary of that date. It was unsuccessful: see note before the poem To the Lady Castlemaine, p. 20, below. It was later revived, with some changes by the author, probably in 1667, since it was entered on the Stationers' Register for publication on August 7 of that year (Malone, I, 1, 69). The first edition, dated 1669, contains both the original prologue and epilogue and those written for the revival. See p. 52, below.]

wrong.

30

1 Astrol. Why then the life's not very short, nor long.

2 Astrol. The luck not very good, nor very ill.

Prolo. That is to say, 't is as 't is taken still.

1 Astrol. But, brother, Ptolemy the learned says,

'Tis the fifth house from whence we judge of plays.

Venus, the lady of that house, I find Is peregrine: your play is ill design'd; It should have been but one continued song, Or at the least a dance of three hours long. 2 Astrol. But yet the greatest mischief does remain,

40

The twelfth apartment bears the lord of Spain;

Whence I conclude, it is your author's lot, To be indanger'd by a Spanish plot.

Prolo. Our poet yet protection hopes from you,

But bribes you not with anything that's

new.

Nature is old, which poets imitate,

And for wit, those that boast their own estate,

Forget Fletcher and Ben before them went,

Their elder brothers, and that vastly spent: So much, 't will hardly be repair'd again, 50 Not tho' supplied with all the wealth of Spain.

TO THE LADY CASTLEMAINE, UPON HER INCOURAGING HIS FIRST PLAY

[In his preface to The Wild Gallant Dryden says that it had "but indifferent success in the action. . . Yet it was receiv'd at court; and was more than once the divertisement of his Majesty, by his own command." This probably does not refer to the revival of 1667; but, in part at least, to a court performance on February 23, 1663, which Pepys attended, and which may well have been procured for Dryden by the influence of the Countess of Castlemaine, then at the height of her power as the favorite mistress of Charles II. This woman was born Barbara Villiers, daughter of William Villiers, second Viscount Grandison; in 1670 she was created Duchess of Cleveland.

This poem was first printed in Examen Poeticum, 1693.]

As seamen, shipwrack'd on some happy

Posterity will judge by my success,
I had the Grecian poet's happiness,
Who, waiving plots, found out a better way;
Some God descended, and preserv'd the play.
When first the triumphs of your sex were
sung

By those old poets, Beauty was but young,
And few admir'd the native red and white,
Till poets dress'd them up to charm the
sight;

49

So Beauty took on trust, and did engage
For sums of praises till she came to age.
But this long-growing debt to poetry
You justly, madam, have discharg'd to me,
When your applause and favor did infuse
New life to my condemn'd and dying Muse.

TRAJAN IMPERATOR ad Plin.