alert, his dialogue not sufficiently lively, for a species of poetry
which it was the principal duty of the Laureate to furnish. Besides,
it is highly probable, his sympathies with rebellious Puritanism were
already so far developed as to make him an object of aversion to the
king. Davenant triumphed. The defeated candidate lived to see the
court dispersed, king and Laureate alike fugitive, and to receive from
the Long Parliament the place of Historiographer, as a compensation
for the lost bays. When, in 1650, he died, Cromwell and his
newly-inaugurated court did honor to his obsequies. The body was
deposited in Westminster Abbey; but the posthumous honor was in
reserve for it, of being torn from the grave after the Restoration,
and flung into a ditch along with the remains of three or four other
republican leaders.

Davenant's career in office was unfortunate. There is reason to doubt
whether, even before the rebellion broke out, his salary was regularly
paid him. During the Civil War he exchanged the laurel for a casque,
winning knighthood by his gallant carriage at the siege of Gloucester.
Afterward, he was so far in the confidence of Queen Henrietta Maria,
as to be sent as her envoy to the captive king, beseeching him to save
his head by conceding the demands of Parliament. When, the errand
proving abortive, the royal head was lost, Davenant returned to Paris,
consoled himself by finishing the first two books of his "Gondibert,"
and then, despairing of a restoration, embarked (in 1650) from France
for Virginia, where monarchy and the rights of Charles II were
unimpaired. Fate, however, had not destined him for a colonist and
backwoodsman. His ship, tempest-tossed, was driven into an English
port, and the poet was seized and carried close prisoner to
London. There the intervention of Milton, the Latin Secretary of the
Council, is said to have saved his life. He was kept in the Tower for