the _Magnus Apollo_, and _The Devil_, where Pope imagines
Ben to have gathered peculiar inspiration:--

"And each true Briton is to Ben so civil,
He swears the Muses met him at _The Devil_."
_Imitation of Horace_, Bk. ii. Epist. i.

Footnote 15: _Election of a Poet-Laureate_, 1719, Works, Vol. II.

Footnote 16: _Feast of the Poets_, 1814.

Footnote 17: _Fable for Critics_, 1850.

Footnote 18: This story rests on the authority of Thomas Betterton,
the actor, who received it from Davenant.

Footnote 19: Dedication of the _Pastorals_ of Virgil, to Hugh,
Lord Clifford, the son of Sir Thomas.

Footnote 20: There were some indications that portions of the farce
had been written while Davenant was living and had been intended for
him. _Mr. Bayes_ appears in one place with a plaster on his nose,
an evident allusion to Davenant's loss of that feature. In a lively
satire of the time, by Richard Duke, it is asserted that Villiers was
occupied with the composition of _The Rehearsal_ from the
Restoration down to the day of its production on the stage:--

"But with playhouses, wars, immortal wars,
He waged, and ten years' rage produced a farce.
As many rolling years he did employ,