BRIGHTON: ITS FOLLIES, ITS FASHIONS, AND ITS HISTORY.

ROYAL TUNBRIDGE WELLS.




To GEORGE MAIR




PREFACE


John Gay was a considerable figure in the literary and social circles
of his day. He was loved by Pope; Swift cared for him more than for
any other man, and the letter in which Pope conveyed to him the sad
tidings of Gay's death bears the endorsement: "On my dear friend Mr.
Gay's death. Received December 15th [1732], but not read till the
20th, by an impulse foreboding some misfortune." Gay was on intimate
terms with Arbuthnot and Lord Burlington, and Henrietta Howard, Lady
Suffolk, was devoted to him and consulted him in the matter of her
matrimonial troubles. He was the _protégé_ of the Duke and Duchess of
Queensberry. His "Fables" and "The Beggar's Opera" have become
classics; his play "Polly" made history. Though he persistently
regarded himself as neglected by the gods, it is nevertheless a fact
that the fates were unusually kind to him. A Cabinet Minister made him
a present of South Sea stock; Walpole appointed him a Commissioner of
Lotteries; he was granted an apartment in Whitehall; Queen Caroline