[Footnote 1: "I have been told, that Dryden having perused these verses,
said, 'Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet;' and that this
denunciation was the motive of Swift's perpetual malevolence to
Dryden."--Johnson in his "Life of Swift."--_W. E. B._

In Malone's "Life of Dryden," p. 241, it is stated that John Dunton,
the original projector of the Athenian Society, in his "Life and
Errours," 1705, mentions this Ode, "which being an ingenious poem, was
prefixed to the fifth Supplement of the Athenian Mercury."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: The Ode I writ to the king in Ireland.--_Swift_.]

[Footnote 3: The floating island, which, by order of Neptune, became
fixed for the use of Latona, who there brought forth Apollo and Diana.
See Ovid, "Metam.," vi, 191, etc.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: Gyges, who, thanks to the possession of a golden ring, which
made him invisible, put Candaules to death, married his widow, and
mounted the throne, 716 B.C. See the story in Cicero, "De Off.," iii,
9.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 5: Proteus. See Ovid, "Fasti," lib. i.--_W. E. B._]



TO MR. CONGREVE

WRITTEN IN NOVEMBER, 1693