book was presented to the king and queen by the Right Honourable Sir
Robert Walpole; he is proud that they had read it before; he is
proud that the edition was taken off by the nobility and persons of
the first distinction. The edition of which he speaks was, I
believe, that which, by telling in the text the names, and in the
notes the characters, of those whom he had satirised, was made
intelligible and diverting. The critics had now declared their
approbation of the plan, and the common reader began to like it
without fear. Those who were strangers to petty literature, and
therefore unable to decipher initials and blanks, had now names and
persons brought within their view, and delighted in the visible
effects of those shafts of malice which they had hitherto
contemplated as shot into the air.

Dennis, upon the fresh provocation now given him, renewed the enmity
which had for a time been appeased by mutual civilities, and
published remarks, which he had till then suppressed, upon the "Rape
of the Lock." Many more grumbled in secret, or vented their
resentment in the newspapers by epigrams or invectives. Ducket,
indeed, being mentioned as loving Burnet with "pious passion,"
pretended that his moral character was injured, and for some time
declared his resolution to take vengeance with a cudgel. But Pope
appeased him, by changing "pious passion" to "cordial friendship,"
and by a note, in which he vehemently disclaims the malignity of the
meaning imputed to the first expression. Aaron Hill, who was
represented as diving for the prize, expostulated with Pope in a
manner so much superior to all mean solicitation, that Pope was
reduced to sneak and shuffle, sometimes to deny, and sometimes to
apologies; he first endeavours to wound, and is then afraid to own
that he meant a blow.