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Book, page 121 / 197 perhaps it is not much worse than other luckier tragedies of the age. Naturally a lover calls his wounded lady "the bleeding fair." Naturally she exclaims - "Celestial powers Protect my father, shower upon his--oh!" (Dies). Naturally her adorer answers with - "So may our mingling souls To bliss supernal wing our happy--oh!" (Dies). We are reminded of - "Alas, my Bom!" (Dies). "'Bastes' he would have said!" The piece, if presented, must have been damned. But Smollett was so angry with one patron, Lord Lyttelton, that he burlesqued the poor man's dirge on the death of his wife. He was so angry with Garrick that he dragged him into "Roderick Random" as Marmozet. Later, obliged by Garrick, and forgiving Lyttelton, he wrote respectfully about both. But, in 1746 (in "Advice"), he had assailed the "proud lord, who smiles a gracious lie," and "the varnished ruffians of the State." Because Tobias's play was unacted, people who tried to aid him were liars and ruffians, and a great deal worse, for in his satire, as in his first novel, Smollett charges men of high rank with the worst of unnamable crimes. Pollio and Lord Strutwell, whoever they may have been, were probably recognisable then, and were undeniably libelled, though they did not appeal to a jury. It is improbable that Sir John Cope had ever tried to oblige Smollett. His ignoble attack on Cope, after that unfortunate General had been fairly and honourably acquitted of incompetence and cowardice, was, then, wholly
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