Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 4.djvu/335

Rh entirely the company of the earl of Bute and his other distinguished friends at London, and planted himself down in a villa, which he built near his former residence in East Lothian, and where he continued to reside for the next twelve years. To increase the felicity of a settled home, he married a lady of his own name in 1770, by whom he never had any children.

Three tragedies, the Fatal Discovery, Alonzo, and Alfred, successively appeared in 1769, 1773, and 1778; but, though received at first with considerable applause, they took no permanent hold of the stage; and thus seemed to confirm the opinion which many English critics had avowed in regard to the success of Douglas that it was owing to no peculiar powers of dramatic composition in the author, but simply to the national character of the piece, with a slight aid from its exhibition of two very popular passions, maternal and filial tenderness. The reception of the last mentioned play was so cool, that he ceased from that time to write for the stage.