Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 16.djvu/80

 the second ‘Miscellany.’ He executed the seventh satire for his father's translation of Juvenal in 1692. About that time he went to Italy and was appointed chamberlain to Pope Innocent XII. Here he wrote an English poem which appeared in the fourth ‘Miscellany.’ He returned to England about 1697 or 1698; administered to his father's effects; was drowned in the Thames near Datchet, and buried at Windsor 20 Aug. 1704. Dryden, who was a believer in astrology, calculated his son's horoscope, and on the strength of it prophesies in 1697 that he will soon recover his health, injured by a fall at Rome. Corinna constructed an elaborate fiction upon this basis, showing that Dryden had foretold three periods of danger to his son; at one of which Charles fell from a (non-existent) tower of the Vatican five stories high and was ‘mashed to a mummy’ for the time (, Life of Congreve). Malone reprints this narrative (pp. 404–20), which is only worth notice from the use made of it in Scott's ‘Guy Mannering.’

, the second son, born in 1667–8, was also at Westminster, and was elected to Christ Church in 1685. His father preferred to place him under the care of Obadiah Walker, the Roman catholic master of University College. He went to Rome with his brother. He translated the fourteenth satire of Juvenal for his father's version, and wrote the ‘Husband his own Cuckold,’ performed in 1696, with a prologue by his father, and an epilogue by Congreve. An account of a tour in Italy and Malta, made by him in 1700 in company with a Mr. Cecil, was published in 1776. He died at Rome 28 Jan. 1701.

, the third son, born 2 May 1669, was a scholar at the Charterhouse, and ‘elected to the university’ November 1685. He studied at Douay, entered the novitiate of the Dominicans 1692, was ordained priest in 1694, was at Rome in 1697, residing in the convent of the English Dominicans, and in that year was sent to the convent of Holy Cross, Bornheim, of which he was sub-prior till 1700. He then returned to England to labour on the mission in Northamptonshire (, English Catholics). From 1708 he resided at Canons Ashby, which in that year had passed by will to his cousin Edward, eldest son of the poet's younger brother, Erasmus. In 1710 he became baronet upon the death of another cousin, Sir John Dryden, grandson of the first baronet. He was apparently imbecile at this time and died soon after. He was buried at Canons Ashby, 4 Dec. 1710.

Dryden was short, stout, and florid. A contemporary epigram, praising him as a poet, says ‘A sleepy eye he had and no sweet feature,’ and a note explains that ‘feature’ here means ‘countenance.’ His nickname, ‘Poet Squab,’ suggests his appearance. A large mole on his right cheek appears in all his portraits. The earliest portrait is said to be that in the picture gallery at Oxford, dated on the back 1655, which is probably an error for 1665. A portrait was painted by Riley in 1683, and engraved by Van Gunst for the Virgil of 1709. Closterman painted a portrait about 1690, from which there is a mezzotint by W. Faithorne, jun. Kneller painted several portraits, one of which was presented by the poet to his cousin, John Driden. It is not now discoverable. From another (about 1698) by Kneller, painted for Jacob Tonson as one of a series of the Kit-Cat Club, there is an engraving by Edelwick in 1700, said to be the best likeness. The original is at Bayfordbury Hall, Hertfordshire. Another portrait by Kneller belonged to Charles Beville Dryden in 1854. A portrait of Dryden was at Addison's house at Bilton; and there was a crayon drawing at Tichmarsh, which afterwards belonged to Sir Henry Dryden of Canons Ashby. A portrait in pencil by T. Forster, taken in 1697, was (1854) in the possession of the Rev. J. Dryden Pigott. Horace Walpole had a small full-length portrait by Maubert. (Further details are given by, pp. 432–7, and , p. 978.).

The affection of his contemporaries and literary disciples proves, as well as their direct testimony, that in his private relations Dryden showed a large and generous nature. Congreve dwells especially upon his modesty, and says that he was the ‘most easily discountenanced’ of all men he ever knew. The absence of arrogance was certainly combined with an absence of the loftier qualities of character. Dryden is the least unworldly of all great poets. He therefore reflects most completely the characteristics of the society dominated by the court of Charles II, which in the next generation grew into the town of Addison and Pope. His drama, composed when the drama was most dependent upon the court, was written, rather in spite of his nature, to win bread and to please his patrons. His comedies are a lamentable condescension to the worst tendencies of the time. His tragedies, while influenced by the French precedents, and falling into the mock heroics congenial to the hollow sentiment of the court, in which sensuality is covered by a thin veil of sham romance, gave not infrequent opportunity for a vigorous utterance of a rather cynical view of life. The declamatory passages are often in his best style. Whatever their faults, no tragedies comparable to his best work have since been written for the stage. The masculine sense