Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 51.djvu/282

 tophel Transpros'd.’ His tory enthusiasm reached its climax in 1685, when he published an adulatory ‘Heroick Poem on the Coronation of the High and Mighty Monarch, James II’ (London, 4to), and shortly afterwards entered himself as a trooper in James's army on Hounslow Heath. He is said, moreover, to have published a weekly sheet in support of the administration.

Upon the revolution Settle recommenced overtures to his whig friends; but, feeling that both parties were looking askance at him, he put in for the reversion of Matthew Taubman's post of city laureate, for which political consistency was not a necessary qualification. Taubman's last pageant was dated 1689; in 1690 the show was intermitted, but Settle was duly appointed city poet in the following year, and issued for lord-mayor's day ‘The Triumphs of London’ (for Abel Roper, London, 4to). His four pageants 1692–5 bear the same title. No pageants are known for 1696–7, but in 1698 Settle produced ‘Glory's Resurrection.’ He then reverted to the older title until 1702. The ‘Triumphs’ for the next five years are missing, but Settle issued one for 1708, though the exhibition of that year was frustrated by the death of Prince George of Denmark. It seems to have been the last lord-mayor's show to have been described in a separate official publication.

In the meantime Settle had not abandoned his career as a playwright. His ‘Heir of Morocco’ (1694, 4to), forming a second part to his ‘Empress of Morocco,’ and based upon a slender substratum of facts furnished by the English occupation of Tangier, was produced at the Theatre Royal in 1682 (revived on 19 Jan. 1709). Then after a long interval came his ‘Distressed Innocence, or the Princess of Persia’ (1691, 4to), founded on the 39th chapter of the 5th book of Theodoret, but ‘warped’ in favour of the Christians. The piece was given at the Theatre Royal in 1691. His ‘New Athenian Comedy’ (1693, 4to) and ‘The Ambitious Slave,’ a tragedy (1694, 4to), were followed at Dorset Garden in 1697 by ‘The World in the Moon’ (1697, 4to), an opera, of which the first scene was formed by a moon fourteen feet in diameter. Of his ‘Virgin Prophetess, or the Fate of Troy’ (1701, 4to), Genest says that the language and the deviations from the accredited legend were ‘disgusting, but the spectacle must have been fine.’ ‘The City Ramble, or the Playhouse Wedding’ (1711, 4to), based to some extent upon the ‘Knight of the Burning Pestle’ and the ‘Coxcomb,’ with humorous additions of some merit, was produced at Drury Lane on 17 Aug. 1711. By this time Settle's reputation was so damaged that he determined to bring out the piece anonymously. But the secret ‘happened to take air,’ and he fell back upon producing it during the long vacation. His last play, ‘The Ladies' Triumph’ (1718, 12mo), produced at Lincoln's Inn Fields in 1718, ended with a masque in which Settle skilfully introduced elaborate scenery and machinery.

The theatre and the corporation proved only occasional resources, and very soon after the revolution Settle fulfilled various predictions by letting himself out to write drolls for Bartholomew Fair, love-letters for maid servants, ballads for Pye Corner, and epithalamiums for half a crown. In Bartholomew Fair he served under the show-woman, Mrs. Mynn, and produced at her booth his ‘Siege of Troy’ in 1707. At the same show he is said to have played a dragon in green leather, whence Pope puts into his mouth the couplet— Yet lo! in me what authors have to brag on! Reduced at last to hiss in my own dragon (Dunciad, iii. 285; cf. Epistle to Mr. Pope, i. 261–8). As a laureate Settle celebrated with equal readiness the act of succession (‘Eusebia Triumphans,’ 1702 and 1707), the danger to the church (‘A New Memorial,’ 1706), the propagation of the Gospel in foreign parts (‘A Pindarick Ode,’ 1711), the tory peace of 1713 (‘Irene Triumphans,’ 1713), and the whig triumph two years later (‘Rebellion Display'd,’ 1715). He seems to have always had in hand a stock of printed elegies and complimentary verses under such titles as ‘Augusta Lacrimans,’ ‘Thalia Lacrimans,’ ‘Thalia Triumphans,’ ‘Memoriæ Fragranti,’ to which he affixed names and dedications in accordance with the demand. Resourceful as he was, however, Elkanah's income dwindled until, about 1718, his city friends procured him a retreat in the Charterhouse. He died there, a poor brother, on 12 Feb. 1723–4 (Hist. Reg. Chron. Diary, 1724, p. 11; the Charterhouse burial registers 1710–40 are missing). Five days after his death he was described in the ‘True Briton’ as a man ‘of tall stature, red face, short black hair,’ who ‘lived in the city, and had a numerous poetical issue, but shared the misfortune of several gentlemen, to survive them all.’ He married, on 28 Feb. 1673–4, Mary Warner, at St. Andrew's, Holborn (Notes and Queries, 8th ser. xii. 483).

Settle was not deficient in promise as scholar, rhymester, and wit; but he wrecked his career by his tergiversation and by his inept efforts to measure his mediocre capacity against the genius of Dryden. He soon be-