Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 58.djvu/352

Villiers you not to follow him with your eye as he went along, he moved so gracefully’ (, Anecdotes, p. 63). ‘The portrait of this duke,’ says Walpole, ‘has been drawn by four masterly hands. Burnet has hewn it out with his rough chisel; Count Hamilton touched it with that slight delicacy which finishes while it seems but to sketch; Dryden catched the living likeness; Pope completed the historical resemblance’ (, Royal and Noble Authors, ed. Park, iii. 304). Sir Walter Scott added a fifth portrait in ‘Peveril of the Peak.’

Dryden's Zimri is in truth a faithful likeness, not a caricature. In the choice of the name the poet no doubt intended an oblique reference to the amours of Buckingham and the Countess of Shrewsbury (cf. Numbers xxv. 6–14), but he purposely attacked Buckingham's follies rather than his vices. ‘'Tis not bloody,’ he said of the character, ‘but 'tis ridiculous enough. And he for whom it was intended was too witty to resent it as an injury. If I had railed, I might have suffered for it justly; but I managed my own work more happily, perhaps more dexterously. I avoided the mention of great crimes, and applied myself to the representing of blind sides and little extravagances, to which the wittier a man is, he is generally the more obnoxious. It succeeded as I wished: the jest went round, and he was laughed at in his turn who began the frolic’ (, Works, ed. Scott, xiii. 10, 95). Buckingham, however, felt Dryden's satire keenly, and replied at once in ‘Poetic Reflections on a late Poem entitled “Absalom and Achitophel.” By a Person of Honour’ (ib. ix. 272). In some unpublished verses addressed to Dryden he complains that the poet's ‘ill-made resemblance’ was like a waxen image made by a witch, that ‘wastes my fame’ (Quarterly Review, 1898, i. 101).

As a statesman Buckingham's only claim to respect is his consistent advocacy of religious toleration, a cause that lost more than it gained by his support. Vanity, and a restless desire for power, which he was incapable of using when obtained, were the governing motives of his political career. His servant, Brian Fairfax, who complains that the world, severe in censuring his foibles, forgot to notice his good qualities, praises his charity, courtesy, good nature, and willingness to forgive injuries. If he was extravagant, he was not covetous. While ‘his amours were too notorious to be concealed and too scandalous to be justified,’ much was imputed to him of which he was guiltless (, Memoirs of the Life of George, Duke of Buckingham). A charge of unnatural crime, brought against him in 1680, ended in the punishment of the informers for conspiracy and perjury (, i. 45, 48, 86, 107, 148; Somers Tracts, viii. 450, ed. Scott;, i. 313; Narrative of the Design laid by Philip del Mar against George, Duke of Buckingham, 1680). Fairfax also praises Buckingham's courage, but contemporaries accused him of being much readier to give offence than to give satisfaction (, Memoirs, pp. 68, 298; Letters to Sir Joseph Williamson, ii. 89). Like the king himself, Buckingham was attracted by the scientific movement of the period, and dabbled in chemistry. He had a laboratory of his own, and when he was a prisoner was allowed to establish one in the Tower (Hist. MSS. Comm. 9th Rep. ii. 62). ‘For some years,’ says Burnet, ‘he thought he was very near the finding the philosopher's stone;’ and his chemical experiments were, according to Brian Fairfax, one of his great expenses (Own Time, i. 182, ed. Airy). The only useful result of this scientific taste was the setting up of some glass works at Lambeth, whose productions are praised by Evelyn (Diary, ii. 322). Buckingham spent much on building ‘in that sort of architecture which Cicero calls insanæ substructiones,’ says Fairfax. Cliefden House, built for him by Captain William Wynne (or Winde), was an immense and costly pile (, Renaissance Architecture in England, p. 190); its gardens are described by Evelyn, ii. 354). His favourite sports were racing and hunting (''Hist. MSS. Comm''. 6th Rep. p. 338; Quarterly Review, p. 108), and he was long remembered as a huntsman in local songs and traditions.

A wit and an author himself, Buckingham was naturally a patron of men of letters. Cowley was his friend, owed something to his bounty, and was indebted to him for the monument in Westminster Abbey (, Lives of the Poets, ed. Cunningham, pp. 15, 17;, Life of Cowley). Sprat was Buckingham's chaplain, and was given a living by him, and Matthew Clifford is mentioned also as one of his intimates. Etherege was one of his correspondents, and Wycherley, who was in 1672 a lieutenant in Buckingham's regiment, was ‘honoured with his familiarity and esteem’ (, Miscellanies, 1726, p. 135). On the other hand, Buckingham is credited with promising patronage to Lee and Butler, and subsequently neglecting both (ib.;, Anecdotes, p. 62). Butler's prose character of Buckingham is possibly the result of his resentment at this treatment (, Genuine Remains of Butler, ii. 72).