Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 10.djvu/130

120 unceasing in their attentions. By the beginning of 1724 he had a new play ready, a tragedy called the Captives, which was patronized by the Princess (afterward Queen) Caroline and the Prince of Wales. In 1726 he published his famous F {fly-one Fables in Verse. His next work was the Beggar’s Opera, performed in 1727, written in ridicule of the Italian Opera, which for a time it drove off the English stage. Swift suggested the subject, and Pope is believed to have added some poignancy to the satirical songs ; but Gay’s own bonhomz'e and voluptuous style colour the whole. The play ran to the end of the season, sixty- two nights, four of which were for the beneﬁt of the author, and produced to him the handsome sum of £693, 13s. 6d. The same year he sold his copyright of the Opera, with that of the Fables, for 90 guineas. The success of The Beggar’s Opera induced Gay to attempt a continuation of the operatic style. He wrote another piece, Poll 3/, with no satirical design, as he states ; but the lord Chamberlain pro- hibited its representation. The poet then resorted in 17 29 to publication by subscription ; his friends were again active—the duchess of Queensberry even bearding royalty in resentment of the refusal of the licence; and Gay must have cleared above £1000 by what was deemed his oppression. The duke of Queensberry received Gay into his house, and the duchess treated him with equal respect for his talents and character. This clever, beautiful, and eccen- tric woman—the idol of the poets—appears nowhere to more advantage than in her affectionate patronage of Gay, and her long-cherished regret for his loss. The poet died, after a short illness, December 4, 1732, and the duke and duchess of Queensberry honoured his remains with a splen- did funeral and monument in Westminster Abbey. A week before his death another opera, Achilles, had been brought out with applause, and this, with a new volume of Fables, was published in 1733, the proﬁts going to his sisters, two widow ladies, who inherited by the poet’s death no less than £6000. As late as 1743 appeared the posthumous comedy of The Distrest Wife. and the farce of The Rehearsal at Gotham in 1753. Pope and Swift—always ready to blame the court and courtiers, though far from averse to their society—have censured Mrs Howard, afterwards countess of Suffolk, for not more zealously promoting the interests of Gay by her supposed inﬂuence with the king. One offer was made to the poet,——the situation of gentleman-usher to the Princess Louisa, a child,—but he declined it on account of his being, as he writes to Swift, so far advanced in life. He was only thirty-nine; but all Gay’s friends seem to have treated the offer as an indignity. When the queen’s establishment was made up in 1727, they expected some more important ofﬁce for their favourite associate, though it is not easy to discover what appointment about the court could have been better adapted to one so easy, so natural, and helpless. Mrs Howard, it is now known, had very little inﬂuence with her royal master. The real power was in the hands of the queen, and the philosophical Caroline was content that his Majesty (who hated bhoetry and bhainting, and looked upon poets as mechanics) should possess what mistresses he pleased, provided that the state power and patronage continued with herself and Walpole. But it may be safely said that no man could have acquired such a body of great and accomplished friends as those which rallied round Gay and mourned his loss, without the possession of many valuable and endearing qualities. His poetry is neither high nor pure ; but he had humour, a ﬁne vein of fancy, and powers of observation and local painting which bespeak the close poetical student and the happy literary artist.  GAY,, (1776–1852), daughter of M. N ichault de Lavalette (who was attached to the household of Monsieur, afterwards Louis XVIII), and of Francesca Peretti, a Florentine lady, was born at Paris 1st July 1776. Under the guidance of her father, a man of taste and culture, she received a very careful education. In 1793 she was married to M. Liottier, an exchange broker, but she was divorced from him in 1799, and shortly afterwards was married to M. Gay, receiver-general of the department of the Roér or Ruhr. This union brought her into more intimate relations with many distinguished per- sonages whom she had previously known; and her circle of acquaintanceship gradually extended, until her salon came to be frequented by all the distinguished litterateurs, musicians, actors, and painters of the time, among whom she made herself remarked by her beauty, her vivacity, and her sprightly wit tempered by ﬁne tact and genuine amia- bility. Her ﬁrst literary production was a letter written in 1802 to the Journal de Paris, in defence of Madame de Stael’s novel Delphin; and in the same year she published anonymously her ﬁrst novel Laure d’Estell. Léom'e (le Montbreuse, which appeared in 1813, is considered by Sainte-Beuve her best work ; but Anatolie, which appeared in 1815, has perhaps a higher reputation. These and several of her other works, amongst which may be specially named Les Salons cc’leb-res, possess an interest beyond their intrinsic merits—chief of which are purity and elegance of style—for their portraitures of French society especially during the period of the directory and the consulate, and of many of the distinguished personages whose intimacy she enjoyed. Madame Gay wrote several theatrical pieces which had considerable success. She was also an accom- plished player on the pianoforte and harp, and composed both the words and music of a number of romances. For an account of her daughter Delphine Gay, Madame de Girardin, see.

1em  GAYÁ, a district of British India in the Patna division, under the lieutenant-governor of Bengal, situated between 24° 17’ and 25° 19' N. lat., and between 84° 4’ and 86° 5' E. long. It is bounded on the N. by Patna, on the E. by Monghyr, on the SE. and S. by Hazaribagh, and on the W. by Shahabad districts. Generally speaking, Gaya consists of a level plain, with a ridge of prettily wooded hills along the southern boundary, whence the country falls with a gentle slope towards the Ganges. Rocky hills occasionally occur, either detached or in groups, the loftiest being Maher hill about 12 miles SE. of Gaya town, with an elevation of 1620 feet above sea-level. The eastern part of the district is highly cultivated; the portions to the north and west are less fertile; while in the south, the country is thinly peopled, and consists of hills, the jungles on which are full of wild animals. The principal river is the Son, which marks the boundary between Gaya and Shah- abad, navigable by small boats throughout the year, and by craft of 20 tons burden in the rainy season. The other rivers are the Pimpt’m, Phalgu, and Jamna, and a number of smaller streams. Two branches of the Son canal system, the eastern main canal and the Patna canal, intersect the district.

