Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/39

Rh Mr. Hughes, as a teſtimony of gratitude to his noble friend, and generous patron, earl Cowper, gave his lordſhip a few weeks before he died, his picture drawn by Sir Godfrey Kneller, which he himſelf had received from that maſterly painter. The value lord Cowper ſet upon it will be beſt ſhewn, by the letter he wrote upon this occaſion to Mr. Hughes. As ſuch a teſtimony from ſo eminent a perſon, was conſidered by himſelf as one of the higheſt honours he was capable of receiving, we ſhall therefore inſert it. 24th Jan. 1719–20.
 * ‘SIR,

‘I thank you for the moſt acceptable preſent of your picture, and aſſure you that none of this age can ſet a higher value on it than I do, and ſhall while I live, tho’ I am ſenſible poſterity will out-do me in that particular.’

Mr. Hughes was happy in the acquaintance and friendſhip of ſeveral of the greateſt men, and moſt diſtinguiſhed genius’s of the age in which he lived; particularly of the nobleman juſt now mentioned, the preſent lord biſhop of Wincheſter, lord chief baron Gilbert, Sir Godfrey Kneller, Mr. Congreve, Mr. Addiſon, Sir Richard Steele, Mr. Southern, Mr. Rowe, &c. and might have juſtly boaſted in the words of Horace Having