502 



NOTES AND QUEEIES. 



[2'«»S. N«78.,June27.'57. 



" When Pope has fill'd the margins round, 

 Why then recall your loan ; 

 Sell them to Curll for fifty pound. 

 And swear they are your own." 

 Whatever may have been the first source of the 

 ill-will which existed between Pope and Curll, it 

 must have been a powerful one, for at almost 

 every period of Curll's life we find them at deadly 

 feud. Was it that they had both the same moral 

 defect, a love of trickery ? They certainly both 

 had the same trick of so expressing themselves as 

 while literally saying one thing — and that the 

 truth — they so said It that it conveyed an im- 

 pression directly the reverse. 



A curious instance of this quibbling is shown in 

 a charge made by Pope against Curll, in "Mar- 

 tinus Scriblerus his Prolegomena to the Dunciad," 

 and in Curll's reply to it. Pope's charge, that 

 to Curll's agency was to be attributed the first 

 publieation of Pope's satire upon Addison, is as 

 follows : 



*' Misfs Journal, June 8. 



" ' Mr. Addison rais'd this Author from obscurity, ob- 

 tained him the acquaintance and friendship of the whole 

 bodj' of our Nobility, and transferred his powerful interests 

 with those great men to this rising Bard, who frequently 

 levied by that means unusual contributions on the public. 

 No sooner was his bodj' lifeless, but this Author, reviving 

 his resentment, libell'd the memory of his departed friend, 

 and what was still more heinous, made the scandal publick. 



" Grievous the accusation ! unknown the accuser ! the 

 person accused no witness in his own cause, the person in 

 whose regard accus'd dead ! But if there be living any 

 one nobleman whose friendship, yea any one gentleman 

 whose subscription Mr. Addison procur'd to our Author; 

 let him stand forth, that truth may appear ! Amicus 

 Plato, Amicus Socrates, sed magis amica Veritas! But 

 in verity the whole story of the libel is a lye ; witness 

 those persons of integrity, who several years before Mr. 

 Addison's decease, did see and approve of the said verses, 

 in no wise a libel but a friendly rebuke, sent privately in 

 our author's own hand to Mr. Addison himself, and never 

 made publick till by Curl their own bookseller in his 

 Miscellanies, 12mo. 1727. 



" One name alone which I am authorised to declare, 

 will suflSciently evince this truth, that of the Right 

 Honourable the Earl of Burlington." 



To a charge so distinct, one would think it dif- 

 ficult to give an answer, yet Curll, of whom it has 

 been said, " You will never find him out in a 

 lie," thus refutes it. We quote from p. 5. of The 

 Curliad : 



" Scriblerus testifieth, p. 12., that, he is authorized to 

 declare, and the name of the Earl of Burlington will suf- 

 ficiently evince this truth, that Pope's Libel upon Mr. 

 Addison was never made Publick till by Curl in his Mis- 

 cellanies, 12rao., 1727. Now in my turn I do, in the 

 antiquated Guise of Martinus Scriblerus avouch, that in 

 Verity the whole story of this dignified Avouchment is a 

 Lye ; for Pope's Libel upon Mr. Addison was first published 

 by Mr. John Markland of St. Peter's College in Cambridge, 

 with an Answer thereto, in a Pamphlet intitled Cytherda, 

 or Poems upon Love and Intrigue, &c. 8vo. Printed for 

 T. Payne in Stationers Court, Ludgate Street, 1723, Price 

 Is. 6d. Wherein from p, 90. to 95. both the Libel and the 

 Answer is to be seen." 



And on reference to Cythereia, at pp. 90. to 94., 

 there will both pieces be found. The first is en- 

 titled Verses occasioned by Mr. TickelVs Trans" 

 lation of the First Iliad of Homer, By Mr. Pope ; 

 and the second, Answer to the foregoing Verses 

 presented to the Countess of Warwick. But Curll 

 has omitted to mention that the title-page of Cy 

 thereia states it to have been printed for E. Curll, 

 over against Catherine Street in Strand, as well 

 as for T. Payne. At least it is so in the copy of 

 the book in the British Museum, which is the only 

 one we have seen. 



Among the charges against Curll, for which 

 Pope is quoted as an authority, is that of his 

 having starved to death William Pattison, one of 

 his authors, whose Poetical Works were " printed 

 in the Year mdccxxviii. for H. Curll in the Strand 

 {Price Six Shillings^." 



Chalmers (Biog. Dictionary, xxiv. 204.) says 

 distinctly, that : 



" Curll, the bookseller, finding some of Pattison's com- 

 positions well received, and going through several im- 

 pressions, took him into his house ; and, as Pope affirms 

 in one of his letters, starved him to death. But this does 

 not appear to be strictly true, and his death is more justly 

 attributed to the small- pox." 



Chalmers gives no reference to the Letter of 

 Pope in which this charge is made. Perhaps 

 some reader of " N. & Q." may know where to 

 find the passage ; but that the charge came from 

 Pope, if not directly, there seems to be little 

 doubt : for it is distinctly made against Curll iu 

 The Author to be let by Iscariot Hackney, which, 

 although ascribed to Savage, who is supposed to 

 have written it at Pope's suggestion, Is more pro- 

 bably from the pen of the writer who prefixed to 

 The Dunciad the Letter to the Publisher signed 

 William Cleland — namely, Pope himself: — 



" At my first setting out, I was hired by a reverend 

 Prebend to libel Dean Swift for Infidelitj'. Soon after I 

 was employed by Curll to write a merry tale, the Wit of 

 which was its Obscenit_v. This we agreed to palm upon 

 the World for a posthumous Piece of Mr. Prior. How- 

 ever, a certain Lady, celebrated for certain Liberties, had 

 a Curiosity to see the real Author. Ciirll, on my promise 

 that if I had a present he should go Snacks, sent me to 

 her. I was admitted while her Ladyship was shifting; 

 and on my Admittance, Mrs. Abigail was ordered to with- 

 draw. What passed between us, a Point of Gallantry 

 obliges me to conceal; but after some extraordinary 

 Civilities, I was dismissed with a Purse of Guineas, and a 

 Command to write a Sequel to my Tale. Upon this I 

 turn'd out smart in dress, bit Curll of his Share, and run 

 out most of my Money, in printing my Works at my own 

 Cost. But some Years after {just at the Time of his 

 starving poor Pattison) the varlet was revenged." 



This is probably the origin of the charge, — 

 which charge, there is no doubt whatever, Is to- 

 tally without foundation. 



Mark Noble, in his Hist, of England, ill. 304., 

 while repeating it on Pope's authority, shows that 

 it was groundless : — 



" Curll, the bookseller, gave Pattison an asylum, ia 



