greater number he had been persecuted for justice' sake. So his popularity had scarcely diminished; and by new exertions in a sort of philanthropic and charitable direction, he brought over many more to his side. He is said to have founded a Discharged Prisoners' Aid Society, which is now flourishing and full of vitality, in spite of the unsound touch that helped to raise it up into life. He was a godly man still with the crowd. "I do my best," writes one Hoadly Ashe, who may be accepted as a fair type of these admirers, "and even the great Doctor Dodd can do do more. Oh, for his pen, and his melodious voice! Pray give my respectful compliments to him.” This popular impression he kept alive and improved by other means. All through his life he had a kind of craze or fancy for devising Charities-and charities of all kinds and degrees. It would almost seem as though he had chosen this as a device for attracting the notice of the town, and made it a useful instrument to acquiring the title of the "Great Doctor Dodd." He could not have found time for more than one or two of these charities; yet at his death he had a whole sheaf of schemes ready for public introduction. In prison he made out a sort of blank verse catalogue of these labours, and poetically claimed credit for all he had done. Among them was a Society for the Release of Debtors; a charity for the Loan of Money without Interest to Industrious Tradesmen, the plan of which he had got from Dublin; and an odd plan for "a National Female Seminary," which had "received the approbation of some very distinguished names." This scheme would, no doubt, have

furnished some merriment to the free wits of the time. But with the good works were other works. The old extravagance, and the devouring annuities that fattened on the extravagance, were strong as ever. About this date we get a glimpse of him characteristic enough, meeting him, as it were, in the fashionable Parks.

That odd Governor Thicknesse-before alluded to —who was essentially the man of a grievance, and who had the knack all through life of stumbling from one grievance to another, had for his arch-grievance of all a quarrel with a Colonel Vernon. It seems as though he had been harshly treated on the whole. By-and-by Colonel Vernon bloomed into Lord Orwell, grew old, as did Mr. Thicknesse; and finally, meditating a tour to the south of France for his health, received, on the eve of starting, a letter from his enemy. It was to the effect, that as the peer was going to France for his health, and Mr. Thicknesse for his purse -also sadly out of sorts-they might both contrive to meet "and settle the little matter so long pending between them." Of this significant proposal no direct notice was then taken. But next day Mr. Thicknesse was wandering about the Park, when he fell in with the gay Doctor Dodd, also taking the air. The Doctor told him that only the day before he had been dining with Lord Orwell, and (we now hear the Doctor speaking for the first time) that the receipt of the letter had been mentioned. "I have seen it," said Doctor Dodd, "and though I cannot justify his conduct to you, still I think it was cruel towards him. I do not think he will live six months. You have

hindered his southern expedition. He will not go, lest you should follow him. I, who have often attended such high-crested men upon their death-beds, could understand his real condition." Mr. Thicknesse parted from the Doctor, but was so affected by this picture, that he went straight to a coffee-house, and wrote a letter to Lord Orwell of quite another tone and pattern-possibly as the Doctor intended he should do. For it requires little penetration to see that the smooth Doctor was sent, as an envoy, to skilfully soothe down the troublesome fellow who had a grievance, and arrange for his lordship's quiet travelling. So was that other Doctor accredited by Selwyn to arrange his unpleasant business. With this squares wonderfully a story whispered by Walpole-a torn rag of gossip-which deals, also, with an embassy. The noble pupil, whose chaplain he was, required some return for his favours; and, anxious to make some sort of reparation to a young person whom he had injured, sent his chaplain as his ambassador, with no less a sum than one thousand pounds. Such a trait was not very common in the fine gentlemen of the day, who were as cruel as they were fine. But it was said-with what truth we know not, but it is to be feared with some probability-that the reverend envoy kept back nine hundred pounds of the sum for his own devouring emergencies! If it be true, it was a far more capital offence than the one for which he suffered.*

But now his unsteadiness was affecting his position

* See later, Toplady's letter exhorting him to make reparation for something that seems to have very much the same character.

*

in life seriously. The last committee that he attended at the Magdalen was in January, 1773. In August of the following year another chaplain was appointed in his room. The directors' patience was, no doubt, worn out.* He was sinking deeper and deeper in the mire of embarrassment. "He descended so low," says the servants'-hall style of memoir before alluded to, "as to become the editor of a newspaper." What the fatal journal was which had become the instrument of his abasement, has not been discovered. A more certain token of his embarrassment is, that there was a rumour abroad of his trying to have himself discharged from his debts by a commission in bankruptcy, but failed. He was hurrying on fast to the end, with scarcely time to look before or behind him -precipitated forward by his furies of debt and difficulty—and literally did not know where to turn to. Characteristically appealing to clap-trap sympathies, he now thought of the Freemasons, and was busy with a history of that order when the catastrophe

came.

* MS. Registers of the Magdalen.

CHAPTER THE FIFTH.

TOWN TALK.

66

It was now come to the year 1776. Early in that year we hear him appealing from the pulpit in the "Anniversary Sermon of the Society for the Recovery of Drowned Persons," at St. Anne's, to a very numerous congregation." His exertions for that society were to aid him later in a way that he little dreamed of. We hear him, too, from a less becoming stage, making an "Oration at Freemasons' Hall," with what aim or purpose we know not. Finally, on February the 24th of that year, he disposed of his Pimlico chapel, and Doctor Courtenay, of St. George's, Hanover-square-a name which could not have rung pleasantly in his ears-succeeded him. Our Doctor, however, retained a little interest in the chapel, and "by purchase," says the account, "acquired a fourth part of the concern." It was, no doubt, pecuniary pressure that forced him to this step; and, indeed,