derived, in several instances, from the copious notes with which Mr. Walter Scott has enriched his edition of Dryden: a work of much labour and research, and for which every scholar must feel particularly grateful to the elegant Editor. The only known work of Otway which is omitted in the present collection, is a translation from the French, published, 8vo. 1686, the year after his decease, with the following title: "The History of Triumvirates: the first part of Julius Cæsar, Pompey and Crassus; the second part of Augustus, Antony and Lepidus. Being a faithful collection from the best historians, and other authors, concerning that revolution of the Roman government, which happened under their authority." A bare translation, which would occupy a large space, and enhance the price of the work, without adding to it's interest, it was deemed better to exclude. London, 22d October, 1812. THE LIFE OF THOMAS OTWAY. THE lives of literary men, who silently found their claims to distinction in privacy and retirement, seldom abound with those materials which make biography a study of so much interest and delight. The reason is obvious. It is not till their works are known and admired, that their characters become objects of solicitude to the world; and as a just appreciation of an author's labours commonly devolves upon posterity, curiosity is oftentimes excited, when the sources of information are neither copious nor authentic. Hence arises that paucity of interest which we frequently discern in lives devoted to the service of science and learning. But circumstances of a more melancholy nature have obscured the history of the eminent writer of whom we are pre sently to speak, whose intercourse with society. was seldom restrained by the motives we have just alluded to, nor was he debarred from the sphere even of rank and fashion. In this narrative, whatever has been transmitted to us by various biographers, has been collected and embodied; yet such is the deficiency of data, that much must unavoidably be left to uncertainty and conjec ture. THOMAS OTWAY was born March 3rd, 1651, at Trotton, near Midhurst, Sussex, upon the borders of the river Arun*. He was the only son of the Rev. Humphrey Otway, rector of Wolbeding, * To this circumstance Collins alludes, in his beautiful "Ode to Pity." But wherefore need I wander wide To old llissus' distant side? Deserted stream and mute! Wild Arun too has heard thy strains, There first the wren thy myrtles shed And while he sung the female heart Thy turtles mix'd their own, |