to a man, ’tis carrying him up stairs to shew him the dining room, and afterwards force him to make a meal in the kitchen.  This I have not only endeavoured to avoid, but also have used a method for the contrary purpose.  The design of this novel is obvious, after the first meeting of Aurelian and Hippolito, with Incognita, and Leonora; the difficulty is in bringing it to pass, maugre all apparent obstacles within the compass of two days.  How many probable casualties intervene, in opposition to the main design, viz. of marrying two couple so oddly engaged in an intricate amour, I leave the reader at his leisure to consider; as also whether every obstacle does not, in the progress of the story, act as subservient to that purpose, which at first it seems to oppose.  In a comedy this would be called the unity of action, here it may pretend to no more than an unity of contrivance.  The scene is continued in Florence from the commencement of the amour, and the time from first to last, is but three days.’

Soon after Mr. Congreve’s return to England, he amused himself, during a slow recovery from a fit of sickness, with writing a comedy.  Captain Southern, in conjunction with Mr. Dryden, and Arthur Manwayring, esq; revised this performance, which was the Old Batchelor; of which Mr. Dryden said, he never saw such a first play in his life, adding, that the author not being acquainted with the stage, or the town, it would be pity to have it miscarry for want of a little assistance.  Mr. Thomas Davenant, who had then the direction of the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane, had so high a sense of the merit of the piece, and was so charmed with the author’s conversation, that he granted him the freedom of the house before his play came on, which, according to the maxims of theatrical government, was not only an unusual, but an unprecedented favour.  In 1693 the Old Batchelor was acted before a numerous, and polite audience.  The play was received with such general applause, that Mr. Congreve was then considered as a prop to the declining stage, and a rising genius in dramatic poetry.  It was this play, and the singular success which attended it upon the stage, that introduced our author to the acquaintance of the earl of Hallifax, who was then the professed patron of men of wit; and who, being desirous to raise a man of so promising a genius, above the necessity of too hasty productions, made him one of the commissioners for licensing Hackney coaches.  The earl bestowed upon him soon after a place in the Pipe-Office, and gave him likewise a post in the Custom-House, to the value of 600 l. per annum.

In the following year Mr. Congreve brought upon the stage the Double Dealer, which met not with so good a reception as the former.