JOHN GAY TO DEAN SWIFT.

  Bath, May 16th, 1728.

“I have been at the Bath about ten days, and I have played at no game but once, and that at backgammon with Mr. Lewis, who is very much your humble servant.  He is here upon account of the ill state of health of his wife, who has as yet found very little benefit from the waters.  Lord and Lady Bolingbroke are here; and I think she is better than when I came; they stay, as I guess, only about a fortnight longer.  They both desired me to make their compliments; as does Mr. Congreve, who is in a very ill state of health, but somewhat better since he came here....  I do not know how long I shall stay here, because I am now, as I have been all my life, at the disposal of others.  I drink the waters, and am in hopes to lay in a stock of health, some of which I wish to communicate to you....  ‘The Beggar’s Opera’ is acted here; but our Polly has got no fame, though the actors have got money.  I have sent [you] by Dr. Delany, the Opera, Polly Peachum, and Captain Macheath.  I would have sent you my own head (which is now engraving to make up the gang), but it is not yet finished.  I suppose you must have heard that I have had the honour to have had a sermon preached against my works by a Court chaplain, which I look upon as no small addition to my fame."[1]

JOHN GAY TO DEAN SWIFT.

  Bath, July 6th, 1728.

“In five or six days I set out upon an excursion to Herefordshire, to Lady Scudamore’s, but shall return here the beginning of August....  The weather is extremely hot, the place is very empty; I have an inclination to study, but the heat makes it impossible."[2]

* * * * *

“I suppose Mr. Gay will return from the Bath with twenty pounds more flesh and two hundred pounds less in money,” Swift wrote to Pope on July 16th.  “Providence never designed him to be above two-and-twenty, by this thoughtlessness and cullibility.  He has as little foresight of age, sickness, poverty, or loss of admirers, as a girl of fifteen."[3] From this it may be deduced that Gay, whenever he was free from an attack of colic, persevered in the pleasures of the table and of his favourite quadrille.

JOHN GAY TO ALEXANDER POPE.

  August 2nd, 1728.

“I have heard more than once from our friend at Court, who seemed, in the letter she writ, to be in high health and spirits.  Considering the multiplicity of pleasures and delights that one is overrun with in those places, I wonder how anyone has health and spirits enough to support them.  I am heartily glad she has, and whenever I hear so, I find it contributes to mine.  You see, I am not free from dependence, though I have less attendance than I had formerly; for a great deal of my own welfare still depends upon hers.  Is the widow’s house to be disposed of yet?  I have not given up my pretensions to the Dean.  If it was to be parted with, I wish one of us had it.  I hope you wish so too, and that Mrs. Blount and Mrs. Howard wish the same, and for the very same reason that I wish it."[4]