represented to have been a man of elegant
manners and refined tastes; a lover of literature and
a poet. Perhaps he was all of these—an
indifferent poet he certainly was. He was born in
the year 1729, at Bourne in Lincolnshire. He
was sent to Cambridge at an early age, and, in
the year 1755, produced a translation of The
Hymns of Callimachus, translated from the
Greek into English verse, with explanatory
notes, with the select Epigrams and other
Poems of the same author, Six Hymns of
Orpheus, and The Encomium of Ptolemy, by
Theocritus. In the same year he wrote several
sermons full of Christian precepts and religious
sentiments. He greatly interested himself in
public charities, and subscribed large sums of
money towards the founding of the Magdalen
Hospital. He preached two or three times at
Magdalen House before Prince Edward. Thus
he became acquainted vith Lord Chesterfield,
who was so pleased with him that he confided
to him the education of his eldest son. Dodd
bought a house in Southampton-row, where he
lived in a sumptuous manner. Wishing to
obtain the living of St. George's, Hanover-square,
he endeavoured to get it by offering a bribe to
the Lord Chancellor. An anonymous letter was
also sent to Lady Chesterfield, offering a sum
of money if she would procure Dr. Dodd the
same living. It was discovered that the letter
must have been written by Dodd himself,
although he tried to throw all the blame on his
wife; but this was not credited, and falling into
disfavour, his name was ordered to be struck off
the list of Royal chaplains. To regain his lost
reputation, he subscribed more liberally than
ever to schools and charities; but continued to
live so extravagantly, that at last he was afraid
to go out of his house lest he should be arrested
for debt. However, being severely pressed by
his creditors, he became desperate, and forged
the name of Lord Chesterfield to a bond for
four thousand two hundred pounds. The
forgery was discovered, and he was arrested—
taken from a gay convivial party—and
committed to Wood-street Compter. Public
sympathy was lavished on him in the most absurd
manner; everybody talked of "the unfortunate
Dr. Dodd;" and the following verses, supposed
to have been written by himself, appeared in all
the newspapers:

Amidst confinement's miserable gloom,
'Midst the lone horrors of this wretched room,
What comforts, gracious Heaven! dost thou bestow
To sooth my sorrows, and console my woe?
A wife beyond the first of woman kind.
Tender, attached, and e'en to death resigned.
Dear youthful friends, in life's ingenuous hour
As children zealous, to exert each power
Men skilled in wisdom's most sagacious lore,
Solicitous to aid, to save—restore!
Lawyers and counsellors, without a fee,
Studious to guide, direct, and set me free!
Nay—from the men I falsely deemed my foes,
The ready offer of all service flows,
While gratitude in guise unknown draws nigh,
Says "I was kind," and tenders his supply!
Above the rest, my keepers, soothed to grief,
With sympathetic pity give relief;
Treat as a guest the sufferer they revere,
And make it even tranquil to be here.
Great God of mercy! if amidst my woes
A stream of such peculiar comfort flows;
Flows full, flows only from thy care divine.
May I not humbly, firmly, Lord, resign!
And trust the issue to thy care alone?
Yes, Lord, I trust, "Oh, may thy will be done!"

This "revered sufferer" also had the coolness
to insert the following letter in the principal
newspapers: it is written quite as of course,
and more with the air of an injured innocent
than with that of a squandering, unprincipled
forger.

Dr. Dodd begs leave to present his most sincere
and grateful acknowledgments to those many
sympathising friends who have been so kind as to think
of him in his distresses, and to assure them, that
though his mind was too much engaged and
agitated with necessary and important business during
his confinement in Wood-street, to admit the kind
favour of their proffered visits, he shall now be
happy, at any time, to receive their friendly and
Christian consolation.

Perfectly at ease with respect to his fate, and
thoroughly resigned to the will of God, he cannot
but feel a complacency in the striking humanity
which he has experienced; and while he most
earnestly entreats a continuance and increase of that
"spirit of prayer, which he is told is poured forth
for him," he cannot omit to assure all those who,
by letter or otherwise, have expressed their solicitude
on his behalf, that, conscious of the purity of
his intention from any purpose to do injury, and
happy in the full proof of that intention, by having
done no injury to any man in respect to this
unfortunate prosecution, he fully reposes himself on
the mercies of his God, and has not a wish to live or
die, but as life or death may tend to the glory of
that God, and the good of mankind.

February 27th, 1777.

He was tried, found guilty, and sentenced
to death; his fate created a great sensation
among all classes. The lord mayor, aldermen,
and commons of the city of London,
got up petitions beseeching commutation of the
sentence, and a monster petition, thirty-seven
yards long and signed by twenty-three thousand
persons, was presented with the same object. A
young man named Joseph Harris, convicted of
highway robbery, was sentenced to die with
him; but the lord mayor, aldermen, and
commons, did not present any petition praying for
commutation of the younger and probably less
culpable offender's sentence, nor was a single
quarter of a yard of public sympathy unfolded
in his behalf. However, the lord mayor, his
sagacious brethren, and the thirty-seven yards
of paper and the twenty-three thousand signatures,
could not save Dr. Dodd. He was hanged
with the low, unclassical, and altogether inelegant
Joseph Harris.

Orator Henley, another well-known preacher,
was a member of St. John's College, Cambridge,
where he distinguished himself by his abilities
and perseverance. When twenty-two years of
age, he wrote a poem, entitled Esther, Queen of
Persia; when he left Cambridge he began to