Note 97 — HOGARTH ILLUSTRATED.
Reading edition
Elkannah Settle was born in the year 1648. In 1680, he was so violent a Whig, that the ceremony of Pope-burning, on the 17th of November, was entrusted to his management. He wrote much in defence of the party, and with the leaders was in high estimation. Politicians and patriots were formed of much the same materials then as they are now. Settle, being disappointed in some of his views, became as violent a Tory as he had been a Whig, and actually entered himself a trooper in King James's army at Hounslow Heath. The Revolution destroyed all his prospects; and in the latter part of his life he was so reduced as to attend a booth, which was kept by Mrs. Minns and her daughter Mrs. Leigh, in Bartholomew Fair. From these people he received a salary for writing drolls, which were generally approved. In his old age he was obliged to appear in these wretched exhibitions; and in the farce of St. George for England, performed the part of a dragon, being enclosed in a case of green leather of his own invention. To this circumstance Doctor Young refers in his Epistle to Pope:
"Poor Elkannah, all other changes past, For bread, in Smithfield-dragons hiss'd at last; Spit streams of fire, to make the butchers gape; And found his manners suited to his shape."