Note 165 — Chapter III
Reading edition
He is the man to whom Pope alluded in the couplet,
"Let humble Allen, with an honest shame, Do good by stealth and blush to find it fame."
Allen and the poet had a falling out just before the death of the latter. In his will, Pope left his quondam friend £150 to pay a "few little debts." Allen is said to have remarked that if Pope had added another figure, it would have represented better the "few little debts." W. Lewins, Her Majesty's Mails, pp. 104-12.