[35] These were prefixed to the edition of "The Adventures of Five Hours," printed the year after the author was made a baronet, but without bearing on the title any mark of his advancement. He is there called only Colonel Tuke. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE HENRY HOWARD OF NORFOLK.[36] Since it is your pleasure, Noble Sir, that I should hold my fortune from you, like those tenants, who pay some inconsiderable trifle in lieu of a valuable rent, I humbly offer you this poem, in acknowledgment of my tenure: and I am well pleas'd with this occasion to publish my sense of your favours, since it seems to me a kind of ingratitude to be thankful in private. It was bred upon the terrace-walks in your garden at Albury; and if I mistake not, it resembles the place where it was brought up: the plot is delightful, the elevations natural, the ascents easy, without any great embellishments of art. I designed the character of Antonio, as a copy of your steady virtue; if it appear to those, who have the honour to know you, short of the original, I take leave to inform them, that you have not sat to me long; 'tis possible hereafter I may gratify my country, for their civility to this essay, with something more worthy of your patronage and their indulgence. In the interim, I make it my glory to avow that, had Fortune been just to me, she could not have recompensed the loyal industry of my life with a more illustrious title than that which you have been pleased to confer upon me, of Your Friend. To which (as in gratitude I am bound) I subjoin that of Your most humble servant, S. TUKE. FOOTNOTES: [36] This dedication, and the prologue and epilogue which follow, are only found in the first and second edition.--_Collier._ THE FIRST SCENE IS THE CITY OF SEVILLE. _The +Prologue+ enters with a play-bill in his hand, and reads_--This day, being the 15th of December, shall be acted a new play, never play'd before, call'd _The Adventures of Five Hours._ A NEW PLAY.