The next tract, Gay's _Present State of Wit_, takes up the history of our popular literature during the period which immediately succeeded the discomfiture of poor Partridge. Its author, John Gay, who is, as we need scarcely add, one of the most eminent of the minor poets of the Augustan age, was at the time of its appearance almost entirely unknown. Born in September 1685, at Barnstaple, of a respectable but decayed family, he had received a good education at the free grammar school of that place. On leaving school he had been apprenticed to a silk mercer in London. But he had polite tastes, and employed his leisure time in scribbling verses and in frequenting with his friend, Aaron Hill, the literary coffee-houses. In 1708 he published a vapid and stupid parody, suggested by John Philip's _Splendid Shilling_ and _Cider_, entitled _Wine_. His next performance was the tract which is here printed, and which is dated May 3rd, 1711. It is written with skill and sprightliness, and certainly shows a very exact and extensive acquaintance with the journalistic world of those times. And it is this which gives it its value. The best and most useful form, perhaps, which our remarks on it can take will be to furnish it with a running commentary explaining its allusions both to publications and to persons. It begins with a reference to the unhappy plight of Dr. King. This was Dr. William King, who is not to be confounded with his contemporaries and namesakes, the Archbishop of Dublin or the Principal of St. Mary Hall, Oxford, but who may be best, perhaps, described as the Dr. William King 'who could write verses in a tavern three hours after he could not speak.' He had long been a prominent figure among wits and humorists. His most important recent performances had been his _Art of Cookery_ and his _Art of Love_, published respectively in 1708 and in 1709. In the latter year he had, much to the disgust of Sir John Soames, issued some very amusing parodies of the _Philosophical Transactions_, which he entitled _Useful Transactions in Philosophy and other sorts of Learning_, to be continued as long as it could find buyers. It ceased apparently to find buyers, and after reaching three numbers had collapsed. When the _Examiner_ was started in August 1710, King was one of the chief contributors. Latterly, however, things had been going very badly with this 'poor starving wit,' as Swift called him. He was either imprisoned or on the point of being imprisoned in the Fleet, but death freed him from his troubles at the end of 1712. John Ozell was, perhaps, the most ridiculous of the scribblers then before the public, maturing steadily for the _Dunciad_, where, many years afterwards, he found his proper place. He rarely aspired beyond 'translations,' and the _Monthly Amusement_ referred to is not, as might be supposed, a periodical, but simply his frequent appearances as a translator. Gay next passes to periodicals and newspapers. De Foe is