[231] Dryden the poet wrote this brilliant poem in 1697 in a night of inspiration. Clayton had set it to music in 1711; and again about 1720 Benedetto Marcello wrote a cantata in the ancient manner on an Italian adaptation of the English ode by the Abbé Conti. A friend of Handel, Newburgh Hamilton, arranged Dryden's poem with great discretion for Handel's oratorio. Handel had already written several times in honour of St. Cecilia. Some fragments of four cantatas to St. Cecilia are to be found in Vol. LII of the great Breitkopf edition (_Cantate italiane con stromenti_). They were all written in London, the first about 1713. [232] _Alexander's Feast_ (January, 1736), _Atalanta_ (April), _Wedding Anthem_ (April), _Giustino_ (August), _Arminio_ (September), _Berenice_ (December). [233] June 1, 1737. But on June 11 the rival opera also closed its doors, ruined. Handel, like Samson, dragged down in his own fall the enemy whom he wished to annihilate. [234] On November 15, 1737, Handel commenced _Faramondo_; from December 7 to 17 he wrote the _Funeral Anthem_. On December 24 he finished _Faramondo_. On December 25 he commenced _Serse_. [235] He said that these kinds of concerts were but a way of begging. [236] Vauxhall was a beautiful garden on the Thames, the meeting place of London Society. Every evening except Sunday from the end of April to the beginning of August, vocal, orchestral, and organ concerts were given. The manager of these entertainments, Tyers, caused a white marble statue of Handel by the sculptor Roubiliac to be placed in a niche of a large grotto. The same sculptor later on executed Handel's statue for his monument in Westminster Abbey. [237] In the first part of _Israel in Egypt_ there is not a single solo air to be found. In the whole work there are nineteen choruses against four solos and three duets. The poem of _Saul_ which Chrysander at first attributed to Jennens appears to have been, as he discovered later on, the work of Newburgh Hamilton. For _Israel_, Handel entirely dispensed with a librettist, taking the pure Bible text. [238] Written between September 29 and October 30, 1739. Handel further prepared in November, 1740, the Second Volume of Organ Concertos (six). The same month he opened his last season of opera, giving on November 22 _Imeneo_, which was only played twice, and on January 14, 1741, _Deidamia_, which was only given three times. [239] Especially in the _Allegro_ and in certain _Concerti Grossi_. [240] An anonymous letter published in the _London Daily Post_ of April 4, 1741, alludes to a single false step made without premeditation.