The income derived from patronage, however, was at best uncertain and necessitated many applications. To the public, moreover, a novel meant nothing if not something new. Eliza Haywood's productiveness, therefore, was enormous. When she had settled to her work, the authoress could produce little pieces, ranging from sixty to nearly two hundred pages in length, with extraordinary rapidity. In 1724, for instance, a year of tremendous activity, she rushed into print no less than ten original romances, beside translating half of a lengthy French work, "La Belle Assemblée" by Mme de Gomez. At this time, too, her celebrity had become so great that "The Prude, a Novel, written by a Young Lady" was dedicated to her, just as Mrs. Hearne at the beginning of her career had put a romance, "The Lover's Week," under the protection of the famous Mrs. Manley. Between 1720 and 1730 Mrs. Haywood wrote, beside plays and translations, thirty-eight works of her own composing, one in two stout volumes and several in two or more parts. If we may judge by the number and frequency of editions, most of the indefatigable scribbler's tales found a ready sale, while the best of them, such as "Idalia" (1723), "The Fatal Secret" (1724), "The Mercenary Lover" (1726), "The Fruitless Enquiry" and "Philidore and Placentia" (1727), gained for her not a little applause. Nor was the young adventuress in letters unhailed by literary men. Aaron Hill immediately befriended her by writing an epilogue for her first play and another of Hill's circle, the irresponsible Richard Savage, attempted to "paint the Wonders of Eliza's Praise" in verses prefixed to "Love in Excess" and "The Rash Resolve" (1724).[21] Along with Savage's first complimentary poem were two other effusions, in one of which an "Atheist to Love's Power" acknowledged his conversion through the force of Eliza's revelation of the tender passion, while the other expressed with less rapture the same idea. But it remained for James Sterling, the friend of Concanen, to state most vigorously the contemporary estimate of Mrs. Haywood and her early writings.[22] "Great Arbitress of Passion!" he exclaims, "Persuasion waits on all your bright Designs, And where you point the varying Soul inclines: See! Love and Friendship, the fair Theme inspires We glow with Zeal, we melt in soft Desires! Thro' the dire Labyrinth of Ills we share The kindred Sorrows of the gen'rous Pair; Till, pleas'd, rewarded Vertue we behold, Shine from the Furnace pure as tortur'd Gold:" of _Love in Excess_, Part II, and at the front of each successive edition, have never been reprinted. [Transcriber's note: wording in original.] A specimen of his praise follows,