"And besides, the inequality of our Stature rightly consider'd, ought to be for us as full a Security from Slander, as that between Mr. P--pe, and those _great_ Ladies who do nothing without him; admit him to their Closets, their Bed-sides, consult him in the choice of their Servents, their Garments, and make no scruple of putting them on or off before him: Every body knows they are Women of strict Virtue, and he a Harmless Creature, who has neither the Will, nor Power of doing any farther Mischief than with his Pen, and that he seldom draws, but in defense of their Beauty; or to second their Revenge against some presuming Prude, who boasts a Superiority of Charms: or in privately transcribing and passing for his own, the elaborate Studies of some more learned Genius."[5] Such an attack upon the sensitive poet's person and pride did not go unnoticed. More than a year later he returned the slur with interest upon the head of the supposed author. The lines on Eliza, which still remain the coarsest in the satire, were in the original "Dunciad" even more brutal.[6] Nothing short of childish personal animus could account for the filthy malignity of Pope's revenge. "See in the circle next, Eliza plac'd; Two babes of love close clinging to her waste; Fair as before her works she stands confess'd In flow'r'd brocade by bounteous _Kirkall_ dress'd, Pearls on her neck, and roses in her hair, And her fore-buttocks to the navel bare."[7] The Goddess of Dullness offers "yon Juno of majestic size" as the chief prize in the booksellers' games. "Chetwood and Curll accept this glorious strife," the latter, as always, wins the obscene contest, "and the pleas'd dame soft-smiling leads away." Nearly all of this account is impudent slander, but Mr. Pope's imputations may have had enough truth in them to sting. His description of Eliza is a savage caricature of her portrait by Kirkall prefixed to the first edition of her collected novels, plays, and poems (1724).[8] Curll's "Key to the Dunciad," quoted with evident relish by Pope in the Variorum notes, recorded on the authority of contemporary scandal that the "two babes of love" were the offspring of a poet[9] and a bookseller. This bit of libel meant no more than that Mrs. Haywood's relations with Savage and other minor writers had been injudiciously unconventional. As for the booksellers, Curll had not been professionally connected with the authoress before the publication of "The Dunciad," and the part he played in the games may be regarded as due entirely to Pope's malice. W. R. Chetwood was indeed the first publisher of Eliza's effusions, but his name was even more strongly associated with the prize which actually fell to his lot.[10] In 1735 Chapman was substituted for Chetwood, and in the last revision Thomas Osborne, then the object of Pope's private antipathy, gained a permanent place as Curll's opponent. Taken all in all, the chief