Dryden's connexion with the politics of the Protectorate had not been such as to make his immediate and cordial attachment to the cause of restored Royalty either very strange or very unhandsome. Not committed either by strong personal convictions, or by acts, to the Puritan side, he hastened to show that, whatever the older Northamptonshire Drydens and their relatives might think of the matter, he, for one, was willing to be a loyal subject of Charles, both in church and in state. This main point being settled, he had only farther to consider into what particular walk of industry, now that official employment under government was cut off, he should carry his loyalty and his powers. The choice was not difficult. There was but one career open for him, or suitable to his tastes and qualifications--that of general authorship. We say "general authorship;" for it is important to remark that Dryden was by no means nice in his choice of work. He was ready for anything of a literary kind to which he was, or could make himself, competent. He had probably a preference for verse; but he had no disinclination to prose, if that article was in demand in the market. He had a store of acquirements, academic and other, that fitted him for an intelligent apprehension of whatever was going on in any of the London circles of that day--the circle of the scholars, that of the amateurs of natural science, or that of the mere wits and men of letters. He was, in fact, a man of general intellectual strength, which he was willing to let out in any kind of tolerably honest intellectual service that might be in fashion. This being the case, he set the right way to work to make himself known in quarters where such service was going on. He had about 40_l._ a-year of inherited fortune; which means something more than 120_l._ a-year with us. With this income to supply his immediate wants, he went to live with Herringman, a bookseller and publisher in the New Exchange. What was the precise nature of his agreement with Herringman cannot be ascertained. His literary enemies used afterwards to say that he was Herringman's hack and wrote prefaces for him. However this may be, there were higher conveniences in being connected with Herringman. He was one of the best known of the London publishers of the day, was a personal friend of Davenant, and had almost all the wits of the day as his customers and occasional visitors. Through him, in all probability, Dryden first became acquainted with some of these men, including Davenant himself, Cowley, and a third person of considerable note at that time as an aristocratic dabbler in literature--Sir Robert Howard, son of the Earl of Berkshire. That the impression he made on these men, and on others in or out of the Herringman circle, was no mean one, is proved by the fact that in 1663 we find him a member of the Royal Society, the foundation of which by royal charter had taken place in the previous year. The number of members was then one