Congreve, William
William, (1670-1729), an English dramatist. He holds first place among the writers of comedy during the Restoration period. The romantic comedy of which As You Like It is the best example had now gone entirely out of fashion. In its place, we find plots drawn often from Spanish and French sources, vivid pictures of the fashionable life of the times, a great deal of witty dialogue, with much that is cynical, coarse, and even immoral. The other writers of this group are William Wycherly, John Vanbrugh and George Farquhar. Congreve was "courted, flattered, and famous" in his own day. He was supreme in the "comedy of repartee." Love for Love and The Way of the World are two of his comedies. He was a friend of Dryden and paid high tribute to him on the latter's death. See Drama; Collier
QUOTATIONS.
Defer not till tomorrow to be wise,
Tomorrow's sun on thee may never rise.
Conifers (Latin, cone bearers), a large and important family of shrubs and trees. They produce naked seeds protected by corky or resinous scales in the form usually of a cone. A few, as the juniper, produce berries. Most conifers are evergreen; that is to say, they retain their old leaves, usually needle-shaped, over winter at least, until new leaves have made their growth. Conifers are not all evergreens. Tamarac drops its leaves in the fall. Comparatively few evergreens, holly for instance, are conifers; but the term evergreen has come to mean conifer and is so used in horticultural manuals, as an evergreen hedge, an evergreen windbreak, etc. In this use of the word there are about 300 evergreens in the world and about 100 native to North America, with 300 or 400 nurserymen's varieties. The beauty of evergreens lies in their natural shape. They should never be trimmed up like an ash or an elm. Their green foliage is pleasing to the eye at all seasons. Evergreens distributed with judgment impart to private grounds and dooryards an air of good taste, and give farms an appearance of comfort and prosperity that can be had so inexpensively in no other way. See special articles on CEDAR; PINE; SPRUCE; CYPRESS; YEW; FIR.