Letters, portraits and first editions of Alexander Pope and Dr. Samuel Johnson are on exhibition in the Widener Memorial Room at present.

The extra illustrated edition of Johnson's "Life of Pope", contains many letters, documents; and portraits of Pope and his contemporaries; a volume containing 18 letters written by Pope to William Fortescue, between 1730 and 1739; the first edition of the four parts of "The Essay on Man," the first edition of "The Rape of the Lock", and "The Dunciad."

Among the Johnson items are his New Testament, with three chapters supplied in Johnson's writing. These are the first and second chapters of Matthew and the last chapter of The Revelation. A letter from Johnson to Sir Joshua Reynolds who painted the famous portraits of Johnson; the first edition of Boswell's "Life of Johnson," the copy presented to Sir Joshua Reynolds, another later edition, presented to Mrs. Williams are also in this collection.

The rarest of all is "The Prologue and Epilogue spoken at the opening of the Theatre in Drury Lane in 1747." The theatre opened with The Merchant of Venice. The Prologue which was written by Garrick, was spoken by Mrs. Woffington.

The pamphlet was advertised in The General Advertiser in October 8, 1747, and in The Gentleman's Magazine. But the pamphlet completely disappeared until about 1900 when a copy was discovered in a volume of miscellaneous pamphlets. A facsimile was made from this, and published in 1902.

The original pamphlet was given to Harvard College Library by Evert J. Wendell.