For the next half dozen years Courten’s life was almost that of a recluse, save that such activities as it admitted of were devoted almost exclusively to the study of antiquities and of the natural sciences. A great part of those years was passed at Fawsley with his aunt, Lady Knightley, one of the few relatives whose affection stood the proof of adversity.
There are several reasons for thinking that the rudimentary foundation of Courten’s Museum had been laid as early as in the time of his grandfather, Sir William, whose mercantile and colonial enterprises presented so many opportunities for bringing into England the more curious productions of remote countries, as well as their merchandise. Be that as it may, the collection of a museum which should eclipse everything of its kind theretofore known in England became, from his attainment of manhood, the leading aim and object of William Courten’s career. It was to him both an ambition and a solace.
The other of the two men who thus came into brief contact in 1663 lived a life as different from Courten’s as can well be conceived. Carew seems to have been a glutton in his appetite for contention. |Pretentien tegens d’Oost-Indische Compagnie, &c. (B. M.)| And the Dutchmen, as far as they were concerned, put no stint upon its indulgence. There was also ample time for it. Treaty followed by war, and war leading to renewed treaty, kept the affair of the Bona Esperanza and the Henry Bon-Adventure both in active historical memory, and in full legal vigour. Towards the close of 1662 it had been covenanted by the English government, as a necessary condition of a good understanding between the two Powers, that there should be a prompt satisfaction of damages. The Treaty of Commerce of that year was tossed to and fro on that one point of the Courten ships with more obstinate pertinacity than on any other. To the intrinsic merits of the claim, in the main, there was really no answer. To the legal technicalities by which its settlement, if left to Dutch courts of judicature, could be indefinitely protracted, there was no end. |The Claims in Holland.| When letters of dismissal had been already drawn at Whitehall for the Dutch envoys of 1662, because they insisted on a clause extinguishing all outstanding claims on both sides; they skilfully contrived to substitute leave to litigate[[41]] for a proviso to satisfy. And the event justified their forecast.
Domestic Corresp., Charles II, vol. cxiii, § 143.
During the year 1665, Letters of Marque and Reprisal were granted to Carew and his associates, and a special clause of continuance until the full recovery of debt and damages,[[42]] notwithstanding the conclusion of any subsequent Treaty of Peace was inserted. This was done after an elaborate argument before the Lord Chancellor Clarendon. Several ships were taken by Carew’s cruisers, but they were nearly all claimed by Hamburghers, Swedes, and others. And at length the cost of the reprisals exceeded their yield.
In this case, and throughout it, as in so many other and graver cases, the policy of Charles the Second’s ministers was a policy of the passing exigence. Principle had always to vail to expediency. The Dutch were permitted, after all, to insert their favorite extinction clause in the Treaty of Breda (21 July, 1667). Five years later, the Privy Council advised the King that ‘it is just and reasonable for your Majesty to insist upon reparation for the debt and damages’ sustained by the seizure, in 1643, of the Bona Esperanza and her consort. New Letters of Marque led to the capture of more vessels, duly provided with a diversity of flag; and to the imprisonment, in England, of the captors, before trial or inquiry. Meanwhile, Carew himself was seized abroad, and put into a Dutch prison. |Courten Papers, in MS. Sloane, 3515.| And, at length, in 1676, the States of Holland sent express orders to their courts of judicature, directing that ‘no further progress shall be made in the pending suits,’ grounding the order upon the proviso in the treaty of 1667, as extinctive of all claims and pretensions, whatsoever, advanced by Englishmen against Dutch citizens, be the foundation and history of such claims what they might. This decree, therefore, operated in bar, as well of the claims of the representatives of Sir William Courten, for the debt of Peter Boudaen, as of those arising out of the seizure of the ships of the East India Fleet. It was estimated that the Courten claims then pending in the Courts of Holland amounted, in the aggregate, to £380,000 sterling.[[43]]
In May, 1683, a petition was presented to the English government, in which humble prayer was made that that government would be graciously pleased ‘to perpetuate the memory of Sir William Courten and of Sir Paul Pindar, by setting up their statues in marble under the piazzas of the Royal Exchange—Sir William Courten’s at the end of the “Barbadoes walk” at the one side, and Sir Paul Pindar’s at the end of the “Turkey walk” of the other side—for encouragement to all merchants, in future ages, |Vox Veritatis, 1683. (B. M.)| to take examples by them for loyalty and fidelity to their King and country.’
Courten’s Second Visit to France, and his Travels.
Courten did his best to avoid any personal share in those unceasing turmoils, and to keep in the quiet paths of a studious retirement. But he presently found that, in order to secure his end, he must needs do as his father had done before him. He must leave England, either for Italy or for France. When his mind was made up to exile, it was also made up to the relinquishment of his name. William Courten became, even to his nearest relatives, ‘William Charleton.’
The friendships he had already formed at Montpelier, in his youth, and the local charms of that city for a studious man, incited him to revisit his old retreat. But he made no permanent abode there. He took long tours, in France, in Germany, and in Italy; adding everywhere both to the stores of his knowledge and to the presses and cabinets of his library and museum. It was during his second stay at Montpelier that he formed his life-long friendships with a famous Frenchman, Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, and with a more famous Englishman, John Locke. Here also began his acquaintance with Dr. (afterwards Sir) Hans Sloane.