[16] The celebrated minister of Philip II.
[17] One of the most curious modern discoveries was that of the Fairfax papers and correspondence by the late J. N. Hughes, of Winchester, who purchased at a sale at Leeds Castle, Kent, a box apparently filled with old coloured paving-tiles; on removing the upper layers he found a large mass of manuscripts of the time of the Civil wars, evidently thus packed for concealment; they have since been published, and add most valuable information to this interesting period of English history.
[18] For some time previous to his death he was in so abject a state of poverty as to be dependent for subsistence upon the exertions of his faithful servant Antonio, a native of Java, whom he had brought with him from India, and who was accustomed to beg by night for the bread which was to save his unhappy master from perishing by want the next day. Camöens, when death at last put an end to a life which misfortune and neglect had rendered insupportable, was denied the solace of having his faithful Antonio to close his eyes. He was aged only fifty-five when he breathed his last in the hospital. This event occurred in 1579, but so little regard was paid to the memory of this great man that the day or month on which he expired remains unknown.—Adamson's Memoirs of Camöens, 1820.
[19] This melancholy event happened in 1788, fifteen years after the original projector of the Literary Fund, Mr. David Williams, had endeavoured to establish it. It appears that Mr. Floyer Sydenham was arrested "for a small debt; he never spoke after being arrested, and sunk under the pressure of his calamity." This is the published record of the event by the officers of the present fund; and these simple words are sufficiently indicative of the harrowing nature of the catastrophe; it was strongly felt that Mr. Williams' hopeful plan of preventing a second act so fatal should be encouraged. A small literary club took the initiative, and subscribed a few guineas to pay for such advertisements as were necessary to keep the intended objects of the founder before the public, and solicit its aid. Two years afterwards a committee was formed; another two years saw it take position among the established institutions of the country. In 1818 it obtained a royal charter. In its career it has relieved upwards of 1300 applicants, and devoted to that purpose 47,725l.
[20] Withers, throughout these unique eclogues, which are supposed to narrate the discourses of "friendly shepherds" who visit him—
"—pent
Within the jaws of strict imprisonment;
A forlorn shepherd void of all the means,
Whereon man's common hope in danger leads"
—is still upheld by the same consciousness of rectitude which inspired Sir Richard Lovelace in his better-known address "To Althea from Prison." Withers' poem was published before Lovelace was born. A few lines from Withers will display this similarity. Speaking of his enemies, he says:—
"They may do much, but when they have done all,
Only my body they may bring in thrall.
And 'tis not that, my Willy; 'tis my mind,
My mind's more precious freedom I so weigh,
A thousand ways they may my body bind,
In thousand thralls, but ne'er my mind betray:
And hence it is that I contentment find,
And bear with patience this my load away:
I'm still myself, and that I'd rather be.
Than to be lord of all these downs in fee."
[21] The same anecdote is related of Dr. Johnson, who once being at a club where other literary men were indulging in jests, upon the entry of a new visitor exclaimed, "Let us be grave—here is a fool coming."
[22] Impressions have been taken from plates engraved by the ancient Egyptians; and one of these, printed by the ordinary rolling-press, was exhibited at the Great Manchester Exhibition, 1857; it being for all practical purposes similar to those executed in the present day.