Four of my sons laid it on my wame.
I was man of my meat, and master of my wife,
And lived in mine ain house without meikle strife.
Gif thou be'st a "better man in thy time than I was in mine,
Tak this stane off my wame, and lay it upon thine.'
"25.—Meric Casaubon on Spirits....
"26.—'There saw we learned Maroe's golden tombe;
The way he cut an English mile in length
Thorow a rock of stone in one night's space.'
"Christopher Marlowe's Tragicall History of Dr. Faustus—a very remarkable thing. Grand subject—end grand.... Copied Prophecy of Merlin from Mr. Clerk's MS.
"27.—Read Everybody's Business is Nobody's Business, by Andrew Moreton. This was one of Defoe's many aliases—like his pen, in parts....
'To Cuthbert, Car, and Collingwood, to Shafto and to Hall;
To every gallant generous heart that for King James did fall.'
"28.—... Anthony-a-Wood.... Plain Proof of the True Father and Mother of the Pretended Prince of Wales, by W. Fuller. This fellow was pilloried for a forgery some years later.... Began Nathan der Weise.
"June 29.—Read Introduction to a Compendium on Brief Examination, by W. S.—viz., William Stafford—though it was for a time given to no less a W. S. than William Shakespeare. A curious treatise—the Political Economy of the Elizabethan Day—worth reprinting....
"July 1.—Read Discourse of Military Discipline, by Captain Barry—a very curious account of the famous Low Countries armies—full of military hints worth note.... Anthony Wood again.
"3.—Nathan der Weise. ... Delrius....