[1052]Father Harcourt—he told me that he was of the familie of Stanton Harcourt, A.D. 1650. He was confessor, and afterwards co-executor, to the lady Inglefield.
[1053]Petrification of a kidney. When father Harcourt suffered[1054] at Tyburne, and his bowells, etc. throwne into the fire, a butcher's boy standing by was resolved to have a piece of his kidney which was broyling in the fire. He burn't his fingers much, but he got it; and one ... Roydon, a brewer in Southwark, bought it, a kind of Presbyterian. The wonder is, 'tis now absolutely petrified: I have seen it. He much values it.
[1055]Mr. Roydon, brewer in Southwarke (opposite the Temple), haz the piece of Father Harcourt's kidney which was snatcht out of the fire, and now petrified and very hard. But 'twas not so hard when he first had it. It being alwayes carried in the pocket hardened by degrees better then by the fire—like an agate polished.
Thomas Hariot (1560-1621).
[1056]Mr. Thomas Hariot[EL]—from Dr. John Pell, March 31, 1680. Dr. Pell knowes not what countreyman[1057] he was (but an Englishman he was)—[There[1058] is a place in Kent called Harriot's-ham, now my lord Wotton's[EM]; and in Wostershire in the parish of Droytwich is a fine seat called Harriots, late the seate of Chiefe Baron Wyld.]
He thinkes he dyed about the time he (Dr. Pell) went to Cambridge. He sayes my lord John Vaughan can enforme me, and haz a copie of his will: which vide.
[1059]Mr. Thomas Hariot—Mr. Elias Ashmole thinkes he was a Lancashire man: Mr. <John> Flamsted promised me to enquire of Mr. Townley.
[1060]☞ I very much desire to find his buriall: he was not buryed in the Tower chapelle.
[1061]Mr. Thomas Harriot[1062]:—Memorandum:—Sir Robert Moray (from Francis Stuart[1063]), declared at the Royal Society—'twas when the comet[1064] appeared before the Dutch warre—that Sir Francis had heard Mr. Harriot say that he had seen nine cometes, and had predicted seaven of them, but did not tell them how. 'Tis very strange: excogitent astronomi.