Richard Martin (1570-1618).
[177]Richard Martin[U] was borne....
Insert here his picture[V] which I sent to Mr. A. Wood[W].
He was of the ancient familie of the Martins of Athelminston in the countie of Dorset, a very faire seate. The name was lost about 50 yeares since by a daughter and heire, who was maried to ... Bruen, who had a daughter and heire maried to Sir Ralph Banks, who sold it to Sir Robert Long (1668). In the church are severall noble monuments. Their crest is an ape; men use to say 'a Martin ape.'
(In queen Elizabeth's time, one Penry of Wales wrote a booke[XIII.] called Martin Marprelate, on which there was this epigram:—
Martin the ape, the drunke, and the mad,
The three Martins are whose workes we have had.
If a fourth Martin comes after Martins so evill,
He can be no man, he must be a devill.)
[XIII.] He was hanged for it. He was kin to my great-grandfather.
He was a very handsome man, a gracefull speaker, facetious, and well-beloved. I thinke he dyed of a merry symposiaque.
He was recorder but a moneth before his death[178].