Swifter than arrow from the Tartar’s bow.”
We can more easily imagine him as one of those Sprites—
“That do run
By the triple Hecat’s team,
From the presence of the Sun,
Following darkness like a dream.”
Henry, our poet, was born in 1621; and had a twin-brother, Thomas. Newton, his birthplace, is now a farm-house on the banks of the Usk, the scenery of which is of great beauty. The twins entered Jesus College, Oxford, in 1638. This was early in the Great Rebellion, and Charles then kept his Court at Oxford. The young Vaughans were hot Royalists; Thomas bore arms, and Henry was imprisoned. Thomas, after many perils, retired to Oxford, and devoted his life to alchemy, under the patronage of Sir Robert Murray, Secretary of State for Scotland, himself addicted to these studies. He published a number of works, with such titles as “Anthroposophia Theomagica, or a Discourse of the Nature of Man, and his State after Death, grounded on his Creator’s Proto-chemistry;” “Magia Adamica, with a full discovery of the true Cœlum terræ, or the Magician’s Heavenly Chaos and the first matter of all things.”
Henry seems to have been intimate with the famous wits of his time: “Great Ben,” Cartwright, Randolph, Fletcher, &c. His first publication was in 1646:—“Poems, with the Tenth Satyre of Juvenal Englished, by Henry Vaughan, Gent.” After taking his degree in London as M. D., he settled at his birthplace, Newton, where he lived and died the doctor of the district. About this time he prepared for the press his little volume, “Olor Iscanus, the Swan of Usk,” which was afterwards published by his brother Thomas, without the poet’s consent. We are fortunate in possessing a copy of this curious volume, which is now marked in the Catalogues as “Rariss.” It contains a few original poems; some of them epistles to his friends, hit off with great vigor, wit, and humor. Speaking of the change of times, and the reign of the Roundheads, he says,—
“Here’s brotherly Ruffs and Beards, and a strange sight
Of high monumental Hats, tane at the fight