17th Jan. 1733–34.—“Mr Baker of Cambridge (who is a very good, as well as a very learned man, and is my great friend, though I am unknown in person to him) tells me in his letter of the 16th of last December, that he hath always thought it a happiness to dye in time, and says of himself, that he is really affraid of living too long. He is above seventy, as he told me some time since.”
10th March 1733–34.— . . . “On the 7th inst.
Ld. Oxford sent me the chronicle of John Bever. He lends it me at my request, and says he will lend me any book he hath, and wonders I will not go to London and see my friends; and see what MSS. and papers are there, and in other libraries, that are worth printing. I could give several reasons for my not going either to London or other places, which however I did not trouble his lordship with. Among others, ’tis probable I might receive a much better welcome than I deserve, or is suitable to one that so much desires and seeks a private humble life, without the least pomp or grandeur.”
2nd May 1734.—“Yesterday an attempt was made upon New college bells of 6876 changes. They began a quarter before ten in the morning, and rang very well until four minutes after twelve, when Mr Brickland, a schoolmaster of St Michael’s parish, who rang the fifth bell, missed a stroke, it put a stop to the whole, so that they presently set them, and so sunk the peal, which is pity, for ’twas really very true ringing, excepting five faults, which I observ’d (for I heard all the time, tho’ ’twas very wet all the while) in that part of the Parks which is on the east side of Wadham college, where I was very private; one of which five faults was the treble, that was rung by Mr Richard Hearne, and the other four were faults committed by the aforesaid Mr Brickland, who ’twas feared by several beforehand would not fully perform his part. . . .”
2nd May 1734. . . . “When I mention’d afterwards my observations to ye said Mr Smith, he told me, that tho’ he rung himself, yet he minded the faults
also himself. Upon which I asked him how many there were? He said three before that which stopp’d them. I told him that there just five before that, at which he admired my niceness.”
14th Oct. 1734. . . . “Dr Sherlock, now bp. of Salisbury, was likewise of that little house (Cath. Hall), and they look upon it as very much for the honour of that little house, that it has produced two of our principal prelates (Dr Sherlock and Hoadly, at Salisbury and Winchester). The last has usually (and regularly) gone to an Oxford man, as Ely to Cambridge.”
31st Dec. 1734. . . . “But having been debarr’d the library, a great number of years, I am now a stranger there, and cannot in the least assist him, tho’ I once design’d to have been very nice in examining all those liturgical MSS., and to have given notes of their age, and particularly of Leopric’s Latin Missal, which I had a design of printing, being countenanc’d thereto by Dr Hickes, Mr Dodwell, etc.”
RECOLLECTIONS
“To entertain the lag-end of my life
With quiet hours.”—Henry IV., Pt. I.