Sir John Vanbrugh, the witty dramatist, for building Castle Howard, was made Clarencieux King of Arms, to the great indignation of the heralds, whose pedantry he ridiculed. He afterwards sold his place for £2,000, avowing ignorance of his profession and his constant neglect of his official duties.
In the same reign, to Peter Le Neve (Norroy) we are indebted for the careful preservation of the invaluable "Paxton Letters," of the reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., and Richard III., purchased and afterwards published by Sir John Fenn.
Another eminent herald was John Anstis, created Garter in 1718 (George I.), after being imprisoned as a Jacobite. He wrote learned works on the Orders of the Garter and the Bath, and left behind him valuable materials—his MS. for the "History of the College of Arms," now preserved in the library.
Francis Grose, that roundabout, jovial friend of Burns, was Richmond Herald for many years, but he resigned his appointment in 1763, to become Adjutant and Paymaster of the Hampshire Militia. Grose was the son of a Swiss jeweller, who had settled in London. His "Views of Antiquities in England and Wales" helped to restore a taste for Gothic art. He died in 1791.
Of Oldys, that eccentric antiquary, who was Norroy King at Arms in the reign of George II.—the Duke of Norfolk having appointed him from the pleasure he felt at the perusal of his "Life of Sir Walter Raleigh"—Grose gives an amusing account:—
"William Oldys, Norroy King at Arms," says Grose, "author of the 'Life of Sir Walter Raleigh,' and several others in the 'Biographia Britannica,' was natural son of a Dr. Oldys, in the Commons, who kept his mother very privately, and probably very meanly, as when he dined at a tavern he used to beg leave to send home part of the remains of any fish or fowl for his cat, which cat was afterwards found out to be Mr. Oldys' mother. His parents dying when he was very young, he soon squandered away his small patrimony, when he became first an attendant in Lord Oxford's library and afterwards librarian. He was a little mean-looking man, of a vulgar address, and, when I knew him, rarely sober in the afternoon, never after supper. His favourite liquor was porter, with a glass of gin between each pot. Dr. Ducarrel told me he used to stint Oldys to three pots of beer whenever he visited him. Oldys seemed to have little classical learning, and knew nothing of the sciences; but for index-reading, title-pages, and the knowledge of scarce English books and editions, he had no equal. This he had probably picked up in Lord Oxford's service, after whose death he was obliged to write for the booksellers for a subsistence. Amongst many other publications, chiefly in the biographical line, he wrote the 'Life of Sir Walter Raleigh,' which got him much reputation. The Duke of Norfolk, in particular, was so pleased with it that he resolved to provide for him, and accordingly gave him the patent of Norroy King at Arms, then vacant. The patronage of that duke occasioned a suspicion of his being a Papist, though I really think without reason; this for a while retarded his appointment. It was underhand propagated by the heralds, who were vexed at having a stranger put in upon them. He was a man of great good-nature, honour, and integrity, particularly in his character as an historian. Nothing, I firmly believe, would ever have biassed him to insert any fact in his writings he did not believe, or to suppress any he did. Of this delicacy he gave an instance at a time when he was in great distress. After the publication of his 'Life of Sir Walter Raleigh,' some booksellers, thinking his name would sell a piece they were publishing, offered him a considerable sum to father it, which he refused with the greatest indignation. He was much addicted to low company; most of his evenings he spent at the 'Bell' in the Old Bailey, a house within the liberties of the Fleet, frequented by persons whom he jocularly called rulers, from their being confined to the rules or limits of that prison. From this house a watchman, whom he kept regularly in pay, used to lead him home before twelve o'clock, in order to save sixpence paid to the porter of the Heralds' office, by all those who came home after that time; sometimes, and not unfrequently, two were necessary. He could not resist the temptation of liquor, even when he was to officiate on solemn occasions; for at the burial of the Princess Caroline he was so intoxicated that he could scarcely walk, but reeled about with a crown 'coronet' on a cushion, to the great scandal of his brethren. His method of composing was somewhat singular. He had a number of small parchment bags inscribed with the names of the persons whose lives he intended to write; into these bags he put every circumstance and anecdote he could collect, and from thence drew up his history. By his excesses he was kept poor, so that he was frequently in distress; and at his death, which happened about five on Wednesday morning, April 15th, 1761, he left little more than was sufficient to bury him. Dr. Taylor, the oculist, son of the famous doctor of that name and profession, claimed administration at the Commons, on account of his being nullius filius—Anglicè, a bastard. He was buried the 19th following, in the north aisle of the Church of St. Benet, Paul's Wharf, towards the upper end of the aisle. He was about seventy-two years old. Amongst his works is a preface to Izaak Walton's 'Angler.'"
The following pretty anacreontic, on a fly drinking out of his cup of ale, which is doubtless well known, is from the pen of Oldys:—
"Busy, curious, thirsty fly,
Drink with me, and drink as I;
Freely welcome to my cup,
Couldst thou sip and sip it up.
Make the most of life you may;
Life is short, and wears away.
"Both alike are mine and thine,
Hastening quick to their decline;
Thine's a summer, mine no more,
Though repeated to threescore;
Threescore summers, when they're gone,
Will appear as short as one."
The Rev. Mark Noble comments upon Grose's text by saying that this story of the crown must be incorrect, as the coronet at the funeral of a princess is always carried by Clarencieux, and not by Norroy.
In 1794, two eminent heralds, Benjamin Pingo, York Herald, and John Charles Brooke, Somerset Herald, were crushed to death in a crowd at the side door of the Haymarket Theatre. Mr. Brooke had died standing, and was found as if asleep, and with colour still in his cheeks.