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rey, and my father would willingly have weaned me from my fondness of my too indulgent grandmother, intending to have placed me at Eton: but, not being so provident for my own benefit, and unreasonably terrified with the report of the severe discipline there, I was sent back to Lewes; which perverseness of mine I have since a thousand times deplored. This was the first time that ever my parents had seen all their children together in prosperity. While I was now trifling at home, I saw London, where I lay one night only. The next day, I dined at Beddington,' where I was much delighted with the gardens and curiosities. Thence, we returned to the Lady Darcy's, at Sutton; thence to Wotton; and, on the 16th of August following, 1633, back to Lewes.

1633 3rd November. This year my father was appointed Sheriff, the last, as I think, who served in that honourable office for Surrey and Sussex, before they were disjoined. He had 116 servants in liveries, every one liveried in green satin doublets; divers gentlemen and persons of quality waited on him in the same garb and habit, which at that time (when thirty or forty was the usual retinue of the High Sheriff) was esteemed a great matter. Nor was this out of the least vanity that my father exceeded (who was one of the greatest decliners of it); but because he could not refuse the civility of his friends and relations, who voluntarily came themselves, or sent in their servants. But my father was afterwards most unjustly and spitefully molested by that jeering judge, Richardson, for reprieving the execution of a woman, to gratify my Lord of Lindsey, then Admiral: but out of this he emerged with as much

1 The ancient and once magnificent seat of the noble family of the Carews.

2 Made a Chief-Justice of the Common Pleas in 1626, and of the King's Bench in 1631. There is a monument to him in Westminster Abbey. Fuller says he lived too near the time to permit him to speak fully of him. One of his acts was an order against keeping wakes on Sundays, which Laud, then Bishop of Bath and Wells, took up as an infringement of the rights of bishops, and got him severely reprimanded at the Council-table. He was owner of Starborough Castle, in Lingfield, in Surrey.

3 Robert Bertie, tenth Baron Willoughby d'Eresby, subsequently created Earl of Lindsey, a Knight of the Garter. He was at different

honour as trouble. The king made this into Scotland, and Duke James was born.

year his progress

1634 15th December. My dear sister, Darcy, departed this life, being arrived to her 20th year of age; in virtue advanced beyond her years, or the merit of her husband, the worst of men. She had been brought to bed the 2nd of June before, but the infant died soon after her, the 24th of December. I was therefore sent for home the second time, to celebrate the obsequies of my sister; who was interred in a very honourable manner in our dormitory joining to the parish church,' where now her monument stands.

1635. But my dear mother being now dangerously sick, I was, on the 3rd of September following, sent for to Wotton. Whom I found so far spent, that, all human assistance failing, she in a most heavenly manner departed this life upon the 29th of the same month, about eight in the evening of Michaelmas-day. It was a malignant fever which took her away, about the 37th of her age, and 22nd of her marriage, to our irreparable loss, and the regret of all that knew her. Certain it is, that the visible cause of her indisposition proceeded from grief upon the loss of her daughter, and the infant, that followed it; and it is as certain, that when she perceived the peril whereto its excess had engaged her, she strove to compose herself and allay it: but it was too late, and she was forced to succumb. Therefore, summoning all her children then living (I shall never forget it), she expressed herself in a manner so heavenly, with instructions so pious and Christian, as made us strangely sensible of the extraordinary loss then imminent; after which, embracing every one of us, she gave to each a ring with her blessing, and dismissed us. Then, taking my father by the hand, she recommended us to his care; and, because she was extremely zealous for the education of my younger brother, times Lord High Chamberlain, Lord High Admiral, Constable of Eng. land, and Governor of Berwick; and was general of the king's forces at the breaking out of the Civil War. He was in command at the Battle of Edgehill, in 1642; but, opposing Prince Rupert's pretensions, he surrendered a responsibility which the weakness of Charles would have had him divide with a "boy," put himself at the head of his regiment, fought with heroic gallantry, and fell covered with wounds.

1 Of Wotton.

she requested my father that he might be sent with me to Lewes; and so, having importuned him that what he designed to bestow on her funeral, he would rather dispose among the poor, she laboured to compose herself for the blessed change which she now expected. There was not a servant in the house whom she did not expressly send for, advise, and infinitely affect with her counsel. Thus she continued to employ her intervals, either instructing her relations, or preparing of herself.

Though her physicians, Dr. Meverell, Dr. Clement, and Dr. Rand, had given over all hopes of her recovery, and Sir Sanders Duncombe had tried his celebrated and famous powder, yet she was many days impairing, and endured the sharpest conflicts of her sickness with admirable patience and most Christian resignation, retaining both her intellectuals and ardent affections for her dissolution, to the very article of her departure. When near her dissolution, she laid her hand on every one of her children; and, taking solemn leave of my father, with elevated heart and eyes, she quietly expired, and resigned her soul to God. Thus ended that prudent and pious woman, in the flower of her age, to the inconsolable affliction of her husband, irreparable loss of her children, and universal regret of all that knew her. She was interred, as near as might be, to her daughter, Darcy, the 3rd of October, at night, but with no mean ceremony.

It was the 3rd of the ensuing November, after my brother George was gone back to Oxford, ere I returned to Lewes, when I made way, according to instructions received of my father, for my brother Richard, who was sent the 12th after.

1636. This year being extremely dry, the pestilence much increased in London, and divers parts of England.1

1637: 13th February. I was especially admitted (and, as I remember, my other brother) into the Middle Temple, London, though absent, and as yet at school. There were now large contributions to the distressed Palatinates.

The 10th of December my father sent a servant to bring

1 In a letter to their father, written in this year, George Evelyn, John's elder brother, describes, with many curious personal details, a Royal visit to Oxford University. (See post, p. 423.)

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