Mansell had shewn to maintain the right which the kings of Great Britain maintained over the four seas. CARDINAL WOLSEY. THIS Cardinal (saith Campian, in his History of England) was exceeding wise, fair spoken, high minded, full of revenge, vicious of his body, lofty to his enemies, courteous to his friends, a ripe schoolman, allured with flattery, insatiable to get, and more princely in his benefactions; but whosoever will know the splendour of his chapel, the nobleness of his tables, the order of his daily attendance in term time to Westminster, and the glory of his state and grandeur, may read the same in Stow and Hollingshead, to whom I refer the reader. But when he fell under the King's displeasure, touching the matter of divorce between the king and queen, Katharine, through despair of recovering his favour, a deep melancholy seized him, and he died on St. Andrew's eve, at Leicester, anno 1530, 21 H. VIII. in his passage from York to London, and was buried in the great church there, of whom Hollingshead gives this description; that he was of a great stomach, counted himself equal with princes, obtained a vast treasure by crafty suggestion, forced title on simony, was not not pitiful, conceited in his own opinion, would say in public that which was false, was double in speech and meaning, would promise much and perform little, was an ill pastor to the clergy, sorely hated, and he feared the city of London. Chauncy's Historical Antiquities of Hertfordshire. DOCTOR MAGENNIS. THE late Doctor Magennis (who was tried some years since at the Old Bailey, for the murder of Mr. Hardy, and to whose character Mr. Burke and a number of gentlemen bore the most honourable testimony) was descended from a very ancient family in the North of Ireland, Having occasion, when a young man, to visit the metropolis of that kingdom, he put up, on his way, at an inn in Drogheda. The mayor of that corporation had enclosed a piece of common contiguous to the town, for his own use, and, in order that he might himself enjoy the full benefit of it, he gave notice in the newspaper, that if any cattle should be found trespassing on it, they would be immediately impounded. The Doctor happened to fall in company with some boon companions, that winged the glass with song and joke, till Morpheus weighed down his eyelids with "soft oppression." When our young young traveller was ready the next morning to resume his journey, he called for his horse: the hostler scratched his pate, and after a pause or two, told him, that as his horse, in all probability, had not read the Mayor's advertisementhe had inadvertently, no doubt, stepped into the favourite inclosure, as it was certainly the most verdant spot in the neighbourhood; in consequence of which he was seized by one of his Lordship's Myrmidons, and committed for farther examination. Magennis immediately waited on the prætor, who heard all that he had to say in favour of the prisoner; on which he collected all his twelvemonth's pride, and in a few words told him, that the culprit should not be enlarged unless he paid down half a guinea, which was more at the time than our youthful Esculapius could conveniently spare. "Well, then," said the suppliant, "if so, it must be so; but I shall have a few verses into the bargain." On which he repeated the following lines: Was ever horse so well befitted? His master drunk-himself committed! Such was the power of verse even on a city magistrate, that he immediately ordered his Rosinante to be delivered up to him free of all expense, PAUL PAUL HEFFERNAN. PAUL Heffernan was a man of learning and ingenuity, notwithstanding the scurrility of Tom Davis, the bookseller, who did not dare, in the lifetime of the former, to look uncivilly at him. The eccentricities of Paul were remarkable: he was always going your way. To try the experiment as far as it would go, a gentleman of his acquaintance, after treating him with a good supper at the Bedford coffee-house, took him by the hand, saying, "Good night, Paul." "Stay," says the other, "I am going your way." His friend. stepped onward out of his own way, with Paul, to Limehouse; when, contriving to amuse Paul with the certain suc cess of his tragedy (the Heroine of the Cave, afterwards performed for Reddish's benefit with no success), he brought him back to Carpenter's coffee-house, in Covent Garden, at three in the morning, where, after drinking some coffee and punch, a new departure was taken, with "Good morning, Paul; I am going to the Blue Boar in Holborn."-" Well," says Heffernan, "that's in my way;" and, upon leaving his friend at the gate, he took his leave a second time, about five in the morning, and afterwards walked leisurely 176 QUEEN ELIZABETH TO LORD BURGHLEY. home to his lodging in College Street, Westminster, next door to the hatter's, where he died about twenty years ago; not in want, for he had a guinea and some silver in his pocket. I DOUBTE I doe nickname you; for those of your kinde (they say) have no sense, but I have of late seen an ecce signữ, that if an asse kieke you, you feele it soone. I will recant you from being my spiritt, if ever I perceyve yt you disdaine not such a feelinge. Serve God, feare yr kinge, and be a goode fellowe to ye rest. Let never care appeare in you for such a rumo; but let ym well knowe, yt you rather despise the righting of such wronge, by making knowne theyr error, then you to be so silly a soule as to foreslowe that you ought to do, or not freely delyvere what you thinke meetest, and pass of noe man soc much as not to regard her trust who puts it in you. God bless you, and longe may you last, Sth May, 1583. Omnino, 3 E. R. GENERAL |