South Wales, was born at Ludlow in this county; and bred a student of our common laws, wherein he attained to great learning; so that he became, when a pleader, eminent; when a judge, more eminent; when no judge, most eminent.

1. Pleader. The character that learned James Thuanus* gives of Christopher Thuanus his father, being an advocate of the civil law, and afterwards a senator of Paris, is exactly agreeable to this worthy knight:-"Ut bonos à calumniatoribus, tenuiores à potentioribus, doctos ab ignorantibus, opprimi non pateretur;" (that he suffered not good men to be borne down by slanderers, poor men by more potent, learned men by the ignorant.)

2. Judge. Who (as when ascending the bench, entering into a new temper) was most passionate as Sir John, most patient as judge Walter; and great his gravity in that place. When judge Denham, his most upright and worthy associate in the western circuit, once said unto him, "My lord, you are not merry!" "Merry enough," returned the other, "for a judge!" 3. No judge.-Being ousted of his place, when chief baron of the Exchequer, about the illegality of the loan, as I take it.

He was a grand benefactor (though I know not the just proportion) to Jesus College in Oxford; and died anno 1630, in the parish of Savoy, bequeathing £20 to the poor thereof.†

EDWARD LITLETON, born at Mounslow in this county, was the eldest son to sir Edward Littleton, one of the justices of the Marshes, and chief justice of North Wales. He was bred in Christ Church in Oxford, where he proceeded bachelor of arts, and afterwards one of the justices of North Wales, recorder of London, and solicitor to king Charles. From these places he was preferred to be chief justice of the Common Pleas, when he was made privy counsellor; thence advanced to be lord keeper and baron of Mounslow, the place of his nativity. He died in Oxford, and was buried in Christ Church, anno 1645.

SOLDIERS.

Sir JOHN TALBOT was born (as all concurring indications do avouch) at Black Mere in this county, the then flourishing (now ruined) house, devolved to his family by marrying the heir of lord Strange of Black Mere.

Many honourable titles deservedly met in him; who was, 1. Lord Talbot and Strange, by his paternal extraction. 2. Lord Furnival and Verdun, by marriage with Joan, the daughter of Thomas de Nevil. 3. Earl of Shrewsbury in England, and Waterford in Ireland, by creation of king Henry the Sixth.

• Obituarium Doctorum Virorum, in anno 1565, in vitâ Joan. Grollierii. Stow's Survey of London, in the Rem. p. 910.

So am I informed by his two surviving brothers, the one a serjeant-at-law, the other a doctor in divinity.-F.

This is that terrible Talbot, so famous for his sword, or rather whose sword was so famous for his arm that used it; a sword with bad Latin* upon it, but good steel within it; which constantly conquered where it came, insomuch that the bare fame of his approach frighted the French from the siege of Bordeaux. Being victorious for twenty-four years together, success failed him at last, charging the enemy near Castilion on unequal terms, where he, with his son the lord Lisle, were slain with a shot, July 17, 1453. Henceforward we may say, "Good night to the English in France," whose victories were buried with the body of this earl, and his body interred at White Church in this county.

Sir JOHN TALBOT, son to Sir John Talbot aforesaid, and viscount Lisle in right of his mother. Though he was slain with his father, yet their ashes must not be so huddled together, but that he must have a distinct commemoration of his valour. The rather, because a noble pen† hath hinted a parallel betwixt him and Paulus Æmilius the Roman general, which others may improve.

i. Æmilius was overpowered by the forces of Hannibal and Asdrubal, to the loss of the day.

2. Cornelius Lentulus entreated Æmilius (sitting all bloodied upon a stone) to rise and save himself, offering him his horse and other assistance.

3. Æmilius refused the proffer; adding withal, "that he would not again come under the judgment of the people of Rome."

1. The same sad success attended the two Talbots, in fight against the French.

2. The father advised the son, by escape to reserve himself for future fortune.

3. His son craved to be excused, and would not on any terms be persuaded to forsake his father.

In two considerables Talbot far surpassed Æmilius: for Emilius was old, grievously, if not mortally wounded; our lord in the flower of his youth, unhurt, easily able to escape. Æmilius accountable for the overthrow received; the other no ways answerable for that day's misfortune, being (as we have said) the 17th of July 1453.

LEARNED WRITERS.

ROBERT of SHREWSBURY.-Take, reader, a taste of the different spirits of writers concerning his character:

Leland's Text.-" Eâdem operâ et religionem celebrabat et literas" (with the same endeavour he plied both religion and learning.")

• "Sum Talboti pro vincere inimicos meos."

† Sir Walter Raleigh, in History of the World, lib. v. p. 455.

Bale's Comment.*" Per religionem fortassis monachatum intelligit, per literas sophistica præstigia ;" (it may be he meaneth monkery by religion, and by learning sophistical fallacies.) I confess he might have employed his pains better. But Bale proceeds, de Consultis Ruthenis, consulting,-not the Russians, as the word sounds to all critics, but-the men of Ruthin in Wales. He wrote the Life and Miracles of St. Winfride; flourishing anno 1140.

DAVID of CHIRBURY, a Carmelite, was so named from his native place in the west of this county, bordering on Montgomeryshire; a small village, I confess, yet which formerly denominated a whole hundred, and at this day is the barony of the Lord Herbert. He was, saith Leland (whom I take at the second hand on the trust of John Pits t), "Theologiæ cognitione clarus" and, going over into Ireland, was there made Episcopus Dromorensis, bishop of Dromore, as I take it. He is said to have wrote some books, though not mentioned in Bale, and (which is to me a wonder) no notice taken of him by that judicious knight Sir James Ware. So that it seems his writings were either few or obscure. Returning into England, he died, and was buried in his native county at Ludlow, in the convent of the Carmelites, anno Domini 1420.

SINCE THE REFORMATION.

ROBERT LANGELAND.-Forgive me, reader, though placing him (who lived one hundred and fifty years before) since the Reformation; for I conceive that the morning-star belongs rather to the day than to the night. On which account this Robert (regulated in our book, not according to the age he was in, but judgment he was of) may by prolepsis be termed a Protes

tant.

He was born at Mortimer's-Clibery in this county,¶ eight miles from Malvern Hills; was bred a priest, and one of the first followers of John Wickliffe, wanting neither wit nor learning, as appears by his book called "The Vision of Pierce Plowghman ;" and hear what character a most learned antiquary giveth thereof:**

"It is written in a kind of English metre, which for discovery of the infecting corruptions of those times I prefer before many of the more seemingly serious invectives, as well for invention as judgment."

There is a book first set forth by Tindal, since exemplified

* De Scriptoribus Britannicis, Cent. ii. num. 76.

+ In Appendice Illustr. Angliæ Scriptor. p. 832.

David of Chirbury was bishop of Dromore from 1427 to 1429.-ED.

In Append. Illustr. Angl. Script. p. 832.

In his Book de Scriptoribus Hibernicis.

Bale, de Scriptoribus, Cent. vi. num. 37.

Mr. Selden, in his notes on Polyolbion, p. 109.

by Mr. Fox,* called "The Prayer and Complaint of the Plowghman," which, though differing in title and written in prose, yet being of the same subject, at the same time, in the same language, I must refer it to the same author; and let us observe a few of his strange words, with their significations:

1. Behotef, for promiseth;' 2. binemen, for take away;' 3. blive, for quickly; 4. fulleden, for baptized;' 5. feile times, for oft-times; 6. forward, for covenant;' 7. heryeth, for worshippeth ;' 8. homelich, for household;' 9. lesew, for 'pasture; 10. leude-men, for laymen;' 11. nele, for will not; 12. nemeth, for 'taketh;' 13. seggen, for 'do say;' 14. swevens, for 'dreams;' 15. syth, for afterwards; 16. thralles, for bondmen.'

It is observable that Pits (generally a perfect plagiary out of Bale) passeth this Langeland over in silence. And why? because he wrote in oppositum to the papal interest. Thus the most light-fingered thieves will let that alone which is too hot for them. He flourished under king Edward the Third, anno Domini 1369.

THOMAS CHURCHYARD was born in the town of Shrewsbury, as himself doth affirm in his book made in verse of "The Worthines of Wales," taking Shropshire within the compass; making (to use his own expression) Wales the park, and the Marches to be the pale thereof. Though some conceive him to be as much beneath a poet as above a rhymer, in my opinion his verses may go abreast with any of that age, writing in the beginning of queen Elizabeth. It seems by this his epitaph, in Mr. Camden's "Remains," that he died not guilty of much wealth :

"Come, Alecto, lend me thy torch,

To find a church-yard in a church-porch,

Poverty and poetry his tomb doth enclose;

Wherefore, good neighbours, be merry in prose."

His death, according to the most probable conjecture, may be presumed about the eleventh year of the queen's reign, anno Domini 1570.

66

THOMAS HOLLAND, D.D. was born in this county,† "in finibus et limitibus Cambriæ, (in the confines and Marches of Wales ;) bred in Exeter College in Oxford, and at last became rector thereof. He did not, with some, only sip of learning, or at the best but drink thereof, but was mersus in libris,' (drowned in his books); so that the scholar in him almost devoured all other relations. He was, saith the author of his funeral sermon, so familiar with the Fathers, as if he himself had been a Father. This quality commended him to succeed Dr. Lawrence Humphrid in the place of regius professor, which place

• Acts and Monuments, p. 398. VOL. III.

F

+ Herologia Anglica, p. 238.

he discharged with good credit for twenty years together. When he went forth of his college on any journey for any long continuance, he always took this solemn valediction of the fellows: "I commend you to the love of God, and to the hatred of Popery and superstition."*

His extemporaries were often better than his premeditations; so that he might have been said "to have been out, if he had not been out." He died in March, anno Domini 1612, and was buried in Oxford with great solemnity and lamentation.

ABRAHAM WHELOCK was born in White-church parish in this county; bred fellow of Clare Hall, library-keeper, Arabic professor, and minister of St. Sepulchre's in Cambridge. Admirable his industry, and no less his knowledge in the Oriental tongues; so that he might serve for the interpreter to the queen of Sheba coming to Solomon, and the wise men of the East who came to Herod; such his skill in the Arabian and Persian languages. Amongst the western tongues, he was well versed in the Saxon; witness his fair and true edition of Bede.

He translated the New Testament into Persian, and printed it, hoping in time it might tend to the conversion of that country to Christianity. Such as laugh at his design as ridiculous, might well forbear their mirth; and, seeing they expended neither penny of cost nor hour of pains therein, might let another enjoy his own inclination. True it is, he that sets an acorn, sees it not a timber-oak, which others may behold; and if such testaments be conveyed into Persia, another age may admire what this doth deride. He died, as I take it, anno Domini 1654.

BENEFACTORS TO THE PUBLIC.

Sir ROGER ACHLEY, born at Stanwardine in this county.f He beheld the whole city of London as one family, and himself the Major 1511 (for the time being) the master thereof. He observed that poor people, who never have more than they need, will sometimes need more than they have. This Joseph collected from the present plenty, that a future famine would follow; as, in this kind, a lank constantly attends the bank. Wherefore he prepared Leaden-hall (therefore called the common-garner), and stored up much corn therein; for which he deserved the praise of the rich, and blessing of the poor.

SINCE THE REFORMATION.

Sir ROWLAND HILL, son of Richard Hill, was born at Hodnet in this county; bred a mercer in London, whereof he was lord major 1549. Being sensible that God had given him a great estate, he expressed his gratitude unto him-in giving maintenance to a fair school at Drayton in this county, which he built and endowed; besides six hundred pounds to Christ

• Herologia Auglica, p, 238.

Stow's Survey of London.

+ Survey of London, p. 577.