the world, to look into his water for discovery of the crazy condition of his body; I forbore him further. So I am your affectionate servitor.

LETTER LVIII.

JAMES HOWEL, ESQ. TO MR. R. SC. AT YORK.

SIR,

London, 19th July, the 1st of the Dog-days, 1626.

I SENT you one of the 3d current, but it was not answered; I sent another the 13th, like a second arrow, to find out the first, but I know not what is become of either: I send this to find out the other two; and if this fail, there shall go no more out of my quiver. If you forget me, I have cause to complain, and more if you remember me: to forget may proceed from the frailty of memory; not to answer me when you mind me, is pure neglect, and no less than a piacle. So I rest yours easily to be recovered.

Ira furor brevis, brevis est mea littera, cogor,
Ira correptus, coripuisse stylum.

LETTER LIX.

FROM JAMES HOWEL, ESQ.

To the Right Hon. Lady Scroop, Countess of Sunderland.

MADAM, Stamford, 5th Aug. 1628. I LAY yesternight at the post-house at Stilton, and this morning betimes the post-master came to my bed's-head and told me the duke of Buckingham

was slain: my faith was not then strong enough to believe it, till, an hour ago, I met in the way with my lord of Rutland (your brother) riding post towards London; it pleased him to alight, and shew me a letter, wherein there was an exact relation of all the circumstances of this sad tragedy.

Upon Saturday last, which was but next before yesterday, being Bartholomew eve, the duke did rise up in a well-disposed humour out of his bed, and cut a caper or two, and being ready, and having been under the barber's hand (where the murderer had thought to have done the deed, for he was leaning upon the window all the while), he went to breakfast, attended by a great company of commanders, where Monsieur Subize came to him, and whispered him in the ear that Kochelle was relieved; the duke seemed to slight the news, which made some think that Subize went away discontented. After breakfast, the duke going out, colonel Fryer stepped before him, and stopped him upon some business, and lieutenant Felton, being behind, made a thrust, with a common tenpenny knife, over Fryer's arm, at the duke, which lighted so fatally that he slit his heart in two, leaving the knife sticking in the body. The duke took out the knife, and threw it away: and laying his hand on his sword, and drawing it half out, said, "The villain hath killed me!" (meaning, as some think, colonel Fryer) for there had been some difference betwixt them; so, reeling against a chimney, he fell down dead. The duchess, being with child, hearing the noise below, came in her night-geers from her bed-chamber, which was in an upper room, to a kind of rail, and thence be

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held him weltering in his own blood. Felton had lost his hat in the crowd, wherein there was a paper sewed, wherein he declared, that the reason which moved him to this act was no grudge of his own, though he had been far behind for his pay, and had been put by his captain's place twice, but in regard he thought the duke an enemy to the state, because he was branded in parliament; therefore what he did was for the public good of his country. Yet he got clearly down, and so might have gone to his horse, which was tied to a hedge hard by; but he was so amazed that he missed his way, and so struck into the pastry, where, although the cry went that some Frenchman had done it, he, thinking the word was Felton, boldly confessed it was he that had done the deed, and so he was in their hands. Jack Stamford would have run at him, but he was kept off by Mr. Nicholas; so being carried up to a tower, captain Mince tore off his spurs, and asking how he durst attempt such an act, making him believe the duke was not dead, he answered boldly, that he knew he was dispatched, for it was not he but the hand of heaven that gave the stroke; and though his whole body had been covered over with armour of proof, he could not have avoided it. Captain Charles Price went post presently to the king, four miles off, who being at prayers on his knees when it was told him, yet never stirred, nor was he disturbed a whit till all divine service was done. This was the relation, as far as my memory could bear, in my lord of Rutland's letter, who willed me to remember him to your ladyship, and tell you that he was going to

comfort your niece (the duchess) as fast as he could. And so I have sent the truth of this sad story to your ladyship, as fast as I could by this post, because I cannot make that speed myself, in regard of some business I have to dispatch for my lord in the way; so I humbly take my leave, and rest your ladyship's most dutiful servant.

LETTER LX.

JAMES HOWEL, ESQ. TO HIS COUSIN, MR. ST. JOHN, At Christ Church College in Oxford.

COUSIN, London, 25th Oct. 1627. THOUGH YOU want no incitements to go on in that fair road of virtue where you are now running your course, yet being lately in your noble father's company, he did intimate to me, that any thing which came from me would take with you very much. I hear so well of your proceedings, that I should rather commend than encourage you. I know you were removed to Oxford in full maturity, you were a good orator, a good poet, and a good linguist for your time; I would not have that fate light upon you, which useth to befal some, who from golden students became silver bachelors, and leaden masters: I am far from entertaining such thought of you, that logic with her quiddities and quæ, la, vel hipps, can any way unpolish your humane studies. As logic is clubfisted and crabbed, so she is terrible at first sight; she is like a gorgon's head to a young student, but after a twelvemonth's constancy and patience, this

gorgon's head will prove a mere bugbear; when you have devoured the organon, you will find philosophy far more delightful and pleasing to your palate. In feeding the soul with knowledge, the understanding requireth the same consecutive acts which nature useth in nourishing the body. To the nutrition of the body there are two essential conditions required, assumption and retention, then there follows two more, Ts and @gosas, concoction and agglutination, or adhesion: so in feeding your soul with science, you must first assume and suck in the matter into your apprehension, then must the memory retain and keep it in; afterwards, by disputation, discourse, and meditation, it must be well concocted: then it must be agglutinated and converted to nutriment. All this may be reduced to these two heads, teneri fideliter, et uti fæliciter, which are two of the happiest properties of a student. There is another act required to good concoction, called the act of expulsion, which puts off all that is unsound and noxious; so in study there must be an expulsive virtue to shun all that is erroneous; and there is no science but is full of such stuff, which by direction of tutor, and choice of good books, must be excerned. Do not confound yourself with multiplicity of authors, two is enough upon any science, provided they be plenary and orthodox; philosophy should be your substantial food, poetry your banqueting stuff; philosophy hath more of reality in it than any knowledge; the philosopher can fathom the deep, measure mountains, reach the stars with a staff, and bless heaven with a girdle.