was despaired of; but at the end of a month he was able to proceed to his father's in Wiltshire.

Soon after the recovery of his health, a circumstance occurred which gave a new turn to his views and his character. He fell desperately in love with a Wiltshire beauty, the daughter of Sir George Ayliffe, a young lady with no fortune, though of good family and high connexions. His indulgent father consented to their union. He thus became allied to the Marquess of Hamilton, and "was introduced into another way of conversation than he had formerly been accustomed to, and which, in truth, by the acquaintance, by the friends and enemies he then made, had an influence upon the whole course of his life afterwards."* But his domestic happiness came to a sudden termination. In little more than six months after his marriage, his young wife, in a journey from London into Wiltshire, caught the malignant smallpox and died. When he was sensible of the loss he had sustained, he was so overwhelmed with grief that he could hardly be restrained by his father from resigning his profession, and seeking seclusion in a foreign land.

He remained a widower near three years, the greater part of which time he devoted to books, but neither then, nor at any period of his life, did he attend very seriously to the study of the law, with the technicalities of which he was never familiar. He continued to cultivate the high-born relatives of his late wife, and he made acquaintance with Ben Jonson, Cotton, Isaac Walton, May, Carew, Edmund Waller, Sir Kenelm Digby, and Chillingworth. His manners were more polished and agreeable than those of most lawyers, and he was kindly noticed, not only by Lord Keeper Coventry, but by the Earl of Manchester, Lord Privy Seal, the Earl of Pembroke, Lord Chamberlain, the Earls of Holland, Hereford, and Essex, and others of great consequence about the Court. His regard for the members of his own profession he chiefly confined to Lane, Attorney-General to the Prince, and afterwards Lord Keeper, Sir Jeffrey Palmer, then a rising conveyancer, afterwards Attorney-General to Charles II., and Bulstrode Whitelock, then getting into the lead on the Oxford circuit, afterwards Lord Keeper to the Commonwealth, with all whom he was at this time on a footing of the most friendly intercourse, although their courses were afterwards so devious. But the man with whom, he tells us, he had the most entire friendship, and of whom he speaks in terms of the highest admiration and affection, was Lucius Carey, Lord Falkland,—in all whose sentiments he continued ever heartily to concur, till this bright ornament of his country fell in the battle of Newbury.

* Life, i. 18.

+"He (Ben Jonson) had for many years an extraordinary kindness for Mr. Hyde, till he found he betook himself to business, which he believed ought never to be preferred before his company."-Life, i. 30. Hyde preferred Ben to all poets, living or dead, except Cowley, but does not seem to have been at all acquainted with the writings of Shakspeare.

In Whitelock's Memorials we have an amusing extract of a letter addressed to him in the country, from Hyde in the Temple: "Our best news is that we have good wine abundantly come over; and the worst, that the plague is in town, and no Judges die."

Hyde having recovered his spirits, again entered the married state, and formed a most auspicious union, which proved the great [A. D. 1632.] solace of his life. The lady was Frances, daughter of Sir Thomas Aylesbury, Master of the Mint. Having been his companion in all the vicissitudes of his fortune,-having lived with him in exile, sharing in his dangers and privations, and with difficulty providing food and raiment for their children,—she was preserved to see him Earl of Clarendon, Lord Chancellor, and Prime Minister of England.

His happiness was in a few months interrupted by the sudden death of his father. Burnet relates that, walking in the fields together, the old gentleman warned him of the disposition then observable among lawyers to stretch law and prerogative to the prejudice of the subject; charged him, if he ever grew to any eminence in his profession, that he should never sacrifice the laws and liberties of his country to his own interests, or to the will of a Prince; and that, having repeated this twice, he immediately fell into a fit of apoplexy, of which he died in a few hours.* Clarendon himself wrote thus to a friend :-"Without one minute's warning or fear, I have lost the best father in the world, the sense of which hath been so terrible to me, that I was enough inclined to think I had nothing to do but to follow him."

The shock being over, he resolved, instead of renouncing the world, and living in retirement on his small estate, to continue to cultivate his profession, in the hope of rising to eminence, and with the resolution to observe the dying injunction of his father. "He put on his gown as soon as he was called to the bar, and, by the countenance of persons in place and authority, as soon engaged himself in the business of the profession as he put on his gown, and to that degree in practice that gave little time for study that he had too much neglected before." He would not submit to the drudgery of " riding a circuit,”—which he afterwards lamented, "both because it would have improved his acquaintance with various classes of his countrymen, and because there is a very good and necessary part of learning in the law which is not so easily got any other way;" but he regularly attended the Courts at Westminster, and diligently devoted himself to the business of any clients who employed him. Though not much of a lawyer compared with the black-letter men of those days, he could, by his books and his friends, get up a respectable argument, even against Selden or Noy, and having a much better delivery, he was sometimes thought by the bystanders to be superior to them in learning as well as eloquence. He lived handsomely in London, and exercised a distinguished hospitality at his house in Wiltshire; but, though he was rather fond of talking of wines and dishes, he was very temperate, and generally abstained from supper, the meal at which those who were fond of good living most indulged.

His growing eminence appears from the fact that at the grand masque * Burn. Times, i. 270.

+ Life, iii. 974, 975.

Life, i. 32. He regretted the want of this practice so much, that he meant to have joined a circuit when the troubles broke out.

[A. D. 1633.]

given by the Inns of Court to the Queen, which we have several times had occasion to allude to, the task was allotted to him, along with Whitelock, of conferring with the Lord Chamberlain and the Comptroller of the household, and taking order about the scenery and preparations in the banqueting house, and he was deputed by the Middle Temple to the office of returning thanks in the name of the four Inns of Court to the King and Queen, " for their gracious acceptance of the tender of their service in the late masque.' In this mixture of business and pleasure some years rolled on, by far the happiest period of the life of Clarendon. "With an excellent wife, who perfectly resigned herself to him, and who then had brought him, before any troubles in the kingdom, three sons and a daughter, which he then and ever looked upon as his greatest blessing and consolation," his practice steadily increased, particularly before the Privy Council; he was respected by his own profession; he kept up an intercourse with men eminent in literature; he was countenanced by powerful courtiers; and he had before him a fair prospect of reaching the highest honours of his profession.

The system of ruling by prerogative alone having been pursued ever since he was of age, he had no opportunity of acquiring parliamentary reputation. In his heart he highly disapproved of "ship money," and the arbitrary proceedings of the Star Chamber; but he was moderate in his principles and cautious in his conversation, and, trying to live well with both parties, I do not find that he was employed in any of the great political cases which then attracted the attention of the nation. However, in a dispute which the merchants of London had with the Treasury as to their being compelled to unload their goods at a particular quay, Hyde was their counsel, and he here displayed what was considered great courage against the government. This introduced him to Archbishop Laud, then chief Commissioner of the Treasury, who wished to see the young lawyer who was not afraid to plead the cause of the merchants," when all men of name durst not appear for them." Hyde consequently went to the Archbishop, whom he found alone in his garden at Lambeth, was received by him very civilly, and was afterwards treated by him with great condescension and kindness.‡

* As this is, I trust, my last notice of this performance, I may be permitted to say I am sorry for the credit of the Inns of Court, that they were obliged to apply to Shirley the poet, to write them "The Triumph of Peace," the masque then exhi bited to show their detestation of the Histriomastix, and of the coarse words sup. posed to be applied to the Queen for her love of theatricals; but they likewise escape the disgrace of Shirley's ironical dedication of the "Bird in a Cage" to Prynne, then in gaol under the inhuman sentence of the Star Chamber,-congratulating him on his " happy retirement.” + Life, i. 75.

I am glad to say a good word for LAUD when it is in my power, and he certainly deserves credit for his patronage of merit. He brought into notice JEREMY TAYLOR; and though the fantasy must be condemned of making BISHOP JUXON Lord High Treasurer, it should be recollected that this prelate not only kept the best appointed pack of fox-hounds in England, but was a most kind-hearted pious man, and so inoffensive that even faction could not find fault with him.

Those who regret the strong high church bias which he afterwards displayed, impute it to the impression now made upon him by his visits to Lambeth, and think it might have been better for the cause of religion in England if he had been thrown into the company of Bishop Williams, Ex-keeper of the Great Seal, who was then leading the opposition against ceremonies and doctrines, which he contended led directly to Romanism.

At last Charles was driven to call a parliament, and Hyde was in such good repute in his own county that he was re[APRIL, 1640.] turned both by Shaftesbury and Wootton Basset. He made his election to serve for the latter town, which had likewise the honour of first sending to the House of Commons Twiss, the eminent lawyer, and the biographer of Lord Eldon. Hyde's public career now begins, and he certainly started with most enlightened and praiseworthy views. A friend to the monarchy, he deeply regretted the abuses which had been practised in the name of prerogative, and was eager to correct them. For this purpose he associated himself with Pym, Rudyard, Whitelock, and the most experienced statesmen and lawyers, who, during this "short parliament," co-operated with him in the same

cause.

He had the honour of striking the first blow in the House at a specific grievance. This was by a motion for papers respecting the Court of Honour, or Earl Marshal's Court, which, under pretence of guarding heraldic distinctions, had become a powerful engine of oppression. He mentioned several instances with great effect. A citizen was ruinously fined by this Court, because, in an altercation with an insolent waterman who wished to impose upon him, he deridingly called the swan on his badge " a goose." The case was brought within the jurisdiction of the Court by showing that the waterman was an earl's servant, and that the swan was the earl's crest. The citizen was severely punished, for "dishonouring" this crest. Again, a tailor who had often very submissively asked payment of his bill from a customer of gentle blood, whose pedigree was duly registered at the Herald's College, on a threat of personal violence for his importunity, was provoked into saying that he was as good a man as his creditor." For this offence, which was alleged to be a levelling attack upon the aristocracy, he was summoned before the Earl Marshal's Court, and mercifully dismissed with a reprimand-on releasing the debt. While the House was thus amused and excited, Hyde successfully concluded his maiden speech by telling them that not only was this Court oppressive to the humbler classes, but that its exactions were onerous to the nobility themselves, and to the whole body of the gentry of England.*

So active was he, that his name is to be found in seven of the twentyone select committees which were appointed during the sixteen days the Commons sat, including "the committee of privileges and elections,' ," "the committee on ship money," and "the committee to inquire

* Com. Jour. April 18, 1640. The business only began on the 16th of April, after the choice of the Speaker.

into the proceedings of the convocation and innovations in matters of religion."

Very soon after he showed his moderation by supporting the Court on the grand question of supply. An indiscreet message had been brought down from the King, demanding twelve subsidies to be paid in three years, and making the abolition of ship money depend upon this specific grant. Hampden, described as being now "the most popular man in the House," dexterously demanded that the question to be put might be," Whether the House would consent to the proposition made by the King as it was contained in the message ?"-so as to insure the rejection of the King's proposition.

Hyde, not dreading the collision into which he was brought, nor the misconstruction to, which he might be liable, with great moral courage desired that the question, as proposed by Mr. Hampden, might not be put. He argued that "it was a captious question, to which only one sort of men could clearly give their vote, which were they for rejecting the King's proposition and no more resuming the debate upon that subject, but that they who desired to give the King a supply, as he believed most did, though not in such a proportion, nor it may be in that manner, could receive no satisfaction from that question; and therefore he proposed, to the end that every man might frankly give his yea or his no, that the question might be put only upon the giving the King a supply.”*

There were loud cries for Mr. Hyde's question, when old Sir Harry Vane, the Treasurer of the household (as some thought treacherously), declared that there would be no use in that question, for he had authority to say that a supply would not be accepted by his Majesty if it were not granted in the proportion and manner proposed in his message. Hyde therefore no longer pressed his amendment, and the debate on the general question was adjourned till the following day, the courtiers threatening an immediate dissolution.

Hyde, foreseeing the fatal consequences of such a step, instantly repaired to Laud, on whose advice in the absence of Strafford it was supposed the King would act, and finding him in his garden at Lambeth, told him he feared a dissolution was meditated, and that "he came only to beseech him to use all his credit to prevent such a desperate counsel, which would produce great mischief to the King and to the Church, assuring him that the House was as well constituted and disposed as ever House of Commons was or would be." The Archbishop heard him patiently, but differed from him entirely as to the disposition of the House, and affected to say that he would not advise a dissolution, but neither would he counsel the King against it.

On returning to the House from this interview, Hyde was more grieved than surprised by the Black Rod's summons for

the Commons forthwith to attend his Majesty in the [AP. 19, 1640.]

Hist. Reb. b. i. This is the mode in which the question is now put, the motion being "that a supply be granted to her Majesty."