name stands too high not to demand an honourable notice; since they contributed, at an early period, by their garden and museum, to raise a curiosity that was eminently useful to the progress and improvement of natural history in general. The reader may see a curious account of the remains of this garden, drawn up in the year 1749, by the late Sir W. Watson, and printed in vol. xlvi. of the Phil. Trans. The son died in 1662. His widow erected a curious monument, in memory of the family, in Lambeth church-yard, of which a large account, and engravings from a drawing of it in the Pepysian Library, at Cambridge, are given by the late learned Dr. Ducarel, in vol. lxiii. of the Phil. Trans."

SIR HENRY WOTTON, Provost of Eaton. His portrait is given in Isaac Walton's Lives of Wotton, and others. It, of course, accompanies Zouch's, and the other well-known editions of Isaac Walton's Lives. In Evans's Illustrations to Granger, is Sir H. Wotton, from the picture in the Bodleian Library, engraved by Stow. In Sir Henry's Reflections on Ancient and Modern Learning, is his chapter "On Ancient and Modern Agriculture and Gardening." Cowley wrote an elegy on him, which thus commences:

What shall we say since silent now is he,

Who when he spoke, all things would silent be;
Who had so many languages in store,

That only Fame can speak of him with more.

Isaac Walton published the " Reliquia Wottonianæ, or, Lives, Letters, Poems, &c. by Sir Henry Wotton," 12mo. 1654, with portraits of Wotton, Charles I., Earl of Essex, and Buckingham. Sir E. Brydges printed at his private press, at Lee Priory, Sir Henry's Characters of the Earl of Essex and Buckingham. In the Reliquiæ, among many curious and interesting articles, is preserved Sir Henry's de

licately complimentary letter to Milton on receiving from him Comus. Sir Henry, when a resident at Venice, (where he was sent on three several embassies by James) purchased for that munificent encourager of painting, the Duke of Buckingham, several valuable pictures, which were added to the Duke's magnificent collection. Isaac Walton's Life of Wotton thus concludes:-" Dying worthy of his name and family, worthy of the love of so many princes, and persons of eminent wisdom and learning, worthy of the trust committed unto him for the service of his prince and country." And, in his Angler, he thus sweetly paints the warm attachment he had for Wotton:-" a man with whom I have often fished and conversed, whose learning, wit, and cheerfulness, made his company to be esteemed one of the delights of mankind. Peace and patience, and a calm content, did cohabit in the cheerful heart of Sir Henry Wotton."

SIR THOMAS BROWNE. Mr. Dallaway, in his Anecdotes of the Arts, mentions the following portrait of Sir Thomas: -"At Devonshire-house is a family groupe, by Dobson, of Sir Thomas Browne. He is smiling with the utmost complacency upon his children, who surround him." His portrait is also prefixed to his works. The Biograph. Dict., folio, 1748, says, "his picture, in the College of Physicians, shews him to have been remarkably handsome, and to have possessed, in a singular degree, the blessings of a grave, yet cheerful and inviting, countenance." The same work farther gives him a most amiable character. Mr. Ray, in his Ornithology, does not omit paying a just compliment to his assistant and friend, "the deservedly famous Sir Thomas Browne." Evelyn, in 1671, mentions Sir Thomas Browne's garden at Norwich, as containing a paradise of varieties, and the gardens of all the inhabitants as full of excellent flowers. Switzer says, "The noble elegance of his style has since induced many to read his works, (of which, that of Cyrus's

gardens is some of the brightest,) though they have had little inclination to the practice of gardening itself. There remains nothing that I have heard of his putting gardening actually into practice himself; but some of his last works being observations on several scarce plants mentioned in Scripture; and of Garlands and Coronary garden plants and flowers, 'tis reasonable to suppose he did; and the love he had so early and late discovered toward it, was completed in the delightful practice thereof." He further says, "his elaborate and ingenious pen has not a little added to the nobleness of our subject.”* His works were published in 1 vol. folio, 1686, with his portrait, engraved by White. His portrait appears also to his "Certain Miscellany Tracts," 8vo. A list of his numerous works may be seen in the Biogr. Dictionaires, or in Watts's Bibl. Britt. To his "Christian Morals," Dr. Johnson has prefixed his Life. It is so masterly written, that it is impossible to give even an abstract. Dr. Kippis has, however, in part, transcribed it. He was chosen Honorary Fellow of the College of Physicians, as a man virtute et literas

* Mr. Loudon, in his Encycl. of Gardening, fondly reviews the taste for flowers which pervaded most ranks during the time of Elizabeth, and Evelyn. The Spectacle de la Nature, of which we have a translation in 1740, has a richly diffuse chapter on flowers. I here transcribe a small part thereof:Prior. "The beauty of flowers never fails to inspire us with joy; and when we have sufficiently examined the fairest, we are sensible they are only proper to refresh the sight; and, indeed, the prospect they afford is so touching, and we experience their power to be so effectual, that the generality of those arts which are ambitious to please, seem most successful when they borrow their assistance. Sculpture imitates them in its softest ornaments; architecture bestows the embellishments of leaves and festoons on those columns and fronts, which would otherwise be too naked. The richest embroideries are little more than foliage and flowers; the most magnificent silks are almost covered with these charming forms, and are thought beautiful, in proportion as they resemble the lively tinge of natural flowers.

"These have always been the symbols, or representations of joy; they were formerly the inseparable ornaments of feasts, and are still introduced with applause, toward the close of our entertainments, when they are brought

ornatissimus. In 1671, he received the honour of Knighthood from Charles II., a prince, (says Dr. Johnson) “who, with many frailties and vices, had yet skill to discover excellence, and virtue to reward it with such honorary distinctions, at least, as cost him nothing, yet, conferred by a king so judicious and so much beloved, had the power of giving merit new lustre and greater popularity." Thus he lived in high reputation, till, in his seventy-sixth year, an illness, which tortured him a week, put an end to his life, at Norwich, on his birth-day, October 19, 1682. "Some of his last words (we are told by Whitefoot) were expressions of submission to the will of God, and fearlessness of death." Dr. Johnson observes, "It is not on the praises of others, but on his own writings, that he is to depend for the esteem of posterity; of which he will not be easily deprived, while learning shall have any reverence among men: for there is no science in which he does not discover some skill; and scarce any kind of knowledge, profane or sacred, abstruse or elegant, which he does not appear to have cultivated with suc

in with the fruit, to enliven the festival that begins to languish. And they are so peculiarly adapted to scenes of pleasure, that they are always considered as inconsistent with mourning. Decency, informed by nature, never admits them into those places where tears and affliction are predominant.

Countess. "The festivals in the country are never celebrated without garlands, and the entertainments of the polite are ushered in by a flower. If the winter denies them that gratification, they have recourse to art. A young bride, in all the magnificence of her nuptial array, would imagine she wanted a necessary part of her ornaments, if she did not improve them with a sprig of flowers. Α queen, amidst the greatest solemnities, though she is covered with the jewels of the crown, has an inclination to this rural ornament; she is not satisfied with mere grandeur and majesty, but is desirous of assuming an air of softness and gaiety, by the mediation of flowers.

Prior. "Religion itself, with all its simplicity and abstraction, and amidst the abhorrence it professes to theatrical pomp, which rather tends to dissipate the heart, than to inspire it with a due reverence for sacred mysteries, and a sensibility of human wants, permits some of its festivals to be celebrated with boughs, and chaplets of flowers."

cess.

His exuberance of knowledge, and plenitude of ideas, sometimes obstruct the tendency of his reasoning, and the clearness of his decisions. On whatever subject he employed his mind, there started up immediately so many images before him, that he lost one by grasping another. His memory supplied him with so many illustrations, parallel or dependent notions, that he was always starting into collateral considerations. But the spirit and vigour of his pursuit always gives delight; and the reader follows him, without reluctance, through his mazes, of themselves flowery and pleasing, and ending at the point originally in view. There remains yet an objection against the writings of Browne, more formidable than the animadversions of criticism. There are passages from which some have taken occasion to rank him among deists, and others among atheists. It would be difficult to guess how any such conclusion should be formed, had not experience shewn that there are two sorts of men willing to enlarge the catalogue of infidels. When Browne has been numbered among the contemners of religion by the fury of its friends, or the artifices of its enemies, it is no difficult task to replace him among the most zealous professors of christianity. He may perhaps, in the ardour of his imagination, have hazarded an expression, which a mind intent upon faults may interpret into heresy, if considered apart from the rest of his discourse; but a phrase is not to be opposed to volumes. There is scarcely a writer to be found, whose profession was not divinity, that has so frequently testified his belief of the sacred writings, has appealed to them with such unlimited submission, or mentioned them with such unvaried reverence."

JOHN EVELYN, Esq. His portrait by Nanteuil, and that by Kneller, holding his Sylva in his hand, are well engraved in Mr. Bray's Memoirs. The following remark is from the Quarterly Review, in its review of the same work, in 1818: