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play-house for the Duke of Yorke's players, where S: William had lodgeings, and where he dyed, April yo . . . . . 166 . . . . . . 166. ... I was at his funerall; he had a coffin of walnutt-tree. Sir John Denham saide 'twas the finest coffin that ever he sawe. His body was carried in a herse from the play-house to Westminster Abbey, where, at the great West dore, he was received by the singingmen and choristers, who sang the service of the church ("I am the Resurrection, &c.") to his grave, t which is in the south crosse aisle, on which, on a paving stone of marble is writt, in imitation of y' on Ben Jonson, "O rare S Will. Davenant.” His first lady was Dr. . . . . daughter, physitian, by whom he had a very beautifull and ingeniose son y dyed above 20 yeares since, His 2d lady was the daughter of . . . by whom he had severall children, I sawe some very young ones at the funeral. His eldest is Charles Davenant, LL.D. who inherits his father's beauty and phancy. He practises at D's Commons. He writt a play called "Circe," which has taken very well.

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S: William hath writt about 25 playes, the ro

* It is now a Tennis court again, upon ye building of the duke's house in Dorset garden.

Which is neer to the monument of Dr. Isaac Barrow. Mem. My hond friend, S Robert Moray lies by him; but sans INS.

mance called " Gondibert," and a little poeme called " Madagascar."

His private opinion was, that Religion at last,e. g. a hundred yeares hence,-would come to a settlement, and that in a kind of ingeniose Quakerisme.

JOHN DEE.

I left about 1674, with Mr. Elias Ashmole, 3 pages in folio concerning him. Mem. Mr. Meredith Lloyd tells me that his father was Roland Dee, a Radnorshire gentleman,* and that he hath his pedegree, which he hath promised to lend to me. He was descended from Rees, Prince of South Wales. My great grandfather, Will. Aubrey, LL.D. and he were cosins, and intimate acquaintance. Mr. Ashmole hath letters between them, under their owne hands, viz. one of Dr. W. A. to him (ingeniously and learnedly written) touching the " Soveraignty of the Seas," of which J. D. writt a booke, wch he dedicated to Q. Eliz. and desired my gr. gr. father's advice upon it. Dr. A.'s countrey-house was at Kew, and J. Dee lived at Mortlack, not a mile distant. I have heard my grandmother say they were often together. Arthur Dee, M.D. his son, lived and

* J. Dee's father was a vintner in London, at ye signe of in . . . . . From Elias Ashmole, Esq. who had it from his grand-sonne, sonne of Arthur.

*

practised at Norwich, an intimate friend of S Tho. Browne, M.D. who told me yt S William Boswell, ye Dutch ambassador, had all J. Dee's MSS. Qu. his executors for his papers. He lived then somewhere in Kent. Mem. S: William Boswell's widowe lives at Bradburne, neer Swynoke, in Kent. Mem. Mr. Huke, of the Physitians' Colledge hath a MS. of Mr. John Dee's, we see or gett. wch

Qu. A. Wood for the MSS. in the Bodleyan library of Doctor Gwyn, wherein are severall letters between him and John Dee, and Doctor Davies, of Chymistrey and of Magical Secrets, which my worthy friend Mr. Meredith Lloyd hath seen and read: and he tells me that he hath been told that Dr. Barlowe gave it to the Prince of Tuscany.

Meredith Lloyd sayes that John Dee's printed booke of Spirits, is not above the third part of what was writt, wch were in S: Rob. Cotton's library; many whereof were much perished by being buryed, and S Rob. Cotton bought the field to digge after it.

Mem. he told me of John Dee, c. conjuring at a poole in Brecknockshire, and that

* Arthur Dee (sonne of J. Dee), a physitian at Norwych, was born 13 Julij, 1579, mane hora 4. 30′ fere vel potius 25 m. in ipso ortu solis, ut existimo. Thus I find it in his father's Ephemerides. Obijt Norwychi, about 1650.

they found a wedge of gold; and that theywere troubled, and indicted as conjurers at the assizes; that a mighty storme and tempest was raysed in harvest time, the countrey people had not knowen the like. His picture in a wooden cut is at the end of Billingsley's Euclid, but Mr. Elias Ashmole hath a very good painted copie of him from his sonne Arthur. He had a very fair, clear, sanguine complexion,* a long beard as white as milke. A very handsome man.

Old Good-wife Faldo (a natif of Mortlack, in Surrey), 80+ ætatis, did know Dr. Dee, and told me he dyed at his howse in Mortlack, next to the howse where the tapistry hangings are made, viz. West of that howse; and that he dyed about 60+,8 or 9 yeares since (January, 1672), and lies buried in the chancell, and had a marble stone upon him. Her mother tended him in his sicknesse. She told me, that he did entertain the Polonian ambassador at his howse in Mortlack, and dyed not long after; and that he shewed the Eclipse with a darke roome to the s ambassador.+ She beleeves that he

As Sr Hen. Saville.

A Brief History of Muscovia, by Mr. Jo. Milton. Lond. 1682, pag. 100. sc. 1588. "Dr. Giles Fletcher "went ambassador from ye Queen to Pheodor then empe"rour; whose relations being judicious and exact, are best "read entirely by themselves. This emperour, upon report "of the great learning the mathematician [possessed], invited "him to Mosco, with offer of two thousand pounds a-yeare,

was eightie years old when he dyed. She sayd, he kept a great many stilles goeing. That he layd the storme S: Everard Digby.* That the children dreaded him because he was accounted a conjurer. He recovered the basket of cloathes stollen, when she and his daughter (both girles) were negligent, she knew this.

He is buried (upon the matter*) in the middest* of the chancell, a little towards the South side. She sayd, he lies buried in the chancell between Mr. Holt and Mr. Miles, both servants to Q. Elizabeth, and both have brasse ISS. on their marble, and that there was on him a marble, but without any inscription, which marble is removed; on which old marble is signe of two or three brasse pinnes.* A daughter of his (I thinke Sarah) maried to a flax-dresser, in Southwarke. Qu. nomen.

He dyed within a yeare, if not shortly after the King of Denmark was here. V. S: Rich. Baker's Chron. and Capt. Wharton's Alm.

He built the gallery in the church at Mortlack, Goody Faldo's father was the carpenter that work't it.

A stone was on his grave, wch is since removed. At the upper end of the chancell then were

"and from Prince Boris one thousand markes; to have his "provision from the Emperor's table, to be honourably re"ceived, and accounted as one of the chief men in the "land. All which Dee accepted not."

* [Sic. EDIT.]

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