John Aubrey: My Own Life (53 page)

. . .

The Ashmolean Museum
⁷⁰
has been robbed. Three years ago, I gave several things to it, including my picture in miniature by Mr Samuel Cooper (which would be worth 20 guineas at auction) and Nicolas Hilliard’s miniature of Archbishop Bancroft, the famous illuminer of Queen Elizabeth’s time. I do not know if the thieves have taken them or not.

. . .

My friend Mr Lhwyd, who became Keeper of the Museum this year upon Dr Plot’s retirement, has confirmed that the two miniatures I donated were among the stolen items.

. . .

My brother has been unkind
⁷¹
to me and (God forgive me) I have undone him and myself. The truth is, I was never made to manage an estate: I was predestined to be cozened and cheated.

. . .

November

I am plagued
⁷²
by worries because I have not yet received back my manuscript from Mr John Ray. He tells me that this has never happened before. He was confident of its safe arrival for he had laid strict charge on his man to see it carefully lodged in the wagon. But it has not arrived.

. . .

I have prepared
⁷³
my notes on Surrey for printing. My papers are chaotic, like
sybillina folia
! I wish I had transcribed them into a fair copy soon after my perambulation of the county in 1673. I cannot take the pains to digest them in better order now (which would require the drudgery of another transcribing); instead I have set them down tumultuarily, as if tumbled out of a sack, as they come to hand, mixing antiquities with natural history. In this state I shall expose them to the view of the candid reader, wishing him as much pleasure in the perusal of them as I had in the collecting of them.

. . .

December

I think someone
⁷⁴
should run over a good English–Latin dictionary and make a collection of the primitives for English, French and endenizened Latin words, together with the few British and Danish words that are yet retained in our language, and then number them, and reduce them to their least forms to see what proportion they are in relation to one another. I guess the greatest proportion would be Latin, or that there would be as many Latin as true English words.

The Earl of Pembroke
⁷⁵
has given me a fine picture in wax that I will send to Mr Lhwyd for the museum even though Mr Ashmole and I are both concerned about the way the pictures in the museum are being looked after. They need to hang so they are reclining from the walls, otherwise the salt and saltpetre in the walls will rot the canvases. Sadly, this has already happened to the picture of the Queen in the room by the museum’s laboratory.

. . .

Anno 1692

February

My friend Edmund Gibson, who is editing the new edition of Mr Camden’s
Britannia
, bemoans the corruption of the nation’s genius, which gives no encouragement to books of learning and antiquity, not even my Monumenta Britannica, which is ignored by the booksellers, despite its august title!

I have asked him
⁷⁶
whether to print my new book (which I hope will have more success) in Oxford or London, and he feels obliged to recommend London because Oxford’s press has few men, only a small stock of letters, and many obstructions. He says the Oxford press is so slow that it would take four or five years to print my Monumenta Britannica.

. . .

The Earl of Clarendon
⁷⁷
is prosecuting Mr Wood for libelling his father. In his Life of Judge Jenkins, Mr Wood included information about the old Earl of Clarendon, which I passed to him, never thinking he would print it. I obtained it from Judge Jenkins himself.

. . .

Mr Wood always warned me not to lend my manuscripts. How right he was. After I had lent my Natural History of Wiltshire to Mr John Ray, he wrote me a very kind letter advising me not to include in it the digression on Mr Hooke’s theory of the Terraqueous Globe. Now he has published a book of his own,
The Wisdom of God manifest in the Works of Creation
, in which Mr Hooke’s theory is published without mention of either Mr Hooke or my book, where Mr Ray learnt of it. Mr Hooke is much troubled by this.

. . .

March

Mr Hooke is very anxious
⁷⁸
to have a copy of what Mr Wood proposes to print about him and will willingly pay for a transcript.

. . .

My brother William
⁷⁹
came to town yesterday and has gone on to Sussex today, after serving me and Mr Kent with a subpoena. So I have got a new law suit that I never expect to wear out: God help the oppressed. About two years ago, when I entrusted my brother with the remnants of my estate at Broad Chalke (about 250 li. per annum), I asked him to pay a debt to Captain Stumpe of Malmesbury for 20 li., on a bond borrowed in 1660, but he never did it. Nor did he take up a further debt of 80 li. on my behalf. In the circumstances, I had to throw myself on Mr Kent’s favour to appease my creditors. In return for an annuity I gave Mr Kent my Broad Chalke estate without telling my brother. Now he is pursuing me for it through the courts.

I hope to get to Oxford by the end of April.

. . .

At the request
⁸⁰
of Sir Charles Howard and Mr John Evelyn I am endeavouring to complete my History of Surrey in manuscript. I need to write about the River Thames and have asked Mr Lhwyd’s opinion as to the derivation of the word Tam or Tame. The Romans, in their conquests, gave Latin endings to the names of places or rivers, so the name was perhaps Thamys originally, to which they added the termination ‘is’, making it Thamesis (or perhaps Thamysis). As to what Tham or Tam signifies, I cannot find either of these words in the Welsh dictionary. Perhaps the word is lost among the Welsh, but it could possibly be retrieved from a manuscript Welsh dictionary, now in the possession of Sir William Williams, in which there are 1,500 more words than there are in Mr Meredith Lloyd’s printed dictionary. I will write to him to ask his opinion about this.

. . .

April

Currently I am collecting my post from The Tobacco Roll & Sugar Loaf, at the upper end of Maidenhead Lane, parish of St Giles in the Fields, Bloomsbury.

I have started preparing
⁸¹
an account of Southwark, which is a troublesome task. I hope Mr Wood can help me by telling me something of Bermondsey Abbey. I have taken enough pains to help him in the past.

When I undertook my perambulation of Surrey, I left out Southwark because it had already been surveyed by Mr Stow. But now I am set to transcribe and print my minutes, all these years later, I do not think I can leave the principal town of the county untouched.

. . .

Mr Lhwyd says he cannot answer my question about the etymology of Thamesis. He says the hypothesis of the Terraqueous Globe could be very useful to him, since he intends to write a treatise on formed stones.

He says he is very glad
⁸²
to hear that I am taking care to leave my papers in order. He will take it as an honour to pay for my letters, and asks for a catalogue of the tracts I have written.

. . .

The account of Southwark
⁸³
, which is now upon my hands, is a hard task.

. . .

Dr Hooke is concerned
⁸⁴
about what Mr Wood has written about him: he says that if Mr Wood makes any mention of him, he must see a copy before the book goes to press.

. . .

May

I have left
⁸⁵
the manuscript of my Idea of Education with my honoured friend Mr Evelyn and told him that if I should happen to die before I call to collect it, he should send it to Mr Hooke at Gresham College to be put into my chest marked ‘Idea’, which is full of books for this design.

Lately I have added some notes to my manuscript, concerning especially the books the boys in my ideal school should read or keep with them.

I would have them carry in their coat pockets Mr John Ray’s
Synopsis of English Plants
, or Mr Andrew Paschall’s
Botanic Tables
from Mr Ray’s book done in the Real Character in three sheets. It is proper for a gentleman to know soils. As they follow their botanics, let them make notes on the earth and minerals. Let them travel several times over all England and Wales making observations. To see the sea and harbours and rocks or cliffs will be a strange sight to them.

Sir Roger L’Etrange’s
⁸⁶
Aesop’s Fables
would be a delightful book for the young to read: it would open their understanding and teach them to write in a clear gentle style.

As for history
⁸⁷
, it is a large field and too long a work for my Idea of Education, and too sour to be relished sweetly by the young. But if the boys have leisure and inclination, so that they are not without guidance, I think they should be given Mr Degore Whear’s
Praelectiones
. Mr William Prynne’s advice to me for the seeking of our English history was to read the authors that wrote of their own time.

I imagine the boys
⁸⁸
in my ideal school to be like pretty bees always excerpting information of some kind or other. This habit will be a considerable advantage to them later in life. One may take a hint from an old woman or a simple person. I would have them treat nobody with contempt, but aim always at truth.

. . .

18 May

My honoured friend Mr Ashmole died on this day at his house in Lambeth. He will be buried in St Mary’s Church, South Lambeth.

. . .

My pretty little bitch
⁸⁹
is with puppy and I will not leave her behind when I go to Oxford next. Maybe I could take her with me?

. . .

I am staying
⁹⁰
with my friend Mr Baskervill of Bagworth. I have been here nearly a week and have been exploring in Bagley Wood. Noticing the presence of ironstone, I sent for powder of galles and tried several springs, which turned violet, or else black as ink. I will carry some samples to Oxford.

. . .

Here in Oxford I cannot get anyone to take any notice of my water samples from Bagley Wood. No one will drink them.

. . .

As a mourner, I have visited St Mary’s Church, South Lambeth, to perform my last office at the grave of my worthy friend Mr Ashmole, whose body lies in the south aisle, at the east end on the north side under a black marble inscription, which I have transcribed for my survey of Surrey.

His greatest memorial is his museum in Oxford. Over the entrance to the door, fronting Broad Street, is the inscription:

Musaeum Ashmoleanum, Schola Naturalis Historiae,

Officina Chymica

. . .

July

The second volume of Mr Wood’s book has been published.

. . .

28 July

Mr Wood’s book came before the Royal Society today, but no one had read it yet; there will be plenty of censors by the next meeting. As the University will not allow the Appendix to be printed, I think Mr Wood should have it printed in Holland.

I have sent two of my own volumes to Mr Wood for his perusal and castigation.

My survey of Surrey is now in Dr Gale’s hands, and from him it will go to Mr John Evelyn.

I go tomorrow
⁹¹
to stay with Mr Ray in Essex for a week. Our quarrel is mended and the manuscripts of mine he sent back arrived safely, thank goodness. Then, about the middle of August, I will visit Broad Chalke and Wilton, and from thence to Oxford around the beginning of September.

. . .

August

I have seen Mr Wood’s books
⁹²
at Dr Gale’s and found that he has not inserted some of the epitaphs I sent him. The Royal Society is adjourned until 18 October, so we will not know what it makes of these volumes until then.

Mr Gadbury is incensed because Mr Wood refers disparagingly to his achievements in astrology as fortune-telling, and has printed an old scandal about his provenance (namely that his father, a farmer of Wheatley, Oxfordshire, made a stolen marriage with a daughter of Sir John Curson of Waterperry). Scholars have generally supposed that Mr Gadbury was bred an academician, since he was born in Oxford, but actually his father was a tailor who married a lady who came to him for a fitting. Mr Wood believes this confirms even more glory on Mr Gadbury’s intellectual achievements, but Mr Gadbury is furious.

It is a great relief to hear that my two volumes have reached Mr Wood safely.

In September I go to Broad Chalke, then to Wiltshire, then to Oxford, where I hope to lodge by Turle Gate. I intend to see Sir Christopher Wren on Monday.

I have had a very
⁹³
civil letter from Dr Garden, Professor of Theology at Aberdeen, and an admirable account of my Templa Druidum; he has explained several monuments in Scotland I did not understand before, and thanks to him I now understand an antiquity in Wiltshire that was altogether dark to me.

. . .

Mr John Ray’s daughters
⁹⁴
are much pleased with the glass microscope I sent them as a present.

. . .

October

Mr John Ray has read
⁹⁵
my inch-thick commonplace book of scientific observations Adversaria Physica a second time and believes it very worthy of the public; he urges me to prepare it for the press for issue in my lifetime, both for my own honour and the instruction of others. He has ordered me a copy of his physico-theological discourses (2nd edition), printed this year. These are miscellaneous writings concerning the dissolution and changes of the natural world, including a discussion of fossils. Mr Ray insists that fossils were once alive.