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up some gravell in her fangs to ballance her little body, then shee hoyseth sayle and steeres her cours homewards more steadily.' With such pious and scientific motives Tom seems to have taken up a wife in his fangs as ballast, and now with a more or less happy shot at the long Welsh name, he announces that he is upon purchasing a leas of the Nov. 24 King for all his majestie's waste lands, lyeing in the parish of Llan_vh=angell-croythin, in the county of Cardigan in South Wales: but I cannot gett Sir Charles Herbord to make a report of the King his reference on my petition till he hath received a certicate from Mr. John Vaughan, who is his majestie's steward in those parts; which hath occasioned my takeing a journey into Wales to make M Vaughan my friend.' He proposes to visit Sister Mary by the way.

6

1663

Tom refers to his second wife as a mayden Feb. 12, gentlewoman, who is the eldest daughter of the Kendals of Smithsby in Darbyshire, of an ancient family, though of noe very great estate, yet her portion would be worth 1200l. if it were well secured.' He is plunging into a lawsuit to obtain it, for which Sir Ralph is to provide the money. 'I would not have my wife to be sencible of my wants becaus I have hitherto possest her with the contrary. . Sir my letters are ever over teadious, which you (in your candid nature) pass by, it being your brother's error '; and lest any doubt should linger in our minds as to Tom's motives, we have this testimonial which he

VOL. III.

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gave himself on 'St. Thomas Day, 1661: Sir,Want is the greatest provoker to mischeif, experience telleth mee the same, I could wish the occasion were taken away, and you would soone heare of an alteration in mee, for I am not natureally inclined to evill.

179

CHAPTER VI.

DOCTOR WILLIAM DENTON.

1605-1658.

'Necessary and ancient their Profession, ever since man's body was subject to enmity and casualty: for that promise "A bone of him shall not be broken" is peculiar to Christ.'-FULLER.

DR. WILLIAM DENTON, whose letters have been so largely quoted in these volumes, was the youngest son and eighth child in a family of thirteen, twelve of whom lived into middle life, and most of them to old age. His father, Sir Thomas Denton, and his mother, Susan Temple, were both endowed with strong health and vigorous understandings; William was born in her old home at Stowe on April 14, 1605.1

1 Children of Sir Thomas and Dame Susan Denton :

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The Dentons and the Temples had large families in several succeeding generations; the Doctor's mother had been one of twelve children, and his Aunt Hester Sands, wife of Sir Thomas Temple, ' had four sons and nine daughters, which lived to be married and so exceedingly multiplied that this Lady saw 700 extracted from her body. . . . Thus in all ages,' says pious Fuller, God bestoweth personal felicities on some far above the proportion of others.' Doctor Denton's share in these 'personal felicities was the possession of such a number of first and second cousins, that there was scarcely a county family in Bucks to whom he was not related; a fact which gave him a great deal of social influence when added to his personal popularity and his professional reputation.

Educated, like Sir Ralph, at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, he studied medicine under a famous physician, Henry Ashworth. He took his doctor's degree at the age of twenty-nine; two years later, in 1636, he was appointed Court Physician to Charles I., and attended upon his person in the Scotch war of 1639. After the destruction of sweet Hillesden' House, and the death of his eldest brother in the Tower, the Doctor and his lawyer brother John did their best for Sir Alexander's

Bridget, b. 1607 = Sir Edward Fust.

Elizabeth, b. 1610 Thomas Isham of Pytchley.

Anne, b. 1611, d. unmarried.

Margaret, b. 1612 = 1st, John Pulteney; 2nd, Hon. Wm. Eure; 3rd, Hon. Philip Sherard.

1 See vol. i. pp. 303, 307.

2 Vol. ii. pp. 188–205.

fatherless and motherless children. The eldest son, John, met with a soldier's death in the Civil War ; Elizabeth, the eldest daughter, married Francis Drake in 1637 at Middle Claydon; Margaret married Sir William Smith just before her father's death in 1644; Sophia died in childhood; but four boys, Edmund, Alexander, Thomas, and George, and five girls, Susan, Anne, Arabella, Mary, and Dorothy, remained to be provided for out of the wreck of the family fortunes. Some of the relations, while taking care to do nothing themselves, advised that Ralph and Mary should adopt the girls; but as they had his five young sisters to care for, Mary declined the suggestion with some warmth. So the charge of the little flock of orphans fell chiefly upon Doctor Denton. He thought of sending Edmund abroad to complete his education, but the youth provided for himself more agreeably by an early marriage with an heiress, Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Richard Rogers, Kt., of Eastwood, co. Gloucester; Alexander read law, and eventually became a Bencher of the Middle Temple, succeeding his uncle John as the legal adviser of the family; Thomas and George, in default of more genteel openings, were apprenticed to linendrapers. The girls turned out creditably. Soon after Mary's funeral there was a quiet little wedding at Claydon, when Susanna Denton gave her hand to Robert Townsend, the worthy Rector of Radcliffe; Anne became the wife of George Woodward of Stratton Dec. 19, Audley; Mary, some years later, married John

1650

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