valuable treatise, which he dedicates to Sir Christopher Hatton, afterwards created Lord Hatton of Kirby, and a man worthy of his friendship and commendation. Faithful to religion and his king, possessing a more than ordinary share of knowledge, a great admirer of learning, and warmed by an even flame of piety, in him Taylor found a patron capable of appreciating his worth, and a disposition eager to embrace his friendship.

Their acquaintance originated, probably, during Taylor's residence at Uppingham, in the neighbourhood of Kirby, the seat of the Hattons, a seat enlarged and ornamented by this distinguished nobleman.

Sir Christopher was the son and heir of a father of the same name and title, and was educated at Jesus College in Cambridge, and

d

• Vide Dugdale Baron.

Sir Christopher

d Vide Ath. Oxon. Vol. i. p. 223. Hatton was attached to the study of antiquity, and at considerable expence obtained collections from public records, ancient charters and other MSS. The world is indebted to him for using his interest in encouraging Dugdale in his studies, and placing him in a situation that enabled him to prosecute them with the greatest facility. Sir Christopher was member for Higham Ferrers, in

made Knight of the Bath at the coronation of King Charles the First; to whom he manifested the warmest attachment. He was one of the first who came to assist his sovereign; and supported the royal cause, both by his person and with his estate. As a reward for such services, in the year 1643, he was created Lord Hatton of Kirby, in the county of Northampton, and constituted comptroller of the household, having been admitted to the degree

Northamptonshire, in the Parliament which met November the 3d, 1640, and foreseeing the issue of the measures pursued by the predominant party, that the public worship would be profaned, and works of art destroyed, he encouraged Dugdale to visit as many of our principal churches as he could, in order to preserve the remembrance of whatever was worthy of his pencil. In the summer of 1641, Dugdale, accompanied by William Sedgwick, a skilful arms-painter, " repaired first to the cathedral of St. Paul, and next to the Abbey of Westminster, and there made exact draughts of all the monuments in each of them, copied the epitaphs according to the very letter, and all the arms in the windows or cut in stone. All of which being done with great exactness, Mr. Dugdale rode to Peterborough, Ely, Norwich, Lincoln, Newark upon Trent, Beverley, Southwell, Kingston upon Hull, York, Selby, Chester, Lichfield, Tamworth, Warwick, and did the like in all those cathedral, collegiate, conventual and divers other churches, wherein any tombs and monuments were to be found, to the end that the memory of them might be preserved for future and better times. Fasti. Oxon. p. 694.

of doctor of civil law at Oxford, on the same day with Taylor. At the restoration he was appointed governor of Guernsey, and a privy counsellor, How Taylor valued this noble person is best expressed in his own language, conveyed in the epistle dedicatory, prefixed to the "Great Exemplar."

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My lord," he says, "Although the results " and issues of my retirements and study, do "naturally run towards you, and carry no "excuse for their forwardness, but the confi"dence that your goodness rejects no emana❝tion of a great affection, yet in this address "I am apt to promise myself a fair interpretation, because I bring you an Instrument, and auxiliaries to that devotion, whereby we believe you are dear to God, and "know that you are, to good men.”

Sir Christopher appears to have been a person of no ordinary merit: for Taylor in another part of his works speaks of "his wisdom and "learning, the great reputation he had abroad " and the honour he had at home; that he had

"secured to himself a great name in all the

registers of honour by his skill and love to "all things that are excellent; that he was

loved and honoured by the beauties of his "virtue, and the sweetness of his disposition, by his worthy employments at court, and his

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being so beloved in his country, by the value "his friends put upon him, and the regard that

strangers paid to him, by his zeal for the "church, and his busy care in the promoting "all worthy learning, by his religion and his "nobleness."

We have stated that about the time of Taylor's institution to Uppingham, he was appointed one of the chaplains in ordinary; and being warmly attached to his royal master, the fortune of the one involved to a great degree that of the other. It is with reason presumed that he quitted Uppingham at the latter end of the summer of the year 1642; and from that time he must be considered as bearing his part in the public calamity.

On the twenty-second of August of the same year, the King erected his standard at Nottingham, and proceeded by a circuitous march to Oxford. Taylor was called upon to attend his Majesty in his capacity of chaplain,

* His handwriting is not met with in the registers at Uppingham after that time.

and might possibly have joined the army at that time, as its route lay at a short distance from his residence at Uppingham. The King after the battle of Edgehill, on the 23d of October, pursued his course on the following day towards the University, and in his way forced the garrison at Banbury to surrender; and he occupied the time between the 23d of October and the 11th of the succeeding month in advancing through Oxford and Reading to Colnbrook, with the intention of proceeding to the capital; but, finding his march obstructed by the superiority of the forces opposed to him, he returned to the University, and resided for some time at Christ Church. During this cessation from conflict, Wood relates, that "it was his Majesty's pleasure that "there should be a creation in all faculties, of "such as had either done him service in the "late battle, or had retired to him at Oxford

for shelter, to avoid the barbarities of the "Presbyterians, then very frequent through" out the nation. Accordingly a convocation

f This convocation is denominated the Caroline, and in Liber. Convocationis Univ. Oxon. Archiv. S. B. 25, 1641 -1647, is called "celeberrima convocatione." The King himself signed the book in the margin " Charles R." So numerous were the degrees, that "darkness coming on "before the business was concluded, the convocation was