and aspiring man-dying at forty-nine-full of rewards and honors, yet far below the higher reaches of his ambition. He had hoped to die a peer; to leave behind him a noble line. He felt that he had deserved this great reward at the hands of his sovereign. His sovereign had offered it; but the son to whom it must have descended in the course of nature firmly rejected the proffered honor. Two years before he had sent forth his voice from a dungeon in the Tower to denounce all such appendages as grace, lordship, highness, majesty. He had not only refused to receive, but even to acknowledge earthly titles. This had been a severe blow to the father; and while he remained in health and in office near the King's person, it is doubtful whether he ever entirely forgave him; but seclusion from the world and the wiser thoughts which a contemplation of his latter end brought with it, seemed to have at length reconciled him to the loss of worldly rank. "Son William," said the veteran only a day or two before his death, "I am weary of the world: I would not live my days over again, if I could command them with a wish; for the snares of life are greater than the fears of death." The admiral had apparently ceased to think of his own great disappointment; but he retained his patriotic ardor to the last. He bewailed the corruption of the age, the profligacy in high places, the daily traffic in justice, the contempt into which the court had fallen, the rottenness of the nation at home, the decline of its influence abroad. He gave his children three maxims as a legacy: "First-Let nothing in this world tempt you to wrong your conscience; so you will keep peace at home, which will be a feast to you in the day of trouble. Secondly -Whatever you design to do, lay it justly and time it seasonably, for that gives security and dispatch. Lastly-Be not troubled at disappointments; for if they may be recovered, do it; if they cannot, trouble is vain: if you could not have helped it, be content; there is often peace and profit in submitting to Providence, for afflictions make wise: if you could

1 This is distinctly stated in one of Penn's letters to an old Quaker friend, who had censured him unjustly. "It is more than a worldly title or patent that hath clothed me in this place [Pennsylvania]. Nor am I sitting down in a greatness which I have denied. Had I sought greatness,

I had stayed at home, where the difference between what I am here, and was offered, and could have been there in power and wealth, is as wide as the places

have helped it, let not your trouble exceed your instruction for another time. These rules," said the admiral, "will carry you with firmness and comfort through this inconstant world."1

The dying man had now risen into that region which is above the fear or favor of the world. His frame of mind was calm, confiding, and religious. He talked a good deal with his son: and in the end came not only to forgive but to applaud his erratic course. "Son William,"-these were almost the last words he uttered,-"if you and your friends keep to your plain way of preaching, and also keep to your plain way of living, you will make an end of priests to the end of the world." For himself, however, he died, as he had lived, a member of the Church of England. He simply added-" Bury me near my mother live all in love. Shun all manner of evil. I pray to God to bless you all; and He will bless you."2

He died on the 16th of September, eleven days after the trial, and was buried in the parish church of Redclyffe, in the town of Bristol, where his monument may still be seen. With a life interest in his estate reserved to Lady Penn,-his daughter Margaret married,3-he left the whole of his property, plate, household furniture, money owing to him by the government, lands in England and in Ireland, his gold chain and medal, and the sole executorship of his last will and testament to his Quaker son. Altogether, this property was of very considerable amount. Besides the claims on the state for money lent to it and for arrears of salary—not much under 15,000%. -the estates brought their owner, on the average, about 1,500l. a year: a large fortune in those times.5

Fearing, not without good cause, from what had already

1 No Cross, no Crown. Collected Works, i. 432, 3.

2 Ibid.

3 She married Antony Lowther of Maske, who served in Parliament for Appleby, in the sessions of 1678-9. Their son, William, was made a baronet in 1697. He married the heiress of Holker, and his son married into the Devonshire family.

4 Granville Penn. Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 565-7.

5 Admiral Penn died tolerably well off; but not so wealthy as his enemies gave out in order to make him unpopular. A curious instance of this system of indirect scandal is recorded by Pepys. "April 20, 1668. Meeting Sir William Hooker, the alderman, he did cry out mighty high against Sir William Penn, for getting such an estate, and giving 15,000l. with his daughter, which is more by half than he ever did give; but this the world believes, and so let them."

happened, that, unless held up and supported by powerful friends, his son's life would be a continual act of martyrdom, Sir William had sent from his death-bed to both the King and the Duke of York to solicit at their hands those kind offices towards his son which they had been ever ready to extend to himself. The royal brothers returned the most flattering answers to this request; and James more especially undertook the office of guardian and protector to the young manan office which he honorably and faithfully discharged.1 This was the simple and natural origin of that connection between the Quaker subject and the Catholic prince which afterwards created so much scandal. As Penn many years after his father's death told the delegates of Magdalen College, the questions which had made him so intimate with the prince were such as affected his property, not his religion.2

CHAPTER IV.

1670-1673.

GULI. SPRINGETT.

GULIELMA MARIA, daughter of Sir William Springett, of Darling, in Sussex, one of the leaders of the Parliamentary forces during the first years of the civil war, was residing with her mother at the rustic village of Chalfont, in Buckinghamshire, when her future husband first saw her. She was the delight of a small but distinguished circle, including no less a person than John Milton, Thomas Ellwood, his friend and pupil, and the famous Isaac Pennington.3 To Pennington, Guli's father-in-law, Ellwood had owed his introduction to his great Master, of whose urbane and gentle manners he has left so touching an account; and when the ravages of the plague made it necessary for the noble bard to quit his house in London for a time, he naturally went down to Chalfont with

1 Penn to Popple, Oct. 24, 1688.

2 Wilmot's Life of Hough, 25.

3 Lady Springett's Autobiography, MS. Ellwood's Memoirs, 233.

Me

4 Ellwood's Memoirs, 131. Milton lived at that time in Jewin street, in London. The young Quaker always speaks of him as "my master.” moirs, 202.

his pupil, knowing that friends were to be found there who shared his opinions and revered his genius.1 Rarely is a small and unpretending village honored with such a company as Chalfont boasted in those days of mourning. The Penningtons occupied the Grange, which they had rebuilt and beautified; Milton lived in a neat little cottage at a short distance; and Ellwood had a house about midway between the residences of his friends, at one or other of which he spent nearly the whole of his time.2 Guli. Springett he had known from childhood; he had been one of her little playfellows in the hop-gardens of Kent, in which county her property lay and his family resided; and as he had grown up to manhood had become deeply sensible of the charms of the young beauty with whom he lived on such perilous terms of familiarity. How far he was in mortal love with her he dared not ask himself, much less avow to her, lest he might break the spell which had bound them together from their common childhood. To be near her, to hear her laugh, to watch her form expand, her soft and lovely features day by day ripen like a peach into more delicate perfection, this made him happy; while from his confessions it is clear that in his secret soul he always felt that she was above his reach, and never could become his wife. It is not easy to decide which of the attractions of Chalfont-his master or his mistress-was the greater for Ellwood. To Milton he was devotedly attached; and though his love for Miss Springett was true and earnest, it was not so violent as to be beyond control. Guli, who was sought after and flattered by men of all classes, peers and commoners, courtiers and puritans, cannot but have been aware of her power over her old playfellow; she cannot fail to have felt flattered by his silent and modest homage, so unlike the warmer forms of courtship common in that polite and

1 Ellwood's Memoirs, 223.

5

2 Lady Springett's Autobiography.

3 Thomas Ellwood was much loved and trusted by the Penningtons. I find frequent and affectionate mention of him in Lady Springett's Autobiography.

4 Ellwood's Memoirs, 210 The history of unsuccessful love has hardly any thing more charming than some of the Quaker's confessions. It was possibly the example of Guli, that moved his spirit to adopt the gospel of George Fox: his account of his first visit to the Penningtons after they had turned Quakers, is quite amusing-when he finds his old playfellow suddenly grown demure, and that although the dinner is good, there is no fun over it. Memoirs, 15.

6 Penn Gaskell MSS.

dissipated age; but as he never gave offence by obtruding his passion on her thoughts, so she mildly and graciously received and reciprocated his attentions, and contracted for him a friendship which lasted without a day of coldness on either side until her death.1

Guli was fond of music. Music was Milton's second passion. In the cottage of the poet, in the Grange of the philosopher, how one can fancy the hours flying past, between psalms of love, high converse from the lips of the inspired bard, old stories of the Revolution, in which the elder people had each had a prominent share, and perhaps the recitation of favorite passages from that stupendous work which was to crown the blind and aged poet, and become one of the grandest heir-looms of mankind! It was to these favored friends that Milton first made known that he had been engaged in writing "Paradise Lost;" and it was also in their society that Ellwood suggested to him the theme of his "Paradise Regained." Immortal Chalfont !

When Penn went down to Chalfont to see his friend Pennington, he was at once struck with the charms of the fair Guli. He saw, loved, and prospered in his love. All other suitors were forgotten: and the heart of Miss Springett, with the consent of her mother and her protector, passed out of her own keeping forever. The personal appearance, the social position, the character of the suitor, were all more or less in his favor; but the circumstances of the time, and the recollections of the past, were not without their influence on his love. To understand these influences, it is requisite to look back upon the romantic story of Guli's parents.

The father of Sir William Springett died in the third year of his marriage, leaving a widow and three infant childrenone of them unborn-to inherit a good name and a moderate fortune. His widow devoted herself to the education of her children, and they grew up to be an honor to her and useful to their native land. She was herself a character; the gen

1 Ellwood's Memoirs, 336.

2 Ibid. 234. In his new poem Milton clothed the dogma of these friends in the language of poetry ;

He who receives

Light from above, the fountain of all light,

No other doctrine needs.

Paradise Regained.

3 Lady Springett's MS. Autobiography, to which I am indebted for most of the following particulars.