Donne, &c. His letters and papers, which compose twelve volumes in folio, were once in the cabinet of Secretary Thurloe, and afterwards in that of the Lord ChancellorSomers. And it is obfervable, that those two great men, whofe natural talents for the administration of affairs were fuperior to those of most others, thought the ftudy of fuch collections of the highest use to themselves; and that the experience of their predeceffors was a confiderable improvement of their own.

- Sir GEORGE CARE W, whofe admirable Relation of the State of France is a model, upon which Embaffadors may form and digeft their notions and reprefentations, and for the communication of which the public, as well as myfelf, are highly obliged to you, was a native of Cornwall, and of the antient family of Eaft- Anthony; being younger brother* of Richard Carew, Efq; author of the Survey of Cornwall, and fecond fon of Thomas Carew (a) of Eaft Anthony, Efq; by Elizabeth Edgecombe, daughter of Richard Edgecombe, of Edgecombe in Cornwall, Efq; He was edu

Wood, Athen. Oxon. Vol. I. col. 452. by mistake fays uncle. (a) This Thomas Carew was fon and heir of Sir Wymond Carew,of Eaft- Anthony, Knight, by Martha, daugh: ter of Edmund, and fifter of Sir Anthony Denny, Knight. Sir Wymond was fon and heir of John Carew, the fon and heir of Alexander Carew, of Eaft-Anthony, Efq; third fon of Nicholas Baron Carew, who lived in the reign of Henry VI. Vifitation-book of Devon and Cornwal, taken in the year 1620, by Sir Henry St. George, Richmond, and Sampfon Lennard, Bluemantle, fol. 27. and Funeral Certificates in the Heralds Office, fol. 22.

cated

cated in the University of Oxford, and afterwards ftudied the Law in the Inns of Court; then travelled into foreign countries; and, at his return, was called to the Bar, and appointed Secretary. to Sir Chriftopher Hatton, Lord Chancellor of England, and to the Lord-Keepers Puckering and Egerton, by the fpecial recommendation of Queen Elizabeth herself, who gave him a Prothonotariship in the Chancery, and knighted him. (r); and, in 1597,, fent him Embaffador to the King of Poland (s), he being at that time a Mafter in Chancery (t). In the latter end of the year 1605 he was appointed Embaffador to the Court of France, where he continued till 1609. During his refidence there he was looked upon by the French Ministers, as not well-affected to their nation, and more attached to the Spanish intereft (v). But whether they had fufficient grounds for this opinion, it is not easy to difcover at fuch a distance of time; and it is highly probable, that their difguft to him might arise from their not finding him very tractable in fome points of his Negotiation, and particularly in the demand of the debts due to the King his Mafter (w). But, whatever his political princi ples might be, it is certain, that he fought the converfation of men of letters, and became ac

(r) Carew's Survey of Cornwall, fol. 61. and Wood, Athen. Oxon. Vol. I, col. 530. (s) Camden's Eliz. p. 695, 696. edit. Lugd. Batav. 1625. (t) Wood, ubi fupr. (v) Lettres d'Henry IV. Roi de France, & de Meff. de Villeroy & de Puifieux, à Monfr. Antoine le Fevre de la Boderie, Embaffadeur de France en Angleterre, Tom. 1. P. 144. & 224. edit. Amfterd. 1733, in 8vo. Tom. I. p. 119. 126. 137, 138. 154, &c.

a

(z) Ibidem,

quainted,

quainted with Thuanus, to whom he communicated an account of the tranfactions in Poland, while he was employed there, which that admirable Hiftorian made ufe of in his CXXI. Book, and sent a prefent to him of his Hiftory, which Sir George acknowledged in a Latin letter, dated at London the 23d of October 1612 (x). After his return from France he was advanced to the important poft of Mafter of the Court of Wards; but he did not long enjoy it; for Thuanus, in a letter to Camden, written about Eafter 1613 (y), lâments his death as a very unfortunate event to himself; for he confidered Sir George's friendship, not only as an ornament to him, but likewife of no fmall use in his work, as well as of the greatest weight in removing the calumnies and mifrepresentations, which might be raised of him in the Court of England. He married Thomafine, daughter of Sir Francis Godolphin, great grandfather of the Lord Treasurer Godolphin, by whom he had two fons, Francis and Richard. Francis, the elder, was created Knight of the Bath, at the Coronation of King Charles I. and attended the Earl of Denbigh to the relief of Rochelle, where he got great reputation by his courage and conduct; but, falling fick at fea in his return from thence, died in the Isle of Wight, June 4th 1628, at the age of twenty-feven; as Richard, the younger fon, died about that of seventeen. Of the three

(x) Thuani Hiftor. edit. Buckleii, Vol. VII. De Thuani Hiftoriæ apud Jacobum I. Regem fucceffu, p. 26. (y) G. Camdeni & illuftrium Virorum ad G. Camdenum epiftol. P. 139.

daughters,

daughters, Anne was married to Giles Rawlins, Gentleman; but Sophia, the fecond, and Lucy, the youngest, died unmarried (z).

ANTHONY BACON, Efq; whofe papers have been alfo of great fervice to me in this work, and of which there are feveral volumes in the Lambeth library, befides that in my poffeffion, was fon of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Knight, LordKeeper of the Great Seal of England in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, by his fecond wife, Anne, one of the daughters of Sir Anthony Cook, a Lady eminent for her skill in the Latin and Greek languages; as was likewise her fifter Mildred (a), the fecond wife of the Lord Treasurer Burghley. He was elder brother of the whole blood to Sir Francis Bacon, Lord High Chancellor, to whom he was thought equal in parts, though inferior in the acquifitions of learning and knowledge*. He travelled early into foreign countries; for he was at Paris in the beginning of the year 1580 (b), and at Geneva in 1581, where he was acquainted with the celebrated Theodore Beza, who speaks of him in very high terms of admiration, in a letter to the Lord Treasurer in December that year (c). It appears likewise, from his papers, that he was at Bourdeaux, and Montauban, and in other parts of France, in the years 1584 and 1586. Upon his return to England, about Janu(z) Funeral Certificates, ubi fupra. (a) Buchanan has an Epigram L. III. ad Antonium Cocum Equitem Anglum, & filias doctiffimas. * Dr. Rawley's Life of Lord Bacon. (b) This appears from his MS. Papers in the Lambeth Li brary. (c) Strype's Annals of the Reformation, Vol. III. Append. No. XIII. p. 21.

ary 1589-90, he held a correspondence by letters in different countries; by which he received the earliest accounts of what paffed there. And tho' the Lord Treasurer was his uncle, and Sir Robert Cecil, Secretary of State, his coufin-german, yet he attached himself chiefly to Robert Devereux, Earl of Effex, who, by his means, carried on a correfpondence with the King of Scots, of which there are fufficient evidences among Mr. Bacon's manufcripts in my hands. But his death happening before that King's acceffion to the Throne of England, and probably in the latter end of the year 1599 (c), deprived him of the reward, which he might have expected for the good, faithful, and acceptable fervice, which his Majefty acknowledged to have received from him, in the grant of a penfion of fixty pounds per Annum to his brother, Sir Francis Bacon (d), who had reminded that King, in 1603, of the infinite devotion, and inceffant endeavours (beyond the strength of bis body, and the nature of the times) which bad, fays he, appeared in my good brother, Mr. Anthony Bacon, towards your Majesty's fervice. He was extremely well skilled in all the polite arts, and particularly in that of Painting; feveral excellent performances of his, in the Flemish ftyle, being still preserved at his feat at Gorhambury †, near St. Albans in Hertfordshire; an estate, which had been fettled upon him by his father, and de

(c) I find no letters to him dated later than Aug. 27th that year. (d) Rymer's Fadera, Vol. XVI. p. 597. in the poffeffion of the Right Hon. Lord the Grimftone.

Now

fcended