Communicated by Mr. James Waylen. 97 
_ Highness’s Guard.” His delinquency consisted in his having 
voluntarily left his dwelling-place, and resided in Oxford during 
the progress of hostilities. Forty pounds was the small sum for 
which he compounded in September, 1647, his estate being esti- 
mated at only £20 per annum. Commons’ Journals, v., 302. He 
afterwards became Solicitor-General; and, in his capacity of a 
Wiltshire magistrate, his name constantly appears at public 
meetings in this county during the three succeeding reigns. There 
appears to have been a strong personal attachment between Mr. 
Levett and his royal master. In the matter of the King’s attempt 
to escape to the French coast about Christmas, 1646, he played an 
important part, being the person appointed to convey a hundred 
_ pounds to the Dutch captain who undertook to carry the King over 
from Newcastle. The captain indeed got the money ; but the King’s 
_ friends having reason to suspect that the Mayor of Newcastle was 
on the watch, abandoned the design and resolved to try Hartlepool. 
_ Here, again, they were defeated, through the faint-heartedness of a 
“messenger, named Tobias Peaker, who turned informer, Lords’ 
— Journals, viii., 666. 
Long after the wars Mr. Levett distinguished himself as one of 
the writers in favour of the authenticity of the work styled when in 
"manuscript Suspiria Regalia, but better known after its publication 
as the Hikon Basilike; that is to say, he defended the proposition of 
its _ its being the King’s own composition, in opposition to Dr. Gauden’s 
claims to the authorship. He tells us that while attending His 
a Majesty during his captivity in Carisbrooke Castle, he had often 
observed him working on the original manuscript, both writing in 
it and perusing it as he sat in the settle of the window of his 
chamber. And occasionally when the King had left the manuscript 
¢ n the window-settle, he (Mr. Levett) had examined it, so that no 
doubt was left on his own mind as to the authorship. His letter 
to the compiler of the “ Restitution to the Royal Author,” containing 
‘the above declaration, is dated from “ Savernak park, near Marl- 
borough, 29 April, 1691.” Referring to the unfortunate prayer in 
the Hikon, which Milton at once detected as being stolen from Sir 
~ Philip Sydney’s Arcadia, Mr. Levett, anxious to save the royal 
VOL, XXIV.—=NO, LXX. H 
