Rev. J. E. Jackson’s Address. 33 
litigation and trouble that he was never independent and never at 
rest. He was a barrister, without anything to do; so spent his time 
in riding to and fro from Easton Piers to another property which 
he had near Salisbury, and in the enjoyment of visits and conver- 
sation at the houses of the gentry. He was an accomplished man, 
a good classical scholar, knew French and Heraldry, could draw, 
and had a quaint way of expressing himself which makes his de- 
scriptions amusing enough. He was a quick observer of things, but 
very often in such a hurry to make them his own, that he did not 
stop to observe them quite accurately. He was unmarried, but had, 
as he tells us, several hairbreadth escapes from matrimony. The 
history of these little adventures is not preserved to us, but they 
seem to have been the cause to him of infinite trouble. Being at 
length reduced to poverty, he spent the latter years of life no one 
could tell how; finding shelter, in adversity, under the roof of the 
Earl of Abingdon at Lavington, or of the Longs at Draycote. 
He left behind him a miscellaneous collection in manuscript, 
which he bequeathed to the Ashmolean Library, then newly formed, 
at Oxford. There they are still preserved, and I lately had occa- 
sion to pay them a visit. The manuscript room is not one of those 
parts of the Institution which are usually shown to the public, but 
haying expressed a wish to go down into it, to see our friend’s 
remains, I was immediately and politely permitted to do so. The 
descent is down a dark and crooked staircase lined with dingy old 
volumes on astrology and magic; and after passing through one or 
two gloomy apartments, also full of the same valuable lore, I came 
to the den in which he is confined. It is a small wooden cupboard, 
about two foot square. Against the door of it hangs a miniature, of 
which, by the courtesy of Mr. Duncan the Principal Keeper of the 
Museum, I was allowed to take a Daguerreotype. That likeness I 
have now in my hand, and it is a valuable memorial, being the only 
one that has ever been made. Inside the little cupboard are the 
relics of the toil of our Wiltshire antiquary, and a strange medley they 
are. In quire, or on scraps of paper, bound and unbound, legible and 
illegible, you see at once the man in his memoranda. He could 
write, when he pleased, a very fine, strong, clear hand; but this he 
did not always please to do,—writing, for the most part, as people 
will who write a great deal and in a hurry, i.e., very badly. The 
particular manuscript which I was most curious to see was that to 
which he gave the name of “An Essay towards the History of 
North Wilts.” Aubrey made at different times a great many 
curious memoranda about the Natural History of Wilts, (extracts 
from which were published a few years ago;) but he was also anxious 
to preserve the Archeology and Topography of the county, and for 
this purpose he had at an earlier period of his life, made a sort of 
attempt to form a company on the principle of division of labour, 
as we hope we are doing now. What is still more to the purpose, 
e ¥ 
