354 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 79. 



gooseberry, peares, peaches, plums, nectarines, 

 grape, Hasell-niitt, quince, strawberry, with the 

 times of their ripening." 



Old John Tradescant died in the year 1652, at 

 which period lie was probably far advanced in 

 years, leaving behind him a son (also of the same 

 name) who seems to have inherited his father's 

 talents and enthusiasm. There is a tradition that 

 .John Tradescant the younger entered himself on 

 board a privateer going against the Algerines, that 

 he niiglit have an opportunity of bringing apricot- 

 trees from that country. He is known to have 

 taken a voyage to Virginia, whence he returned 

 with many new plants. The two Tradesuants 

 were the means of introducing a variety of curious 

 species into tliis kingdom, several of which bore 

 their name. Tradescants' Spiderivort and Aster are 

 well known to this day; and Linnasus has immor- 

 talised them among tlie botanists by making a new 

 genus under their names of the Spiderwort, which 

 had been before called Ephemeron. 



When the elder Tradescant first settled in 

 England, he formed a curious collection of natural 

 history, coins, medals, and a great variety of 

 "uncommon rarities." A catalogue of them was 

 published in I2mo. in the year 1G56, by his son, 

 under the name of Museum Tradescantianum ; to 

 which are prefixed portraits, both of the fiither 

 and son, by Hollar. This Museum or " Ark," as 

 it was termed, was frequently visited by persons 

 of rank, who became benefactors thereto; among 

 these were Charles the First, Henrietta Maria (his 

 queen), Arclibishop Laud, George Duke of Buck- 

 ingham, Robert ami William Cecil, Earls of Salis- 

 bury, and many other persons of distinction : 

 among them also appears the philosophic John 

 Evelyn, who in his Diary has the following 

 notice : 



" Sept. 17, 16J7, I went to see Sir Robert Necdhnm, 

 at Lambeth, a relation of mine, and thence to John 

 Tradescant's museum." 

 " Thns John Tradeskin starves our wondering eyes 



By boxing up his new-found rarities." 



Ashmole, in liis Diary (first published by Charles 

 Burman in 1717), has three significant entries re- 

 lating to the subject of our notice, which I tran- 

 scribe verbatim: 



" Decern. 12, 1659. ]\Ir. Tredescant and his wife 

 told me tlicy had been lonir consiileiing upon whom to 

 bestow their closet of curiosities when they died, and 

 at last had resolved to give it unto me. 



" April 22, 1662. Mr. John Tredescant died. 



" May .30, 1662. This Easter term I jjreferred a bill 

 in Chancery against Mrs. Tredescant, for the rarities 

 '\er husband had settled on me."j 



The success of Ashmole's suit is well known ; 

 but the whole transaction refiects anything but 

 lionour upon his name. The loss of her husband's 

 treasures probably preyed upon the mind of Mrs. 



Tradescant ; for in the Diary before quoted, under 

 April 4, 1678, Ashmole says : 



" My wife told me tliat Mrs. Tradescant was found 

 drowned in her pond. She was drowned the day 

 before at noon, as appears by some circumstance." 

 This was the same Hesther Tradescant who erected 

 the Trailescant monument in Lambeth church- 

 yard. She was Ijuried in the vault where her 

 husband and his son John (who " died in his 

 spring") had been formerly laid. 



The table monument to the memory of the 

 Tradescants was erected in 1662. The sculptures 

 on the four sides are as follows, viz. : on the north, 

 a crocodile, shells, &c., and a view of some Egyp- 

 tian buildings ; on the south, broken columns, 

 Corinthian capitals, &c., supposed to be ruins in 

 Greece, or some Eastern country ; on the east, 

 Tradescant's arms, on a bend three fleurs-de-lys, 

 impaling a lion passant; on the west, a hydra, 

 and under it a skull ; various figures of trees, &c., 

 in relievo, adorn the four corners of the tomb: 

 over it is placed a handsome tablet of black marble. 

 The monument, by the contribution of some friends 

 to their memory, was in the year 1773 repaired, 

 and (according to Sir Jnhn Hawkins) the following 

 lines, ^^ formerly intended for an epitaph, inserted 

 thereon." Other authorities say that they were 

 merely restored. 



" Know, stranger, ere thou pass beneath this stone, 

 Lye John Tradescant, grandsire, father, son ; 

 The last dy'd in his spring ; the other two 

 I>iv'd till they had travell'd Art and Nature through, 

 As by their choice collections may appear, 

 Of what is rare, in land, in sea, in air ; 

 Whilst tlicy (as Homer's Iliad in a nut) 

 A world (if wonders in one closet shut ; 

 These famous antiquarians that had been 

 Bnlh Gardeners to tlie Rose and Lily Queen, 

 Transplanted now themselves, sleep here ; and when 

 Angels shall with their trumpets waken men. 

 And fire sliall purge the world, these hence shall rise, 

 And change this garden for a Paradise." 

 A number of important errors concerning this 

 once celebrated family have been made by differ- 

 ent writers. Sir John Hawkins, in a note to his 

 edition of Walton's ^?i^/er (edit. 1792, p. 24.), 

 says : 



" There were, it seems, tlu'ee of the Tradescants, 

 grandfather, father, and son : the son is the person here 

 meant : the two former were gardeners to Queen 

 Elizabeth, and the latter to King Charles I." 



The epitaph above quoted satisfactorily proves, I 

 think, that the Tradescants were never gardeners 

 to the maiden Queen. "The rose ami lily queen" 

 was certainly Henrietta Maria, the queen of 

 Charles the First. I have now before me (from 

 the cabinet of a friend) a small silver medal struck 

 to commemorate the marriage of Charles the First. 

 It has on the obverse the busts of Charles and 

 Henrietta, the sun shining from the clouds above 



