ccclxxxviii LIFE OF BACON. 



modest servant you sent with your letter, nor his who now 

 returns you this answer, ofttimes given me by your master 

 and mine; who though by this may seem not to satisfy 

 your desert and expectation, yet, take the word of a friend, 

 who will never fail you, hath a tender care of you, full of a 

 fresh memory of your by-past service. His majesty is but 

 for the present, he says, able to yield unto the three years- 

 advance, which if you please to accept, you are not here 

 after the farther off from obtaining some better testimony 

 of his favour, worthier both of him and you, though it can 

 never be answerable to what my heart wishes you, as your 

 Lordship s humble servant, G. BUCKINGHAM. 



That he was promised some compensation for the loss 

 of his professional emoluments seems probable not only 

 from his letters to the King, and from the aid received, 

 but from his having lived in splendour after his fall, 

 although his certain annual income seems not to have ex 

 ceeded ,2500. (a) With this income, he, with prudence, 

 might, although greatly in debt, have enjoyed worldly 

 comfort : but in prudence he was culpably negligent. (6) 



lordship a true friend, loth in the watery trial of prosperity and in the 

 fiery trial of adversity, &c. 



My very good Lord, I hope his majesty may reap honour out of my 

 adversity, us he hath done strength out of my prosperity. His majesty 

 knows best his own ways ; and for me to despair of him were a sin not to 

 be forgiven. I thank God I have overcome the bitterness of this cup by 

 Christian resolution ; so that worldly matters are but mint and cummin. 

 God ever preserve you. 



(o) A pension from the crown of 1,200/., his grant from the Alienation 

 Office 600/. a year, his own estate 700/. This pension he kept to his 

 death, as appears by his will, from which it seems that he thought himself 

 in opulence. 



(b} King James sent a buck to him, and he gave the keeper fifty pounds. 



Aubrey. 



In the preface to a work entitled &quot; The Cries of the Oppressed,&quot; pub 

 lished by M. Pitt, 1691, 12mo. there is the following gossiping statement: 



