xl LIFE OF IZAAK WALTON. [1646, 



Walton, and might be supposed to have been accurately informed 

 of the fact, he continued "in Chancery Lane till about 1643 (at 

 which time he found it dangerous for honest men to be there), he 

 left that city, and lived sometimes at Stafford and elsewhere, but 

 mostly in the families of the eminent clergymen of England, of 

 whom he was much beloved/' The part of this statement which 

 fixes Walton's removal from London to the year 1643 has been 

 proved erroneous, because he did not leave Chancery Lane until 

 about August 1644 ; and as he was certainly in London in January 

 1645, and in December 1647, and, as will be afterwards shown, 

 was living there in 1650, it is extremely doubtful when, if ever, he 

 retired to Stafford. Very little has been discovered respecting 

 him between 1645 an ^ 1650; and it does not appear that he 

 printed anything in that period ; but it has been confidently stated 

 by many writers that Walton sought seclusion and safety during 

 the civil wars, in a cottage of his own near to his native town of 

 Stafford, where he indulged in his favourite pursuits of literature 

 and angling. Disgusted with public events, and grieved to the 

 heart at the murder of his sovereign, the destruction of the Epis- 

 copal Church, and the dispersion and distress of its conscientious 

 ministers > among the most eminent of whom were many of his 

 dearest friends, he probably refrained from reflecting upon events 

 which he could only bitterly deplore ; but it is nearly certain that 

 he did not leave London, excepting for temporary and occasional 

 visits to Stafford, until after the Restoration. 



Mr Bowles, in his Life of Bishop Ken, 4 has not only assumed 

 that Dr Morley was Walton's guest, at his cottage in Staffordshire, 

 from April 1648 until the first week in May i649, 5 but he exercised 

 the poetical talents for which he is justly celebrated, by imagining 

 a dialogue to have taken place between Morley and Walton and 

 his wife during Morley's visit. It is always painful to destroy the 

 fabrics of genius ; but biography is not a proper field for flights of 

 poesy; and however pleasing might be such an episode in the life of 

 Walton, as his having afforded shelter to the venerable Morley in his 

 adversity, contrasting, as it would forcibly have done, with Walton's 

 having passed the latter years of his life in the episcopal residences 

 of that eminent person, it must nevertheless be said, that there is 

 no evidence that Morley ever visited Walton in Staffordshire, or 

 that he was indebted to him for any particular services. 



* Life of Ken, vol. i. p. 139. Mr Bowies' authority for stating that Morley took 

 shelter with Walton in Staffordshire, after his ejection from Oxford, appears to have 

 been derived from traditional information only. Ibid. pp. 93-95. 



3 Vol. i. p. 99, et seq. 



