xlii LIFE OF IZAAK WALTON. [1651, 



tros, 1 in my house in Clerkenwell, Mr Henry Davison and brother 

 Beauchamp were his god-fathers, and Mrs Row his god-mother." 



Of the parties here mentioned all which can be said is that 

 Mr Thrustros was apparently the rector or curate of Clerkenwell. 

 Mr Henry Davison was a member of Gray's Inn, and was pro- 

 bably descended from Secretary Davison, the connection between 

 whose family and that of Cranmer has been pointed out. 2 

 Walton's " brother Beauchamp " was James Beacham, a gold- 

 smith of London, and the husband of Martha Ken, Mrs Walton's 

 half-sister. Mrs Row was probably the wife either of the " Nat. 

 or R. Roe " who accompanied Walton in his fishing excursions, 

 and who were distantly related to him. 



In 1651 Walton published a collection of the writings of Sir 

 Henry Wotton under the title of " Reliquiae Wottonianae," with 

 a memoir of the author. 3 He was induced to become Wotton's 

 biographer at the solicitation of Sir Edward Bysshe, Clarencieux 

 King-of-Arms, Charles Cotton, whose name is identified with "The 

 Complete Angler," and Nicholas Oudert, the confidential servant 

 of Wotton ; and the manner in which he executed the task they 

 imposed upon him, fully justified their request. With his wonted 

 modesty he thus speaks of the motives by which he was 

 influenced : 



"Sir Henry Wotton was a branch of such a kindred as left a stock of 

 reputation to their posterity ; such reputation as might kindle a generous 

 emulation in strangers, and preserve a noble ambition in those of his name 

 and family to perform actions worthy of their ancestors. And that Sir 

 Hemy Wotton did so, might appear more 'perfectly than my pen can 

 express it, if, of his many surviving friends, some one of higher parts and 

 employment had been pleased to have commended his to posterity ; but 

 since some years are now past, and they have all (I know not why) forborne 

 to do it, my gratitude to the memory of my dead friend, and the renewed 

 request of one 4 that still lives (Mr Nicholas Oudert) solicitous to see this 



1 See Note B. 



2 The will of "Henry Davison, of Gray's Inn, gentleman," was dated on the 3d of 

 April, and proved on the 3oth of May 1652. He does not appear to have been married, 

 but had two sisters, Jane, then the wife of Richard Cleare, and Mary, who was un- 

 married. A Mr Henry Neville was his executor. 



3 Sir John Hawkins (p. 17) conjectures that the Life of Wotton was finished in 1644, 

 because in the preface to the collected edition of Walton's Lives, he says, "having 

 written these two Lives" [of Donne and Wotton], he "lay quiet twenty years" before 

 he commenced the Life of Hooker, which appeared in 1664. Walton is not always 

 exact in his dates ; but Hawkins's suggestion seems to be erroneous from Walton's stat- 

 ing that it was printed as fast as it was written, the MS- being supplied to the printer in 

 detached pieces. Vide p. xliii. postea. 



4 In the first two editions of the " Reliquiae Wottonianse," this passage is so written ; 

 and "Mr Nic. Oudert" only is referred to ; but in the third edition, printed in 1672, it 

 is altered to " of some that still live" and the marginal note is as follows : "Sir Edward 

 Bish, Clarentieux King-of-Arms, Mr Charles Cotton, and Mr Nic. Oudert, sometime Sir 

 Henry Wotton's servant." 



