LIFE OF WALTON". 3 



In the year 1662, he was for the second time deprived of the 

 solace and comfort of a wife, as appears by the following monu- 

 mental inscription in the chapel of Our Lady, in the cathedral 

 church of Worcester : 



Exterris 



D. 



M. S. 



Here lyeth buried 



so much as could dye 



of ANNE, the wife of IZAAK WALTON ; 



Who was a Woman of remarkable prudence, 



and of the Primitive Piety ; 



her great, and general, Knowledge 



being adorned with such true Humility, 



and blest with so much Christian Meekness 



as made her worthy of a more memorable monument. 



She dyed (alas that she is dead ! ) 



the 17th of April, 1662, Aged 52. 



Study to be like her. 



Living, while in London, in the parish of St. Dunstan in the 

 West, whereof Dr. John Donne, dean of St. Paul's, was vicar, he 

 became a frequent hearer of that excellent preacher, and, at 

 length, his convert. Upon his decease 1 in 1631, Sir Henry 

 Wotton requested Walton to collect materials for a " Life of the 

 Doctor," which it seems Sir Henry had undertaken to write : 

 but Sir Henry dying before he had completed the life, Walton 

 undertook it himself ; and in the year 1640, finished and pub- 

 lished it, with a " Collection of the Doctor's Sermons," in folio. 

 As soon as the book came out, a complete copy was sent as a 

 present to Walton, by Mr. John Donne, the doctor's son, after- 

 wards doctor of laws : and one of the blank leaves contained his 

 letter to Mr. Walton ; the letter is yet extant, and in print, 2 and 

 is a handsome and grateful acknowledgment of the honour done 

 to the memory of his father. 



Doctor King, afterwards Bishop of Chichester, in a letter to 

 the author, thus expresses himself concerning this life : " I am 



ad that the general demonstration of his [Doctor Donne's] 



1 Walton attended Dr. Donne in his last sickness, and was present when 

 consigned his sermons and numerous papers to the care of Dr. Henry 



King, who was promoted to the see of Chichester in 1641. ZOTJOH. 



2 In Peck's "Desiderata Curiosa," vol. i. lib. vi. p. 24. In the year 

 1714, the very book, with the original manuscript letter, was in the hands 

 of the Rev. Mr. Borradale, rector of Market-Deeping, in the county of 



oln. H. 



B 2 



