70 THE NEW SCIENCE AND ENGLISH LITERATURE 



erano in despair wills his property to Lionel. He is altogether a 

 despicable fool, the gull and dupe of everyone. But the sharpest 

 satire underlies this dialogue between the Antiquary and his ser- 

 vant Petro. — 



''Antiquary, — The very dust that cleaves to one of those monu- 

 ments, is Avorth more than the ore of twenty mines! 



Petro, — Yet, by your favour, Sir, of what use can they be to 

 you? 



Antiquary, — ^Wliat use? Did not the Seigniory build a State- 

 chamber for antiquities? And 'tis the best thing that e'er they 

 did; They are the registers, the Chronicles of the age they were 

 made in, and speak the truth of history better than a hundred of 

 your printed commentaries".^^ 



But in spite of such ridicule the interest in antiquarianism, as 

 the search after all sorts and conditions of rarities and curiosities 

 was called, increased through the succeeding years, and Veterano 

 reappeared under the name of Sir Arthur Oldlove in Durfey's 

 comedy. Madam Fickle, 1677. A glimpse into Oldlove 's relic 

 room is given in this play, where there is a "table with a skull, 

 sword, vial, shooing horn, box, and picktooth".^^ The skull, 

 Oldlove declares, was one set on the shoulders of St. Gawain of the 

 Round Table; the sword belonged to "Sir Lancelot du Lake"; the 

 * ' shooing horn ' ', the very first ever invented, ' ' was left by the Queen 

 of Sheba in Jerusalem when she visited Solomon"; the box, like 

 Veterano 's, contained Nero's beard; the vial was full of the tears 

 of St. Jerome. The dramatist apparently forgot the "picktooth", 

 or else his invention failed him. 



Here is a full grown humor. 



"As when some peculiar quality 

 Does so possess a man, that it does draw 

 All his affects, his spirits, and his powers 

 In their confluctions, all to run one way, 

 This may be truly said to be a humour".^® 

 So it is with Oldlove. "Is there anything", he asks, "more pleas- 

 ant than antiquities? The Knowledge of the distinction of the 



" Madam Fickle, Act II, sc. 1. 



" Ibid. Act III, sc. 1. 



" Jonson, Ben, Every Man Out of his Humour, Prologue. 



