Capt. of the Fort of Plimouth, Sr Ferdinando Gorges.

At this period in Francis Davison's life, we are left without the slightest information of his future career, beyond his being mentioned in his father's will in 1608; and the exertions made by his present biographer to trace him to the close of his existence have entirely failed of success. It was this research, however, which

discovered the fragments at the end of this work, and his other articles and memoranda here printed. The unfortunate death of the Earl of Essex was a severe blight to the prospects of the Davison family, for during the whole of the Secretary's misfortunes that generous nobleman proved himself a warm and most faithful friend;* and had he continued in power, the fate of his children would, there is every cause for believing, have been very different. Francis Davison lost his father on the 23d or 24th of December, 1608; † and by his will he was bequeathed, out of the profits of the office of Custos Brevium of the King's Bench, which had been granted to Secretary Davison and his assigns during the lives of his friends and relations, George Byng of Wrotham, Esquire, and Henry Byng of Gray's Inn, Gent. one hundred pounds per annum; and after the payment of certain incumbrances, he was to have half the profits of these appointments, with reversion "to such children as he should leave of his body.”+

Here, all trace of this accomplished man is lost, nor can the period of his demise be satisfactorily established, though some circumstances persuade us that he died before the year 1619. There can scarcely be a doubt that his brothers and himself, after their father's death, became reduced to a state of poverty; for the Secretary died much involved, and left nothing but the emoluments of his office of Custos Brevium of the King's Bench

* Life of William Davison, Secretary of State to Queen Elizabeth. 8vo. 1822.

+ Ibid.

to pay his debts and support his children; and in 1610, one of his executors was accused, as will be more fully noticed when speaking of Christopher Davison, of having appropriated that appointment to his own advantage. Though educated for the legal profession, Francis Davison was never called to the bar; and the service of the Muses, for which he appears to have abandoned more useful occupations, seldom yields any substantial advantage; and, as one of the contributors to his own work justly observes,

Praise is the greatest prize that poets gain,

A simple gain that feeds them not a whit.*

An obscure life, and an early grave, may therefore, with apparent certainty, be considered to have been his lot; nor is it the blind partiality of biography which assumes that his genius, talents, and accomplishments, merited a far different fate. His person, from no known portrait being extant, cannot of course be imagined; but judging from the following line in speaking of himself, it may be concluded that his face was much marked with the small pox:

"Is't that my pock-hol'd face doth beauty lack ?” †

Of his merits as a Poet, it would be almost superfluous to say any thing, because ample specimens are contained in the following sheets upon which to form a judgment. Most of those pieces were, however, as he himself informs us in his Preface, written whilst he

* Page 70.

+ Page 144.

was on his travels, at which time he could not have been above twenty years of age; hence they ought not to be judged with the same severity as if they had been the productions of a maturer period of life. Without being influenced by this consideration, it is not more than is warranted by truth to say, that if he did not reach the excellence of some of his contemporaries, he far surpassed many who are infinitely better known to posterity; and in an age when almost every gentleman was a Sonneteer, we may fairly class Francis Davison amongst the few who were more indebted to nature than to art for their poetical qualifications. Sir Egerton Brydges, whose accurate judgment of early English poetry few will have the hardihood to dispute, has thus described Davison's productions: "A thought of native beauty, a felicitous combination of simple, elegant, and energetic words frequently catch the ear, and convey a sudden thrill of sympathy and admiration to the heart.” * His translations of the Psalms are not only the happiest of his efforts, but they have strong pretensions to be placed amongst the best versions of the inspired monarch which have ever appeared.

It is not, however, merely as a Poet that Francis Davison is to be considered; for from the large portion of his correspondence and other papers, now printed, we are enabled to estimate his talents on other subjects. His letters prove him to have been no less high-minded and affectionate, than he was intelligent

* Lee Priory Edition of the Rhapsody, Part III. p. 2.

and accomplished; but his prudence is certainly far from being satisfactorily evinced. Nor does it appear that at the period when our information about him closes he had acquired greater steadiness of conduct; for his father's office was ordered by the Secretary to be executed by his second son, Christopher, he paying a proportion of the emoluments to his brother Francis. Notwithstanding that Secretary Davison had several children, he only makes a provision in his will for such issue as his sons Francis and William may leave; from which it does not seem too much to infer, that they had each a family in 1608: but on this point nothing positive has been ascertained.

Besides the articles by Francis Davison which are printed in this work, there are several manuscripts in the Harleian collection, which bear a strong resemblance to his writing, and may with great probability be attributed to him, though the identity is not sufficiently established to justify their insertion. Of these the principal are, "That the Lord Treasurer Burleigh endeavoured to suppress and keep down Mr. Secretary Davison." "" * -Harl. MSS. 290, f. 237. "Names of persons of rank put to death during the reigns of Henry VII., Henry VIII., Edw. VI., and Mary."Ibid. f. 260. "Observables to be noted by a Traveller." -Ibid. f. 261, 262. "The Cypher used by Se

* Printed in the Appendix to the Life of Secretary Davison before cited.

These notes are nearly a verbatim copy, so far as they extend, of the first part of a small volume, 16mo. printed in