Читать книгу Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe - Ann Fanshawe - Страница 7

In Hypogeo, juxta hoc monumentum, jacet corpus nobilissimi viri RICARDI FANSHAWE, Equitis Aurati et Baronetti, ex antiqua illa familia de Ware Parke, in comitatu Hertfordiae, Henrici Fanshawe, Equitis Aurati, prolis decimae. Uxorem duxit Annam filiam natu maximam Johannis Harrison, Equitis Aurati, de Balls, in com. Hertfordiae; et ex ea suscepit sex filios et octo filias; e quibus supersunt Ricardus, Catherina, Margarita, Anna, et Elizabetha. Vir comitate morum, luce fidei, constantia, praestantissimus, qui olim (laetus exul) serenissimi regis Caroli Secundi calamitates fortiter amplexus est, in Rebus bellicis, ab eodem constitutus Secretarius, posteaque (Regno ei feliciter restaurato) libellorum supplicum Magister, a Latinis epistolis, a sanctioribus Regis consiliis tum Angliae, tum Hiberniae factus; pro Academia Cantabrigiensi Burgensis; Necnon ejusdem serenissimi Regis ad utrasque Aulas Portugal. et Hispan. Legatus, in quarum proxima, cum pulcherrime officio suo functus esset, splendidissimam quamdiu egerat Vitam cum luctuosa morte commutavit. Monumentum hoc, cum Hypogeo, moestissima conjux pie posuit, quas etiam corpus Mariti sui ab urbe Madrid huc per terras transtulit.

Obiit 16 de Junii, anno Dom MDCLXVI aetatis suae LIX. [Footnote: Clutterbuck's History of Hertfordshire, vol. iii. page 311. The following arms occur on the monument: Quarterly, 1st and 4th, Or, a chevron between three fleurs-de-lis Sable, Fanshawe ancient; 2nd and 3rd, cheeky Argent and Azure, a cross Gules, Fanshawe modern, being an honourable augmentation granted in 1650: on an escutcheon in the centre, the arms of Ulster. Impaling, Checky, a cross, thereon five pheons' heads, pointing upwards. Harrison. Crest, on a wreath, Or and Azure, a dragon's head erased Or, vomiting fire. On a label under the arms these mottos: "Dux vitae ratio." "In Christo victoria."]

Sir Richard Fanshawe was buried with much pomp; and a full account of the ceremony occurs in his funeral certificate in the College of Arms.

From the King, the Queen, the Court, and some of the ministers, Lady Fanshawe received much sympathy and kindness; but, in common with every other person who had pecuniary claims on the Government, she experienced great difficulty in procuring the arrears due to her husband, and it was not until nearly three years that the whole was paid; by which delay, she says, she sustained a loss of above two thousand pounds. At the instigation of Lord Shaftesbury, of whom she speaks with the utmost bitterness, she was obliged to pay the same amount for the plate furnished to the embassy.

Of the tardy manner in which Sir Richard Fanshawe's allowance was paid, and the embarrassment into which he was consequently thrown, he has left ample proof in his letter to his brother-in-law Sir Philip Warwick, dated a few weeks before his death; in which he tells him that he had been obliged to pawn his plate for his subsistence.

Lady Fanshawe states in a very feeling manner the situation in which she found herself after her husband's death; and it is scarcely possible to read her allusions to his long and faithful services, and the heavy sacrifices which he made, without admitting the justice of the charge so often brought against Charles, of being neglectful of his servants. It is, however, more than possible that the fault was not the monarch's alone. He was surrounded by greedy and selfish courtiers, each eager to advance his own interest, and possessed of similar claims on the ground of services; and as the spoils out of which they sought to enrich themselves were limited, it was an obvious point of policy to oppose the demands of others. The few years which succeeded the Restoration are among the most disgraceful in the annals of this country; and to the evidence which exists of the want of principle which characterised the Court of Charles the Second, these Memoirs are no slight addition. The monarch was heartless and profligate; his ministers, with very few exceptions, were intent alone on the promotion of their own interests; and services and sufferings were nothing in the balance against the influence of the royal mistresses. In such a state of things, merit availed but little; and with a host of other zealous adherents of the royal family, at a time when fidelity was attended with the fearful penalties attached to high treason, Sir Richard Fanshawe, after thirty years' devotion to his master, and spending a fortune in his cause, was sacrificed to the intrigues of his enemies, and probably was only spared by death from greater mortifications.

To this outline of the lives of Sir Richard and Lady Fanshawe little remains to be added. The Memoir, though continued to the year 1670, contains very few facts after her return to England which are deserving of notice. It is manifest that her hopes were destroyed, and that her only happiness consisted in reflecting on the past. Her first object was to reduce her establishment according to her altered fortune, and the second to educate her family. In 1670 she lost her excellent father, whose death added heavily to her misfortunes; but she possessed that resource against human woes which can only be inspired by a reliance upon Him who never deserts the widow and the fatherless. Her life had been marked by extreme vicissitudes; and at its conclusion—dark and cheerless as it was—she wisely looked for consolation where she had so frequently found it, and where, it may be confidently said, it is never sought in vain.

Of the conduct of Sir Richard Fanshawe, as a servant of the Crown, and as a husband and a father, sufficient is said in the Memoir; but it is desirable to notice his literary labours, which are stated in the Biographia Britannica to consist of—

1. An English translation, in rhyme, of the celebrated Italian pastoral, called "Il Pastor Fido, or, the Faithful Shepherd," written originally by Battista Guarini. Printed at London, 1646, 4to, and in 1664, 8vo.

2. Select parts of Horace translated into English, 1652, 8vo.

3. A translation from English into Latin verse, of "The Faithful Shepherdess," a pastoral, written originally by John Fletcher. London, 1658.

4. In the octavo edition of "The Faithful Shepherdess," anno 1664, are inserted the following poems by Sir Richard, viz.: 1. An Ode upon occasion of his Majesty's Proclamation in 1630, commanding the gentry to reside upon their estates in the country. 2. A summary Discourse on the Civil Wars of Rome, extracted from the best Latin writers in verse and prose. 3. An English translation of the fourth book of the AEneid of Virgil or the Loves of Dido and AEneas. 4. Two Odes out of Horace, relating to the civil wars of Rome, against covetous rich men. 5. He translated, from Portuguese, into English, "The Luciad, or Portugal's Historical Poem"; written originally by Luis de Camoens. London, 1655, fol. From the many corrections in the Translator's copy, in the possession of the late Edm. Turnor, Esq., it appears to have been very negligently printed, which may in some degree account for the remarks of Mr. Mickle on Sir Richard's translation. After his decease, namely in 1671, two of his posthumous pieces in 4to were published, Querer per solo querer: "To love only for love's sake," a dramatic piece, represented before the King and Queen of Spain; and Fiestas de Aranjuez: "Festivals at Aranjuez"; both written originally in Spanish, by Antonio de Mendoza; upon occasion of celebrating the birthday of King Philip IV. in 1621, at Aranjuez. They were translated by Sir Richard in 1654, during his confinement at Tankersley Park, in Yorkshire; which situation induced him to write the following stanzas:

"Time was, when I, a pilgrim of the seas,

When I, 'midst noise of camps and court's disease,

Purloin'd some hours, to charm rude cares with verse,

Which flame of faithful shepherd did rehearse.

"But now, restrain'd from sea, from camp, from court,

And by a tempest blown into a port,

I raise my thoughts to muse of higher things,

And echo arms and loves of queens and kings.

"Which queens (despising crowns and Hymen's band)

Would neither man obey, nor man command;

Great pleasure from rough seas to see the shore;

Or, from firm land, to see the billows roar."

Sir Richard, to whom Mr. Campbell assigns the merit of having given "to our language some of its earliest and most important translations from modern literature," [Footnote: Specimens of the Poets.] wrote several other articles, which he had not leisure to complete; and it is said that "some of the before mentioned printed pieces have not all the perfection which our ingenious author could have given them, but that is not the case with his excellent translation of Pastor Fido." [Footnote: Biographia Britannica.]

That translation is highly complimented by Denham, who observes,

"Such is our pride, or folly, or our fate,

That few but such as cannot write translate;"

and after censuring servile translators, he says—

"Secure of fame, thou justly dost esteem

Less honour to create than to redeem;

That servile path thou nobly dost decline,

Of tracing word by word, and line by line."

And,

"That master's hand, which to the life can trace

The air, the line, the features, of the face,

May with a free and bolder stroke express

A varied posture, or a flatt'ring dress;

He could have made those like, who made the rest,

But that he knew his own design was best."