two fons, Sir Henry who fucceeded him, and Francis-Henry his fecond fon.

Sir Henry Lee dying without male iffue, by his wife Anne, eldeft daughter of Sir John Cornbury, in Oxfordfhire, the title of baronet devolved on his brother Sir Francis-Henry, who was, by command of the chancellor of the univerfity of Oxford, created mafter of arts, in Sept. 28, 1663, king Charles II. with his queen, and their respective courts, being prefent. He married Elizabeth, daughter and fole heir of Thomas Pope, earl of Downe in Ireland, by whom he had issue two fons, Sir Edward Henry Lee, who fucceeded him in his paternal honours and estate, and Francis-Henry Lee of the Temple, Efq.

Sir Edward-Henry Lee was, in the reign of Charles II. by letters patent, bearing date June 5, 1674, created baron of Spellbury, in the county of Bucks, and earl of the city of Litchfield. In the reign of James II: he was conftituted lord-lieutenant and cuftos rotulorum of the county of Oxford, lord-lieutenant of Woodftock-park, high-tteward of the borough of Woodstock, one of the lords of his majefty's bed-chamber, colonel of a regiment of foot, and afterwards colonel of his majesty's first regiment of foot guards. He died July 14, 1716, at Greenwich, and had issue by his wife, lady Char

John

lotte Fitzroy, (one of the natural daughters of Charles II. by the duchess of Cleveland) thirteen fons, and five daughters.

He was fucceeded in his title and eftate by his fixth fon, George Henry Lee, father of the prefent earl, born March 12, 1689, who married Frances, daughter of Sir John Hales of Woodchurch, in the county of Kent, bart. by whom he had iffue three fons and five daughters. His lordhip departed this life in February 15, 1742-3, and was fucceeded by his eldeft fon

George-Henry Lee, the prefent earl of Litchfield, who married Diana, only daughter of Sir Thomas Frankland, bart. by whom he has no children. His lordship's titles are, earl of Litchfield, vifcount Quarendon, baron of Spelfbury, and baronet,. cuftos brevium in the court of common-pleas, chancellor of the univerfity of Oxford, &c. &c.

Armorial bearings.] Argent, a fels between three crefcents, fable.

Creft.] In a marquis's coronet or, a demi-ftone-colume argent, and on its capital, a bird's leg eraz'd at the thigh, perch'd, prey'd on by a falcon, all proper.

Motto.] Fide et Conftantia. By fi delity and perfeverance.

Chief Seats.] At Ditchley, in Oxfordshire; and in Bruton Street, London.

him fucceffively with three artifts" eminent in different ftiles. Stein, however, with all his fuccefs in this fine art, and the reputation to which he foon rofe by his works, thought

there

there was no living comfortably without other fupplies: accordingly, with great joy, and warm expretlions of gratitude, he embraced the propofal of his father, of fetting him up in a brewhouse at Delft; but, within the twelvemonth, careleffness and intemperance ruined him. Afterwards brewer Stein turned vintner; this was only making bad worse, for the greater part of his wine he himself drank. When his cellar was empty, he ufed to take down the fign, and clofely fall to painting, and with the money accruing from a few pictures, as they always fald well, he laid in a fresh ftock of wine, which went the fame way as the laft.-Did not genius often fupply the want of application and study, it could not eafily be conceived how a man perpetually in liquor fhould produce fuch fine pieces. Indeed, the fubjects of molt of his pictures bear no little affinity with his prevailing difpofition, being fcenes in tippling boufes. But we have alfo fome hiftorical pieces of his, where neither grandeur nor fentiment are wanting; few painters have better characterized their compofitions, and given more life to their figures; his defign is very correct, his colouring good, with an eafy pencil, and a touch full of expreflion.

Stein, it feems, had an incomparable knack at telling ftories, and Francis Meiris had like to have paid dear for the delight he took in hearing him. He had just parted from Stein, after spending a good part of the night in drinking and drollery; it being very dark, he fell into a common-fewer, which the workmen had left open in this plight, he owed his life to an induftrious cobler and his wife, who, being at work in a neighbouring ftall, heard his groans;

with great difficulty they got him out, and having folaced him with a glafs of brandy, put him into a bed well warmed. Meiris did not let this kind office go unrewarded; he fhut himself up and laboured affiduoufly on a fmall picture, which he carried to his deliverers, telling them that he came from a man whom they had one night drawn from a very difagreeable plunge and this picture brought them 800 florins. An ingenious mind cannot but admire the delicacy of this liberal artift, who, in making fuch a confiderable prefent, would not fo much as be known. This excellent painter furpaffed Gerrard Doun his master; like him he copied his models with the concave glass, instead of designing them by fquares.

Maria Sibylla Merian is highly praifed both by naturalifts and painters: her pertinacious refolution to leave the needle for the pencil, brought to her mother's mind, that, when pregnant with her, fhe had been troubled with a kind of diforder, which was an unusual, but very active, defire of furveying infects, and all other natural curiofities, and that fhe had made no fmall collection of caterpillars, fhells, and petrifications, which the used to make her greatest amusement. This is adduced as a farther inftance of the impreffion of a mother's inclination on her children; but this fyftem seems daily to lofe ground. However it be, mademoifelle Merian was a phænomenon, indeed, both in the depth of her ftudies, and the delicacy of her pencil.

Gerard Laireffe, called the Flemish Pouffin, having but little business at Liege, the place of his birth, received an invitation from a dealer in pictures at Amfterdam. The day after his arrival, a piece of canvas, fome Q 9 2 crayons,

crayons, and a palette, were brought to him; after ftanding fome time filent and motionlefs, as a ftatue, to the great furprize of the company, he drew a fiddle from under his cloak and played fome tunes; then haftily taking up a crayon and pencil, he fketched a Jefus in the manger: this done, he fell to fiddling again; then laying down his crowd, he, within two hours, painted the feveral heads of the Infant, Mary, Jofeph, and of the Ox, and fo fupremely finished, that he left the fpectators no lefs charmed with the beauty of his work and eafy manner, than aftonifhed at his preparation. From one well-known inftance of his furprizing readiness, we need not hesitate to believe all the wonders related of it. He laid a wager, that in one day he would paint Apollo and the Mofes on Parnaffus, as big as life,

and won.

But Laireffe's genius and talents were fullied by a moft fhameful intemperance, which, in time, deprived him of his fight. In this melancholy condition, all his comfort and refource was to talk of his art. He allowed one day in the week to artists and the curious, and in these conferences he difcourfed fucceffively of all the branches of painting. As an expedient, under his inability of writing, he invented fome figns cafier than letters, to exprefs fuch ideas which he was afraid of lofing; these he delineated on a large primed cloth, and his fon, to whom he had taught the import of thefe marks, never failed every day to take them off in common writing. After his decease, thefe fcraps, and his weekly lectures, were digefted into two volumes, with plates; the first treats of Defign, the fecond of Painting.

arts, but a man of intolerable vanity and ignorance. Bever is a young fellow lately arrived from Oxford, and recommended by his father to the acquaintance of Sir Thomas, as the propereft means of initiating him into the republic of letters, an honour of which the young gentleman is fuppofed to be not a little ambitious. His vifits at Sir Thomas's are attended with the lofs of his heart, which Juliette, the knight's niece, captivates in a fhort time; but in return the makes him a prefent of her own, and takes every method the can to give him her hand into the bargain. To effect this, however, he has one confiderable difficulty to furmount, her uncle,

upon

upon whom her whole dependance js, having promifed her to Mr. Ruft, a celebrated antiquarian.

The converfation between Bever and his friend is interrupted by the appearance of Sir Peter Pepperpot, a Weft-Indian of great fortune, who is going to feast on a delicious Barbecue, and is rating a couple of negroes by whom he is attended, for neglecting to carry his bottle of Kian.

This gentleman is alfo a pretended patron of the arts; but neverthelefs feems more folicitous about the prefervation of the body than the improvement of the mind, his whole difcourfe turning upon the excellence of turtle; and the laft fleet having brought him five, he tells us, that he difpofed of two at Cornhill, fent a third to Almack's; and the remaining two being unhealthy, he packed them off to his borough in Yorkfaire. The laft indeed (fays he) I fmuggled, for the unconscionable rafcal of a stage-driver ufed to charge me five pounds for the carriage; but my coachman having occafion to go into the country, he clapped a capuchin upon the turtle, and carried it down for thirty fhillings as an infide paffenger;-the frolic, however, was near proving fatal, for as Betty the bar-maid at Hatfield, thruft her head into the coach to know what the company chofe for breakfaft, the turtle fnapped her by the nofe, and it was with the greateft difficulty they could difengage her." Sir Peter further tells them, that his borough is fuch a connoiffeur in turtle, that it can diftinguish the path from the pee, and leaves them to judge by the confumption how univerfally it is efteemed. Six pounds being, according to him, the fint of an alderman; five the allowance of his 6

wife, and the mayor, the parfon, and the recorder being indulged without limitation.

-

Sir Peter has no fooner retired, than Bever and his friend are again interrupted by a quarrel between Dactyl a poet, and Puff a publisher; owing to the latter having refused to purchase a copy of Dactyl, which is all praife and panegyrick.—In this altercation, the poet and publisher mutually recriminate. The bard puts Puff in mind, that till he took notice of him,-his shop was nothing but a shed in Moorfields; his kitchen a pan of charcoal, and his bed under the counter;-to which the other replies, by threatening to reftrain his hand, and declaring he will give no more beef and carrots of a morning.

By Juliette's advice Mr. Bever had flattered Sir Thomas fo fuccefsfully, that the knight at laft profeffes the greatest friendship imaginable for him, and informs him of what he calls the greateft fecret of his life; begging at the fame time Mr. Bever's affiftance, as the ftrongest mark of attachment and efteem. Sir Thomas had it seems written a play, which was to be acted that night, under the title of Robinson Crusoe, but had tranfacted every thing with fo much fecrecy, that nobody fufpected him for the author. The manager, however, of Drury-lane, where he fays it is to be performed, hearing that every anonymous production was placed to his own account, infifted upon, and obtained a pofitive promife from Sir Thomas, that he fhould know the poet's name before the curtain drew up. Sir Thomas's vanity making him rather apprehenfive about the fuccefs of his piece, he determined to make Mr. Bever pafs for the author, that fo, if it happened to fail, the

whole

whole difgrace fhould be laid at that gentleman's door, knowing that if it was well received, nothing would be easier than to whisper the truth, and get the whole reputation tranfferred to his own. Urged by this motive, he entreats Mr. Bever would oblige him by an acquiefcence, with which our young lover, after a confiderable ftruggle within himself, complies. Unhappily for the poor knight, the play is damned before the end of the third at. Dactyl, Puff, and Ruft, whom he had fent to fupport it, very quickly follow his fervants with an account of its fate; nor is Bever long after them, but comes back fired with rage and indignation, to make Sir Thomas take the scandal of the play on himfelf-In vain our Patron begs, argues, remonstrates, foothes; Bever tells him he fhould be gibbeted down to all pofterity, with the author of Love in a Hollow Tree, and afks if he imagined any family would receive him after fo public a difgrace; the knight inftantly anfwers he would; upon which Bever directly demands his niece, as a recompence for keeping the fecret; and bearing the infamy of the piece. Sir Thomas confents, and joining their hands, fays to Juliette,

Here take bis band-I owe him much-I know it,

Lnd make the man, although I damn the poet. In the fecond act we have the following humorous ftroke, which may ferve as a fpecimen of the performance. Ruft being afked by Sir Thomas if any thing new had been added to his collection of curiofities, he replies, "Why, I don't know, Sir Thomas; I have both loft and gained in the courfe of the week.—

The urn that held the ashes of Agrippa

Sir Thomas. "No accident I hope.-

Ruft. "Has fallen a martyr to ignorance and barbarity; for a new housemaid miftaking it for a crack'd chamber-pot, carried it down ftairs one morning, and threw it into a cart to a dustman. I have got fomething, however, to make amends; here it is.-I am no churl, but love to regale my friends with a fight of my treasures; here it is—I believe fome of the letters are still to be feen-'Tis a little bit of the famous North Briton that was burned before the Change, on Cornhill.—— But huh,-for as it has not fuffered the law, 'tis poffible they may be inclined to feize it out of my hands; and that, you know, would be an irreparable misfortune."

This piece, which is taken from the Connoiffeur of Marmontel, is the fecond performance for which our ftage has been indebted to that writer. The French author, indeed, in his preface to his Moral Tales, tells us that he has there furnished the poets with fufficient matter for theatrical entertainment, without putting them to the trouble of inventing. Accordingly, we have feen one of the first geniufes of the age, following him, the beginning of laft winter, in a piece which was received with very uncommon, but deferved, applaufe. Mr. Foote is now treading the fame path, and if we are rightly informed, another gentleman, as yet but little known to the public, is preparing a piece or two from the fame author, which may be expected next feafon.

Some