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Show 2-14 ATROCIOUS JUDGE • (A. D.l685. Jeffreys was always ready to join jn the laugh. I n1ny offer as an example "the story of the rhinoceroN." l\Iy lord keeper went one day into the ci1 y, aec01n panir•d by his brother Sir Dudley, to see a rl1inoccros of enormou., size lately imported, and about to be exhibited a a 'how.* Next n1orning, at Whitehall, a run1or was industriously . pread that the lord keeper had been riding on the rhinoceros, " anJ soon after dinner some lords and other" cau1e to his lord -·hip to know the truth fron1 himself; for the ·etters of the lie affirmed it positively, as of their own know ledge. 1'hat did not give his lordship much disturbance, for he expected no better from his adversarie". But that his friends, intelligent persons, who n1u ·t know him to be f~u from guilty of any chil<li h levity, should believe it, was what roiled him extremely, and much more when they had the f~tce to come to hin1 to know if it were true. ~S o 1" t pa ~ ecl ; an d t h e l~arl of Sunderland with ' J effreys and others of that crew, n ever blushed aL the lie of their own making, but valued them~ elvcs upon it as a very good j est." To try how far his complianC'c with tl1e lnnn ors of the court would go, they next per uaded hi -- own brother-in-bw (that. he n1ight not su pect the hoax) to wait upon him, and in strict confidence, and with great seriousness, to advise him to keep a mistress, "otherwise he would lo ... e all his interest with the king ; for it was well understood that he was ill looked upon for want of doing o, becatbe he seemed continually to reprehend then1 by not falling in with the general custom ; and the messenger added, that if his lordship plea eel * Evelyn tells us that this was the first rhinoceros ever introduced into England, and that it sold for two thousand pounds. ).. D. 1()85.] FRANC1S NORTll. 24:) he ·would help hin1 to one." lie d eclineJ the offer- with much politeness, however, lest he hould gi\'e ofl'cncc. But with his familiar fi·ienJs " he 1nade wonderfully merry with this state policy, e~pecially the procuring part, and said, that if he were to entertain u m::u.1a1n, it would be one of his own ehoosing, and not one of their s tale trumpery." Although he never a i1ned at oratory, it i ... said that he meditated a " history of hi" own times. ' lie n1ight have tran, mitted to us many cm·iou · anecdotes, but the perfonnance must have been without literary merit; for son1e of his notes which he had written a, m::ttcrials are in the most wretched style, and how that he wa un~cqnuintcd with the first principles of English c01nposition, and eveu with the common rules of grammar. Ile diu publi ·h two or three short tract "on music" and other ubjccL which were soon forgotten. lie was well ver eel in music, conYersed -with t)ir Peter Lely about painting, speculated with natural philo:-;ophers on the u e of the bladder of fi --he~, and learn eel several of the continental language ; but he c::een1s ne,·er to have looked into a classical writer after he left colleo·e and to have had the '-Came 0 ' ta. tc for the belles lettres a his brother l~ogcr, who, placing them all in the dUne category, talks with equal contempt of " departed q uuck , poets, and almanack n1aker ' ." AlLhough his two immedi::ttc predecessors were libellc(l and lauded by popular ver::;es in the mouths of every one, I can find no allu ion in any fine writer either of the court or country party to North; and it 1nay be uoubtful whether he knew anything of the works of Duller, of Dryucn, of "\V ullcr, or of Cowley, beyond the snatches of them he n1UJ have heard r epeated in the merry circle at Whitehall. l-Ie lived very hospitably, receiving those who r etailed the 21 * |
