They gave him one comfortable expectation, that he would not be liable to fevers in the latter part of his life (which they thought would be none of the longest), and that if he still observed a regularity in his diet, as he grew older, he would be healthfuller every day than other; and so it proved, though his labours and watchings and fastings were far greater as he drew nearer to heaven.

14. He had both studied the Roman antiquities and the best modern accounts of her, and as this study begat in him St. Augustine's wish', to have seen her ancient glory, so it gave him a longing desire to see her present polity. But conferring with some that came from thence and were well acquainted with the English college there, he was assured the Jesuits had him in the wind already, and that those perfect intelligencers had a description of his person with such a character of his abilities and of his manners, that they concluded he came abroad with some great design. Therefore, as Rome was not so safe a place then as it is now for

1 "Present Rome may be said to be but the monument of Rome past, when she was in that flourish that St. Austin desired to see her in."-Howell, bk. i. s. 1, letter 38. "Augustinus fertur tria videre cupiisse: nimirum Christum in carne, Paulum in cathedra, Romam in flore.”—J. T. Freigius, Præf. in Rosin. Antiq. Rom. (Basil. 1583). For the reference to this passage, which probably gives the original form of this hackneyed saying, I am indebted to the learning of the Rev. Richard Gibbings. Elsewhere we find triumpho for flore.

2 The English government at this time looked with

Protestants, if they happened to be discovered, he stole away from Padua, and travelled very privately' on foot, casting his business so as to reach Rome upon Monday' in the great holy week before Easter. When there, he changed his lodgings every night, and stayed but ten days, which he managed as advantageously as possible to take a view of everything very remarkable. One time he very unadvisedly pressed into a gallery, through which the pope passing in state, all the people fell on their knees to beg his indulgence before Easter, which Mr. Ferrar was not aware of. Though he was too genteel a traveller to have scrupled at such compliments as were usually paid the pope as a temporal prince, set up in the midst of Christian kingdoms and supported at their charges, yet this good Protestant was so surprised at this encounter, that one of the Switz guard, seeing him stand amazed and taking him for some Dutchman, came up to him as if on purpose to preserve him, and clapping his heavy hand upon his shoulder he pressed him down, whispering him softly in the ear dune Skellam, dune

suspicion upon visits to Rome. "I have got a warrant," says Howell, "from the lords of the council to travel for three years anywhere, Rome and St. Omers excepted."—Letters, bk. i. s. 1, letter 3.

1 Communicating his route only to his friend Garton, who, in case anything should happen to him, was to send an account to his family.-Peckard, 63.

2 i.e. Apr. 3, 1615. Comp. § 15, n.

1

Skellam'. When the pope was gone by, the fellow took off his hand from his neck; so he got up and got away in the throng, but he felt the great heavy paw of the brawny Switzer a week after, nor would he thrust himself into such places of danger any

more.

15. And now taking his leave of Italy, he went to Marseilles, designing from thence to go by sea for Spain; but he was arrested at Marseilles by a more terrible fever than that which seized him before at Padua. Here his physician and his landlord took him for a knight of Malta, as they told him afterwards when he undeceived them. They thought him so because they had by chance espied, among his other curiosities, one of those little crosses usually worn by those knights, which was bestowed upon him when he was among them. His doctor confidently supposing him to be his countryman (for he spoke perfect Italian), wondered at his learned discourses in physic, which he thought very extraordinary for a young knight of Malta, and had a high veneration for him. At the beginning of his sickness he dispatched a passionate letter to his most dear friend Mr. Garton', a worthy English gentleman whom he left at Venice, entreating him to take a charitable voyage to visit the sick in a place where he was a perfect stranger, where he

1 Du Schelm, Du Schelm! (you rascal, you rascal!) In Dr. Turner's Life the words are Down, simpleton, down! 2 See § 71.

was obliged to be his own priest, his own book', ana was able to endure no light but from his own memory: wherefore he prayed him to come immediately, if ever he would see him alive or else procure him some corner for a Christian burial. His distemper grew so high and so acute, that he must either mend

die soon. His doctor took his leave (his last leave as he feared it would prove) one evening; but it pleased God, Whom he day and night invoked with a mighty fervour and with no less resignation, to send him a sound sleep and so comfortable a morning, that his physician pronounced it was a change preternatural and little less than supernatural, and that he was in the special care of the Divine providence. To double his hopes and joys (for which he never failed to double his thanks and praise to Almighty God), his friend Mr. Garton arrived and came to him that very day, even weeping over him and never parting from him' until a perfect recovery was established.

16. Soon after he shipped himself in a small English vessel of twelve guns bound from Marseilles3 to Spain; but they had not sailed far before

1 See § 2 with the note.

2 N. F. would take no refusal, but saw his friend safe back to Venice: when there he wrote (April, 1616) to his parents, giving them an account of his sickness and recovery. On leaving Venice he received from his friend a costly rapier, (comp. § 17. Peckard, 69.)

3 From Venice (Peckard, 69, who says the vessel carried ten guns).

a Turkish pirate gave them chase and fetched them up amain, though the wind was not very favourable to the pirate. The sailors began to tremble, and only the master and his mate had the heart to think of fighting, the major part inclining to strike *ail and yield immediately. Our traveller stood upon the deck and heard all, and said nothing till the master appealing to him asked his opinion. For, said he, this young gentleman has a life to lose as well as we; shall we hear what he thinks of it? Then this young Christian worthy animated them all with such words as David used'; Let us fall into the hands of God and not into the hands of men; however, not into the hands of such men as have cast off all humanity. He persuaded them to fight manfully, terrifying the fearful with horrid representations of the chains and stripes they must endure together with slavery, and firing the most phlegmatic by recounting how our ancestors lorded it over the sea and were renowned over all the world for their naval victories. He so wrought them, that they all prepared for an engagement, and he was as active2

1 2 Sam. xxiv. 14.

2 So Isaac Barrow, when his ship was attacked by a pirate, bore his part manfully in her successful resistance; and when afterwards asked, Why he did not go down into the hold, and leave the defence of the ship to those to whom it did belong? replied, It concerned no man more than myself; I would rather have lost my life, than have fallen into the hands of those merciless infidels. See Walter Pope's Life of Seth Ward, 136, 137, Barrow's Opusc. 211,