naked and simple terms, is strong, clear, and expressive; familiar, without vulgarity or meanness; and beautiful, without affectation or ornament. He is sometimes licentious in his satire; and transgresses the bounds of delicacy and purity. He, in the latter part of his life, availed himself of the privilege of his great wit to trifle; but when, in this instance, we deplore the misapplication of such wonderful abilities, we at the same time admire the whims, if not the dotages, of a Swift. He was, perhaps, the only clergyman of his time, who had a thorough knowledge of men and manners. His Tale of a Tub,' his Gulliver's Travels,' and his 'Drapier's Letters,' are the most considerable of his prose works; and his 'Legion Club,' his Cadenus and Vanessa,' and his Rhapsody on Poetry,' are at the head of his poetical performances. His writings, in general, are regarded as standing models of our language, as well as perpetual monuments of their author's fame."

Anne.. Perry. Another daughter.

ANECDOTES

OF THE

FAMILY OF SWIFT.

A FRAGMENT.

WRITTEN BY DR. SWIFT.

[The original Manuscript, in his own hand, is lodged in the University Library of Dublin.]

THE family of the Swifts was ancient in Yorkshire; from them descended a noted person, who passed under the name of Cavaliero Swift, a man of wit and humour. He was made an Irish Peer by King James or King Charles the First, with the title of Baron Carlingford,* but never was in that kingdom. Many traditional pleasant stories are related of him, which the family planted in Ireland had received from their parents. This lord died without issue male; and his heiress, whether of the first or second descent, was married to Robert Fielding, Esq., commonly called Handsome Fielding; she brought him a considerable estate in Yorkshire, which he squandered away, but had no children; the Earl of Eglinton married another co-heiress of the same family, as he has often told me.t

* Barnam Swift, Esq. was created Viscount (not Baron) of Carlingford, by King Charles I. March 20, 1627, and by his death in 1642, S. P. the title became extinct.

+ Scottish genealogists do not record such a marriage in the pedigree of the Eglintoun family.

Another of the same family was Sir Edward Swift, well known in the times of the great rebellion and usurpation, but I am ignorant whether he left heirs or not.

Of the other branch, whereof the greatest part settled in Ireland, the founder was William Swift, prebendary of Canterbury, towards the last years of Queen Elizabeth, and during the reign of King James the First. He was a divine of some distinction. There is a sermon of his extant, and the title is to be seen in the catalogue of the Bodleian Library, but I never could get a copy, and I suppose it would now be of little value.t

This William married the heiress of Philpott, I suppose a Yorkshiret gentleman, by whom he got a very considerable estate, which, however, she kept in her own power; I know not by what artifice. She was a capricious, illnatured, and passionate woman, of which I have been told several instances. And it has been a continual tradition in the family, that she absolutely disinherited her only son Thomas, for no greater crime than that of robbing an orchard when he was a boy. And thus much is certain, that except a church or chapter lease which was not renewed, Thomas never enjoyed more than one hundred pounds ayear, which was all at Goodrich, in Herefordshire, whereof not above one half is now in the possession of a great grandson.

His original picture§ is now in the hands of Godwin Swift, of Dublin, Esq. his great grandson, as well as that of his wife, who seems to have a good deal of the shrew in her countenance; whose arms of an heiress are joined with his own; and by the last he seems to have been a person somewhat fantastic; for in these he gives as his device, a dolphin (in those days called a Swift) twisted about an anchor, with this motto, Festina lente.

There is likewise a seal with the same coat of arms, (his not joined with his wife's,) which the said William commonly made use of, and this is also now in the possession of Godwin Swift above mentioned.

* William Swift was rector of St. Andrew's in Canterbury, not a prebendary.

+ It was preached Jan. 25, 1621, at St. George's, Canterbury, at the funeral of Sir Thomas Wilson, in Rom. viii. 18, and is written much in the style and manner of that age.-D. S.

More probably of Kent.-D. S.

Drawn in 1603, æt. 57; his wife's in the same year, æt. 54.D. S.

These pictures are still preserved in the family.

His eldest son Thomas seems to have been a clergyman before his father's death. He was vicar of Goodrich, in Herefordshire, within a mile or two of Ross; he had likewise another church living, with about one hundred pounds a-year in land, as I have already mentioned. He built a house on his own land in the village of Goodrich, which, by the architecture, denotes the builder to have been somewhat whimsical and singular, and very much toward a projector. The house is above a hundred years old, and still in good repair, inhabited by a tenant of the female line, but the landlord, a young gentleman, lives upon his own estate in Ireland.*

This Thomas was distinguished by his courage, as well as his loyalty to King Charles the First, and the sufferings he underwent for that prince, more than any person of his condition in England. Some historians of those times relate several particulars of what he acted, and what hardships he underwent for the person and cause of that blessed martyred prince. He was plundered by the Roundheads six-and-thirty times, some say above fifty. He engaged his small estate, and gathered all the money he could get, quilted it in his waistcoat, got off to a town held for the king, where being asked by the governor, who knew him well, "What he could do for his majesty ?" Mr. Swift said, "he would give the king his coat," and stripping it off, presented it to the governor; who observing it to be worth little, Mr. Swift said, "then take my waistcoat:" he bid the governor weigh it in his hand, who, ordering it to be ripped, found it lined with three hundred broad pieces of gold, which, as it proved a seasonable relief, must be allowed an extraordinary supply from a private clergyman with ten children, of a small estate, so of ten plundered, and soon after turned out of his livings in the church.

At another time, being informed that three hundred horse of the rebel party, intended in a week to pass over a

*This house, now the property of Mr. Theophilus Swift, is still standing. A vault is shown beneath the kitchen, accessible only by raising one of the flag stones. Here were concealed the provisions of bread and milk, which supported the lives of the family after they had been plundered by the Parliamentary soldiers. The vicar was in those days considered as a conjuror, especially when, his neighbours being discharged from assisting him, and all his provisions destroyed, he still continued to subsist his family. This vault is probably one of the peculiarities of architecture noticed by the Dean.