



Produced by David Garcia, Linda Hamilton, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net









[Illustration: _Harl. MS., Brit. Mus., N^o. 5353, fo. 111_]

G. F. TUPPER, LITHOG: LONDON. 1868.




  DIARY
  OF
  JOHN MANNINGHAM,

  OF THE MIDDLE TEMPLE,
  AND OF BRADBOURNE, KENT, BARRISTER-AT-LAW,

  1602-1603.

  EDITED FROM THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT BY
  JOHN BRUCE, ESQ.,

  AND PRESENTED TO THE CAMDEN SOCIETY BY
  WILLIAM TITE, ESQ., M.P., F.R.S., F.S.A.,
  PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIETY.

  WESTMINSTER:
  PRINTED BY J. B. NICHOLS AND SONS.

  M.DCCC.LX.VIII




  WESTMINSTER:
  J. B. NICHOLS AND SONS, PRINTERS,
  25, PARLIAMENT STREET.




  TO
  THE COUNCIL AND MEMBERS
  OF
  THE CAMDEN SOCIETY.

GENTLEMEN,

When you did me the honour to appoint me President of your most useful
Society as the successor of the Marquess Camden, I felt anxious to
express my sense of that honour by some appropriate acknowledgment.

I at first thought of printing a MS. from my own library, but, not
finding one that seemed exactly suitable, in my difficulty I applied to
my old and valued friend Mr. Bruce, and he pointed out to me
Manningham's Diary in the British Museum as possessing a varied interest
in the literary world which was likely to commend it to your notice. I
willingly adopted his suggestion; and I owe to him my sincere
acknowledgments for the pains he has bestowed in seeing the work through
the press, and in prefacing it with an interesting essay.

I have now to offer you this copy of Manningham's little book, and to
assure you how sincerely I am

Your obedient and obliged servant,

  WILLIAM TITE.
  42, Lowndes Square,
  3rd October, 1868.




PREFACE.


The original of MANNINGHAM'S DIARY, which is here printed, is No. 5353
in the Harleian collection of MSS. in the British Museum. It is a
diminutive 12mo. volume, measuring not quite six inches by four, and
containing 133 leaves. The handwriting, of which an admirable
representation is given in the fac-simile prefixed, is small, and in the
main extremely legible; yet in some few places, from haste in the
writer, from corrections, from blotting, from the effects of time, and
from other obvious causes, difficulties have occurred in a word or two,
which, even with the assistance of gentlemen most skilful in reading the
old hands, have not been entirely overcome. The few instances in which
the collater has been baffled are indicated by marks of doubt.

The first historical writer who noticed this little volume for a
literary purpose was Mr. John Payne Collier. In his Annals of the Stage,
published in 1831 (i. 320), Mr. Collier quoted from this Diary various
passages connected with his special subject, and drew attention to the
principal personal facts disclosed by the writer respecting himself,
namely, that he had many relations in Kent, and had probably been a
member of the Middle Temple.

The late Mr. Joseph Hunter was the next writer who used the work for an
historical purpose.[1] With his well-known fondness for genealogical
inquiries he applied himself to determine who the writer was whom Mr.
Collier had designated merely as a barrister. In this inquiry Mr. Hunter
was completely successful. Pursuing the clue given by the mention of
relationships in Kent in the various ways which would occur to a person
skilled in such investigations, Mr. Hunter fell upon a track in which
coincidences between the facts stated in the MS. and those elicited by
his own researches followed one another so rapidly as in the end to
leave not even the shadow of a doubt that the desired result had been
obtained.

    [Footnote 1: See his Illustrations of Shakespeare, i. 365.]

We shall briefly indicate the course by which Mr. Hunter arrived at his
conclusions. It looks easy enough after the end has been attained, but
it will be borne in mind that inquiries of this kind are extremely
discursive. The statement of a few leading facts upon the establishment
of which the final conclusion is arrived at, gives no idea of the time
lost in investigations which are merely tentative. In all such inquiries
we are soon reminded of the pretty passages which, after turnings and
windings almost _ad libitum_, are ultimately found to lead to nothing.

Besides cousins of at least seven different names who are alluded to by
the Diarist, several of them in connection with Canterbury, Sandwich,
and Godmersham, there is one whom he specially commemorates as "my
cousin in Kent" (p. 19), and whom he frequently vouches by that
designation, or merely as his cousin, as his authority for information
which he chronicles. This cousin was evidently the writer's most
important connection--the great man of the family. To visit him and his
somewhat wayward second wife was the principal object of the Diarist's
journeys into Kent. It also appears that this cousin was a man advanced
in life,--roughly stated to be 62 years of age in March 1602-3, and that
he resided at a place called Bradbourne, in the neighbourhood of
Maidstone. This last fact led directly to the identification desired.

Bradbourne was easily found. It has been for centuries a family seat in
the parish of East Malling. Hasted has represented the house in one of
his pictorial illustrations pretty much as it yet exists. It has been
shorn indeed of many of the noble trees, of the deer, and of some of the
other aristocratic adornments with which the county historian surrounded
it, but it still stands a stately old-fashioned red-brick mansion,
probably of the date of the reign of Queen Anne. Long before that period
the same spot was occupied by a previous residence of a county family.
From the time of the Protectorate it has belonged to a branch of the old
Kentish stock, the Twysdens; and before they purchased it--"in the reign
of Queen Elizabeth," as Hasted remarks[2]--"it was in the possession of
a family named Manningham."--Manningham! Our diarist slightly alludes to
a cousin of that name, "G. Manningham, deceased."[3] The clue was vague,
but at that little chink there entered light sufficient to guide the
researches of an antiquary.

    [Footnote 2: Vol. ii. p. 215, ed. 1782.]

    [Footnote 3: P. 108.]

The inscriptions on the older monuments in East Malling church are
printed in Thorpe's _Registrum Roffense_.[4] To them Mr. Hunter had
recourse, and with good success. Amongst them he found one upon a
monument[5] still standing on the north side of the chancel of the
church to a Richard Manningham, evidently a person of importance in that
neighbourhood. It is not stated in the inscription that he was the
owner of Bradbourne, but he lived at the time when our author paid his
visits thither, and his age, as given on the monument, although not
coincident with that stated by the Diarist,--for the monument declares
that Richard Manningham died on the 25th April, 1611, in his 72nd
year,--was sufficiently near to stimulate to further inquiries. But
without following Mr. Hunter step by step it will be enough to state
that from the inscription he went to Doctors' Commons, where, under the
vicious system of mismanagement which then prevailed, he was one of the
favoured two or three who were permitted to use the testamentary
records, whilst all other inquirers were excluded with a most offensive
disregard of courtesy. The will of Richard Manningham helped on the
inquiry very considerably. It was further advanced by an heraldic
Visitation of Kent, and was finally and triumphantly concluded by an
inspection of the register-books of the Middle Temple.

    [Footnote 4: Lond. 1769, fol. p. 793.]

    [Footnote 5: The inscription is surmounted by a bust of singular
    coarseness, evidently the work of some country sculptor, and
    executed in the worst taste and manner.]

Without derogating in the slightest degree from the merit of Mr.
Hunter's investigations, or desiring to deprive his memory of one atom
of the credit which attaches to it on that account, we prefer to state
the facts respecting the Manninghams in words of our own, which will
enable us to weave into the narrative some additions to the results of
Mr. Hunter's inquiries.

About the middle of the sixteenth century the Manninghams were a
numerous family of the middle class,[6] branches of which were scattered
about in various parts of England. The Richard Manningham of the
monument at East Malling was born at St. Alban's; Robert Manningham,
descended from a stock which removed out of Bedfordshire into
Cambridgeshire, lived and died at Fen Drayton in that county; George
Manningham dwelt in Kent, and from the marriages of his female
descendants in that county there probably sprang the numerous cousinred
of the family to which we have already alluded. Their _status_ in Kent
before Richard Manningham settled at Bradbourne may be inferred from one
fact which appears in the Diary, namely, that George Manningham was
bound as surety with William Somner, father of the well known antiquary
of Canterbury, for the father's performance of the duties of the
registrarship of the Ecclesiastical Court, in which office he preceded
his son.

    [Footnote 6: "_Honesta natus familia_" are the words of the
    inscription to Richard Manningham, the very words used also as
    descriptive of the descent of Sir Thomas More on his monument in
    Chelsea church; _familia non celebri sed honesta natus_. (Faulkner's
    Chelsea, i. 207.)]

Richard, Robert, and George Manningham are all stated to have been
relations, and probably they all stood about upon a par in worldly
circumstances, but Richard pursued a way of life which enabled him to
shoot ahead of all the members of his family. Of his youth we have no
particulars, but he was well educated even according to present notions.
He united an acquaintance with modern languages to the share of
classical knowledge taught in our old grammar-schools, and is
commemorated as having spoken and written Latin, French, and Dutch, with
freedom and elegance, and as having been able at the age of sixty-two to
repeat _memoriter_ almost the whole of the first and second books of the
AEneid.

Brought up to some branch of commerce, he was a member of the Mercers'
Company of London, and in his business days resided in the metropolis,
but age found him with a competency, and brought with it some customary
infirmities. He retired from London, purchased the quiet sheltered
Bradbourne, and passed the evening of his days in occupations in which
literature bore a considerable share.

He was twice married; the first time to a native of Holland, a family
connection of the Lady Palavicini, afterwards wife of Sir Oliver
Cromwell, the uncle of the future Protector.[7] This marriage was a
happy one. The lady survived the purchase of Bradbourne,[8] and was
buried in the church of East Malling. Richard Manningham's second match
was with a Kentish widow. The traces we find of her in the Diary do not
leave an impression that she added much to her husband's happiness. She
is not alluded to in his will. We may therefore conclude that she died
between 1602 and 1611.[9] There is no mention of issue by either
marriage.

    [Footnote 7: Diary, pp. 49, 51.]

    [Footnote 8: The last notice we have of her is under the date of
    1595, when her husband, "at her request and for her sake," lent her
    kinsmen, Arnold Verbeck, Abraham Verbeck, and Goris Besselles,
    merchant-strangers, 400_l._ which remained due with all interest
    upon it up to the 21st January 1611-12, the date of his will. He
    forgave his debtors the amount, provided they paid 40_l._ a piece to
    Margarita and Susanna Verbeck, daughters of Arnold, and to the
    testator's niece Janeken Vermeren, daughter of his first wife's
    sister, within twelve months after his decease.]

    [Footnote 9: The registers of East Malling do not begin until 1640.
    We beg warmly to acknowledge our obligations to the Rev. W. L.
    Wigan, the rector, who in the kindest manner searched from 1640 to
    1660 for entries relating to the Manninghams, but without finding
    anything about them.]

Childless, solitary, and infirm, Richard Manningham was in no degree
misanthropic. Out of his abundance he applied considerable sums in
charity, and for the benefit of his kindred, and at an early period
looked around for a Manningham who might inherit the principal portion
of his property and carry on his name. His choice fell upon John
Manningham, a son of Robert of Fen Drayton, and his wife Joan, a
daughter of John Fisher of Bledlow in the county of Bedford. That person
is our Diarist.

Richard Manningham carried out the obligations of this adoption in the
most liberal way. It is obvious from the Diary that John Manningham,
whom Richard Manningham designated by the several titles of "cousin,"
"kinsman," and "son in love," received a generous education of the best
kind. He was intended for the practice of the law, and on the 16th
March, 1597-8, was entered of the Middle Temple, as the son and heir of
Robert Manningham of Fen Drayton, gentleman, deceased. John Chapman,
probably the same person who is mentioned in the Diary as one of the
cousins who lived at Godmersham,[10] and John Hoskyns, were the members
of the Inn who were his sureties upon his admission.

    [Footnote 10: Diary, pp. 108, 111.]

On the 7th June 1605, having kept his exercises and been on the books
for the needful seven years, he was called to the degree of an utter
barrister; whether afterwards advanced to the dignity of being permitted
to plead in actual causes in court does not appear.

Whilst in the Temple he had for his chamber-fellow Edward Curle, son
of William Curle, a retainer of Sir Robert Cecil, who procured him to
be appointed one of the auditors of the Court of Wards. Several
persons of this family are quoted in the Diary, and the close
relationship of chamber-fellow ripened not merely into lasting
friendship with Edward Curle, and with his brother Walter, who
afterwards became Bishop of Winchester, but into affection towards
their sister Anne. John Manningham and Anne Curle were married
probably about 1607. A son was born to them in 1608, who was named
Richard after the _quasi_-grandfather at Bradbourne. Two other sons
were subsequently named John and Walter, and three daughters, Susanna,
Anne, and Elizabeth. Where John Manningham lived after he quitted the
Temple, whether in London with a view to practice at the Bar, at
Hatfield which was the place of residence of the Curles, or at
Bradbourne with his "father in love," then a second time a widower,
does not appear.

On the 3rd January 1609-10, the old merchant proved the reality of his
assumed fatherhood by executing a deed of gift to John Manningham of the
mansion-house of Bradbourne and the lands surrounding it in East
Malling, and two years afterwards, on the 21st January, being, as he
states, "in tolerable health of body in regard of mine age and
infirmities," he made his will. It confirmed, "if needful," the deed of
gift to John Manningham, appointed him sole executor, and with some
slight exceptions and the charge of a considerable number of legacies,
most of them tokens of remembrance, gave him all the residue of his
property. The multitude of the old man's legacies and not less so their
character tell of his continuing interest in the connections of his past
life. They read like the last utterances of a warm and affectionate
spirit casting back its glance upon those from whom it was about to
part; whilst his adjuration to his adopted son to discharge the amounts
with punctuality, although deformed by the verbiage of legal formality,
and smacking a little of the mercantile estimate of the indispensable
importance of payment on the very day, is not devoid of real solemnity.
Omitting some of the tautologous expressions it reads thus:--"I charge
John Manningham, by all the love and duty which he oweth me, for all my
love and liberality which I have always borne [to] him and his
heretofore, but chiefly in this my will, that he pay every legacy within
six months after my death, those excepted that are appointed to be paid
at certain days, and those to be duly paid at their days appointed, as
my trust is in him, and as he will answer afore God and me at the latter
day!" Nor is the pious close of the document without a share of true
impressiveness:--"Having thus, I thank God, finished my will, and set an
order in my worldly affairs, I will henceforward await God's will to
depart hence in