are Catholics here, I take to witness." Then recollecting himself, he prepared for his approaching end, frequently ejaculating, "Holy Mary, Mother of God, and all saints pray for me;" and, signing himself with the cross," Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit; thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth, my God and all; God be merciful to me a sinner," &c. At length, the horses being started and the car removed from under his feet, he continued to beat his breast and make the sign of the cross, until the executioner, who had so awkwardly applied the noose as to prevent his speedy strangulation, pulled him by the legs to ease his agony. The martyr's behaviour had such an effect on the spectators, that when, in terms of his sentence, the executioner wished to cut him down alive, neither they nor the magistrate who superintended the judicial murder would permit him to do so. When he was dead, his countenance exhibited no change, neither did the halter leave its ordinary marks of discoloration; and when his body was partitioned, the heart leaped from the dissector's hand, and, by its throbbing, seemed to repel the flames, as if expressing with the Psalmist, "My heart and my flesh shall exult in the living God." * Lord Mountjoy who happened to be present, was so struck by the mar * Charles Blount, 8th Baron Mountjoy. tyr's constancy, that he exclaimed," May my soul be with this man's!" and he assisted in restraining those who would have cut the rope while he was still in life. Such, at the age of thirty-three, was the end of this excellent soldier of the cross, and most devoted member of the Society of Jesus; the victim of a barbarous law, vainly devised to destroy what is indestructible-the work of God. In blood the Church was planted; with blood it has been watered; and its fecundity has ever been the greater in proportion to the efforts made to eradicate it. The seed sown by persecution in the three last centuries, begins in the present to bring forth fruit an hundred fold. After Southwell's death, one of his sisters, a Catholic in heart, but timidly and blameably simulating heresy, wrought, with some reliques of the martyr, several cures on persons afflicted with desperate and deadly diseases, which had baffled the skill of all physicians. Thus God, in his usual manner, honours his saints. Of Father Southwell no authentic portrait, so far as I know, is in existence. Lord Viscount Southwell possesses an original manuscript, but it merely contains a translation into Italian of the rules of the society, some short prayers in Latin, and a summary * Tanner, Soc. Jesu Martyr, p. 37. of those virtues which he seems to have practised on stated days. For this information I am indebted to the obliging attention of the Rev. William Waterworth, S. J.. By favour of the Rt. Hon. Sir George Grey, I have had access to the documents in the State Paper Office, whereby I am enabled to subjoin Nos. III. and IV. of the Appendix. From the gentlemen connected with that department of the public service I have experienced every courtesy.* The first who in recent times reintroduced to notice those poems of Southwell, which, with his other writings, were, at an earlier date, so popular,† was Mr. Francis Godolphin Waldron, an actor at Drury Lane in the time of Garrick, who, in 1783, in an appendix to his edition of Ben Jonson's "Sad Shepherd," gave a few specimens of them. These were subsequently included in Mr. Headley's "Select Beauties of English Poetry," published in the same year. Since then they have formed the subject of * The Books of the Privy Council, from 26th Aug. 1593 to 9th March 1595, were unfortunately consumed by fire in 1613. In the volume which intervenes from the time of Southwell's arrest to the former date, no notice of him occurs. Father Henry More says of them, "hodie cum voluptate teruntur." Nichols' Literary Anecdotes, viii. 136. с essays, by Mr. Park, in the Gentleman's Magazine for November, 1798, by Mr. Haslewood in the Censura Literaria, II. 64, and in the Retrospective Review, IV. 267. That they met with due appreciation by our ancestors is proved, not only by the numerous editions through which they passed, but by their being glanced at, in a marked manner, by Dr. Hall, the protestant bishop of Norwich, in the 8th Satire of the First Book of his "Virgidemiarum," first printed in 1597, two years after their author's martyrdom, when presuming to ridicule the sacred poetry of his time, he says: "Parnassus is transform'd to Sion-Hill, But Dr. Hall's antagonist, the mordant Marston, avenges the pious Father in these terms: "Come dance, ye stumbling satyrs, by his side, Ye Granta's white nymphs come, and with you bring, At sacred sonnets." Certain Satires, 1598. Sat. iv. The following, it is believed, is an accurate list of Father Southwell's works and of their editions, with the authorities for most, as no bibliographer, perhaps, can say that he has seen them all. A Consolation for Catholics imprisoned on account of Religion. Printed at St. Omer's. No date. (Dodd's Church History.) This is probably identical with An Epistle of Comfort to the Rev. Priests, and to the Honourable, Worshipful, and others of the Lay Sort, restrayned in Durance for the Catholic Faith. Printed with Licence. 1605. No place. A Supplication to Queen Elizabeth. London, 1593. (Dodd.) Query, May this not be the petition by his father, noticed in the Memoir, supra, p. xxvi? Saint Peter's Complaint, with other Poems. Imprinted by J. Wolfe. London, 1595, 4to. A copy of this is in the library of Jesus College, Oxford. The same. Imprinted by James Roberts for Gabriel Cawood. London, 1595. The same. London and St. Omer's, 1597, (Dodd.) The same. Imprinted by J[ames] R[oberts] for Gabriel] C[awood]. London, 1599. The same, newly augmented with other Poems. Imprinted by H. L. for W. Leake. London. No date. The same, newly augmented, &c. Printed by W. Stainsby for W. Barret. London, 1615. The same, with St. Mary Magdalen's funerall Teares, and sundry other selected and devout Poemes, |