putation for honesty and discretion, and then about the age of
fifty years, or more. This man had been bred in his youth in a school
in the parish where Sir George Villiers the father of the Duke lived,
and had been much cherished and obliged in that season of his age, by
the said Sir George, whom afterwards he never saw. About six months
before the miserable end of the duke of Buckingham, about midnight,
this man, being in his bed at Windsor, where his office was, and in
very good health, there appeared to him, on the side of his bed, a man
of very venerable aspect, who fixing his eyes upon him, asked him, if
he knew him; the poor man half dead with fear, and apprehension, being
asked the second time, whether he remembered him, and having in that
time called to his memory, the presence of Sir George Villiers, and
the very cloaths he used to wear, in which at that time he used to be
habited; he answered him, That he thought him to be that person; he
replied, that he was in the right, that he was the same, and that he
expected a service from him; which was, that he should go from him to
his son the duke of Buckingham, and tell him, if he did not somewhat
to ingratiate himself to the people, or at least, to abate the extreme
malice they had against him, he would be suffered to live but a short
time, and after this discourse he disappeared, and the poor man, if he
had been at all waking, slept very well till the morning, when he
believed all this to be a dream, and considered it no otherwise.

'Next night, or shortly after, the same person appeared to him again
in the same place, and about the same time of the night, with an
aspect a little more severe than before; and asking him whether he had
done as he required him? and perceiving he had not, he gave him very
severe reprehensions, and told him, he expected more compliance from
him; and that if he did not perform his commands, he should enjoy no
peace of mind, but should be always pursued by him: Upon which he
promised to obey him.

'But the next morning waking exceedingly perplexed with the lively
representation of all that had passed, he considered that he was a
person at such a distance from the duke, that he knew not how to find
any admittance into his presence, much less any hope to be believed in
what he should say, so with great trouble and unquietness he spent
some time in thinking what he should do. The poor man had by this time
recovered the courage to tell hi