ces to the Parliament, they voted him a grant of 500_l_. "The Five
Years of King James," which passes under the name of Sir Fulk Greville,
the dignified friend of the romantic Sir Philip Sidney, and is frequently
referred to by grave writers, is certainly a Presbyterian's third day's
hash--for there are parts copied from Arthur Wilson's "History of James
I.," who was himself the pensioner of a disappointed courtier; yet this
writer never attacks the personal character of the king, though charged
with having scraped up many tales maliciously false. Osborne is a
misanthropical politician, who cuts with the most corroding pen that ever
rottened a man's name. James was very negligent in dress; graceful
appearances did not come into his studies. Weldon tells us how the king
was trussed on horseback, and fixed there like a pedlar's pack or a lump
of inanimate matter; the truth is, the king had always an infirmity in his
legs. Further, we are told that this ridiculous monarch allowed his hat to
remain just as it chanced to be placed on his head. Osborne once saw this
unlucky king "in a green hunting-dress, with a feather in his cap, and a
horn, instead of a sword, by his side; how suitable to his age, calling,
or person, I leave others to judge from his pictures:" and this he
bitterly calls "leaving him dressed for posterity!" This is the style
which passes for history with some readers. Hume observes that "hunting,"
which was James's sole recreation, necessary for his health, as a
sedentary scholar, "is the cheapest a king can indulge;" and, indeed, the
empty coffers of this monarch afforded no other.

These pseudo-histories are alluded to by Arthur Wilson as "monstrous
satires against the king's own person, that haunted both court and
country," when, in the wantonness of the times, "every little miscarriage,
exuberantly branched, so that evil report did often perch on them." Fuller
has designated these suspicious scribes as "a generation of the people
who, like _moths_, have lurked under the carpets of the council-table, and
even like _fleas_, have leaped into pillows of the prince's bed-chamber;
and, to enhance the reputation of their knowledge, thence derived that of
all things which were, or were not, ever done or thought of."--_Church
History,_ book x. p. 87.]

Such was the race generated in this court of peace and indolence! And
Hacket, in his "Life of the Lord-Keeper Williams," without disguising the
fact, tells us tha