Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 12.djvu/80

 vince. An inventory (Lansd. MSS. vol. lxxv. No. 31) of papers in his house in London, which Dethick proposed should be bought for the Heralds' College, was taken after his death by order of the privy council; it is dated 11 Oct. 1593, and signed by the sheriff in presence of Dethick Garter, Lee Richmond, and John Woodnote. Cook was also a painter, and it has been supposed that he painted the portraits of Henry VII, Henry VIII, Queen Catherine, the Duke of Suffolk, Sir Anthony Wingfield, and Sir Robert Wingfield and his family at Cockfield Hall in Yoxford, Suffolk; but this seems doubtful. Cook's portrait has been engraved by T. Tovey. The accusations laid against him by his enemy, Dethick, jun., are perhaps not worthy of much credit. They are that he was son of a tanner, ignorant of languages, unable to speak French, dissolute, had married another man's wife, had granted arms to unworthy persons in taverns in exchange for the cheer they made him, &c., &c.

Cook wrote: 1. ‘An English Baronage’ (Harl. MSS. 214, 1163, 1966, 4223, 7382; Addit. MSS. 4958–9, 5504, 5581, 12448; MSS. Coll. Regin. Oxon. 73, 133, 136; Arund. MS. in Coll. Arm. 34; Royal MS. 18 C. 17; MSS. Phillipp. 111, 196). 2. ‘Heraldic Rudiments’ (Harl. MS. 1407, art. 3). 3. ‘An Ordinary of Arms’ (MS. Phillipp. 7357). 4. ‘A Treatise on the Granting of Arms’ (Lansd. MS. 255, f. 219). All remain in manuscript. Upon one (Harl. MS. 214) Sir Symond d'Ewes has written a title concluding ‘in which are a world of errors, ergo caveat lector.’



COOK, ROBERT (1646?–1726?), vegetarian, son of Robert Cook, esq., of Cappoquin, co. Waterford, was born about 1646. He was a very rich and eccentric gentleman, and generally went by the name of ‘Linen Cook,’ because he wore only linen garments, and used linen generally for other purposes. During the troubles in the reign of James II he fled to England and resided for some time at Ipswich (Addit. MS. 19166, f. 64). During his absence the parliament held at Dublin on 7 May 1689 declared him to be attainted as a traitor if he failed to return to Ireland by 1 Sept. following. His first wife was a Bristol lady, and in consequence of his visits to that city he caused a pile of stones to be erected on a rock in the Bristol Channel, which, after him, was called ‘Cook's Folly.’ By his second wife, whose name was Cecilia or Cicily, he had three sons and two daughters (, Patrician, iv. 64). He died about 1726, and by his will directed that his body should be interred in the cathedral or church called ‘Tempul’ at Youghal, and that his shroud should be made ‘of linen.’

Cook was ‘a kind of Pythagorean philosopher, and for many years neither eat fish, flesh, butter, &c., nor drank any kind of fermented liquor, nor wore woollen clothes, or and other produce of an animal, but linen’ (, Ancient and Present State of Waterford, edit. 1774, p. 371). In 1691 he published a paper (reprinted in Smith's ‘Waterford’), giving an explanation of his peculiar religious principles. The Athenian Society wrote an answer to his paper and refuted his notions.



COOK, SAMUEL (1806–1859), water-colour painter, was born in 1806 at Camelford, Cornwall. His mother kept a bakehouse, and under the same roof there was a small school, which he attended early in life, learning there reading and writing. He did not obtain any further education, as at the age of nine he was apprenticed to a firm of woollen manufacturers at Camelford, his duty being to feed a machine called a ‘scribbler’ with wool. During the intervals of his labour he used to amuse himself by drawing with chalk on the floor to the annoyance of the foreman, who said that he would never be fit for anything but a limner. His talents gained him employment in painting signboards and scenes for itinerant showmen, and in graining wood. On the termination of his apprenticeship he went to Plymouth, and became assistant to a painter and glazier there, subsequently setting up business in that line on his own account. Every hour he could spare he devoted to sketching, especially by the seaside and on the quays at Plymouth. As his sketches showed increasing merit, they attracted the attention of resident connoisseurs, and found many generous and wealthy patrons. Encouraged by them, he sent, about 1830, some of his drawings to the New Water-colour Society, and was immediately admitted a member. From that time he was a regular contributor to the gallery in Pall Mall till his death, which took place 7 June 1859. His pictures were