Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 18.djvu/270

 old, Lord Robert Spencer, a prominent whig. She died at Woolbeding, near Midhurst, on 17 Nov. 1825. A well-known painting by Sir Joshua Reynolds of Mrs. Bouverie and Mrs. Crewe, Fawkener's two daughters, was afterwards engraved by Marchi. The descendants of Fawkener married into other leading English families, such as those of Cavendish and Walpole. The change in his life from commerce to the most fashionable society of London is not easily accounted for. Carlyle, in his ‘Frederick the Great’ (ii. 586–587), calls Fawkener ‘a man highly unmemorable now were it not for the young Frenchman he was hospitable to.’ Voltaire called him ‘the good and plain philosopher of Wandsworth,’ and in after life renewed the friendship in a correspondence of some twenty letters, sending Fawkener some books, soliciting his good offices for an English edition of the age of Louis XIV, and drawing upon him for 94l. on account of the profits. These letters, dated between 1735 and 1753, were confided by the younger Fawkener to an English diplomatist called Edward Mason, and were sent by him in 1780 to M. de la Harpe. They were printed in ‘Lettres inédites de Voltaire’ (1856), i. 71, &c., and afford a valuable proof of the warmth of Voltaire's friendship. Fawkener's character is revealed to us in the following passage from one of his letters quoted in Voltaire's ‘Remarks on Pascal's “Pensées:”’ ‘I am here, just as you left me, neither merrier nor sadder, nor richer nor poorer, enjoying perfect health, having everything that renders life agreeable, without love, without avarice, without ambition, and without envy; and as long as all that lasts I shall call myself a very happy man.’



FAWKES, FRANCIS (1720–1777), poet and divine, son of Jeremiah Fawkes, for twenty-eight years rector of Warmsworth, Doncaster, was baptised at Warmsworth 4 April 1720, and educated at Bury free school under the Rev. John Lister. On 16 March 1737–8 he was admitted as an ordinary sizar into Jesus College, Cambridge, his tutor being the Rev. Richard Oakley, and was then described as of Warmsworth, Yorkshire. He was elected to an exhibition on the foundation of Dr. Mawhood on 24 April 1738, to an exhibition on Dr. Brunsel's foundation on 6 Dec. 1739, and advanced to a foundation scholarship on 24 June 1742. His degree of B.A. was taken in 1742, his supplicat being dated 15 Jan. 1741–2; he received his college testimonials on 26 April 1744, and proceeded M.A. in 1745. At an early period in life he was ordained in the English church to the curacy of Bramham in his native county. He was ‘a sort of chaplain’ to Mr. Fox and Lane (afterwards Lord Bingley), and his first production in literature is said to have been an anonymous poem describing the beauties of Mr. Lane's house at Bramham, which was published in quarto in 1745. Fawkes afterwards held the curacy of Croydon, where he came under the notice of Archbishop Herring, whom he flattered with an ode, said to have been included in Dodsley's collection, on his recovery from sickness in 1754. In the following year the archbishop bestowed upon the poet the vicarage of Orpington, Kent, with the chapelry of St. Mary Cray and the attendant curacy of Knockholt. Further preferment was expected, but his hope of advancement was crushed by his patron's death in 1757, when the disappointed aspirant gave vent to his feelings in an elegy styled ‘Aurelius,’ which was printed in 1761 with the ‘Original Poems and Translations’ of Fawkes and reprinted in 1763 in the volume of ‘Seven Sermons by Archbishop Herring,’ pp. xlii–xlviii. Fawkes remained at Orpington until April 1774, when, by the favour of the Rev. Charles Plumptree, D.D., rector of Orpington, and as such patron of the adjacent rectory of Hayes, he was appointed to Hayes with the curacy of Downe. The only additional piece of clerical patronage which he received was a chaplaincy to the Princess Dowager of Wales. This was probably his own fault, for though the standard of clerical life was not high, he was pronounced too fond of social gaiety. He was always poor, but his cheerful good humour drew many friends to him. He died on 26 Aug. 1777, when his widow, formerly a Miss Purrier of Leeds, whom he married about 1760, was left with scanty resources. His library was sold in 1778.

Fawkes was considered by his contemporaries the best translator since the days of Pope, and Dr. Johnson gave it as his opinion that Fawkes had translated ‘Anacreon’ ‘very