Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 55.djvu/150

 tions may be true. It relates how Suckling after his flight took up his residence at Rouen, and thence removed to Paris. Here he commenced an amour with a lady of distinction, but was soon compelled to make his escape in order to avoid the fury of Lord Lequeux, the lady's former lover. Suckling fled to Spain, whither he was followed by the nobleman, who accused him of having conspired the death of Philip IV. After suffering various tortures he was condemned to the gallows, but was saved by the remorse of his enemy, who confessed to the perjury and was sentenced to die in his stead. The tract concludes, ‘Sir John and his lady are now living at The Hague in Holland, piously and religiously, and grieve at nothing but that he did the kingdom of England wrong.’ Somewhat similar in its tone is the squib, also dated 1641, entitled ‘Four Fugitives Meeting, or the Discourse amongst my Lord Finch, Sir Francis Windebank, Sir John Sucklin, and Dr. Roane, as they accidentally met in France, with a detection of their severall pranks in England’ (London, 4to). Much more intelligible in its general aim and purport than these roundhead fabrications is a satire launched about the same time against the levities of Suckling's gilded youth, under the title ‘The Sucklington Faction, or Suckling's Roaring Boyes.’ Here in the centre of a large folio sheet an engraving represents two cavaliers, sumptuously dressed, and provided with such emblems of debauchery and profusion as long hair and wreaths of tobacco-smoke, dice-boxes and drinking-cups; while the paper, which is closely printed, condemns in strong language all such incitements to evil conversation.

Some uncertainty exists as to the circumstances of Suckling's death. One story, of which there are several variants, recounts how having been ‘robbed by his valet, that treacherous domestic, on finding his offence discovered, placed an open razor [Oldys says a penknife] in his master's boot; who, by drawing it hastily on, divided an artery which caused his death through loss of blood’ (see, ap. Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. i. 316). This story, which reached its disseminator Oldys in a very circuitous manner, may quite safely be rejected in favour of Aubrey's account of the poet's death, which also has the support of family tradition. Reduced in fortune and dreading to encounter poverty, he purchased poison of an apothecary in Paris, and ‘produced death by violent fits of vomiting.’ This solution, which he had condemned strongly enough in the case of his eldest sister's husband, was probably reached by him in May or June 1642. He was buried, says Aubrey, in the cemetery attached to the protestant church at Paris. The news of his death elicited ‘An Elegie upon the Death of the Renowned Sir John Sucklin [by William Norris?],’ 1642, 4to; and also ‘A copy of two remonstrances brought over the River Stix in Caron's Ferry-boate, by the Ghost of Sir John Sucklin’ (London, 1643, 4to; Brit. Mus.).

Upon his death, unmarried and without issue, the patrimony passed to his father's half-brother, Charles Suckling. His great-grandson, Dr. Maurice Suckling, prebendary of Westminster, was father of Captain Maurice Suckling [q. v.] and of Catherine, the mother of Lord Nelson (see, Commoners, iii. 460).

Only a small fraction of Suckling's writings appeared during his lifetime. All that is of importance in his literary legacy appeared four years after his death in a volume entitled ‘Fragmenta Aurea. A collection of all the Incomparable Peeces written by Sir John Suckling; and published by a friend to perpetuate his memory. Printed by his owne copies, London: for Humphrey Moseley,’ 1646, 8vo; 2nd edit. unaltered, 1648, 8vo. This contains his ‘Poems,’ ‘Letters to divers eminent personages written on several occasions,’ the three plays ‘Aglaura,’ ‘The Goblins,’ and ‘Brennoralt,’ and the tract on Socinianism already mentioned, entitled ‘An Account of Religion by Reason. A Discourse upon Occasion presented to the Earl of Dorset’ (a manuscript copy of this remarkable essay is in the Record Office). Prefixed is an indifferent portrait, skilfully engraved by William Marshall, and accompanied by some lines from the pen of Thomas Stanley (see, Poems, 1651) (the original edition with the portrait is scarce; it fetched 8l. 10s. in 1897, Book Prices Current, p. 37). Among the ‘Poems,’ of which the lyrics are stated to have been ‘set in music’ by Henry Lawes, appeared for the first time in print ‘A Session of the Poets,’ together with ‘I prithee send me back my heart.’ ‘The Ballad upon a Wedding,’ that ‘masterpiece of sportive gaiety and good humour,’ had already seen the light in ‘Witts Recreations’ (1640). Harleian MS. 6917 contains a copy of the ‘Ballad’ headed ‘Upon the Marriage of the Lord Lovelace;’ but the hero and heroine were in fact Roger Boyle (afterwards Earl of Orrery [q. v.]) and Lady Margaret Howard, third daughter of the Earl of Suffolk, and the wedding took place at Northumberland House (where now stands the Grand Hotel), hence the allusion to Charing Cross in the second stanza (see Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. xi.