Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/468

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NOTES AND QUERIES, [ii s. vm. DEC. is. ioia

Buncombe. When Mead had been worsted at the Assizes, the "Triers " installed him by the aid of a troop of horse (Walker's matter seems to have been compromised by William Peirce, Peters' s nephew, being appointed (Peters was a " Trier "). It was to the care of his nephew in. this secluded village, therefore, that Peters was sent when he was making damaging confessions in 1659.
 * Sufferings of the Clergy'). Ultimately the

Two satires about Peters's supposed death appeared at the time. The first was pub- lished on 2 Sept., 1659, and was entitled :

" Peters Patern [sic] ; or, The Perfect Path to worldly happiness. As it was delivered in a funeral sermon preached at the interment of Mr. Hugh Peters, lately deceased. By I. C. [Joseph Caryl] Translator of Pineda upon Job [a plain hint that Caryl's "famous Puritan Commentary" was stolen from the classic work of the great Spanish Jesuit] and one of the Triers. Gusman, Lib. 1, 2, Verse 4. Amicus Plato, sed magis arnica veritas. London. Printed in the year 1659." Brit. Mus. press-mark B. 995(11).

The second appeared on 26 Sept., 1659, with the title :

"Peters's Resurrection. By way of dialogue between him and a merchant. Occasioned upon the publishing a pretended sermon at his funeral. Wherein is affirmed those sayings of Machiavel. Machiavel, Lib. 3, Cap. 2, Vers. 6. * All men were born to play their game.' Lib. 5, Cap. 8, Vers. 12. ' The whole world is but a cheat.' London. Printed in the year 1659." Brit. Mus. press-mark E. 999 (8).

Peters probably never entirely recovered from this last attack of mania. Dr. John Price, Monck's chaplain, in his * Mystery and Method of his Majesty's Restauration,' says that about six months later, when the General arrived at St. Albans on his way to London, a " fast " was held in the abbey, and

" Peters [who met Monck, in company with the Rump's messengers] supererogated, and prayed a long prayer in the General's quarters too, at night. As for his sermon, he managed it with some dexterity at first, allowing the cantings of his expressions. His text was Psalm 107, v. 7, ' He led theni forth by the right way that they might go to the City where they dwelt.' With his fingers on the cushion, he measured the right way from the Red Sea through the Wilderness to Canaan ; told us it was not forty days march, but God led Israel forty years through the Wilderness before they came thither ; yet this was the Lord's right way, who led his people ' crinkledom cum crankledom.' "

In John Collins's narrative of the Restora- tion, printed in the Report on the Leyborne- Popham MSS., the writer states that when he arrived at St. Albans he "found Hugh Peters, 'in querpo,' like a jack pudding, bustling up and down there in the market ; and, as soon as the General came, he

presently put himself into his attendance, and saying grace at the table, at dinner, I remember he prayed for a defecated gospel, an expression fit for such a carnal gospeller."

Entries in the Calendar of State Papers for 1659-60 prove that the moribund Rump turned Peters out of his apartments at Whitehall. On 9 Jan., 1660 ; Mr. Cawley was to have Peters's lodgings (p. 305), but on 31 Jan. (p. 338) Dr. Holmes and Mr. Meade were substituted for Cawley. On 8 Feb. the latter order was repeated (p. 350) r and on 13 Feb., Peters apparently having refused to leave, it was ordered (p. 360) that his lodgings were " to be forced." Thus did Meade revenge himself for the loss of the Rectory of Great Brickhill ! On 24 April Peters wrote a letter to General Monck (given in the Leyborne-Popham Report,, p. 179) thanking him for having sent some one " to see, an old decrepit friend," adding, " Truly, my lord, my weak head and crazy carcass puts me in mind of my great change,' r and going on to express concern for the pros- perity of " religion " in the nation. Monck's motive in sending to inquire appeared on 11 May, in the order of the then "Council of State" for Peters's arrest (' Cal. S.P., Dom., 1659-60,' p. 575), though Peters was not caught until 2 Sept.

Can it, therefore, be contended that this hunted, half-crazed fugitive could have then written the ' Dying Father's Legacy ' or the Sermons, &c., attributed to him ? His- Narrative and Petition to the House of Lords were presented on 13 July, and are- the best proof possible that he was not capable of any coherent literary work at the time.

When Peters was seized with mania in 1649, he w T as also credited with a dream* On his copy of this (press-mark 669. f. 14 [5]) Thorn ason wrote : " Said to be made by Mr. Hugh Peters and made in February 1648 [i.e., 1649]." The document is short enough to quote in full :

" A Vision which one Mr. Brayne (one of the ministers at Winchester) had, in September 1647." "He thought a man took and put him into the water, and on the other side of the water stood another man, which gave him a book and bad him go into France and denounce there the heavy judgment of God against the kingdom, until the Martyrs massacration in Paris was revenged, and the bloud that hath been in England shall be foure times doubled in France.

"Monarchy shall fall, first in England, then in France, then in Spain, and after in allChristendom. And when Christ hath put down this power, He Himself will begin to reign, and first in England, where the meanest people that are now despised shall have first the revelation of truth, and it shall pass from them to other nations. After that *