nty of Surrey, October 31, 1620, after
my father had been married about seven years, and my mother had borne
him two daughters and one son.

My father's countenance was clear and fresh-coloured, his eyes quick and
piercing, an ample forehead and manly aspect. He was ascetic and
sparing; his wisdom was great, his judgement acute; affable, humble, and
in nothing affected; of a thriving, silent, and methodical genius. He
was distinctly severe, yet liberal on all just occasions to his
children, strangers, and servants, a lover of hospitality; of a singular
and Christian moderation in all his actions. He was justice of the
peace, and served his country as high sheriff for Surrey and Sussex
together, and was a person of rare conversation. His estate was esteemed
about L4,000 per annum, well wooded, and full of timber.

My mother was of an ancient and honourable family in Shropshire. She was
of proper personage, of a brown complexion, her eyes and hair of a
lovely black, of constitution inclined to a religious melancholy or
pious sadness, of a rare memory and most exemplary life, for economy and
prudence esteemed one of the most conspicuous in her country.

Wotton, the mansion house of my father, is in the southern part of the
shire, three miles from Dorking, and is upon part of Leith Hill, one of
the most eminent in England for the prodigious prospect to be seen from
its summit.

From it may be discerned twelve or thirteen counties, with part of the
sea on the coast of Sussex on a serene day. The house large and ancient,
suitable to those hospitable times, and sweetly environed with delicious
streams and venerable woods.

_November_ 3, 1640. A day never to be mentioned without a curse, began
that long, foolish, and fatal Parliament, the beginning of all our
sorrows for twenty years after.

_January_ 2, 1641. We at night followed the hearse to the church at
Wotton, where my father was interred, and mingled with the ashes of our
mother, his dear wife. Thus we were bereft of both our parents in a
period when we most of all stood in need of their counsel and
assistance, especially myself, of a raw and unwary inclination.

_II.--Travels Abroad_

_May_ 12, 1641. I beheld on Tower Hill the fatal stroke which severed
the wisest head in England from the shoulders of the Earl of Strafford,
whose crime coming under the cognisance of no human law, a new one was
made to his destruction--to such exorbitancy were things arrived