fterwards distinctly in receipt of L365 a year,[4] The actual
reduction, in his case, therefore, was not from L400 to L300, as had
been proposed, but only from L400 to L365, or back to what his salary
had been formerly (Vol. IV. 575-578). Milton again is found at the
end of the Protectorate in receipt of L200 a year, and not of L150
only, as had been proposed In the Order.[5] The inference must be,
therefore, that there had been a reconsideration and modification of
the Order in his case also, ratifying the proposal of a reduction,
but diminishing considerably the proposed _amount_ of the
reduction. One would like to know to what influence the modification
was owing, and how far Cromwell himself may have interfered in the
matter. On the whole, while one infers that the reconsideration of
the Order generally may have been owing to direct remonstrances from
those whom it affected injuriously, such as Frost, Vaux, and Needham,
there is little difficulty in seeing what must have happened in
Milton's particular. My belief is that he signified, or caused it to
be signified, that he had no desire to retire on a life-pension, that
it would be much more agreeable to him to continue in active
employment for the State, that for certain kinds of such employment
he found his blindness less and less a disqualification, that the
arrangement as to salary might be as the Council pleased, but that
his own suggestion would be that his salary should be reduced to
L200, so that he and Mr. Meadows should henceforth be on an equality
in that respect. Such, at all events, was the arrangement adopted;
and we may now dismiss this whole incident in Milton's biography by
saying that, though in April 1655 there was a proposal to
superannuate him entirely on a life-pension of L150 a year, the
proposal did not take effect, but he went on from that date, just as
before, in the Latin Secretaryship Extraordinary, though at the
reduced salary of L200 a year instead of his original L288.

[Footnote 1: My notes from the Money Warrant Books of the Council.]

[Footnote 2: Money Warrants of Feb. 15, 1658-9 and Oct. 25, 1659.]

[Footnote 3: Money Warrant of Oct. 25, 1659.]

[Footnote 4: Ibid.]

[Footnote 5: Ibid.]

As if to prove that the arrangement was a perfectly suitable one, and
that Milton's retirement into ex-Secretaryship would have been a
loss, there came from him, immediately after the arrangement had been
made, that burst of Latin State-lette