It was also one of the especial cares of Mr. Beaumont, in the lectures which he regularly delivered to his pupils, to impress upon their minds the deepest love and veneration for their king and country; and he used to speak of it as one of the most pleasing recollections of his life, that in the days of anarchy and rebellion which shortly afterwards occurred, not an individual of the numerous young men who had been placed under his direction, and many of them belonged to some of the best families in the kingdom, hesitated to embrace with cheerfulness and alacrity, and at the immediate risk of life and property, the cause of royalty and the established constitution.

An office of greater weight and publicity now fell to the lot of Mr. Beaumont, being chosen Vice-Proctor or Moderator in the University, the duties of which situation he discharged with more than common zeal and effect, enforcing, as far as his delegated authority extended, a strict and general observance of the statutes. But his residence at Cambridge, and the benefit resulting from his influence and example, were about to receive a long and fearful interruption;

for the storm was now gathering which very shortly afterwards broke with irresistible fury upon the civil and ecclesiastical constitution of the kingdom; and in 1644, when the Scotch army declared for the parliament, and had commissioned the Earl of Manchester to re-model the University of Cambridge, the tutor of Peterhouse, who was well known for his firm adherence to the cause of his sovereign, was the first to feel the weight of their resentment. He was, in fact, compelled to quit the University, then under the control of the rebels, and being ejected from his fellowship, he retired to his native town of Hadleigh; and here we are told, "he formed a little society of gallant spirits, men of abused merits, which chiefly consisted of some of his former pupils, and the sons of his great friend and patron Bishop Wren ;" and here also, "being in deacon's orders, he constantly performed the daily services of the liturgy in his father's house, and preached to his little flock every Sunday."

It was whilst resident at Hadleigh that he employed his leisure hours in the composition of his elaborate allegorical poem, entitled

"Psyche, or Love's Mystery, displaying the Intercourse between Christ and the Soul," which was commenced in April 1647, and though, in its first edition, consisting of twenty long cantos, was completed before the 13th of March following, and published early in 1648. Nor was this production, extensive as it is, the only fruits of his retirement in Suffolk; numerous miscellaneous poems, both English and Latin, though not published until many years after his death, issued from his pen whilst lingering on the banks of the Brett, his native stream. Indeed nearly all his poetry appears to have been written between the years 1644 and 1653.

Scarcely had our author completed his Psyche, when he was induced to leave Hadleigh by an invitation from Dr. Wren, Bishop of Ely, to reside in his house as his domestic chaplain. This prelate, as visitor of Peterhouse, had long known and admired the worth and the talents of Mr. Beaumont, and had, as early as the year 1643, collated him to the rectory of Kelshall in Hertfordshire; to that of Elm with the chapel of Emneth in 1646, and to the seventh

canonry and prebend in the Cathedral church of Ely in 1647. But as these preferments, which occurred during the rebellion, would be considered as little more than nominal, the Bishop was anxious to give him an asylum in his own family; and so affectionately did he become attached to him, in consequence of this domiciliation, that in the year 1650 he bestowed upon him in marriage his step-daughter, Miss Brownrigg, a young lady of the most pleasing manners and amiable disposition, and who was possessed of a considerable estate together with, the manor of Tatingston in Suffolk; and with her at Tatingston-place, in the mutual endearments of domestic society, in the occasional exercise of his professional duties, and in the daily practice of every Christian charity, he passed the succeeding ten years, and, perhaps, the happiest period, of his life.

The Restoration, as might be imagined, almost instantly drew Mr. Beaumont forth from his retreat; and not only did he take immediate possession of the benefices to which he had been formerly presented by his great patron Bishop Wren, but he was also admitted into the first

list of his majesty's chaplains, and created D.D. by a royal mandamus in 1660.

In the ensuing year, at the particular request of Bishop Wren, who wished to have two persons whom he so highly valued, near him, our author and his lady were induced to remove to Ely, and took possession of the Prebendal house; but unfortunately the situation disagreed so much with Mrs. Beaumont, who was of a delicate constitution, and had a tendency to consumption in her frame, that when in April 1662, on the resignation of Dr. Pearson, master of Jesus' college, Cambridge, the Bishop had appointed Dr. Beaumont his successor, Mrs. Beaumont was become too weak to bear the fatigue of removal, and expired at Ely on the 31st of the following month, leaving a family of six very young children. This severe stroke, whilst it was borne by her sorrowing husband with the resignation of a Christian, was deeply and irreparably felt as a man; for he had lost one who had been his support under every distress, and who had never welcomed prosperity, but as he was a sharer with her in it.

With his little family he now removed to