CONTENTS. I. OF MY DESCENT AND PARENTAGE, AND OF MY SENDING II. OF MY TARRYING IN LONDON AND OF MY SAILING IN XIII. OF MY JOURNEYING TO THE CITY OF AGRA; OF MY COMING THITHER, AND OF THE PERSON I FOUND THERE, XIV. OF MY LEAVING THE CITY OF THE GREAT MOGUL IN THE COMPANY OF ONE THAT HAD NOT ENTERED XVI. OF MY DEPARTING FROM EAST INDIA, AND RETURNING UNIV. OF IN FURTHEST IND. CHAPTER I. OF MY DESCENT AND PARENTAGE, AND OF MY SENDING It will be convenient for me, before relating my history, to give some account of my birth and parentage, and this I will proceed to do. Our branch of the family of Carlyon, though not of the most illustrious, is at least respectable in its antiquity, having been settled at Ellswether (which at one time belonged to a branch of the noble family of De Lovetot) for the space of four hundred years, ever since the esquire Simon Carlyon wedded Dame Elianora, daughter and heiress to Sir Walter de Lovetot. My honoured father was the fourth and youngest son of Roger Carlyon, Esquire, and Margery Colepepper his wife. Being but a younger son, he quitted his home early, and adventured himself in the wars in foreign parts, together with his cousin, my Lord Brandon. Under the banner of this nobleman my father showed great valour and skill in arms, both in Bohemia and also in the Palatinate, so that his assistance was much sought after by many princes and captains of those parts. A 10 Minu on hearing of the troubles in England, my father accompanied his kinsman to Oxford, to the intent to place their swords at the disposition of his majesty. It was when on this visit that my father first saw my mother, that was then Mrs Margaret Brodie, daughter to Sir Nicholas Brodie of Rinnington in the county of Durham, and Anne Delamere his wife. In her youth my mother was bred up with a young lady of quality, Mrs Hyacinth Penfold, that was sister's daughter to my lord Duke of London, and dwelt at his grace's castle of Belfort in this county. Now when my lady duchess (that was as truly honest a lady in her opinions as ever lived, though his grace her husband was but a trimmer) came to pay her devoirs to the king and queen at Oxford, she carried with her the two young gentlewomen aforesaid, and they were to her as her own daughters. My Lord Brandon, then, was presented to Mrs Penfold as a match she should do well to accept, though he was well advanced in years, and little beautified by the chances of war, and my father cast his eyes upon the gentlewoman that bare this lady company. And Mrs Brodie, hearing of his feats of arms in the wars of Germany, and finding his person not disagreeable to her, was not loath to look kindly upon her servant.1 He then, discovering in her not only great beauty of countenance, but also a sweet civility of manner and marvellous parts of mind, did ask her hand of my lady duchess. Who did grant him, with many kind words, the boon he craved; and my father and mother were wedded at the same time and place with my lord and Mrs Penfold, and lived together for over seven years thereafter in the enjoyment of a rare peace and felicity, though troubled on all sides by the evil chances of the time. This same year was memorable for that my father was knighted on the field of battle by the hand 1 Suitor. MY BIRTH AND PARENTAGE. 3 of his sacred majesty himself, after a certain skirmish near to the city of Bristow, since that he did, by his skill in war, save the king's forces when near to their destruction. 'Twas at Oxford that I was born, in the year 1646, in a mean lodging in a certain poor street of that town, since my mother was afraid to show herself in any more convenient dwelling, and my father durst only visit her secretly by night for fear of capture, my Lord-General Fairfax having but just then took the city. Shortly after this, also, by the deaths of my uncles, his three brothers (whereof the eldest was slain with my grandfather in that lamentable defeat of my Lord Astley at Stow-on-the-Wold, and the second, having been taken at Leicester the year before, died in prison, and the third was foully murdered in a tumult raised against him in the streets of Northampton), my father found himself possessed of Ellswether-that is to say, of the old house only, whereof all the lands were sold or mortgaged for his majesty's service. And he, taking up his abode there with my mother and myself, fought still for the king, until that day when the rebels consummated their iniquity by that deed whereof no age hath ever seen the like for its enormity, when he left fighting, being assured that God must shortly punish the whole nation of England with utter destruction. Two years thereafter, notwithstanding, he joined himself to the cause of his majesty King Charles II., and at Worcester Fight was grievously wounded, and lay for many days in danger of his life in a certain mean house of that city. Being there found by the rebels, he was thrown into a dungeon, but after a while, by the good offices of my lord Duke of London, was released, and suffered to return home, being now incapable of fighting more, for that his left leg had been shot off by a ball from 1 Bristol. |