•
John
Dee's Conversations With Angels |
The Queen, when out riding in Richmond Park with her lords and ladies, would sometimes pass through the East Sheen Gate, down the hill towards the river, and would stop at the house between Mortlake Church and the Thames, desiring to be shown the latest invention of her astrologer, or the newest acquisition of his library. On the afternoon of one such windy day in march, 1576, she arrived at a slightly unlucky moment, for Dee's young wife, after a year of marriage, had just died, and not four hours earlier had been carried out of the house for burial in the churchyard opposite. Hearing this, Elizabeth refused to enter, but bade Dee fetch his famous glass and explain its properties to her outside in the field. Summoning Leicester to her assistance, she alighted from her horse by the church wall, was shown the wonderful convex mirror, admired the distorted image of herself, and finally rode away amused and merry, leaving the philosopher's distress at his recent bereavement assuaged for the moment by such gracious marks of royal interest and favour. And so this wraith of Dee's first wife fades away in the courtly picture, and we do not even know her name.
He turned more than ever to literary work and followed up the scholastic books dedicated to the young King Edward VI. and the studies of astrological hieroglyphs with books of another kind. To this year of historical labours, perhaps, belongs a letter from Dee to his "loving friend," Stow, the historian. Contrary to Dee's careful practice, it is undated, save for day and month, "this 5th of December." He has evidently been the means of introducing a fellow-author in influential quarters, for he says, "My friend, Mr. Dyer, did deliver your books to the two Earls, who took them thankfully, but, as he noted, there was no reward commanded of them. What shall be hereafter, God knoweth. So could not I have done." Then he adjures Stow to "hope as well as I," and turns from considering fruits to the sources of their toil. He sends a list of the varius ports, including the Cinque Ports, that have a mayor or bailey, all except Gravesend, which has a portreeve. Stow may get fuller information, "the very true plat," from Lord Cobham's secretary. He returns a manuscript of Asser's Saxon Chronicle; "it is not of the best and perfectest copy. I had done iwth it in an hour. If you have Floriacensis Wigornensis [the Chronicle of Florence of Worcester] I would gladly see him a little."
Stow, like Dee, was a Londoner and, within a year or two, of the same age. He had already published his Annals of England, which had then gone through four editions.
Dee now began to keep a diary of his doings, written in the pages and margins of three fat quarto almanacs, bound in sheepskin and clasped. Quotations have perhaps already shown that his style, his spelling, his use of words, is that we expect from a man of his wide culture and reading. He was of the new learning, though before Shakespeare and Bacon. He had also two or more distinct handwritings, a roman hand with neat printed letters, and a scribbling hand. In the former all his manuscript works and his letters are written; his diary is in the last. This diary was quite unnoticed until about 1835, when the almanacs were discovered at Oxford in the Ashmolean Library, having been acquired by Elias Ashmole, a devout believer in hermetic philosophy and collector of all alchemical writings. They were transcribed (very inaccurately) by J.O. Halliwell and printed by the Camden Society in 1842.
The books contain a strange medley of borrowings and lendings, births and deaths, illnesses, lawsuits, dreams and bickerings; observations of stars, eclipses and comets, above all of the weather (for Dee was a great meteorologist), of horoscopes, experiments in alchemy and topographical notes. Here are some of the earliest entries: -
"1577. Jan. 16. The Earl of Leicester, Mr. Philip Sidney, and Mr. Dyer, etc., came to my house." This was Edward Dyer, Sidney's friend, afterwards to be dramatically associated with Dee and kelley in their reputed discovery of the secret of makig gold. "Feb. 19th. great wynde S.W., close, clowdy. March 11. My fall upon my right knucklebone about 9 o'clock. Wyth oyle of Hypericon in 24 hours eased above all hope. God be thanked for such his goodness to his creatures! March 12. Abrahamus Ortelius me invisit Mortlakii." This interesting visit from the great Dutch map-maker is entirely omitted in the printed diary. "May 20. I hyred the barber of Chyswick, Walter Hooper, to kepe my hedges and knots in as good order as he seed them then, and that to be done with twise cutting in the year, at the least, and he to have yearlly five shillings and meat and drink."
Then he speaks of a visitor, Alexander Simon, who comes from persia, and has promised his "service" on his return, probably to assist with information on Eastern lore and wisdom. His friend and neighbour, William Herbert, sends him notes upon his already published Monas. Another work is ready for press, and he is constrained to raise money, whether for the printing or other expenses. In June he borrowed £40 from one, £20 from another, and £27 upon "the chayn of gold." On August 19, his new book is put to printing (one hundred copies) at John Day's press in Aldersgate.
This was another of those works, so pithy and so alive in their remarkable application to the future, which have fallen with their author into undeserved neglect. Dee had made suggestions about supplying officers of the army with perspective glasses as part of their equipment. Now his friendship with the Gilberts, Davis, Hawkins, Frobisher, and others off the great sea-captains, drew his attention to the sister service and the sea power of "this blessed isle of Albion." He had spent most of the previous year (1576) in writing a series of volumes to be entitled "General and Rare Memorials pertayning to the perfect art of Navigation." The first volume, The British Monarchy, or Hexameron Brytannicum, was finished in August. It was dedicated to Christopher Hatton in some verses beginning: -
"If privat wealth be leef and deere
To any wight on British soyl,
Ought public weale have any peere?
To that is due all wealth and toyle.
Whereof such lore as I of late
Have lern'd, and for security,
By godly means to Garde this state,
To you I now send carefully."
The intention is better than the lines. Dee was no poet, and even a bad versifier, but he would not have been a true Elizabethan had he not on special occasions dropped into rhyme, like the rest of his peers.
The second volume, The British Complement, "larger in bulk than the English Bible," was written in the next four months and finished in December. It was never published; its author tells us it would cost many hundreds of pounds to print, because of the tables and figures requisite, and he must first have a "comfortable and sufficient opportunity or supply thereto." The necessary funds were never forthcoming, and the book remained in manuscript. A considerable part of it is devoted to an exposition of the "paradoxall" compass which its author had invented in 1557.
Can't find what you're looking for? Something missing, broken, or incorrect? Have an idea or a question? Let us know in the Discussion Forum
|
|
|
|
| Need to ask me a question? I make every attempt to reply to all email. Click here to send me an email. |
