My father was the son of a gentleman of Oxfordshire that had a<br />small estate near to the town of Eynsham, in that county. The monks<br />of Eynsham Priory had the land aforetime and &lsquo;twas said that here,<br />as elsewhere, there was a curse upon such as held for their own uses<br />that which had been dedicated to God&lsquo;s service. How this may be I<br />know not, though there are notable instances&mdash;as, to wit, the<br />Russells&mdash;in which no visible curse has fallen on the holders of such<br />goods; but it is certain that my father&lsquo;s forbears wasted their estate<br />grievously. Being but the third son, he had scarce, in any case,<br />tarried at home; but, matters being as they were, the emptiness of the<br />family purse drove him out betimes into the world. Being of good<br />birth and breeding he got, without much ado, a place about the<br />Court, which was not, however, much to his liking. I have heard him<br />say&mdash;and this, though, as will be seen hereafter, he was a great lover<br />of monarchy&mdash;that, between a weak king and villainous courtiers,<br />Whitehall was no place for an honest gentleman. Robert Carr, that<br />was afterwards Earl of Somerset, he liked little, and George Villiers,<br />Duke of Buckingham, he liked yet less, being, as he was wont to say,<br />by so much a greater villain than Somerset as a duke is greater than<br />an earl. He was right glad, therefore, to leave the &ldquo;sunshine of the<br />Royal presence;&ldquo; for so did men speak of the Court in the<br />hyperbolical language of those times, even for so dismal and<br />outlandish a part as Ireland. But I know not whether he did not wish<br />himself back, for of Ireland he would never afterwards speak with<br />any measure of patience, declaring that he knew not which were the<br />worse, the greediness and cruelty of the English conquerors, or the<br />savagery and unreason of the native people...