Richard F. Burton - "First footsteps in East Africa"

Alpheus Spring Packard - "Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution"

Albert Mathiez - "Les grandes journees de la Constituante"

Various - "The International Monthly Magazine Volume V to No II"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2)

J >> John Evelyn >> Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2)




Evelyn longed for settlement in England, because he saw that the
Royalist cause was hopelessly lost for the time being. His
father-in-law's estate of Sayes Court had been seized and sold by the
rebels, but 'by the advice and endeavour of my friends I was advis'd to
reside in it, and compound with the soldiers. This I was besides
authoriz'd by his Majesty to do, and encourag'd with promise that what
was in lease from the Crowne, if ever it pleased God to restore him, he
would secure to us in fee-ferme.{xxxi:1} I had also addresses and cyfers
to correspond with his Majesty and Ministers abroad: upon all which
inducements I was persuaded to settle henceforth in England, having now
run about the world, most part out of my owne country, neere ten yeares.
I therefore now likewise meditated sending over for my Wife, whom as yet
I had left at Paris.' She arrived on 11th. June with her Mother; and as
small-pox was then raging in and about London they sojourned for some
time at Tunbridge Wells, drinking the waters. About the end of that
month Evelyn went to Sayes Court to prepare for their reception, but was
waylaid by footpads near Bromley and came near meeting his death from
them. Fortunately, however, 'did God deliver me from these villains, and
not onely so, but restor'd what they tooke, as twice before he had
graciously don, both at sea and land;... for which, and many signal
preservations, I am extreamly oblig'd to give thanks to God my Saviour.'

On 24th July, 1652, Mrs. Evelyn presented her husband with their first
child, their son, John, who predeceased his father in 1698. He now
busied himself in acquiring full possession of his father-in-law's and
the rebels' interests in Sayes Court, which he effected at a cost of
L3,500 early in 1653.

Then he began gardening and planting on a large scale, transforming the
almost bare fields around the house into fine specimens of the art of
horticulture, as then practised. Sayes Court was afterwards the
temporary residence of Peter the Great, who committed great havoc in the
gardens and hedges during his rough orgies. Here Evelyn lived quietly
till the time of the Restoration, spending his days in gardening and in
cultivating the acquaintance of men of cultured tastes like his own,
with occasional journeys to different parts of England. Thus he visited
Windsor, Marlborough, Bath, Oxford, Salisbury, Devizes, Gloucester,
Worcester, Warwick, Leicester, Doncaster, York, Cambridge, and many
other places, so that he probably saw a great deal more of England than
the majority of men in his position. Thus, too, he learned much about
the country and about all branches of rural economy. He had not yet
seriously given himself to literature, although his third work was
published in 1656, _An Essay on the First Book of T. Lucretius Cerus de
Rerum Natura. Interpreted and made English Verse_.

In January, 1658, heavy sorrow fell upon Evelyn by the death of his
younger son, an infant prodigy, and a sad and wonderful example of a
young brain being terribly overtaxed. 'After six fits of a quartan ague
with which it pleased God to visite him, died my dear Son Richard, to
our inexpressible grief and affliction, 5 yeares and 3 days old onely,
but at that tender age a prodigy for witt and understanding; for beauty
of body a very angel; for endowment of mind of incredible and rare
hopes. To give onely a little taste of them, and thereby glory to God,
he had learn'd all this catechisme who out of the mouths of babes and
infants does sometimes perfect his praises: at 2 years and a halfe old
he could perfectly read any of ye English, Latine, French, or Gothic
letters, pronouncing the first three languages exactly. He had before
the 5th yeare, or in that yeare, not onely skill to reade most written
hands, but to decline all the nouns, conjugate the verbs regular, and
most of ye irregular; learn'd out "Puerilis," got by heart almost ye
entire vocabularie of Latine and French primitives and words, could make
congruous syntax, turne English into Latine, and _vice versa_, construe
and prove what he read, and did the government and use of relatives,
verbs, substantives, elipses, and many figures and tropes, and made a
considerable progress in Comenius's Janua; began himselfe to write
legibly, and had a stronge passion for Greeke. The number of verses he
could recite was prodigious, and what he remembered of the parts of
playes, which he would also act; and when seeing a Plautus in one's
hand, he ask'd what booke it was, and being told it was comedy, and too
difficult for him, he wept for sorrow. Strange was his apt and ingenious
application of fables and morals, for he had read AEsop; he had a
wonderful disposition to mathematics, having by heart divers
propositions of Euclid that were read to him in play, and he would make
lines and demonstrate them. As to his piety, astonishing were his
applications of Scripture upon occasion, and thus early, he understood
ye historical part of ye Bible and New Testament to a wonder, how Christ
came to redeeme mankind, and how comprehending these necessarys
himselfe, his godfathers were discharg'd of their promise. These and
like illuminations, far exceeding his age and experience, considering
the prettinesse of his adresse and behaviour, cannot but leave
impressions in me at the memory of him. When one told him how many days
a Quaker had fasted, he replied that was no wonder, for Christ had said
that man should not live by bread alone, but by ye Word of God. He would
of himselfe select ye most pathetic psalms, and chapters out of Job, to
reade to his mayde during his sicknesse, telling her when she pitied
him, that all God's children must suffer affliction. He declaim'd
against ye vanities of the world before he had seene any...... How
thankfully would he receive admonition, how soone be reconciled! how
indifferent, yet continually chereful! He would give grave advice to his
Brother John, beare with his impertinencies, and say he was but a
child!' Even allowing for Evelyn's tendency to exaggeration, this is
surely one of the very saddest stories about a child of tender years,
reared in a wrong manner, that has ever been written in the English
language. This loss was no doubt the occasion of his writing his fourth
work, _The Golden Book of St. John Chrysostom, concerning the Education
of Children. Translated out of the Greek_, which was published in
September, 1658. A further relief from grief was also found in the
translation of _The French Gardiner: instructing how to cultivate all
sorts of Fruit-trees and Herbs for the Garden; together with directions
to dry and conserve them in their natural; six times printed in France
and once in Holland. An accomplished piece, first written by N. de
Bonnefons, and now transplanted into English by Philocepos_.

It must have gratified his royalist feelings when, on 22 Oct. 1658, he
'saw ye superb funerall of ye Protector.' He remarks that 'it was the
joyfullest funerall I ever saw, for there were none that cried but dogs,
which the soldiers hooted away with a barbarous noise, drinking and
taking tobacco in the streets as they went.' Not long after this, on 25
April 1659, he notices 'a wonderfull and suddaine change in ye face of
ye publiq: ye new Protector Richard slighted, several pretenders and
parties strive for the government: all anarchy and confusion; Lord have
mercy on us!' For six months things drifted on, till on 11 Oct. 'the
Armie now turn'd out the Parliament. We had now no government in the
nation; all in confusion; no magistrate either own'd or pretended, but
ye soldiers, and they not agreed. God almighty have mercy on and settle
us!'

Evelyn apparently now thought the time ripe for him to venture; hence,
during 1659, he published _A Character of England as it was lately
presented in a Letter to a Noble Man of France_, and also _An Apology
for the Royal Party, written in a Letter to a person of the late Council
of State, by a Lover of Peace and of his Country. With a Touch at the
Pretended "Plea for the Army_." Of the latter he remarks in his Diary:
'Nov. 7th. was publish'd my bold "Apoligie for the King" in this time of
danger, when it was capital to speake or write in favour of him. It was
twice printed, so universaly it took.' Encouraged by the success of this
work, he began to intrigue with Colonel Morley, Lieutenant of the Tower,
and Fay, Governor of Portsmouth, in the interest of the exiled Charles;
but Morley shrank from declaring for the King, and General Monk
returning from Scotland to London, broke down the gates of the city,
'marches to White-hall, dissipates that nest of robbers, and convenes
the old Parliament, the Rump Parliament (so called as retaining some few
rotten members of ye other) being dissolv'd; and for joy whereoff were
many thousands of rumps roasted publiqly in ye streets at the bonfires
this night, with ringing of bells and universal jubilee. This was the
first good omen.'

From the February till the April following thereon Evelyn was confined
to bed with ague and its after effects, but found strength to write and
publish a pamphlet, _The late News from Brussels unmasked, and His
Majesty vindicated from the base calumny and scandal therein fixed on
him_, 'in defence of his Majesty, against a wicked forg'd paper,
pretended to be sent from Bruxells to defame his Majesties person and
vertues, and render him odious, now when everybody was in hope and
expectation of the General and Parliament recalling him, and
establishing ye government on its antient and right basis.' Early in May
came the tidings that the King's application for restoration had been
accepted and acknowledged by the Parliament 'after a most bloudy and
unreasonable rebellion of neare 20 years,' and before the end of the
month Evelyn was an eye-witness of the triumphal entry of the new king
into his capital. '29th. This day his Majestie Charles the Second came
to London after a sad and long exile and calamitous suffering both of
the King and Church, being 17 years. This was also his birthday, and
with a triumph of above 20,000 horse and foote, brandishing their swords
and shouting with inexpressible joy; the wayes strew'd with flowers, the
bells ringing, the streets hung with tapissry, fountaines running with
wine; the Maior, Aldermen, and all the Companies in their liveries,
chaines of gold, and banners; Lords and Nobles clad in cloth of silver,
gold, and velvet; the windowes and balconies all set with ladies;
trumpets, music, and myriads of people flocking, even so far as from
Rochester, so as they were seven houres in passing the citty, even from
2 in ye afternoone till 9 at night. I stood in the Strand and beheld it,
and bless'd God. And all this was don without one drop of bloud shed,
and by that very army which rebell'd against him; but it was ye Lord's
doing, for such a restoration was never mention'd in any history antient
or modern, since the returne of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity;
nor so joyfull a day and so bright ever seene in this nation, this
hapning when to expect or effect it was past all human policy.'

Despite his dilettantism and dabbling in science, philosophy and
letters, Evelyn had for years past felt the desirability of having some
sort of fixed employment. Previous to this, during 1659, he had
communicated to the Hon. Robert Boyle, son of the Earl of Cork, a scheme
for founding a philosophic and mathematical college or fraternity, and
had even arranged with his wife that they should live asunder, in two
separate apartments. The Restoration, however, put a stop to this
scheme, which then evolved itself, soon afterwards, into the foundation
of the Royal Society, Boyle and Evelyn being two of the most prominent
original Fellows.


V

_Evelyn's Career after the Restoration. (1660-1685)._

Evelyn was about forty years of age when the Restoration changed the
whole prospects of his still long life. He had been a devoted Royalist,
though it can not be denied that his zeal in this respect was ever
tempered with a vast amount of caution and prudence. In addition to what
interest he had earned by his own actions, he had the far more powerful
influence of his father-in-law who had, like Charles himself, been
exiled for nineteen years. Mrs. Evelyn was promised the appointment of
lady of the jewels to the future Queen, which she never received; and
Evelyn might have had the honour of knighthood of the Bath, but declined
it. He was present at the Coronation in Westminster Abbey on St.
George's Day, 1661, and had prepared and printed a _Panegyric_ poem on
the occasion, a screed of bombastic doggerel in fulsome praise of the
King. He was a frequent visitor at the Court, and loved to sun himself
in the royal presence. One of the finest examples of this feature of
Evelyn's character is his _Fumifugium_, published in 1661, which will be
more particularly referred to later on, a work which marks the real
commencement of his literary career.

In 1661, also, Evelyn wrote a pamphlet entitled _Tyrannus or the Mode_,
an invective against 'our so much affecting the French' in dress, and he
was pleased with the idea that afterwards, in 1666, a change in costume
then adopted by the King and court was due to this cause. He, too,
donned and went to office in 'the vest and surcoat and tunic as 'twas
call'd, after his Majesty had brought the whole Court to it. It was a
comely and manly habit, too good to hold, it being impossible for us in
good earnest to leave ye Monsieurs vanities long.'

At length employment, at first unpaid, in the public service fell to
Evelyn in May, 1662, when along with 'divers gentlemen of quality,' he
was appointed one of the Commissioners 'for reforming the buildings,
wayes, streetes, and incumbrances, and regulating the hackney coaches in
the Citty of London.' About this same time he was also on the Commission
appointed 'about Charitable uses, and particularly to enquire how the
Citty had dispos'd of the revenues of Gressham College,' and in the
original grant of the Charter of the Royal Society he was nominated by
the King to be on its Council. Among the other Commissions upon which he
shortly sat were those on Sewers, and on the regulation of the Mint at
the Tower; but it was not till 27 Oct. 1664 that he received a paid
appointment as one of the four Commissioners for the care of the sick
and wounded prisoners to be made in the war declared against Holland.
For this the remuneration was 'a Salary L1,200 a year amongst us,
besides extraordinaries for our care and attention in time of station,
each of us being appointed to a particular district, mine falling out to
be Kent and Sussex.'

Before this, however, an event had occurred which must have given
intense gratification to Evelyn, when on 30th April, 1663, 'Came his
Majesty to honour my poore villa with his presence, viewing the gardens
and even every roome of the house, and was pleas'd to take a small
refreshment. There were with him the Duke of Richmond, E. of St. Albans,
Lord Lauderdale, and several persons of Quality.'

The year 1664 was a busy one for Evelyn, as he then brought out his two
great masterpieces _Sylva_ and the _Kalendarium Hortense_, of which more
anon, as well as the translation of a French work on Architecture. His
official duties in connection with the maintainance of the Dutch
prisoners also became so heavy that the charges came to L1,000 a week.
The Savoy Hospital was filled with them, and a privy seal grant of
L20,000 was made to carry on the work; but the expenses increasing
reached L7,000 a week, and Evelyn had hard work to get money from the
treasury. Harassed with anxieties of this sort, he frequently went 'to
ye Royal Society to refreshe among ye philosophers' where he found
solace in serving along with Dryden, Waller, and others on a Committee
for the improvement of the English language.

In the following year the dreadful plague broke out, when he and one
other Commissioner were left to deal with the task of providing for the
sick and wounded prisoners. From 1,000 deaths in a week in the middle of
July, the mortality increased to near 10,000 by the beginning of
September, so he sent his wife and family to his brother at Wotton, and
remained at work, 'being resolved to stay at my house myselfe; and to
looke after my charge, trusting in the providence and goodnesse of God.'
Prisoners poured in in larger numbers than he could receive and guard in
fit places, and he was continually forced to importune for money lest
the prisoners should starve. It was then, perhaps, that Evelyn was
thrown most in contact with his intimate friend Pepys, for both of them
remained steadfast when others had fled. And they had their reward in
coming safely through their trial of faithfulness to official duty. 'Now
blessed be God,' he writes on 31 Dec. 1665, 'for his extraordinary
mercies and preservation of me this yeare, when thousands and ten
thousands perish'd and were swept away on each side of me.'

This hard work was a source of loss to Evelyn, as from time to time he
advanced monies of his own to supply provisions for the needy committed
to his care: and subsequent petitions for reinbursement were only
partially successful. But he was rewarded by the sunny warmth of that
royal favour which cost nothing, because when the King returned from
Oxford to Hampton Court and Evelyn went to wait upon his Majesty there
at the end of January, 1666, he duly records how 'he ran towards me, and
in a most gracious manner gave me his hand to kisse, with many thanks
for my care and faithfulnesse in his service in a time of such greate
danger, when every body fled their employments.' Poor Evelyn seems to
have been rather easily duped in this sort of way. 'Then the Duke (of
Albemarle) came towards me and embrac'd me with much kindnesse, telling
me if he had thought my danger would have been so greate, he would not
have suffer'd his Majesty to employ me in that station.' And so on,
'after which I got home, not being very well in health.' It certainly
was such ridiculously insincere treatment that it might well have caused
immediate sickening in one of robust health.

It was, forsooth, only in very minor matters that Evelyn profited by the
royal favour or by his courtiership. In April, 1666, Charles informed
him that he must now be sworn for a Justice of the Peace, ('the office
in the world I had most industriously avoided, in regard of the
perpetual trouble thereoff in these numerous parishes'), and he only
escaped this infliction by humbly desiring to be excused from fresh
duties inconsistent with the other service he was engaged in. So excused
he was, by royal favour, for which he 'rendered his Majesty many
thanks.' And on that same day he declined re-election to the Council of
the Royal Society for the following year on 'earnest suite' of other
affairs; for he had to be consistent in such different matters that
would have engaged a portion of his time.

Besides his work in connection with prisoners and the Mint he was
shortly afterwards nominated one of the Commissioners for regulating the
farming and making of saltpetre and gunpowder throughout Britain, an
appointment which was all the more appropriate from the fact that his
grandfather, George Evelyn of Long Ditton and Wotton (1530-1603), had
been the first to introduce the manufacture of gunpowder into England,
when he established mills on both of his properties. He was also
appointed one of the three Surveyors of the repairs of St. Paul's
Cathedral, 'and to consider of a model for the new building, or, if it
might be, repairing of the steeple, which was most decay'd.'

With hands and head fully occupied with business affairs he found time
for other work of a useful nature, while still having plenty of leisure
for social duties and enjoyments. In this respect he forms a good
example of the well-known truth that it is always the busiest men who
can spare most time for matters lying outside of their special grooves
of work. Thus in September, 1665, he drew up a scheme for erecting an
infirmary at Chatham, in which he was supported by his friend Pepys,
then a high official in the Navy Department and like himself a shrewd
man of business and method, and therefore finding time for other than
purely routine official work; while in August, 1666, he entreated the
Lord Chancellor 'to visite the Hospital of the Savoy, and reduce it
(after ye greate abuse that had been continu'd) to its original
institution for ye benefit of the poore, which he promis'd to do.'

But nothing came from either of these schemes, for on 2nd. Sept. 'this
fatal night about ten, began the deplorable fire neere Fish Streete in
London.' It raged by day and by night,--'(if I may call that night which
was light as day for 10 miles round about, after a dreadful manner).'
Nothing could be done to stay its progress, and the citizens were
awe-stricken and paralyzed by fear. 'The conflagration was so universal,
and the people so astonish'd, that from the beginning, I know not by
what despondency or fate, they hardly stirr'd to quench it, so that
there was nothing heard or seene but crying out and lamentation, running
about like distracted creatures without at all attempting to save even
their goods; such a strange consternation there was upon them, so as it
burned both in breadth and length, the churches, publics halls,
Exchange, hospitals, monuments, and ornaments, leaping after a
prodigious manner, from house to house and streete to streete, at great
distances one from ye other; for ye heate with a long set of faire and
warm weather had even ignited the aire and prepar'd the materials to
conceive the fire, which devour'd after an incredible manner houses,
furniture, and every thing. Here we saw the Thames cover'd with goods
floating, all the barges and boats laden with what some had time and
courage to save, as, on ye other, ye carts etc., carrying out to the
fields, which for many miles were strew'd with moveables of all sorts,
and tents erecting to shelter both people and what goods they could get
away. Oh the miserable and calamitous spectacle! such as happly the
world had not seene since the foundation of it, nor be outdon till the
universal conflagration thereof. All the skie was of a fiery aspect,
like the top of a burning oven, and the light seene above 40 miles round
about for many nights. God grant mine eyes may never behold the like,
who now saw above 10,000 houses all in one flame; the noise and cracking
and thunder of the impetuous flames, ye shreiking of women and children,
the hurry of people, the fall of towers, houses, and churches, was like
an hideous storme, and the aire all about so hot and inflam'd that at
the last one was not able to approach it, so that they were forc'd to
stand and let ye flames burn on, which they did for neere two miles in
lengh and one in breadh. The clowds also of smoke were dismall and
reach'd upon computation neer 50 miles in length. Thus I left it this
afternoone burning, a resemblance of Sodom, or the last day. It forcibly
call'd to my mind that passage--_non enim hic habemus stabilem
civitatem_: the ruines resembling the picture of Troy. London was, but
is no more! Thus I returned.'

For days the conflagration raged, although the whole situation might
probably have been saved if the advice of seamen, then as now amongst
the bravest and most practical of Britain's sons, had been followed.
When the court suburb of Whitehall began to be threatened,--'but oh, the
confusion there was then at the Court!'--the gentlemen, 'who hitherto
had stood as men intoxicated, with their hands acrosse,.... began to
consider that nothing was likely to put a stop but the blowing up of so
many houses as might make a wider gap than any had yet been made by the
ordinary method of pulling them downe with engines; this some stout
seamen propros'd early enough to have sav'd neere ye whole citty, but
this some tenacious and avaritious men, aldermen, etc., would not
permitt, because their houses must have been of the first.' At length,
however, the fire died out, the houseless citizens finding refuge in
tents and miserable huts and hovels hastily erected about St. George's
fields and Moorfields as far as Highgate. But Evelyn's abode had
remained untouched. From reviewing the now poverty-striken people 'in
this calamitous condition I return'd with a sad heart to my house,
blessing and adoring the distinguishing mercy of God to me and mine, who
in the midst of all this ruine was like Lot, in my little Zoar, safe
and sound.'

The plague and the fire were held to be the visitation of God's anger,
and Evelyn evidently thought the heavy punishment richly merited. 'Oct.
10th. This day was order'd a generall fast thro' the Nation, to humble
us on ye late dreadfull conflagration, added to the plague and warr, the
most dismall judgments that could be inflicted, but whiche indeed we
highly deserv'd for our prodigious ingratitude, burning lusts, dissolute
Court, profane and abominable lives, under such dispensations of God's
continu'd favour in restoring Church, Prince, and People from our late
intestine calamities, of which we were altogether unmindfull, even to
astonishment.'

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