The old English family of Habingdon, Abingdon, Habington, or Abington traced their pedigree beyond the reign of Henry III., to Philip de Habington, of Abingdon, co. Cambridge: but that branch of the family from which our Poet sprang, descended from Richard Habington, of Brokhampton, whose third son John was coifferer to Queen Elizabeth. This John Habington, our Poet's grand-father, bought Hindlip Hall, an estate beautifully situated about four miles from Worcester. He married twice. By his second wife he had two sons, Thomas; and Edward, who was executed for Babington's plot in 1586.

Anthony-a-Wood gives this account of Thomas Habington. He 'was born at Thorpe near to Chertsey in Surrey, on the 23 Aug. 1560, (at which time and before the manor thereof belonged to his father) and at about 16 years of age he became a commoner of Lincoln Coll. Where spending about three years in academicall studies, was taken thence by his father and sent to the universities of Paris and Rheimes in France. After some time spent there in good letters, he return'd into England, and expressing and shewing himself an adherent to Mary qu. of Scots (who plotted with Anth. Babington against qu. Elizabeth) was committed prisoner to the Tower of London, where continuing six years, he profited more in that time in several sorts of learning, then he had before in all his life. Afterwards he retired to Hendlip (the manor of which his father had settled upon him) took to wife Mary the eldest daughter of Edward lord Morley by Elizabeth his wife, daughter and sole heir of Sir William Stanley knight, lord Mounteagle; and at riper years survey'd Worcestershire, made a collection of most of its antiquities from records, registers, evidences both private and public, monumental inscriptions and arms.... At length, after he had lived to the age of 87 years, surrendred up his pious soul to God at Hendlip near Worcester on the 8th October 1647, and was buried by his father in a vault under the chancel of the church there.' Ath. Oxon. iii. 222. Ed. 1817.

Hindlip Hall was full of lurking places. T. Nash in his Hist. of Worc. i. 585-7, gives a transcript of Ashmole's MSS. Vol. 804, fol. 93, at Oxford: which is a most graphic description of a search, for eleven nights and twelve days, in Jan. 1605, through the house: wherein Garnett the Jesuit and others were discovered, who were afterwards executed.

3. Wood's account of our Poet is perhaps the most authentic. "William Habington, was born at Hendlip, on the fourth [So have I been instructed by letters from his son Tho. Habington esq.: dated 5 Jan. 1672.] (some say the fifth) day of November 1605, educated in S. Omers and Paris; in the first of which he was earnestly invited to take upon him the habit of the Jesuits, but by excuses got free and left them. After his return from Paris, being then at man's estate, he was instructed at home in matters of history by his father, and became an accomplished gentleman.... This person, Will. Habington, who did then run with the times, and was not unknown [what does Wood mean by this?] to Oliver the usurper, died on the 30th of November 1654, and was buried in the vault before-mentioned by the bodies of his father and grand-father. The MSS. which he (and his father) left behind, are in the hands of his son Thomas, and might be made useful for the public, if in others."—Ath. Oxon. iii. 223. Ed. 1817.

4. The Habingtons were connected with the Talbots through the above Richard Habington's second son Richard Habington, whose grand-daughter Eleanor Baskerville married John Talbot of Longdon: and became the mother of (1) John, Lord Talbot 10th Earl of Shrewsbury, who succeeded his bachelor uncle George Talbot, the 9th Earl (lamented by our Poet at p. 77) on his death, 2d April 1630: (2) of George Talbot, our author's bosom friend, who died young and unmarried; and of other children.

5. The second son of the Earl of Pembroke, Sir William Herbert, was created on 2d April 1629, 1st Baron Powis. He had three children by Eleanor, youngest daughter of Henry Percy, 10th Earl of Northumberland, Sir Percy Herbert, Catherine Herbert, and Lucy Herbert. This Lucy Herbert is Castara.

6. A concurrence of allusions would seem to fix Habington's marriage with Lucy Herbert, between 1630 and 1633: later than which it cannot be: as the anniversary of his wedding day is celebrated in verse, at p. 80. Most of the poems relate to

There is in their arrangement, a slight thread of continuity. We are to realize the young Englishman, of good family, possibly not unhandsome, wooing—with a culture and grace acquired in France—the young English beauty: possibly under some disadvantage, being neither possessed of high station nor large fortune; and the lady's father too having just been made a Peer. The wooing beginning in town migrates to Marlow.

The lovers meeting 'under the kind shade of this tree' is noticed. In sum, the details of a pure courtship leading up to a happy marriage.

In "Wits Recreations, Selected [by the bookseller Humphry Blunden] from the Finest Fancies of Moderne Muses. London, 1640:" is the following.

Again, the after incidents of life are alluded to, in the poems; Castara has a fever but she recovers, she mourns over the loss of friends, and the like: while, the brightness and fancifulness of this earlier poesy but reflect the happiness of the Poet's home.

7. There are also songs of Friendship. As where he reproaches his bosom friend Talbot for not having seen him for three days, at p. 39, or where he consoles him for the hard usage he has received from that jilt Astrodora, at p. 82: and most of all, in the eight passionate Elegies over his decease.

8. Occasionally there is a bit of lashing satire, as that against the cravings of Poets, at p. 50: or of dry humour, as in

9. Lastly: strangely intermingled are Requiems over the mortality of Man, the vanity and uncertainty of all things; leading almost to a disgust with life. Of this he thus gives the key-note in saying at p. 114, 'When the necessities of nature returne him downe to earth, he esteemes it a place he is condemned to.... To live he knows a benefit, and the contempt of it ingratitude, and therefore loves, but not doates on life.' To this frame of thought may be opposed the keen wise saying of a great contemporary: Selden.

"Whilst you are upon Earth enjoy the good things that are here (to that end were they given) and be not melancholly, and wish yourself in Heaven. If a King should give you the keeping of a Castle, with all things belonging to it, Orchards, Gardens, &c., and bid you use them; withal promise you that after twenty years to remove you to Court, and to make you a Privy Councellor. If you should neglect your Castle, and refuse to eat of those fruits, and sit down, and whine, and wish you were a Privy Councellor, do you think the King would be pleased with you?"—Table Talk, p. 84. Ed. 1867.

Our wisdom is to recognise the representations of Habington, and to live in the spirit of Selden: thus 'using the world as not abusing it.'

William Habington's works were published in the following order:—