TWO BIOGRAPHIES OF WILLIAM BEDELL.
Another interesting reprint is Two Biographies of William Bedell, edited, with Notes and Index, by Evelyn Shuckburgh, M.A. (Cambridge University Press, 10s. net). The first Life is by the Bishop's son; the second is the work of Alexander Clagie, an Anglican clergyman, who married the Bishop's stepdaughter, and was his chaplain from his appointment to the Sees of Kilraore and Ardagh in 1629 (Ardagh he resigned within a very short time) till his death in 1641. This biography, of which there are two manuscripts differing from each other in some important particulars, was not printed till 1862. Mr. Shuckburgh, who has performed his task with scrupulous care, has added a number of letters, written by Bedell to various cor- respondents. The greater part of these—there are sixty-three in all, including some replies—are addressed to Dr. Samuel Ward, Master of Sidney Sussex College, 1609-43. These touch on a variety of matters, personal and controversial. Two were written to Dr. Newton, Dean of Durham (a layman, for such things were done in that golden age of the Church). These give an interesting account of affairs in Venice. And there is a cor- respondence with Laud, whose aid Bishop Bedell vainly invoked in a controversy that he had with the Chancellor of his diocese. Anything more scandalous than the condition of the Church in Ireland, as it comes out in these letters, it would be difficult to imagine. Bedell himself was an honourable exception to a generally prevailing laxity. He had a troublous time, but even his Romanist neighbours respected and loved him.
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