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found time to write comments upon the laws of his country, even to this day, unexcelled in their profound legal knowledge; and to arrange huge volumes of decisions distinguished for their learning and accuracy-voluminous works, still regarded as first authorities by the lawyer, at the same time that they are among the best text books of the legal student.

To the law student, the life of Sir Edward Coke is full of materials for the most careful, the most serious reflection. Riches did not render him idle, affluence did not enervate him. Born to a competent estate, he yet laboured in his profession as if for his very existence. Rising from his bed before day-break, he studied unceasingly until weariness compelled him to seek repose. He was one of the few eminent lawyers on whom, as Lord Woodhouselee justly remarks, "Fortune has bestowed hereditary affluence; for, to a man of talents and of moderate activity, the possession of a competence in early life is very far from being an advantage.

Coke did not start in life with both the great advantages which Lord Talbot considered the best endowments of a law student, parts and poverty," for he had a family estate, and

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excellent connexions-connexions which through life he studiously, perhaps too carefully, preserved and extended, certainly in his latter days more so than accorded with his happiness. He commenced, however, with still greater endowments than these: namely, with a moral courage which no difficulties appalled, and with habits of industry, for which no investigation was too tedious or intricate.

It would be unjust to the student to hold up Coke as a perfect model for his imitation, for he had many great and important defects of character. He was proud in the extreme, imperious and overbearing. This pride was one great actuating principle which followed him through life, was distinguished in his two marriages, in his pleadings, in his decisions as a judge, in his contests with Bacon, in his intrigues at court, in the marriages of his children, and even in his speeches in Parliament.

His pride, however, was not confined to himself, storehouse as he was of common law, or to his own gigantic acquirements. He felt proud of the equity of the laws of England, proud of his country and of his country's rights, and, when tottering towards his grave, in one of his last addresses to the Commoners of England, he again spoke of his country's glories, of the feats of her children in by-gone days of triumphant victories, with

all the buoyant enthusiasm of youth. This proud feeling of patriotism is discernible in all his works; it is found in every page of his " Commentaries," and it peeps out even in the dry prefaces, to still more uninviting reports.

His ever anxious solicitude for the progress of the student was worthy of so great a man. It was not with him an occasional feeling, for it will be found beaming through all his gigantic labours-he let no opportunity escape to further this benevolent intention.

Of Coke's morality, of his religious feelings, we have abundant evidence. The student will not fail to be struck with the testimony he gives to the unvaried non-success of every lawyer of his day, who was distinguished for his disregard of the rules of virtue or the laws of God.

The foregoing is a slight sketch of the life and mind of Edward Coke, an outline that I will now proceed to fill up in detail. He was born on the first of February in the year 1551, at his father's seat in the parish of Mileham, near East Dereham, in Norfolk.

The house in which he was born no longer exists; it was pulled down some years since by the present Mr. Coke, and another erected on its site. It stood on the ground formerly occupied by some of the outworks of the old Castle of Arundel; built in the age of William of

Normandy, by Alan son of Flaad, to whom the Conqueror granted the Manor of Mileham.

Sir Henry Spelman was shown by Sir Edward Coke the very spot of his birth, his mother being suddenly delivered of him, by the parlour fire-side, before she could be carried up stairs to her bed.*

Although the house no longer remains, Mrs. Leeds, the present tenant of the new mansion, still shews the spot of Sir Edward's birth.

According to the register of Mileham, he was baptized on the 8th of February, 1551, so that he was probably born on the day I have assigned, or late in the previous year.†

His father, Robert Coke, was a bencher of Lincoln's Inn, and a barrister of very extensive practice.‡

His mother, Winifred Knightley, was daughter

* Spelman's Icenia sive Norfolciæ p. 150 Mileham-Prædicabat miri quidpiam ejus Genitura; Matrem ita subito juxta Focum intercipiens et in Thalamum cui suberat non moveretur. Locum ipsum ipse mihimet demonstravit. The learned Spelman resided at Narborough, in Norfolk, about twenty miles from Mileham.

"

I owe to the politeness of the Reverend C. B. Barnewall, the following copy of the Milebam Register. Edvardus Coke generosus baptizatus fuit VIII die Februarius, An. 1551" Stowe's London, p. 429.

and co-heiress of William Knightley, of Morgrave Knightley, in Norfolk, and a very estimable woman. Coke, in after life, always spoke of her with much gratitude and reverence.

The surname of Coke is evidently of British origin, being derived from the British word coc, or coke, a chief.

The town of Cuckfield, in Sussex, was originally spelt Cokefield, Cokkfield, or Cookefield, then Cuxfield and lastly Cuckfield.*

In the reign of Henry III, in a grant to the great Earl de Warren, it is spelt Cokefield† ; in the ninth of Edward II, I find it changed into Cokefeld ; and in the eighteenth of Henry VII into Cockfield.§

I find the same variations in spelling the name of Sir Edward Coke; he is often designated by contemporary authors as Cook; even Lady Hatton, his second wife, always spelt his name Cook, or Cooke; and, in Norfolk, his native country, the provincial pronunciation of the name is still more extraordinary, being more like Kuke than Coke.

In the writs of military aid, printed by order of

*Horsfield's Sussex. vol. 1, page 252.

†Tower Records. No. 2.

Burrell MSS.

§ Tower Records.

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