[1701]Winceslaus Hollar, natus Pragae 23 Julii, st
[1702]Winceslaus Hollar, Bohemus, was borne at Prague.
His father was a Knight of the Empire: which is by lettres patent under the imperiall seale (as our baronets). I have seen it[1703]: the seale is bigger then the broad seale of England: in the middle is the imperiall coate; and round about it are the coates of the Princes Electors. His father was a Protestant, and either for keeping a conventicle, or being taken at one, forfeited his estate, and was ruined by the Roman Catholiques.
He told me that when he was a schoole-boy he tooke a delight in draweing of mapps; which draughts he kept, and they were pretty. He was designed by his father to have been a lawyer, and was putt to that profession[1704], when his father's troubles, together with the warres, forced him to leave his countrey. So that what he did for his delight and recreation only when a boy, proved to be his livelyhood when a man.
I thinke he stayd sometime in Lowe Germany, then he
came into England, wher he was very kindly entertained
by that great patron of painters and draughts-men
He hath donne the most in that way that ever any one
did, insomuch that I have heard Mr. John Evelyn, R.S.S.,say that at sixpence a print his labour would come to ...li.(quaere J
At Arundel-house he maried with my ladle's wayting woman, Mrs. ... Tracy, by whom he haz a daughter, that was one of the greatest beauties I have seen; his son by her dyed in the plague, an ingeniose youth, drew delicately.
When the civil warres brake-out, the Lord Marshall had leave to goe beyond sea[CXXXI.]. Mr. Hollar went into the Lowe-Countries, where he stayed till about 1649.
[CXXXI.]Italie[1706].
[CXXXI.]Italie[1706].
I remember he told me that when he first came into England, (which was a serene time of peace) that the people, both poore and rich, did looke cheerfully, but at his returne, he found the countenances of the people all changed, melancholy, spightfull, as if bewitched.
I have sayd before that his father was ruined upon the account of the Protestant religion. Winceslaus dyed a Catholique, of which religion, I suppose, he might be ever since he came to Arundel-howse.
He was a very friendly good-natured man as could be, but shiftlesse as to the world, and dyed not rich[1707]. He maried a second wife, 1665, by whom he has severall children. He dyed on our Ladie-day (25 Martii), 1677, and is buried in St. Margaret's church-yard at Westminster neer the north west corner of the tower. Had he lived till the 13th of July following, he had been just 70 yeares old.