my part, to make the best and thankfullest returns I can, and to yourself in particular, who are to be, if I have the honour to be admitted to the King's business, my polar star.
Highness, and from whose judicious mouth I confess to have received the most early and strongest impressions of his character."
The Prince of Orange had not a high opinion of the powers of Sir L. Jenkins; and, if what D'Estrades says of him be true, he wanted an essential qualification of a statesman, and that for which the Prince was very eminent—decision of mind. He calls him "homme peu résolutif;" but he was an honest, humble-minded man, and, according to James II., took as much pains to escape the appointment to the office of secretary of state as other men did to obtain it. A curious and characteristic anecdote is told of him. When he rose to the high offices in which he was employed, that he might be constantly reminded of his humble origin, he is said
Suspendisse potenti
Vestimenta Deo,
to have hung in his chamber the old pair of leathern breeches in which he first rode into Oxford a poor scholar of Jesus College. Sir Leoline Jenkins died in 1685, aged 62.
It is a curious fact that two of the secretaries of state of Charles II., Sir Leoline Jenkins and Sir Joseph Williamson, had both been tutors. The latter was the son of a clergyman
in Cumberland, and, from a travelling tutor, became Keeper of State Papers, and, in 1665, Under Secretary of State. He was afterwards Plenipotentiary at Cologne, and, from 1674 to 1678, Secretary of State, when he was succeeded by Lord Sunderland. He was Member for Thetford in 1678, and President of the Royal Society.—Biog. Dict. xxxii. 136.
