AMERICA AND THE MIDDLE TEMPLE on May 12, 1597, at the age of seventeen. His published accounts contain a good deal of information about the colony of which he more than once acted as Governor. In the second party of settlers 'was a certain Gabriel Beadall, who with John Russell was set "to learn to make clapbord cut downe trees and ly in woods . . . making it theire delight to hear the trees thunder as they fell, but the axes so oft blistered their tender fingers that commonly even,' third blow had a lowd oath to drowne the echo; for remedy of which sin the President devised howe to have everie mans oathes numbered, and at night, for every oath to have a can of water poured downe his sleeve, with which every offender was so washed (himself and all) that a man should scarce heare an oathe in a weake.."1 It may be only a coincidence that about thirty years later there was a Gabriel Beadall keeping a stationer's shop at the Middle Temple as a tenant of the Inn. On the other hand it is quite possible that having gained a little money Beadall re turned to his native land and set up in business under the auspices of those who had been instrumental in sending him to Virginia. Shortly after the formation of the new colony we find a connection between the Temple and the Virginia Settlement through quite a different channel. The Rev. William Cranshaw, father of the poet, who preached the sermon in connection with the departure to Virginia of Lord Delaware on Feb. 21, 1609-10, was Reader of the Temple Church from 1605 to 1613 and is known to have been deeply interested in the infant English commonwealth. Un like his friend, the Rev. William Symonds who had preached before the Virginia Company in Whitechapel Parish Church in the previous year, he had never been a resident in Virginia though a Mr. Raleigh Crawshaw was in the second party of 1 Proceedings of the English Colony in Virginia by W.S. 1612. p. 48.
settlers and is mentioned several times in Mr. Simonds's narrative. Another friend of the Reader of the Temple Church was the Rev. Alexander Whitaker, son of the Master of St. John's College, Cambridge, who ministered in the colony and was drowned there. Richard Martin, whose erratic tempera ment has gained for him prominence in the history of the Inn, was also connected with the Virginia Company. In 1591 he was expelled for an assault in the Hall upon another member, but some years later was allowed to return, was called to the Bar and finally became a Reader of the Inn in 1615. Martin was an advocate of considerable force but spoilt his eloquence by indulgence in raillery and invective. In 1614 he acted as counsel for the Company in some proceedings before the House of Commons who passed a resolution of censure upon his speech which was described "as the most unfitting that was ever spoken in this Chouse."1 Among the contemporaries of Robert Ashley were the sons and nephews of the Treasurer, Miles Sandys; William, Miles, Edwin, George, and Henry were the names of the five sons who were members of the Inn. His brother the Archbishop also had five sons who were members, — Samuel, Edwin, Thomas, Henry and George. Neither Mr. A. F. Pollard nor Mr. Sidney Lee who wrote the notices of Edwin and George Sandys in the Dictionary of National Bio graphy appear to have been aware that there were two Edwins and two Georges, so that, in consideration of this evidence, it is probable that both biographies require con siderable emendation. Edwin, son of the Treasurer, is mentioned in the Records of the Inn as a Knight in 1602, whereas Mr. Pollard states that Edwin, son of the Arch bishop, was knighted on May n, 1603. Perhaps the other Edwin was the rightful husband of one or more of the four wives whom Mr. Pollard assigns to the Arch 1 Commons Journals i. 488.
