that King Charles diverted him from his purpose to attempting a History of England ’by a persuasive loving violence (to which may be added a promise of 500 pounds a year).’  He likes these parenthetic touches, as in his description of Donne, ’always preaching to himself, like an angel from a cloud,—­but in none.’  Again, of a commendation of one of his heroes he says, ’it is a known truth,—­though it be in verse.’

A memory of the days when Izaak was an amorist, and shone in love ditties, appears thus.  He is speaking of Donne:—­

   ’Love is a flattering mischief . . . a passion that carries us to
   commit errors with as much ease as whirlwinds remove feathers.’

   ’The tears of lovers, or beauty dressed in sadness, are observed to
   have in them a charming sadness, and to become very often too strong
   to be resisted.’

These are examples of Walton’s sympathy:  his power of portrait-drawing is especially attested by his study of Donne, as the young gallant and poet, the unhappy lover, the man of state out of place and neglected; the heavily burdened father, the conscientious scholar, the charming yet ascetic preacher and divine, the saint who, dying, makes himself in his own shroud, an emblem of mortality.

As an example of Walton’s style, take the famous vision of Dr. Donne in Paris.  He had left his wife expecting her confinement:—­

’Two days after their arrival there, Mr. Donne was left alone in that room in which Sir Robert and he, and some other friends, had dined together.  To this place Sir Robert returned within half an hour, and as he left, so he found Mr. Donne alone, but in such an ecstacy, and so altered as to his looks, as amazed Sir Robert to behold him; insomuch that he earnestly desired Mr. Donne to declare what had befallen him in the short time of his absence.  To which Mr. Donne was not able to make a present answer:  but, after a long and perplexed pause, did at last say, “I have seen a dreadful vision since I saw you:  I have seen my dear wife pass twice by me through this room, with her hair hanging about her shoulders, and a dead child in her arms; this I have seen since I saw you.”  To which Sir Robert replied, “Sure, sir, you have slept since I saw you; and this is the result of some melancholy dream, which I desire you to forget, for you are now awake.”  To which Mr. Donne’s reply was, “I cannot be surer that I now live than that I have not slept since I saw you:  and I am as sure that at her second appearing she stopped, and looked me in the face, and vanished . . . " And upon examination, the abortion proved to be the same day, and about the very hour, that Mr. Donne affirmed he saw her pass by him in his chamber.

’ . . .  And though it is most certain that two lutes, being both strung and tuned to an equal pitch, and then one played upon, the other, that is not touched, being laid upon a table at a fit distance, will (like an echo to a trumpet) warble a faint audible harmony in answer to the same tune; yet many will not believe there is any such thing as a sympathy of souls, and I am well pleased that every reader do enjoy his own opinion . . . ’

He then appeals to authority, as of Brutus, St. Monica, Saul, St. Peter:—­