Page:Men of Kent and Kentishmen.djvu/163

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AND KENTISHMEN.
149

after bencher, treasurer, and reader of his Inn. In 1724 he was made Attorney-General, which office he filled ten years. In 1733 he was appointed Chief Justice of the King's Bench, and raised to the Upper-house as Lord Hardwicke. Three years and a half later, on the death of Lord Talbot, he became Lord Chancellor, a position he filled with credit and dignity for nearly twenty years. "The beauty of his person, the urbanity of his manners, the peculiar sweetness of his voice enhanced the admiration which could not fail to be excited by his excellence as a judge." He died March 6th, 1764. His eldest son Philip, second Earl of Hardwicke, was a distinguished statesman and man of letters, and his second son, Charles, a lawyer of reputation. His eldest daughter married the famous sailor, Lord Anson, but whether these children were Kentish born does not appear.

[See "Collins's Peerage," "Biographia Britannica," "Foss's Judges," and Campbell's "Lives of the Chancellors"


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(The following were omitted from their proper order in the Catalogue.)


Nicholas Billingsley,

POET AND DIVINE,

Was born at Faversham in 1633, his father being one of the masters of the school there. In 1650 he proceeded to Eton, and subsequently entered at Merton College, Oxford, though ill health interfered with his residence