Dr. Fysher, the Librarian, died on Nov. 4, at Mr. Warneford's, of
Sevenhampton, Wilts, and was buried, on Nov. 7, in Adam de Brome's
chapel in St. Mary's Church, Oxford. And on Nov. 10, Rev. Humphrey Owen,
B.D., Fellow of Jesus College (afterwards D.D., and chosen Principal of
his College in 1763), was unanimously elected his successor[210].
Rawlinson mentions, in a letter to Owen of April 15, 1751, that he had
heard a complaint that in Fysher's time 'there was a great neglect in
the entry of books into the Benefactors' Catalogue, and into the
interleaved one of the Library; as to these objections, my answers were
as ready as true, at least I hope so, that Dr. Fysher's indisposition
disabled him much from the duty of his office, and that I did not think
every small benefaction ought to load the velom register[211].'
[210] Memorandum by Owen himself, in reply to a question from Rawlinson,
Rawl. MS. C. 989, f. 142. This volume contains a collection of letters
to Owen, chiefly from Browne Willis and Rawlinson, between the years
1748-1756. It affords proof that Owen was what his correspondents would
call an 'honest' man, _i.e._ a Jacobite. In one letter, Willis sends him
a Latin inscription in praise of Flora Macdonald, which he says is 'on a
fair lady's picture, in an honest gentl. seat in the province of St.
David's;' in another, Rawlinson sends him, as a contribution to the
Oxford collection of verses on the death of Frederick, Prince of Wales,
this Jacobite epitaph:--
'Here lies Fred., Down among the dead;
Had it been his Father, Most had much rather;
Had it been his Brother, Better than any other;
Had it been a Sister, More would have mist her;
Wer't the whole generation, Happy for the nation;
But since it is only Fred., There is no more to be said.'
[211] Rawl. MS. C. 989.