The church at Falmouth is dedicated to King Charles the First, with the proud additions of Saint and Martyr. It evidently suited with the views and with the interest of those in power after 1660, to identify Charles the First with the Established Church, and to inculcate that he died in its defence. The new church at Plymouth is dedicated in a similar manner to St. Charles; and in this instance the pleasure of outraging the feelings of their adversaries may have acted in aid of political expediency. Mr. Hals does not seem to have treated the very distinguished family of Killigrew in a manner that might have been expected, from his attachment to aristocracy in general, or from his prejudices as a Cavalier. The horrible story of Jane Killigrew cannot possibly be true, in the manner or to the extent in which it is related, and the whole should have been omitted, were there not reasons for believing that it rests on some foundation. If the lady is exonerated from the most atrocious part of the tale, representing her as actually boarding the vessels and participating in the destruction of foreign merchants, and for which mere popular tradition at the interval of two centuries cannot form an adequate proof, we must not too rigidly apply the manners and feelings of our own times to a period so dissimilar. Many exploits performed by the great Sir Francis Drake, would now create very different impressions from those stamped on men’s minds at the time; and the more gentle and courteous, though not less brave, Sir Walter Raleigh, would now hardly escape without blame. No one seems to have suffered greater degradation, from common report, than Mr. Thomas Killigrew. He is usually represented as the Jester, or even licensed fool, of Charles the Second; and the anecdotes given by Mr. Hals contain much more of rudeness than of wit. His history is thus related in the Biographical Dictionary of 1784: