In 1583 a Polish noble, named Albert Laski, palatine of Siradia, beiag in England, Dee and Kelly were introduced to him, whether with a political object or not no direct evidence exists to inform us, but they accompanied him to Poland. It is said that the attachment arose from the similarity of their pursuits, that he soon became weary of them by finding himself abused by their idle pretensions, and that to get rid of them he persuaded them to pay a visit to Rodolph, king of Bohemia ; that moreover, though a weak and credulous man, Rodolph was soon disgusted with their nonsense; and that they had no better success with the King of Poland; but that they were soon after invited by a rich Bohemian noble to his castle of Trebona, where they continued for some time in great affluence, owing, as they asserted, to their power of transforming the baser metals into gold.
It was very probably from the circumstance of Laski's being addicted to astrology and alchemy, as well as the King of Poland, that Dee was employed by the queen's crafty ministers as a fitting person for a political mission to that country, in the real character of secret intelligencer.' It was in keeping with the unvarying policy of Elizabeth's government, and with the habits and previous occu pation of Dee. The ridiculous pretensions which he and Kelly set up were well calculated to lull all suspicions of their real purpose. No other hypothesis seems capable of affording a key to Dee's conduct during this singular excursion ; end all the circumstances admit of tolerably complete explanation by it. It is only fair to add however that Dee, in his private Diary,' which includes all the period of this Polish journey, gives no indication of any such secret object; but then he gives no indication of any purpose whatever for undertaking the journey, or for returning home when ho did.
Kelly appears to have been oue of those sordid and servile characters that look only at the immediate gain to be made of each single transac tion, without having either principle or honour in his composition. Dee, on the contrary, was, as Lilly in his gossiping memoirs tells us, " tho most ambitious man living, and most desirous of fame and renown, and was never so well pleased as when he heard himself styled Most Excellent." Lilly also gives a curious narrative of the means by which the servant Kelly obtained the art of transmutation from a poor friar, with whom Dee would have no intercourse; and that when the secret was obtained, the friar was made away with ; and one reason given by this arch-knave of the Protectorate, Butler's Sidrophel,' why "many weaknesses in the manage of that way of Mosaical learn iug (' conference with spirits,' in the book ascribed to Dee), was because Kelly was very vicious, unto whom the angels were not obedient, or willingly did declare the questions propoundsd."
Dee and Kelly separated in Bohemia, the former returning to England, the latter remaining at Prague. Of the circumstances attend ing this rupture nothing is certainly known; • though the narrative given by Sidropbel is characteristic enough of Kelly's character. See William Lilly's History of his Life and Times from 1602 to 1681, p. 224, Baldwin'a edition.
In 1595 the queen appointed Dee warden of Manchester College, he being then sixty-eight years of age. Ile resided there nine years; but from some cause not exactly known he left it in 1604, and returned to his house at Mortlake, where he spent the remainder of his days. Ile died in 1601, aged eighty-one, leaving a numerous family and a great number of works behind him. "He died," says Lilly, " very poor, enforced many times to sell some book or other to buy his dinner with, as Dr. Napier of Linford in Buckinghamshire oft related, who knew him very well :" but Dee was very extravagant in his style of living, and be had for many years been in pecuniary difficulties. Long beforo and during the period of his wardenship of Manchester College he appears from his 'Diary' to have been in the constant habit of borrowing money from his friends, and of raising small sums by pawning articles of plate, &c.
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Dee's writings are very numerous, several of which still remain in manuscript. A catalogue of his printed writings may be seen in his Compendious Rehearsal,' or his letter to Whitgift; and from these it appears that he then had by him more than forty unpublished writ ings, the titles of which he gives. His 'Diary,' a curious record of his daily life during some important portion of his later was printed in 1842 by the Camden Society, and along with it theCata lope of his library of Manuscripts, made by himself before his house was plundered by the populace : it Is curious, as containing the titles of several works of medimval date, not now known to be in oxisteuco. His library is said to have cost him 30001., a large sum for those days.