been the commencement of his decreased attention to public business.

He had then been married twenty-eight years, being in the fifty-first year of his age. Of his numerous family he lost five sons and three daughters. Edward, his first born and heir was probably about twenty-six years old; Sir John Somerset, his second son, most likely occupied Troy House, a few miles off, while his next surviving and sixth son, Charles Somerset, he installed as Governor of his Castle.

The noble Earl, inclined to a plethoric constitution, had not uniform good health, being subject to gout, yet was he of a joyous, hearty, kind, benevolent disposition. He was too a man of some learning, without being distinguished for its application, otherwise than in some verbal polemical discussions attributed to him by Dr. Bayly, the last chaplain in his service, who has preserved many of his witty apophthegms, presenting us with indications of his religious and political sentiments.

Although our interest in this memoir concerns us less in reference to the father, than to be informed respecting his son, yet the intelligent reader cannot fail to discover, that Edward, now Lord Herbert, during the early years of his life, was necessarily so intimately associated with all matters of domestic history, affecting the large family then resident at Raglan Castle, that such relations as can be gathered respecting its several branches at that early period, are invested with a degree of interest which they might not under other circumstances possess.

CHAPTER II.

BIRTH, HOME, EDUCATION, EARLY CAREER, TIMES, AND FIRST MARRIAGE OF EDWARD SOMERSET, LORD herbert.

As already related, Henry,* fifth Earl of Worcester, married in June, 1600, while yet attached to the Court of Queen Elizabeth, and, therefore, most likely he was resident at Worcester House, in the Strand, a building of some importance from its magnitude and position, as well as from the princely character of the noble possessor of the property.

There, it is reasonable to conclude, was born Edward Somerset early in 1601, the son and heir whose eventful history will hereafter mainly occupy our attention, first as Lord Herbert, afterwards as the Earl of Glamorgan, and lastly, on succeeding to his father's titles, as Earl and Marquis of Worcester.

The birth of this Lord Herbert has never before been attempted to be ascertained, wherefore the present assumed date requires confirmation. On the 14th of July, 1609, when he would thus probably be only eight years of age, we find him associated with his grandfather and father in a lease of lands in the manor of Wondy, Monmouth, and of the fishing, or river of Usk and Carlion, for their lives.†

His preceptor at Raglan Castle was Mr. Adams; but he does not appear, like his father, to have been at any college in England; as, however, he travelled much

* The annexed specimen of his Lordship's autograph, during his father's lifetime, is from a MS. certificate in the British Museum dated 21st May, 1604.

† Calendar of State Papers, Do

H: Herbertz

mestic, 1603-1610. Edited by Mrs. M. A. E. Green. 8vo. 1857, page 529.

on the Continent at an early period of his life, it is possible he also finished his education at some foreign university. In a communication of singular interest, written late in life, hereafter given in full, he specially observes:-"Amongst Almighty God's infinite mercies to me in this world, I account it one of the greatest that his divine goodness vouchsafed me parents as well careful as able to give me virtuous education, and extraordinary breeding at home and abroad, in Germany, France, and Italy, allowing me abundantly in those parts." This summary is sufficiently explicit as regards the circuit of his travels, and the easy, agreeable circumstances under which it was performed, but still leaves it open to doubt whether he had completed his educational course before entering on his continental tour. Wood expressly states, in reference to Lord Herbert's father, that after he had been two or three years at college he was sent to travel in France, Italy, &c., where he presumes he changed his religion for that of Rome.109

During the reign of James I., and while his grandfather was Keeper of the Privy Seal, no mention occurs of Lord Herbert enjoying any favour at Court, his courtier life commencing only in that of Charles I., according to allusions made in the document before noticed. On the accession of the latter monarch to the throne, Lord Herbert might be 24 years of age. In alluding to his "education and breeding," coupled with his travels, he adds: "And since most plentifully at my master of most happy memory, the late King's Court;" making it almost conclusive that his education was considered as completed shortly prior to the King's decease, in 1625.

In 1627 his grandfather was at Worcester House,

109 An, à Wood. Vol. 3, pp. 199–204.

whence he wrote to the Earl of Huntingdon on the 11th of June, informing him of his illness and inability to leave his bedchamber.*

The first year of the reign of Charles I. was an auspicious one, therefore, for the young Lord Herbert. His father, a stalwart, hale man, was in the prime of life, only 48 years of age, lord of one of the finest castles in the kingdom, whether considered for the beauty, strength and importance of its structure and its commanding situation, or the extent of its parks, pastures, plantations, and forests; it was a luxurious place well stored with paintings, furniture, and plate, while it was surrounded with every embellishment of fountains, fishponds, statuary, and gardens that art or wealth could command. Lord Herbert himself was rich in acquired knowledge, and in whatever way his natural genius then displayed itself, such a mind as he possessed must have afforded many evidences of latent talent. One important part of a young nobleman's education in Elizabeth's time, and later, was that of horsemanship, particularly in the tilt-yard, a kind of adjunct to noble residences, supposed by many to have existed even at Raglan Castle, but such an opinion is not even authorised by any tradition. Some interest he might take in tournaments, but we easily suspect without aiming at, or succeeding in that skill in manœuvres so requisite in the fierce and fiery jousts appertaining to such knightly contests, equipped in heavy armour, wielding a ponderous lance, and mimicking all the maddest encounters of the fellest enemies. We doubt if his talent lay that way. His grandfather's horsemanship has been greatly extolled

* Bodleian Library, "Carte Papers-Earl of Huntingdon's Papers, Temp. Eliz. Car. II. 77.' No 120. The annexed engraving is a facsimile of his autograph to the letter in question.

I

by all writers, in alluding to his character. In his youth (it is said) he was remarkable for his athletic acquirements, distinguishing himself by the manly exercises of riding and tilting, in which he was perhaps superior to any of his contemporaries. But we have no reason to extol the grandson for like success in these chivalric exercises.

We conceive he was otherwise disqualified, that he was too light of weight and too short in stature. He appears to have been of slender figure, and rather under than above the middle standard in height. In another point, indirectly perhaps affecting this same matter, he did not possess that boisterous speech easy, which armed assailants may often be called on to assume, to strike terror into a foe, by throwing him off his guard. He himself acknowledges, later in life, to this vocal defect, when, in writing to Charles II. he admits that he takes up the pen, as he says, " To ease your Majesty of a trouble incident to the prolixity of speech, and a natural defect of utterance which I accuse myself of." "The prolixity of speech" any one may imagine, both from the letter in which this passage occurs, as well as in the noble lord's general correspondence throughout his life; it seems to be a style in which the close of each sentence, or its matter, suggests the next, to be followed again in like manner, until the main subject becomes so overlaid as to be lost in needless verbose amplification. But he could and did write tersely enough on occasion. No man could then better display the admirable art of compressing large meaning into small compass. If eloquence in speaking "troubled" him, eloquent writing assuredly cost him, it would appear, vastly more trouble in the labour of the pen. We suspect that concentration of thought was natural to him, but its elaboration to produce that