King made Baron Dacre of Gillesland, Viscount Howard of Morpeth, and EARL of CARLISLE. To the Merry Monarch we owed also the coronets of Cornwallis, Langdale, Halifax, Clifford of Chudleigh, Dartmouth, &c. JAMES II., in the four troubled years of his reign, restored the Viscounty of Stafford-the most unjustly attainted of titles; made Catherine Sidley, Countess of Dorchester for life; created the Dukedom of Berwick, (afterwards so celebrated in European warfare), and added five new Baronies -all of which are extinct, save Churchill, conferred on the great general, and Waldegrave, still enjoyed by the representative of that ancient house. It was also from James II. that the Ratcliffes derived their luckless title of Derwentwater, and the Herberts their Marquessate of Powis. WILLIAM III. raised to the peerage twenty-one personages, including his Dutch favourites, Bentinck, Keppel, Nassau, Schomberg, and Auverquerque; and several of the leading Whig families, such as Lowther, Somers, Vane, Fermor, and Ashburnham, the last quaintly designated by old Fuller as of "stupendous antiquity;" in this reign also each of the three great Whig lords, Bedford, Devonshire, and Carmarthen, received a Ducal Coronet. Among Queen Anne's new creations were the well-born and well-endowed Granvilles, Pelhams, Cowpers, Harcourts, Harleys, Herveys, Leveson-Gowers, Willoughbys, Bathursts, and St. John's. At the commencement of the eighteenth century, the House of Peers reckoned but a hundred and seventy members, of which nearly one half has passed away. In GEORGE the First's time a less regard began to be paid to birth or hereditary pretension; the political and legal elements predominating. Still in this reign originated the Baronies of Cobham, Coningsby, Romney, Onslow, Cadogan, and Walpole, and the Viscounties of Torrington and Falmouth. Forty is about the number of GEORGE II.'s peers; but such had been the decay amongst old titles that neither this increase nor that of his predecessor did more than barely counterbalance extinctions, and left the House much in the same position as they found it. Lawyers and statesmen were duly honoured by the house of Hanover; and the Second George chose from the bench no less than five peers, Raymond, Hardwicke, Talbot, Mansfield, and Henley. The present Dukedom of Northumberland, the present Earldom of Fitzwilliam, and the late Earldom of Egremont, three of the most powerful titles, were George II.'s creations. The same moderate and discriminating selection marked the first twenty-four years of the reign of GEORGE III., and chose for additions to the peerage the great Commoners, Grosvenor of Eaton, Curzon of Kedleston, Eliot of Port Eliot, Vernon of Sudbury, and Bagot of Blithfield. After 1784 a new era, however, commenced in peerage annals. Political purposes, and the consequent lavish bestowal of the highest honours of the Crown, increased the roll of the Lords to such an extent, that at the death of GEORGE IV., new peerages, to the number of two hundred and thirty-five, had been added. WILLIAM IV. raised the Marquesses of Stafford and Cleveland to the rank of Dukes, and gave Earldoms to Col. FitzClarence, Lord George Cavendish, and Mr. Lambton, of Durham, besides elevating to the same grade several peers of lesser degree. He also created one Viscounty, Canterbury, and a goodly array of baronies. Among her present Majesty's creations, occur warriors, statesmen, and lawyers, of great eminence, besides several of the representatives of good old county families, such as Coke of Norfolk, Wrottesley of Staffordshire, Methuen of Wilts, Egerton of Tatton; French of French Park, and Morgan of Tredegar; and one Peer, Macaulay, for ever illustrious in literature. Of these creations of the existing and the late Sovereign, eight have already become extinct, namely, Colborne, Dinorben, Sydenham, Langdale, Western, Milford, Beauvale, and Macaulay; the Earldom of Burlington has merged in the Dukedom of Devonshire, the Barony of Panmure in the Earldom of Dalhousie, and the Barony of Godolphin in the Dukedom of Leeds. It would be manifestly impossible, in my limited space, to make an analysis of the vicissitudes of the various titles which have been created in the peerage. Suffice it to indicate a few of the more remarkable instances: : THE DUKEDOM OF CLARENCE, four times conferred, never passed to an heir: it was enjoyed by three Princes of the Royal House of Plantagenet, and by one of the Royal House of Guelph. The first possessor was LIONEL PLANTAGENET, Edward the Third's son, through whom the house of York derived its right to the Crown. The second was Thomas Plantagenet, Henry the fifth's brother, who was slain at Beaugé by Sir John Swinton "And Swinton placed the lance in rest, And the third was George Plantagenet, K.G., "false, fleeting, perjured Clarence," King Edward IV.'s brother, drowned, according to tradition, in a butt of malmsey. His son, Prince Edward, Earl of Warwick, the last male Plantagenet, was beheaded on Tower Hill, in 1499. With him withered the final buddings of the White Rose. The attempts of Perkin Warbeck and Lambert Simnel proved to Henry VII, that he could never be assured of his Crown while one branch of the tree of York flourished. The adherents of that race of heroes were silent and sorrowing, but still brooding, watchful, and valiant, and thus it that it became the policy of the Tudors to destroy the Yorkist nobility. was, From the death of George Plantagenet, the title of Clarence was never again used, until conferred by King George III. on his third son, afterwards King William IV. The title of CAMBRIDGE suffered many a vicissitude. Although nine times created, it always, it may be said, kept royal company, and frequently shared royal misfortune, for Hamilton was no exception to its royalty, James, Earl of Arran, (grandfather of James, second Marquess of Hamilton, and first Earl of Cambridge), having been declared heir presumptive to the Crown of Scotland. As an Earldom, it was first conferred by Edward III. on his brother-in-law, William Duc de Juliers, and subsequently by the same monarch on his fifth son, Edmond of Langley. After the Plantagenets, the Scotch Marquesses of Hamilton enjoyed the title; but in the time of Charles II. it again became unquestionably Royal. Henry of Oaklands, brother of the King, when made Duke of Gloucester, had the Earldom of Cambridge as his second honour. As a Dukedom, it was first conferred in succession on the four infant children of James, Duke of York, afterwards James II.; but they all died in infancy, and the title remained unappropriated until conferred, by Queen Anne, on George, Elector of Hanover, and the heirs male of his body. This creation raises in my mind a curious genealogical question. At the accession of George I., the dignity became vested in the Crown; but it seems a very doubtful point whether at the death of King William IV. the Dukedom did not devolve on the Duke of Cumberland, he becoming then heir male of the body of the original grantee. The fact of the same title having been since bestowed on another, cannot affect the right of the original heir, for it is not uncommon to see two or more peerages of the same name co-existent. The argument against the Duke of Cumberland's (King of Hanover's) right, would be that if a dignity once vested in the Crown, the claim of the heir, under the patent by which it was first created, was thereby extinguished; but it is not at all certain that such an objection would be tenable. The case is a singular and, I believe, an unprecedented one. THE DUKEDOM OF GLOUCESTER seems to have been associated in early times with a peculiar doom, the first five possessors of the title having met with violent deaths. Thomas of Woodstock, sixth son of King Edward III., was the first who ever bore the title; and the last Planta |