Chapter C (3)

Lord Cowper did go to England at last, and Walpole owns to his going
to a concert at Mrs. Cosway’s—‘out of curiosity, not to hear an
Italian singer sing one song, at the extravagant sum of £10—the same
whom I have heard half a dozen times at the opera-house for as many
shillings—but to see an English earl, who had passed thirty years at
Florence, and thought so much of his silly title, and his order from
Würtemberg! You know, he really imagined he was to take precedence of
all the English dukes, and now he has tumbled down into a tinsel
titularity. I only meant to amuse my eyes, but Mr. Durens brought the
personage up, and presented us to each other. He answered very well,
to my idea, for I should have taken his Highness for a Doge of Genoa.
He has the awkward dignity of a temporary representative of a nominal
power. I wonder his Highness does not desire the Pope to make one of
his sons a bishop _in partibus infidelium_, and that Miss Anne Pitt
does not request his Holiness to create her Principessa Fossani.’

It is inconsistent with the character of Horace Walpole, who did not
disdain rank or titles, and who was by no means insensible to the
charm of decorations—whether of walls or button-holes—to inveigh so
harshly against a dignity which entitles the owner to the privilege,
dear in heraldic eyes, of bearing his paternal coat on the breast of
the Imperial Eagle.

England could not long detain Lord Cowper from the country of his
adoption. He returned to Florence, where he died in 1789. The greater
part of the Italian pictures in this beautiful collection was
purchased by the third Lord Cowper, who was a true lover of art, and
who was reduced to great difficulties, on more than one occasion, in
conveying his pictures out of Florence, the inhabitants of that city
being averse to parting with such treasures. One of the most valuable
is said to have been concealed in the lining of his travelling
carriage, when he went to England.

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_No. 14._

GEORGE AUGUSTUS, FOURTH EARL COWPER.

_Peer’s Parliamentary robes. Powder._

BORN 1776, DIED 1799.

BY JACKSON.

BORN at Florence, Sir Horace Mann stood proxy as godfather for the
King of England at the boy’s baptism, and Sir Horace Walpole writes to
the Minister giving him information on some especial points of
etiquette to be observed on the occasion. Lord Cowper died suddenly.
He was unmarried, and was succeeded by his brother, Peter Leopold.

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_No. 15._

PETER LEOPOLD FRANCIS NASSAU, FIFTH EARL COWPER.

_In Peer’s Parliamentary robes_

BORN 1778, DIED 1837.

BY NORTHCOTE.

HE was the second son of the third Earl, born at Florence, godson to
the Grand Duke of Tuscany, married, in 1805, Emily, only daughter of
Peniston Lamb, first Viscount Melbourne (afterwards Viscountess
Palmerston), by whom he had three sons,—George, his successor,
William, and Spencer, and two daughters, the Countess of Shaftesbury
and Viscountess Jocelyn. He succeeded his brother. Lord Campbell, in
his _Lives of the Chancellors_, concludes his notice of the first Earl
Cowper with a sincere tribute of admiration to Peter Leopold, the
fifth earl:—

‘He had too much delicacy of sentiment to take a leading part in
public life, but to the most exquisitely pleasing manners he joined a
manly understanding and a playful wit. From him I received kind and
encouraging notice when I was poor and obscure; and his benevolent and
exhilarating smile is one of the most delightful images in my memory
of pleasures to return no more.’

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_No. 16._

JOHN OF NASSAU, COUNT OF NASSAU SIEGEN; HIS WIFE AND FAMILY.

_The Count and Countess are seated side by side in a large vestibule;
he is richly dressed, and wears the collar of the Golden Fleece; a
dog at his feet. On the lap of the Countess lies a small spaniel,
and at her side leans her son, in a red dress. Three daughters, in
different-coloured frocks, stand together; the eldest holds a
rose._

BORN 1583, DIED 1638.

BY VANDYCK.

HE was surnamed the Junior, son of Count John of Nassau Siegen by his
wife, Margaret de Waldeck. He began public life in the service of the
Archbishop of Cologne, and afterwards entered that of the United
Provinces, in which he fought against Spain. But the Count considered
that he was slighted, and his merits not duly appreciated by the
Government, and in disgust he renounced the Protestant faith in 1609
(or 1613), at the Hague, where he published an explanation of the
motives which led him to embrace the tenets of the Church of Rome. He
moreover transferred his military services to the Emperor of Germany,
Ferdinand II., the sworn enemy of the Protestants, the adversary of
the unfortunate King of Bohemia, of Gustavus Adolphus, and all the
heroes of the Reformed religion in the early part of the Thirty Years’
War. In 1620, when the Stadtholder, Frederic Henry, was besieging
Bois-le-Duc, the Count of Nassau Siegen (his kinsman) invaded Holland
at the head of eight or ten thousand men, and took the town of
Amersfoort. The following year, in command of a small army, he
encamped in the neighbourhood of Rynberg, and did all in his power to
prevent his brother William from crossing the Rhine between Broek and
Orsoy. In this attempt he was defeated, wounded, and carried prisoner
to Wesel, where, we are told, his brother frequently visited him
during his captivity. When his wounds were cured, Count John purchased
his freedom with the sum of ten thousand rixdollars; but he narrowly
escaped being taken prisoner a second time, in a naval engagement with
the Spaniards. This was at Mosselkreek (the Creek of Mussels), where
his vessels were stranded, and he lost a considerable number of men.
The Dutch on this occasion gave him the derisive title of Mussulman.
In 1637 he made an unsuccessful attempt to surprise Rynberg; and in
1638 death put an end to his adventurous, but by no means blameless,
career.

It is impossible to look on Vandyck’s splendid picture without
experiencing a feeling of profound regret that a brave and able
soldier, a man of so imposing a presence, and so noble a bearing,
should have renounced the faith for which numerous members of his
family had fought and bled, and drawn his sword against his native
land in the service of an alien sovereign. The proud order of the
Golden Fleece which hangs round his neck seems but a poor distinction
when we remember the circumstances by which it was obtained. In 1618
he had married Ernestine, daughter of Lamoral, Prince de Ligne, by
whom he had one son and three daughters:—

John Francis Desideratus, Prince of Nassau Siegen, Knight of the
Golden Fleece, and Spanish Governor of Guelderland in 1688. He
had three wives: first, Johanna Claudia, daughter of John,
Count of Köningseck, who died in 1664; second, Eleanor Sophia,
daughter of Hermann Fortunatus, Margrave of Baden, who died in
1668; third, Isabella Clara Eugenia de la Serre, _alias_ de
Montant, ‘a noble lady.’ She died in 1714. Prince John of
Nassau Siegen had eleven children. He died in 1690.

The three daughters represented in this family group were—

1. Ernestine, married to the Prince Maurice Henry, Hadawar.

2. Clara Mary, married first Albert Henry, Prince de Ligne, and
afterwards Claudius Lamoral, his brother.

3. Lamberta Alberta, who died unmarried.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

ANTE-LIBRARY.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

ANTE-LIBRARY.

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_No. 1._

ADMIRAL DE RUYTER.

_In armour, holding a truncheon. The other arm akimbo. Curtain._

BORN 1607, DIED 1676.

BORN at Flushing, of which town his father was a burgher. As a mere
child Michael de Ruyter was determined to be a sailor, and gained the
paternal consent that he should go to sea as cabin-boy when only
eleven years of age. He rose quickly in his profession, was made a
pilot when still very young for the post, and passed through the
intermediate grades, till he gained the command of a vessel. In 1635
he made several campaigns in the East Indies, and in 1645 was sent as
Vice-Admiral in command of a Dutch fleet to assist the Portuguese
against the Spaniards. After two years’ retirement from service, De
Ruyter engaged the Algerine corsairs off Sarley, and gained a complete
victory. The Moors, who were spectators of the conflict, insisted on
his entering the town in triumph, on a richly caparisoned horse,
followed by a long retinue, including many of the captive pirates.

These ‘plagues of the ocean,’ as they were justly termed, continued to
give De Ruyter much annoyance, but he was usually successful in his
encounters with them, and in one fierce combat he seized and hanged
one of the most notoriously cruel and rapacious of these ‘buccaneer
sea-dogs.’ In 1659 he was sent, by order of the States-General, to the
assistance of Denmark against Sweden, an enterprise in which he
distinguished himself greatly, and gained the gratitude of the King of
Denmark, who complimented him highly, and granted him a pension. On
his return home De Ruyter was received with great honour, and
promoted. He then proceeded to the coast of Africa, to look after some
Dutch colonies, of which England had taken possession. England and the
United Provinces were now in constant collision, and the Dutch Admiral
found a noble and well-matched foe in the gallant commander Prince
Rupert, soldier, sailor, and artist. De Ruyter was afterwards joined
in command with Van Tromp, a worthy colleague, but of no friendly
spirit. During the time that negotiations were pending for peace with
England, at Breda, De Ruyter resolved, so to speak, to hasten his
opportunities; he therefore bore down on Sheerness, burned all the
available shipping, and, continuing his work of destruction up the
river Thames, approached too near London to be agreeable to the more
peaceable portion of the citizens.

In 1671 he had sole command of his country’s fleet, against the
combined forces of England (under the Duke of York) and France (under
the Comte D’Estrées), and it is but just to record that he was
frequently successful, but invariably brave. Indeed, the French
Admiral wrote to Colbert, the Minister, at home, ‘I would lay down my
life for the glory that De Ruyter has gained.’ In 1675 the Spaniards
had recourse to their old enemies, the Dutch, to ask assistance for
the inhabitants of Messina, against the French, and De Ruyter was
despatched to Sicily for that purpose. A terrible sea-fight ensued,
the French being commanded by Duquesne, a brave and efficient officer;
many vessels were sunk and destroyed on both sides, and the carnage
was terrible.

At the commencement of the action the gallant De Ruyter had his left
foot carried away, and a few moments afterwards his right leg was
shattered by a shell. Writhing with pain, and covered with blood, the
brave sailor remained on deck, and issued his orders, even to the
bitter end of the battle. It was only when he became aware that five
of his vessels, including his own, were about to fall into the hands
of the enemy, that he could be prevailed upon to give the word for
retreat. Favoured by the approaching darkness, he made the port of
Syracuse, and in that town he died of his wounds. His heart was
carried to Amsterdam, where the States-General caused a noble
mausoleum to be erected to the memory of this brave and patriotic
commander. His name is still venerated in his native country.

The King of Spain sent De Ruyter the title of Duke, but the patent did
not arrive till after his death, and his children wisely refrained
from pressing any claim to rank, which would have been incongruous in
a Republic; and they were more proud of their father’s simple name
than of any foreign and alien dignity. Louis XIV. expressed his regret
for the death of this brave commander in public, and when reminded
that he had lost a dangerous enemy, he replied generously, ‘I always
mourn the death of a great and brave man.’ A medal was struck in
honour of Admiral de Ruyter, and the following distich was written on
his name:—

‘Terruit Hispanos Ruyter, _ter_ _ter_ruit Anglos,
_Ter_ ruit Gallos, _ter_ritus ipse ruit.’

It will not be necessary that the reader should be a scholar to enable
_her_ to perceive the anagrammatic and punning nature of these lines,
but we subjoin a very ingenious rendering of the same, done into
English by a friend in what he terms ‘a free-and-easy translation’—

‘Ruyter thrice the Spaniards routed,
Daunted thrice the British foe,
Thrice o’ercame the Gallic squadrons,
Struck his flag, and went below.’

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_No. 2._

WILLIAM, PRINCE OF ORANGE, AFTERWARDS WILLIAM III. OF ENGLAND.

_In armour. His hand resting on a black and white dog. Helmet lying on
the table._

DIED 1702.

BY WISSING.

HE was the son of William of Nassau, Prince of Orange (and grandson of
Henry Frederic, the Stadtholder), by Princess Mary, daughter of
Charles I. of England. He married, in 1677, Mary, daughter of James
II., and in 1688 came over to England, and ascended the throne as King
Consort. He left no children.

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_No.3._

ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER, FIRST EARL OF SHAFTESBURY.

_Fawn-coloured Chancellor’s robes. Wig. Sitting in an arm-chair._

BORN 1621, DIED 1683.

BY GREENHILL.

SON of Sir John Cooper of Rockbourne, county Hants, by Anne, daughter
and sole heir of Sir Anthony Ashley, Bart., of Wimborne St. Giles,
county Dorset, where the future Chancellor was born.

In his Autobiography he describes his mother of ‘low stature,’ as was
also the aforesaid Sir Anthony, ‘a large mind, but his person of the
lowest,’ while his own father was ‘lovely and graceful in mind and
person, neither too high nor too low,’ therefore the pigmy body of
which Dryden speaks must have been inherited from the maternal side.

Sir Anthony was delighted with his grandson; and although at the time
of the infant’s birth the septuagenarian was on the point of espousing
a young wife, his affection was in nowise diminished for his daughter,
or her boy.

Lady Cooper and her father died within six months of each other. Sir
John married again, a daughter of Sir Charles Morrison, of Cassiobury,
county Herts, by whom he had several children. He died in 1631,
leaving the little Anthony bereft of both parents, with large but
much-encumbered estates, and lawsuits pending.

Many of his own relations being most inimical to his interests,
Anthony went with his brother and sister to reside with Sir Daniel
Norton, one of his trustees, who—we once more quote the
Autobiography—‘took me to London, thinking my presence might work some
compassion on those who ought to have been my friends.’

He refers to the suit in which they were now engaged. The boy must
have had a winning way with him (as the old saying goes), for,
when only thirteen, he went of his own accord to Noy, the
Solicitor-General, and entreated his assistance as the friend of
his grandfather. Noy was deeply touched, took up the case warmly,
and gained one suit in the Court of Wards, stoutly refusing to
take any fee whatever.

After Sir Daniel Norton’s death, Anthony went to live with an uncle,
Mr. Tooker, near Salisbury, though it was supposed Lady Norton would
gladly have kept him under her roof, with a view to a match with one
of her daughters. He says himself: ‘Had it not been for the state of
my litigious fortune, the young lady’s sweet disposition had made me
look no farther for a wife.’

In 1637 he went to Exeter College, Oxford, where he ‘made such rapid
strides in learning as to be accounted the most prodigious youth in
the whole University.’ By his own showing, he was popular with his
companions and well satisfied with himself,—indeed, a general spirit
of self-complacency pervades these pages. In little more than a year
he went to Lincoln’s Inn, where he appears to have found the theatres,
fencing galleries, and the like, more to his taste than the study of
the law.

An astrologer who was in old Sir Anthony’s house at the time of the
grandson’s birth cast the horoscope, and to the fulfilment of these
predictions may probably be attributed young Anthony’s own
predilection for the study of astrology in later days. The horoscope
in question foreboded feuds and trouble at an early age; and some
years afterwards the same magician, foreseeing through the medium of
the planets that a certain Miss Roberts (a neighbour without any
apparent prospect of wealth) would become a great heiress, he
endeavoured to persuade his pupil to marry her. The lady did
eventually come into a considerable fortune; but Mr. Tooker, who was
not over-credulous, had other views at the time for his nephew; and
accordingly, at eighteen, Ashley Cooper became the husband of
Margaret, the daughter of my Lord Keeper Coventry, ‘a woman of
excellent beauty and incomparable gifts.’

The young couple resided with the bride’s father in London, Sir
Anthony, as he now was, paying flying visits to Dorsetshire. He was
subject to fits, but even this infirmity redounded to his advantage,
according to his own version; how that being in Gloucestershire on one
occasion, and taken suddenly ill, ‘the women admired his courage and
patience under suffering,’ and he contrived to ingratiate himself with
the electors of Tewkesbury to some purpose.

He gives us an amusing and characteristic description of how he won
the favour of the electors and bailiffs of this town by his conduct at
a public dinner, where he and a certain Sir Henry Spiller were guests,
and sat opposite each other. The knight, a crafty, perverse, rich man,
a Privy Councillor, had rendered himself very obnoxious in the
hunting-field, and, at the banquet aforementioned, began the dinner
with all the affronts and dislikes he could possibly put on the
bailiffs and their entertainment, which enraged and disgusted them,
and this rough raillery he continued. ‘At length I thought it my duty
to defend the cause of those whose bread I was eating, which I did
with so good success, sparing not the bitterest retorts, that I had a
complete victory. This gained the townsmen’s hearts, and their wives’
to boot. I was made free of the town, and at the next Parliament
(though absent at the time), was chosen burgess by an unanimous vote,
and that without a penny charge.’

Sir Anthony had strange humours: he loved a frolic dearly. He had a
confidential servant who resembled him so much that, when dressed in
his master’s left-offs, the lackey was often mistaken for his better.
This worthy was a clever man-milliner, and had many small
accomplishments which made him popular in country houses, and his
master confesses that he often listened to the valet’s gossip, and
made use of it, in the exercise of palmistry and fortune-telling,
which produced great jollity, and ‘of which I did not make so bad a
use as many would have done.’ With this account he finishes the record
of his youth. A time of business followed, ‘and the rest of my life is
not without great mixture of public concerns, and intermingled with
the history of the times.’

Sir Anthony sat for Tewkesbury in 1639, but that Parliament was
hastily dissolved. He raised a regiment of horse for the King’s
service, and occupied places of trust in his own county; but,
believing himself unjustly treated and slighted by the Court, he
listened to the overtures of the Parliament, and returned to
Dorsetshire as colonel of a regiment in their army.

In 1649 he lost the wife he dearly loved, to whose memory he pays a
most touching tribute in his Diary. But she left no living child, and
before the expiration of the year the widower had espoused Lady
Frances Cecil, daughter of the Earl of Exeter, a Royalist.

The friendship of the Protector and Sir Anthony was of a most fitful
and spasmodic nature,—now fast allies, now at daggers drawn. Some
writers affirm that, on the death of his second wife, he asked the
hand of one of Cromwell’s daughters; others, that he advised the
Protector to assume the Crown, who offered it to him in turn!

He held many appointments under the reigning Government, and continued
to sit in Parliament; but having, with many other Members, withstood
the encroachments of the great man, Oliver endeavoured to prevent his
return, and, not being able to do so, forbade him to enter the House
of Commons. (See the history of the times.) The Members, with Ashley
Cooper at their head, insisted on re-admittance. Again ousted, again
admitted; nothing but quarrels and reconciliations. The fact was, that
Sir Anthony was too great a card to lose hold of entirely. He had
still a commission in the Parliamentary army, and a seat at the Privy
Council, circumstances that in nowise prevented him carrying on a
correspondence with the King ‘over the water.’ Indeed, he was accused
of levying men for the Royal service; arrested, acquitted; sat again
in Parliament under Richard Cromwell, joined the Presbyterian party to
bring back Charles, and when the Parliament declared for the King, Sir
Anthony was one of the twelve Members sent over to Breda to invite his
return. While in Holland, Ashley Cooper had a fall from his carriage,
and a narrow escape of being killed. Clarendon (there was no love lost
between them) says it was hoped that by his alliance (as his third
wife) with a daughter of Lord Spencer of Wormleighton, a niece of the
Earl of Southampton, ‘his slippery humour would be restrained by his
uncle.’

He now took a leading part in politics, was appointed one of the
Judges of the Regicides, created Baron Ashley at the Coronation, and
afterwards became Chancellor of the Exchequer, Under-Treasurer, and
further high offices, and in 1672 Lord Cooper of Pawlett, county
Somerset, and Earl of Shaftesbury; and so quickly did honours rain on
him, that the same year saw him Lord High Chancellor of England. He
appears to have given great umbrage to many of the law officers by his
haughty bearing. We are told ‘he was the gloriousest man alive; he
said he would teach the bar that a man of sense was above all their
forms; and that he was impatient to show them he was a superior judge
to all who had ever sat before on the marble chair.’

He maddened the gentlemen of the long robe by his vagaries and
innovations, and defiance of precedents. He wore an ash-coloured gown
instead of the regulation black, assigning as his reason that black
was distinctive of the barrister-at-law, and he had never been called
to the bar.

He went to keep Hilary term ‘on a horse richly caparisoned, his grooms
walking beside him,’ all his officers ordered to ride on horseback,
‘as in the olden time.’

No doubt the good Dorsetshire country gentleman, the lover of sport
and of horse-flesh, who had been accused of regaling his four-footed
favourites on wine and cheese-cakes, had a mischievous pleasure in
seeing the uneasy and scared looks of his worshipful brethren, some of
whom perhaps had never sat on a saddle till that day.

At all events, poor Judge Twisden was laid in the dust, and he swore
roundly no Lord Chancellor should ever reduce him to such a plight
again. Shaftesbury lived at this time in great pomp at Exeter House,
in the Strand, and was in high favour with his Royal master, who
visited him at Wimborne St. Giles during the Plague, when the Court
was at Salisbury.

At Oxford, when Parliament sat, he made acquaintance with the
celebrated John Locke, who afterwards became an inmate of his patron’s
house, his tried friend, and medical adviser.

The situations of public employment which Shaftesbury obtained for
this eminent man were, unfortunately, in the end, the source of
difficulty and distress rather than advantage. The history of the
Cabal, of which he was the mainspring, and of which he formed the
fourth letter (Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley, Lauderdale),
would suffice for his biography during the five years of its life. But
it must never be forgotten that to Shaftesbury England owes the
passing of the Habeas Corpus Bill, as likewise one for making judges
independent of the Crown.

The reader must seek elsewhere, and elect for himself, whether
Shaftesbury was or was not guilty of all the plots and conspiracies
against King and country of which he has been accused. To the Duke of
York he made himself most obnoxious. He was instrumental in
establishing the Test Act, which made Roman Catholics ineligible for
public offices; he was, moreover, the champion of the Exclusion Bill,
and opposed James’s marriage with Mary of Modena; and there is little
doubt that the Duke did all to undermine Shaftesbury’s favour with the
King.

There was always an element of humour mixed up with his doings, even
when fortune frowned on him. Finding that the King meant to unseat him
from the Woolsack, and that his successor was already named, he sought
the Royal presence. The King was about to proceed to chapel. The
fallen favourite told Charles he knew what his Majesty’s intentions
were, but he trusted he was not to be dismissed with contempt. ‘Cod’s
fish, my lord,’ replied the easy-going monarch, ‘I will not do it with
any circumstances that may look like a slight,’ upon which the
ex-Minister asked permission to carry the Great Seals of Office for
the last time before the King into chapel, and then to his own house
till the evening.

Granted permission, Shaftesbury, with a smiling countenance, entered
the sacred building, and spoiled the devotions of all his enemies,
during that service at least. Lord Keeper Finch, who was to succeed
him, was at his wit’s end, believing Shaftesbury reinstated, and all
(and there were many) who wished his downfall were in despair.

The whole account is most amusing and characteristic, including the
manner in which the Seals were actually resigned, but we have not
space to say more. Shaftesbury was indeed now ‘out of suits with
fortune.’ In 1677 he, with other noblemen, was committed to the Tower
for contempt of the authority of Parliament, and although other
prisoners were soon liberated, he was kept in confinement thirteen
months. On regaining his freedom he was made Lord President of the
Council, but, opposing the Duke of York’s succession, was dismissed
from that post in a few months. In 1681 he was again apprehended, on
false testimony, and once more sent to the Tower on charge of treason,
and that without a trial.

His papers were searched, but nothing could be found against him
except one document, ‘neither writ nor signed by his hand.’ The jurors
brought in the bill ‘Ignoramus,’ which pleased the Protestant portion
of the community, who believed the Earl suffered in the cause of
religion.

Bonfires were kindled in his honour; one of the witnesses against him
narrowly escaped from the fury of the mob; a medal was struck to
commemorate his enlargement. Hence the poem of that name from the pen
of Dryden, suggested by the King. On regaining his liberty,
Shaftesbury went to reside at his house in Aldersgate Street, when,
finding his enemies were still working against him, he took the
friendly advice of Lord Mordaunt, and after lying _perdu_ in another
part of London for a night or two, he set off for Harwich, _en route_
for Holland, with a young relative, both disguised as Presbyterian
ministers, with long black perukes. Adverse winds detained them at a
small inn, when one day the landlady entered the elder gentleman’s
room, and, carefully shutting the door, told him that the chambermaid
had just been into his companion’s apartment, and instead of a
swarthy, sour-faced dominie, had found a beautiful fair-haired youth.
‘Be assured, sir,’ said the good woman, ‘that I will neither ask
questions, nor tell tales, but I cannot answer for a young girl’s
discretion.’

The man who had been so hunted of late was touched, thanked the good
soul, and bade his handsome young friend make love to the maid, till
the wind changed.

The fugitives, however, had an extra run for it, as it was, for the
hounds were on their track. Fortunately the capture of one of
Shaftesbury’s servants, dressed like his master, gave them time to
embark.

They arrived at Amsterdam after a stormy passage, where Shaftesbury
hired a large house, with the intention of remaining some time, and
all the more that he found himself treated with great respect by all
the principal inhabitants. But misfortune pursued him. He was seized
with gout in the stomach, and expired on the 1st of January 1683. His
body was conveyed to England, and landed at Poole, whither the
gentlemen of his native county flocked, uninvited, to pay a tribute to
his memory, by attending the remains to Wimborne St. Giles.

We leave the sentence to be pronounced on the first Earl of
Shaftesbury to wiser heads than ours, but one remark we feel
authorised to make,—that we are not called on to believe him as black
as Dryden has painted him, since we cannot but question the justice of
the pen that described Charles II. as the God-like David, in the
far-famed poem of ‘Absalom (the Duke of Monmouth) and Achitophel’
(Shaftesbury), which loads the latter with invective:—

‘A name to all succeeding ages curst,
For close designs and crooked counsels fit,
Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit,
Restless, unfixed in principles and place,
In power unpleased, impatient of disgrace;
A fiery soul, which working out its way,
Fretted the pigmy body to decay....
Great wits are sure to madness close allied;...
Oh! had he been content to serve the Crown
With virtues only proper to the gown,’ etc. etc.

There spoke the Laureate, and woe indeed to the man who had such a
poet as Dryden for his censor! Yet for all this abuse, which he had
written to order, Dryden could not help bearing testimony as follows:—

‘Yet fame deserved no enemy can grudge,
The Statesman we abhor, but praise the Judge;
In Israel’s courts ne’er sate an Abbethdin
With more discerning eyes or hands more clean,
Unbribed, unsought, the wretched to redress,
Swift of despatch, and easy of access.’

Lord Shaftesbury was kind and charitable to the poor in his
neighbourhood, and was very hospitable. In 1669 Cosimo de’ Medici,
being in England, went to St. Giles’s, and was so much pleased with
his reception, that he kept up a correspondence with his English
friend, and sent him annually a present of Tuscan wine. It has been
adduced by some, in evidence of his immorality, that on one occasion,
while still in favour with Charles, the King said to him, ‘I believe,
Shaftesbury, you are the greatest profligate in England.’ The Earl
bowed low, and replied, ‘For a subject, sire, I believe I am.’ It
would be hard to condemn a man on the testimony of a repartee.

------------------

_No. 4._

WILLIAM, FIRST EARL COWPER, FIRST LORD CHANCELLOR OF GREAT BRITAIN.

_In Chancellor’s robes._

BORN 1664, DIED 1723.

BY SIR GODFREY KNELLER.

------------------

_No. 5._

JOHN, FIRST LORD SOMMERS, LORD CHANCELLOR.

_Violet velvet coat. Lace cravat. Fall wig._

BORN 1652, DIED 1716.

BY SIR GODFREY KNELLER.

THE fine old cathedral city of Worcester is so justly proud of its
noble citizen, the first Lord Sommers, that different districts
have contested the honour of his birthplace; but the best evidence
goes to prove that he was born at his father’s estate of Whiteladies,
which at that period was not included in the precincts of the city.

The house was a dissolved Carthusian nunnery, and had been granted to
the Sommers family at the time of the Reformation.

For two generations before the birth of Lord Sommers, the name
was spelled without the final _s_, which probably gave rise to the
supposition that it had a common origin with that of Van Somer, the
famous Flemish painter. On the other hand, some writers contend that
the name was derived from a St. Omer, as in the case of St. Maur, St.
Leger, and the like.

Be this as it may, they undoubtedly claimed kinship with the gallant
admiral, Sir George Somers, who rediscovered the island (or rather the
cluster of islands) of Bermuda, so called after one Juan Bermudez,
‘who was driven thereon by force of tempest.’ The place did not enjoy
a good reputation; it was termed ‘the island of divelles,’ or the
‘enchanted isle,’ and was supposed to harbour sea-monsters, mermen,
and ‘such cattle,’ from which legend doubtless sprang Setebos and
Caliban. Admiral Somers was also wrecked here, and thus rediscovered
the whereabouts which had been lost; and he was most desirous it
should bear his name, and so it is still called Bermuda or Somers’
(erroneously Summer’s) island.

Purchas, in his _Pilgrimage_, gives a long description of the
abundance of sea-fowl, on which the shipwrecked mariners feasted, and
of the wonderful tameness of the birds,—for Somers might have said
with Alexander Selkirk:—

‘They are so unaccustomed to man,
Their tameness is shocking to me.’

Purchas goes on to say, ‘Notwithstanding the wonted danger, you may
now touch at Bermuda, for danger hath made it not so dangerous:’ after
the fashion of many another peril that calls for precautionary
measures.

Waller, in his didactic poem on the beauties of this region, forgets
to do honour to the gallant old ‘salt,’ who was as well known for his
daring rejoinder to King James I. as for his nautical adventures; it
was when subjected to one of the tyrant’s manifold acts of injustice.
‘I hope I may be the last of sacrifices in your time. When from
private appetite it is resolved that a creature shall be sacrificed,
it is easy to pick up sticks enough from any thicket, whither it has
strayed, to make a fire to offer it with.’

The immediate ancestors of the Lord Chancellor had been settled for
some time on a small estate in Gloucestershire, called Stoke Severne,
and they also owned the ‘Whiteladies,’ then a suburb of Worcester.
Here, in 1585, the family entertained Queen Elizabeth, in her progress
through Worcestershire, and although the Sommerses afterwards
imbibed republican principles, the bed in which good Queen Bess lay,
and the cup out of which she drank, were long preserved as precious
relics in the family.

Queen Elizabeth was much pleased with her reception at the
Whiteladies, and indeed at Worcester altogether. More especially was
her Grace’s fancy taken by a conceit of Master Sommers, who
caused a splendid pear-tree, loaded with fruit, to be transplanted
from his own garden to the market-place in the town, as a decoration,
at the time of the Queen’s public reception,—in remembrance of which
Elizabeth granted an augmentation to the arms of the city, in the
shape of three pears, as may be seen to this day.

Master Sommers, the father of the future Peer, had been bred up
to the law, and practised as an attorney, but, when the civil war
broke out, in opposition to the majority of his fellow-citizens, he
took part with the Roundheads, and raised a troop of horse to serve
under Cromwell. He was for some time quartered at Upton, near his own
estate of Stoke Severne, the parish church of which he frequented.

Now the Rector was a Royalist, and a firm upholder of Divine right,
and he was very apt to mix political with theological arguments in his
sermons. Captain Sommers had constantly warned him against so
doing, but in vain; and one Sunday the good parson indulged in so much
abuse of the Cromwell men as to raise the ire of the Parliamentarian
officer, who, drawing forth a loaded pistol, lodged a shot in the
sounding-board above his reverence’s head.

In spite of all this, King Charles passed the night previous to the
battle of Worcester, and that following, at the Whiteladies, where,
after ‘shifting himself’ into a disguise, he left his trunk hose, his
garters, and two pairs of fringed gloves, to be added to the Royal
Elizabethan relics. Lord Campbell remarks that a species of sanctity
had been attached to the Whiteladies by both parties, since the
building was spared, when almost every other edifice was destroyed;
but Nash, the county historian, accounts for the circumstance by
saying that the soldiers spared the house on account of its being a
strong building, capable of holding 500 men with safety.

Not many days after the King’s flight, Captain Sommers brought
his wife, Mistress Catherine (whose maiden name was Ceaverne, a native
of Shropshire), to this stronghold, she being at the time in an
interesting condition for the second time, having already presented
her husband with a daughter; and there, to the best of our belief, was
born, a few months afterwards, the future Lord Chancellor of England,
and the first Peer of the name. Few good stories are told of his
boyhood, excepting one which was probably very much prized in the home
archives, and is remembered till this day, as an omen of his future
greatness. He was on a visit to his aunt, Mistress Bluron, the wife of
a Presbyterian minister, with whom he was walking hand-in-hand amid
the glories of her poultry-yard, when a beautiful roost-cock lighted
on the little fellow’s curly head, and crowed three distinct times
while perched thereon. No less honour than the Woolsack could surely
be prognosticated by so splendid an augury! When, in modern times,
could there have been such literal _avium garritus_?

The boy went to the College School at Worcester, where he became the
favourite model pupil of the master, Dr. Bright, a distinguished
classical scholar. He is described as weakly in health, wearing a
little black cap, but the ‘brightest boy in the whole school, so
studious and contemplative that he did not care for the sports of his
companions, and was usually seen musing alone with a book in his hand
during the hours of recreation.’ He appears to have gone to more than
one other school, and at intervals to have learned the business of an
attorney in his father’s office, the elder Sommers having by
this time resumed the profession to which he was bred before he joined
Cromwell’s army.

At the time of the Restoration he had solicited, and obtained, a
pardon, under the Great Seal, for his former disaffection to the
Crown, but, ‘being a lawyer,’ says Lord Campbell, ‘he perhaps
remembered Sir Edward Coke’s wise observation, that “good men will
never refuse pardon from God or the King, because every man doth often
offend both.”’ In 1667 young Sommers matriculated, and was
entered at Trinity College, Oxford, but apparently only remained there
a short time, and did not take his degree. While at the University he
showed more predilection for the study of the _belles lettres_ than
for that of law, in spite of which his father insisted on his becoming
his clerk at Whiteladies. The picturesque old place was now not only
inhabited by Sommers, the well-to-do solicitor, and his wife and
children, but it had been converted into a species of colony, and was
peopled by several families connected, for the most part, with the
owner, either by blood or marriage. Some of the occupants were engaged
in the cultivation of the large farm adjoining, others in producing
all kinds and colours for dyeing materials, or manufacturing cloth,
which trade was at that time in a flourishing condition in Worcester;
and, above all, in making bricks and tiles for rebuilding the ruined
city and suburbs. The latter calling gave rise to the epithet by which
the scurrilous libellers of later days thought (vainly) to lower the
pride of the great Lord Sommers, by calling him the brickmaker’s
son! When the multifarious labours of the day were at an end, the
various inhabitants, occasionally augmented by outside guests, met, to
the number of twenty or thirty, round the table, in the old refectory
of the nunnery, where the produce of the farm and gardens afforded
them a plentiful and inexpensive banquet. John Sommers, senior,
had great influence in electioneering matters, and also received and
entertained at his house many persons of weight and influence,—among
others, Sir Francis Winnington, a rising lawyer, and Member for the
city, afterwards Solicitor-General. The good knight was much impressed
by young John’s talents, and recommended that he should pursue the
study of the law, in which profession, he remarked, many
Worcestershire men had risen to eminence. It took some time to
persuade the father to send his son away from the establishment, which
was growing more lucrative every day, but at length he yielded to the
wish of Sir Francis, and entered his son as student of the Middle
Temple, 1669. The youth returned, however, and read law at Whiteladies
for a year before settling in the Temple, and, both at Worcester and
in London, he benefited by the friendship and tuition of his good
friend Sir Francis. His circle of acquaintance in London was, at
first, limited almost exclusively to lawyers, and amongst his
intimates was Sir Joseph Jekyll, afterwards his brother-in-law.

But the young Templar returned for his vacations to Worcester
(although the society did not much suit his taste) until the year
1672, when he met a genial spirit at Whiteladies. His father was agent
for the estates of several noblemen, and, among others, of the young
Earl of Shrewsbury, son to the unfortunate Peer who had been killed in
a duel with the Duke of Buckingham,—his shameless wife, at least so
goes the tradition, holding her lover’s horse while he murdered her
husband.

Grafton, the estate of the Shrewsburys, was at that time out of
repair, and the young Earl gladly accepted an invitation to
Whiteladies, and no sooner did our Templar come down from London for
his usual visit, than the two youths formed a friendship which proved
lifelong. They became inseparable companions, both in their studies
and their recreations, and the intimacy continued when they returned
to London. Lord Shrewsbury took a delight in introducing Sommers
to the most distinguished men of his acquaintance, whether remarkable
for birth or learning. John Sommers, becoming aware of his own
deficiency in education, resolved to return to the University, where
he made the Classics his more especial study, without neglecting his
legal pursuits, or giving up his visits to home. It speaks well for
the liberality both of father and son, that John was able and willing
to contribute five pounds (a large sum for a student in those days)
towards the reparation of the chapel; and in after years and better
circumstances he gave a larger donation for the same purpose, as a
proof of his attachment to his old College. We are told rather a
laughable story, which shows in what high repute he was held by his
father, who, in his frequent visits to London, used to leave his horse
at the George Inn at Acton, and in conversing with the landlord seldom
omitted a panegyric on ‘young John,’—so much so, that mine host’s
curiosity was inflamed, and he requested to be allowed some day to see
this prodigy. Mr. Sommers, in consequence, asked his son one
time to escort him on his way as far as Acton, and on entering the
inn, he took the landlord aside, and whispered, ‘I have brought him,
Cobbett, but you must not talk to him as you do to me, for he will not
suffer such fellows as you in his company.’

John Sommers, junior, was called to the bar in 1666, but did not
practise much till five years afterwards; and it was on the occasion
of the famous trial of the seven Bishops that he first made his mark.
Macaulay, in his eloquent account of the transaction, does honour to
the rising barrister. He gives an animated description of the progress
of these stout-hearted Prelates on their committal to the Tower, to
await their trial, of which we give a short extract: ‘The river was
alive with wherries when they came forth under a guard to embark, and
the emotion of the people broke through all restraint. Thousands fell
on their knees and prayed for the men who had emulated the Christian
courage of Ridley and Latimer; many dashed into the water up to their
waists, and cried on the holy fathers to bless them. All down the
stream, from Whitehall to London Bridge, the royal barge passed
between lines of boats, whence arose a shout of “God bless your
Lordships!”’

John Sommers had been chosen as junior counsel for the Bishops
on the trial. He had not yet had much opportunity of distinguishing
himself in public, ‘but his genius, industry, his great and various
accomplishments, were well known to a small circle of friends, and in
spite of his Whig opinions, his pertinent and lucid mode of arguing,
and the constant propriety of his demeanour, had already secured to
him the ear of the Court of King’s Bench, and it was said of him
beforehand that no man in Westminster Hall was so well qualified to
treat an historical and constitutional question.’

Even while endeavouring to keep within our prescribed limits, we feel
it is but simple justice to the future Chancellor to quote the great
historian’s own words: ‘Sommers rose last. He spoke little more
than five minutes, but every word was full of weighty matter, and when
he sat down his reputation as an orator and a constitutional lawyer
was established. The jury were long in coming to a decision, but when
they did return, and the foreman pronounced the verdict—“Not
guilty”—amid deathless silence, a tempest of rejoicing arose. Lord
Halifax threw up his hat, and ten thousand people who crowded the Hall
made the oaken roof crack with shouts, which, echoed by the throng
outside, resounded as far as Temple Bar, and were caught up and sent
back by all the boatmen on the river. The acquittal was mainly
attributed to Sommers’s speech, the effect of which upon the
jury was greatly heightened by the modesty and grace with which it was
delivered. He now, and ever, merited the praise that his pleading at
the bar was masculine and persuasive, free from everything that was
trivial and affected.’

Amid the solemn details of this most important trial, the comic
element cropped up in a speech of one of the jurymen, a Nonconformist,
who was brewer to the Court. The story goes that he complained
bitterly of the dilemma in which he was placed. ‘What am I to do?’ he
asked piteously; ‘if I say Not guilty, I shall brew no more for the
Court; if I say Guilty, I shall brew no more for anybody else.’ On the
same day that the Bishops were acquitted, a paper was drawn up,
entitled ‘The Association,’ censuring the Government of King James
II., and calling on William, Prince of Orange, to come over to
England, and deliver the country from Popery and despotism. The name
of Sommers did not appear, but by many it was believed that the
wording of the document emanated from him. It was signed by all his
political friends, and Lord Shrewsbury immediately afterwards went to
the Hague, laden with large supplies of money, to urge on the Prince
the advisability of his coming over without delay. William answered by
a ‘Declaration,’ announcing his readiness (as the husband of the
Princess Mary) to accede to the wishes of the nation, and promised to
proceed to England, ‘in order to have a free and lawful Parliament
assembled for the maintenance of liberty and the Protestant religion,
and by the decision of that Parliament he would abide.’

This document also was ascribed to Sommers, or at all events it
was said to have been supervised by him, for he had by this time, to
quote the words of Lord Sunderland, become the ‘very soul and spirit
of his party.’ No sooner had King James left the country than
Sommers was returned for his native city, having refused to sit
in the former Parliaments under the two last Kings.

This was in the so-called ‘Convention Parliament;’ and we give
Macaulay’s notice of the new Member’s first appearance in the House of
Commons. After enumerating the names of many political veterans, he
says: ‘But they were speedily thrown into shade by two young Whigs,
who, on this great day, took their seats for the first time, and soon
rose to the highest honours of the State, who weathered the fiercest
storms of faction together, and, having been long and widely renowned
as statesmen, as orators, and as munificent patrons of genius and
learning, died within a few months of each other. These were Charles
Montagu and John Sommers.’

The latter led the debate in the Lower House, and in his maiden
speech, which was considered a model of eloquence, he maintained that
James, by his flight and abdication, had forfeited all claim to
allegiance, and he drew up a manifesto to that effect, declaring the
throne of England to be vacant.

He was thus most instrumental in the passing of the Exclusion Bill,
which precluded the succession of a Popish Prince to the Crown of
England. In all the differences of opinion which now ensued between
the two Houses, John Sommers zealously supported the claims of
William and Mary. He also gained lasting renown by the declaration
that he drew up for classing under general heads ‘such things as were
necessary for the better security of our religion, laws, and
liberties.’ Hence sprang the world-famed Bill of Rights, with which
the name of John Sommers is indissolubly connected. William and
Mary were proclaimed King and Queen; Lord Shrewsbury made his friend,
and that friend’s merits, known to the new Sovereigns; and Sir John
Sommers, Knight, was appointed Solicitor-General. He now took a
prominent part in every public question of importance, evincing the
utmost consistency in his opinions and principles; and his biographer
and earnest admirer, Lord Campbell, appears never to have found fault
with his administration of justice, excepting in one instance, namely,
the course he pursued with regard to a Bill for regulating high
treason—a question we leave to judicial minds. But the same pen awards
him great praise for the manner in which he conducted prosecutions
before Courts of Justice, which he designates as ‘mild, candid, and
merciful.’ Speaking of the trial of Lord Preston and others for high
treason (the first State trial of the reign), in which his moderation
and humanity were universally extolled, Sommers himself said: ‘I
did never think that it was the part of any, who were counsel for the
King in cases of this nature, to aggravate the crime of the prisoners,
or to put false colours on the evidence.’

Indeed, the manner in which these trials were conducted formed an
epoch in legal annals, contrasting brilliantly with the injustice and
cruelty which had characterised former tribunals. Lord Preston, though
found guilty, and sentenced to death, owed his respite and subsequent
pardon to the recommendation of Sir John Sommers.

When war was declared with France, it was the Solicitor-General who
drew up the declaration; and in 1692 he was promoted to the office of
Attorney-General, and shortly afterwards chosen counsel for the
plaintiff in the first trial for criminal conversation, _i.e._ the
Duke of Norfolk _versus_ Sir John Germaine. But the divorce was not
granted till after Sommers became Chancellor. In 1693 he was
again returned for Worcester, and a few days afterwards the Great Seal
of England was intrusted to his keeping, and he took his seat at the
Council Board. Evelyn thus records the event: ‘The Attorney-General
Sommers made Lord Keeper, a young lawyer of extraordinary
merit.’

The appointment (with the exception, naturally, of adverse
politicians) was generally popular. Burnet says: ‘Sommers is
very learned in his own profession, with a great deal more learning in
other professions,—divinity, philosophy, and history.’