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HARVARD STUDIES IN ENGLISH
VOLUME IV
THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
AND HER HUSBAND AS FIGURES
IN LITERARY HISTORY
BY
HENRY TEN EYCK PERRY
no ">-<?> ^■iTr\'v^\>A^'
■'T
IHE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
AND HER HUSBAND AS FIGURES
IN LITERARY HISTORY
BY
HENRY TEN EYCK PERRY, Ph.D.
BOSTON AND LONDON
GINN AND COMPANY, PUBLISHERS
1918
COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY GINN AND COMPANY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
6
^'
JUL II 1918
GINN AND COMPANY • PRO-
PRIETORS • BOSTON • U.S.A.
©CI.A499609
TO
G. V. S.
PREFACE
This book was first written as a doctor's thesis at Harvard,
and it stands now in substantially its original form. Conse-
quently I must make acknowledgments to many Cantabrigians
who assisted me at various times in my efforts. For suggesting
the subject credit belongs to Dr. James B. Munn, whose inti-
mate acquaintance with the works of Elia gave me the hint
that was ultimately developed into this work. While still in the
thesis stage, it was greatly benefited by the advice of Professor
Kittredge and Dr. Bernbaum ; since it has become a book
Professor Neilson and Dr. Maynadier have united to improve
it. The two latter have read the entire proof, assisted by
Professor Bliss Perry, under whom the dissertation was written.
To all these gentlemen I owe most extended and hearty
thanks, but especially to Professor Perry for his tireless inter-
est and sympathetic criticism, which have continued from the
very beginning of my task to its present completion.
The chief difficulty thrown in my way was that several of
the Duchess's volumes exist in only one copy on this side
of the Atlantic, and discovering them has not always been
an easy task. The search was profitable, however, and I wish
here to express my gratitude to all those who had any share
in it. Most of all I am indebted to Mr. Henry E. Huntington
of New York City for permitting me to use his extraordi-
narily fine library. His collection of Margaret Cavendish's
works, besides supplying several useful details, furnished
me with the only available copies of The World's Olio and
Natures Picture Drawn by Fancies Pencil. Mr. Huntington's
viii THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
librarian, Mr. George Watson Cole, showed me unfailing con-
sideration during my research, and Mr. George D. Smith of
New York made possible this entire opportunity. A chance
to examine the CCXI Sociable Letters I owe to the efficiency
of the Arthur H. Clark Company of Cleveland and to the
good services of Mr. John B. Dempsey of that city.
For various and sundry other favors in connection with pre-
paring this study I am under obligations to Dr. John J. Parry,
to Mr. Andrew Keogh, Librarian of Yale, to Mr. Richard W.
Goulding, Librarian at Welbeck Abbey in Nottinghamshire,
and to Mr. George van Santvoord.
H. T. E. P.
CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION I
CHAPTER I. THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE . . 5
I. "The First Book" (i 593-1 644) 5
II. "The Second Book" (i 644-1 667) 44
III. "The Third and Fourth Books" (1667-1676) . 68
CHAPTER II. "OUR ENGLISH M.«CENAS" 85
I. Early Patronage (1617-1636) 85
II. Patronage in Prosperity (1636-1644) .... 100
III. Patronage IN Exile (i 644-1 660) 122
IV. Patronage AFTER THE Restoration (1660-16 76) . 145
CHAPTER III. THE MINOR WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 171
I. Poems and Pseudo-Science (i 653-1 668) . . . 171
II. The World''s Olio (1655) and Nature's Pic-
tures (1656) 198
III. Plays and Orations (166 2- 1 668) 213
IV. CCXI Sociable Letters (1664) and The Blaz-
ing World (1666) 237
CHAPTER IV. THE DUCHESS HERSELF 265
I. Margaret Lucas (1623-1645) 265
II. The Marchioness of Newcastle (i 645-1 664) . 283
III. The Duchess of Newcastle (i 664-1 673) . . . 293
CONCLUSION 314
BIBLIOGRAPHY • 317
INDEX 327
THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
AND HER HUSBAND AS FIGURES
IN LITERARY HISTORY
INTRODUCTION
Students of English literature know of Margaret Cavendish,
first Duchess of Newcastle — if they know of her at all — as
" a dear friend " of Charles Lamb's, frequently mentioned in
the Essays of Elia. As we all love Lamb for himself, it is not
unnatural that any person for whom he expresses admiration
should be of some general interest, and the more one comes
to learn of his " dear friend's " character and peculiarities, the
more fascinating a study she proves to be. There can be no
doubt that Margaret Cavendish is an unusual and engaging
personality, whatever one may think of her as an authoress.
Her thirteen volumes are various and varied, in subject matter
as well as in artistic excellence ; she is at times stimulating
and readable, more often, it must be admitted, verbose and
tiresome. The worst feature of her work is its length, which
proves discouraging to the uninitiated and exasperating to those
who do peruse her books. Among the Duchess's many words,
however, there may be discovered upon occasion much valuable
and delightful matter.
Her most famous and important single work is the Life of
William Cavendishe, which purports to be a historical biog-
raphy of her husband and from one point of view lives up
to this claim. As such, it has been frequently reprinted and
edited, and in 1906 Professor C. H. Firth of Oxford published
2 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
the definitive edition. Professor Firth's wide reading and vast
knowledge in the Civil War period have enabled him to
assemble many remote passages to illuminate the Duchess's
work, so that little now remains to be done for the Life by
historians. It is possible, however, to look at the biography
more as literature than history, which is the attitude assumed
in Chapter I of this book. So regarded, it appears to be an
early species of "glory-story," in which the truth is so colored
as to distort authentic facts, and hence it is perhaps not unjusti-
fiable to class the work as an embryonic novel. Its authoress
herself, no doubt, would have been profoundly outraged at such
an idea, but in any case her book is literature and all discus-
sion of Margaret Cavendish must inevitably have its beginning
with this biography.
When one does begin to discuss the Life, he finds his inter-
est not wholly devoted to the Duchess ; it is also decidedly in-
trigued by the protagonist, Newcastle himself. He becomes to
the reader more than a mere puppet or figurehead ; he proves to
be a very real flesh-and-blood man, a fine example of the Stuart
aristocrat, the English Cavalier. Apart from the Life, Cavendish
is interesting from a literary point of view. He too was an
author; he wrote proclamations, treatises filled with political
advice, books on horsemanship, and plays. He was also a
patron of letters, as is shown by his literary productions ; three
of the five plays in which the Duke had a share were largely
written by his proteges, so that his position as a writer is in-
extricably entangled with his position as Maecenas. Chapter II
attempts to cover both these subjects, and if some confusion
results, it is because of the difficulty inherent in this web of
cross-relationships. At all events Newcastle appreciated art
and, though he only dabbled in it, he has a distinct position as
patron and author — not to mention the fact that he furnished
his wife with the material from which she built her masterpiece.
INTRODUCTION 3
The Duchess's works all have a place in literature apart
from their intrinsic value, for Margaret Cavendish was one of
the first Englishwomen to attain recognition as a writer. This
in itself is no small claim to fame and is a sufficient reason
for discussing her lesser books, which is done in Chapter III.
As has been said, however, these volumes are for the most
part extremely tedious, and because of this quality, coupled with
their scarcity, they are little known to-day. Nevertheless, delv-
ing in them has its compensations, for it is of absorbing interest
to see how one woman began written composition and how
she continued it. Her works have no sources but her own
imagination, and their influence is too nebulous to compute.
Still the Duchess did write at a time when women were just
entering the field of literature. Her enterprise may have en-
couraged more talented authoresses, and if her results are not
tangible, that is no cause for denying them ; tradition often
works more subtly than the eye of science can perceive.
The chief pleasure in perusing Margaret Cavendish's writ-
ings (both the Life and the minor works) is in seeing what
light they cast upon the character of their author. What sort
of person was this woman of whom Charles Lamb thought
so highly, but who was so ridiculed by Horace Walpole and
Sir Walter Scott .? Whence grew the Newcastle legend t The
answer is to be found largely in the Duchess's own books,
most of all in her True Relation of my Birth, Breeding and
Life, where she recounts her life from the quiet home circle
of the Lucas family through her probation as maid of honor
to Henrietta Maria, until she at last found a safe harbor in
her husband's arms. Here the truth may easily be reached
and the Duchess's famous peculiarities may be analyzed and
explained. Exaggeration and myth set aside, Margaret Lucas's
heredity and environment account for even the most surprising
occurrences of her life. When her history is considered step
4 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
by step and its gradual growth is minutely observed, each
specific act seems the inevitable outcome of all that has pre-
ceded it. The Duchess emerges from the test a fallible mortal
like the rest of us, only a trifle more warped and lopsided
than modern psychology tells us that we all are. In Chapter IV
the course of her development has been traced in an effort
to rationalize the eccentric figure which tradition has built up,
and to substitute for it a more human personage, whom we
may come to love and understand.
This book, then, is a sketch of the Duchess of Newcastle
first, and only secondarily of her husband ; the Duke's life must
be included in any account of his wife's career, and no literary
study could ignore his accomplishments in authorship and
the encouragement of authorship. Yet, just because this is
a literary study, Margaret Cavendish must necessarily have a
more prominent place in it than her lord, her right to future
reputation resting, as it does fundamentally, upon the impor-"
tance of her books. Even her strange personality depends
upon her life as an authoress, and the notoriety which she has
achieved has been gained in works of art, not in chronicles
of fact. It is the imaginative mind which is fascinated by the
Duchess's inconsistencies, just as the Duke appeals to the
more practical historians. Both interests have their place, and
it would be the part of rashness to rate either above the other.
Up to this time Newcastle has been treated merely with a
cold regard to facts ; his wife has been lauded or condemned
with a total lack of reasonable moderation. The present book
is an effort to consider their artistic significance sanely and
without bias.
CHAPTER I
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE
I
"THE FIRST BOOK" (1593-1644)
If William and Margaret Cavendish, first Duke and Duchess
of Newcastle, deserve any place in the history of literature,
their first claim rests on the wife's biography of her husband.
The Life of the Thrice Noble, High and Puissant Prince,
William Cavendishe, Duke, Marquess and Earl of Newcastle,
Written by the thrice Noble, Illustrious and Excellent Princess,
Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle, His Wife was printed in
London by A. Maxwell in 1667. The following year appeared
a Latin translation by Walter Charleton, later to be known as
President of the College of Physicians ; and a second English
edition in 1675 bears witness to the volume's immediate
popularity. That it has maintained an audience to our own
day is shown by frequent reprintings, the last and best-edited by
C. H. Firth (1906).^ Indeed, it has always been regarded by
historians as the chief document relating to Newcastle's by no
means insignificant part in the Civil War. It was written, too,
in a period when fictitious material was beginning to masquer-
ade as veracious record, and it may therefore be considered as a
literary product as well as an authentic history. With whatever
1 The other modern reprints are : 1872, ed. M. A. Lower; 1886, ed. C. H.
Firth; 1903, The Cavalier in Exile, Newnes' Pocket Classics. An edition in
Everyman's Library (No. 722) came out in November, 1915. Hazlitt's Hand-
book to the Poptilar, Poetical and Dramatic Literature of Great Britain, 1867,
p. 416, says, "His life was also written by W. Pomfret," but I can find no
further trace of such a work.
6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
genre we choose to classify it, however, critical opinions have, for
the most part, been extremely favorable to this work. A single
dissenting note is struck the very year following its publication,
by Samuel Pepys on March i8, 1667- 1668 : '" Stayed at home,
reading the ridiculous History of my Lord Newcastle, wrote
by his wife, which shews her to be a mad, conceited, ridiculous
woman, and he an asse to suffer her to write what she writes
to him and of him." But the diarist had already made up his
mind about the Duchess on extraneous evidence, nor is he to
be trusted implicitly as a critic of literary matters. Even the
unfriendly Horace Walpole admits that it is " amusing to hear
her sometimes compare her lord to Julius Caesar, and oftener
to acquaint you with such anecdotes, as in what sort of coach
he went to Amsterdam." ^
Yet at the other end of the scale is to be found the most
extravagant adulation. Perhaps the authoress's rank had its
share in producing such a letter as that addressed to her by
the University of Cambridge, in which it is asserted that
" hereafter, if generous and highborn men shall search our
library for a model of a most accomplished general, they
shall find it expressed to the life, not in Xenophon's Cyrus,
but in the Duchess of Newcastle's William." ^ Again in 1691,
after the death of both Duke and Duchess had removed any
such artificial stimulus, Gerard Langbaine in his Account of
the English Dramatick Poets refers his readers to the life
of the Duke, "already writ in Latin and English, by the
Hand of his Incomparable Dutchess ; who during his Life-
time, describ'd all his Glorious Actions, in a stile so Noble and
Masculine, that she seems to have antedated his Apotheosis." ^
And much nearer our own day the gentle Elia held that "no
^ A Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors, ed. Park, 1806, III, 189-190.
^ Letters and Poems in Honour of the Incomparable Princess, Margaret,
Dutchess of Newcastle, 1676. • P. 386.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 7
casket is rich enough, no casing sufficiently durable, to honor
and keep safe such a jewel." ^ The consensus of opinion has
evidently approved this biography. Wherein lie the causes of
its popularity and its real value ?
The First Book deals with William Cavendish's history up
to his flight from England after Marston Moor, the material
being derived at first hand from the Duke himself or, even
more often, from his secretary, John Rolleston.^ The authoress
spares us a long account of her hero's pedigree and is content
with furnishing a background for his birth and upbringing :
his father was Sir Charles Cavendish, youngest son to Sir
William of the same name ; his mother Catharine, the second
daughter of Cuthbert, Lord Ogle. By the death of an older
brother in infancy, he was left heir to the family title and
estate. The Duchess with a self-confessed^ neglect of dates
does not state the year of her Lord's birth, but Cokayne's
Complete Peerage says that he was baptized on December 16,
I593> ^t Handsworth, and Anthony a Wood confirms it.*
In a letter to Secretary Nicholas from Antwerp, April 2, 1659,
Cavendish himself writes, " For age I am in less than a year
of you,"^ and as Nicholas was born on April 4, 1593, the
passage is added proof for a later date in that year. All this
evidence is needed, for Collins in his Historical Collections^
put it as 1592, which the usually reliable Firth accepts, perhaps
misunderstanding "aetatis suae 84" on Newcastle's tomb.
This same error is repeated in the Dictionary of National
1 " Detached Thoughts on Books and Reading" in Essays of Elia, Boston,
i860, p. 275.
2 " To his Grace, the Duke of Newcastle," dedication to the Life of William
Cavendish, ed. Firth, 1906, p. xxv.
* " The Preface," Firth, p. xlv. The dates given throughout are from other
sources.
* The article on Walter Charleton in Athence Oxonienses, Vol. IV, Col. 756.
^ Egerton Mss., 536, f. 336, in Firth, p. 207.
^ London, 1752, p. 25.
8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Biography y whence it has become generally prevalent, — but
it is an error none the less.
William and his younger brother Charles spent much of
their boyhood with their aunt, Mary, Countess of Shrewsbury,^
and her husband, the Earl Gilbert. This Gilbert was not only
Sir Charles Cavendish's brother-in-law twice over^ but his
closest and most intimate friend, for they had been brought
up together in the same family, because of the marriage of
Sir William Cavendish's widow with George Talbot, Gilbert's
father. In connection with this uncle and aunt we first hear
definitely of our William Cavendish, by a letter from him to
his father, written sometime in 1604, when he could not have
been more than eleven years old. In that year Prince Charles,
afterwards Charles I, then a child of three or four, journeyed
from Scotland to London and on the way was entertained at
Worksop, the Earl of Shrewsbury's home. It was perhaps
because of this royal guest's tender age that Shrewsbury
deputed the actual reception to his young nephews, but at all
events he did so, as is shown by the following letter, composed
in by no means contemptible French : ^
Monsieur & Pere Jay pence que cestoit mon debuoir de vous
escrire par ce presant porteur quel Honnorable entretsnement Mon-
seigneur le Due et sa compaignee ont receu a Worsop & comme mon
frere & moy auons Receu beaucoup d'honneur nous gouuernant si
bien que ses messieurs les escossois s'en estonnoient, principallement
en la langue franqoise en laquelle Monsieur le Presidant, son gouuer-
neur est perfect, comme aussi plussieurs gentilshommes de sa suite
1 Cavendish afterwards gave a portrait of this lady to St. John's College,
Cambridge, of which she was the "second Found'ress." See the letter of
acknowledgment in Letters and Poems in Honour of the Incomparable Prin-
cess, Margaret, Dzitchess of Newcastle, 1676.
2 Henry Cavendish, his eldest brother, married Grace Talbot, Gilbert's sister.
8 An English translation of this appears in the Welheck Mss., II, 118 ^Hist.
Mss. Comm., ij Rep., App., Part II), but I am indebted for the French original
to Mr. R. W. Goulding, Librarian at Welbeck Abbey.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 9
auec les quelz nous auons eu beaucoup de conferance, Je feray fin
pour vous suplier, de vous en informer dauantaige semblablement pour
baiser tres-humblement les mains de Monseigneur mon oncle, & de
Madame matante, au quelz Je rends graces de Lhonneur quilz me
font de mestimer capable dentretenir tel prince et en ceste veryte
Je demeureray ^.^ ^^^ humble & tres-obeissant
filz Guillaume Cauendysshe
(Addressed : — )
A Monsieur & Pere
Monsieur Cauendysshe.
It may be seen that the boy's education began early, both as
to specific knowledge and, what is of greater importance, as to
how to use it. The future court politician was in training
even from his cradle.
In two homes, then, the future Duke of Newcastle was
reared and in each he was shown unbounded affection. On
the whole, life seems to have been made too easy for him ;
when he was sent to St. John's College at Cambridge, his
tutors "could not persuade him to read or study much, he
taking more delight in sport than in learning; so that his
father being a wise man and seeing that his son had a good
natural wit, and was of a very good disposition, suffer'd him
to follow his own genius. . . . One time it happened that a
young gentleman, one of my Lord's relations, had bought some
land, at the same time when my Lord had bought a singing-
boy for £^0, a horse for £^0, and a dog for £2, which
humour his father Sir Charles liked so well, that he was
pleased to say. That if he should find his son to be so covetous,
that he would buy land before he was twenty years of age, he
would disinherit him. But above all the rest, my Lord had a
great inclination to the art of horsemanship and weapons, in
which later his father Sir Charles, being a most ingenious
and unparalleled master of that age, was his only tutor, and
kept him also several masters in the art of horsemanship and
lO THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
sent him to the Mews to Mons. Antoine, who was then
accounted the best master in that art." ^ Such an education
was dehghtful enough, no doubt, and eminently suited to
produce a fine gentleman of the time, but it must, also, have
encouraged expensive tastes, ill fitting the youth to encounter
those difficulties which were to beset his path in later life.
This Cavalier training came to a climax in 1610, for young
Cavendish was made a Knight of the Bath when James I's
oldest son was created Prince of Wales. Two years after this
honor he went to travel abroad with Sir Henry Wotton, Am-
bassador Extraordinary to the Duke of Savoy, and " the honest
man sent abroad to lie for the good of his country " evidently
took Cavendish into high favor. On March 28 he writes from
Amiens of "Sir William Candishe, son and heir to Sir Charles
his father, and by his mother heir to the Barony of Ogle, a
young gentleman very nobly bred, and of singular expecta-
tion." 2 And at Liineburg on May 9, " From Bologne to
Lyons I spent just three weeks, staying in no place longer
than was meet for some care of our horses, save only at Troyes,
where I rested a day and a half upon a little indisposition
<which> William Candish had contracted, first by the extre<me
of cold) and wind, and then of heats, being loath to leave
<behind> so sweet an ornament of my journey, and a gentle-
man himself of so excellent nature and institution." ^ The
Duke of Savoy also conceived a fancy for the lad, and having
urged him in vain to stay after the Ambassador's return,
presented him on his departure with a Spanish horse, a richly
embroidered saddle, and a rich jewel of diamonds. Within the
twelvemonth^ our travellers were back in London, where for the
next few years Cavendish lived, attending at court. In 16 16
1 Book III, Section 8, Firth, pp. 104-105.
^ Sir Henry Wotton^ Life and Letters, by Logan Pearsall Smith, II, 2.
3lbid., II, 4. 4 Ibid., I, 123.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 1 1
the Earl of Shrewsbury died and left his nephew his executor ;
nor did Sir Charles Cavendish long outlive his friend, as he
was buried within the year. The widowed Lady Cavendish
wished her eldest son to marry, whereupon he satisfied both
himself and her by his choice of Elizabeth, daughter and heir
to William Basset, Esq., of Blore in the county of Stafford,
and widow of Henry Howard, third son of the Earl of Suffolk.
This lady, of whom little is known, seems to have led a very
troubled life until her death in 1643. We find occasional
allusions to her ill health and once an extensive list of reme-
dies to ease her labor in childbirth ;i the fact that she was the
mother of ten children, five of whom died in infancy, may ex-
plain this, and indeed she seems to have been a poor harmless
drudge, destined to be worn out by the highest function of
woman. After their marriage in 161 8, they went to live at
Welbeck in Nottinghamshire, only coming up to town occasion-
ally that they might wait upon the king. On August 10, 16 19,
James stayed with them in the country during a royal progress .^
We have now come to Cavendish's first advancement, and
here it is necessary to distinguish carefully between what the
Duchess states and what recent investigations have revealed to
be the facts. Says our chronicler :
About this time King James, of blessed memory, having a purpose to
confer some honour upon my Lord, made him Viscount Mansfield, and
Baron of Bolsover ; ^ and after the decease of King James, King Charles
the First, of blessed memory, constituted him Lord Warden of the Forest
of Sherwood and Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire, and restored his mother,
Catharine, the second daughter of Cuthbert, Lord Ogle, to her father's
dignity, after the death of her only sister Jane, Countess of Shrewsbury,
publicly declaring that it was her right ; which tide, after the death of
his mother, descended also upon my Lord, and his heirs general, together
with a large inheritance of ^3000 a year in Northumberland.
* Welbeck Mss., II, 120-123.
^ Nichols's Progresses of King James /, III, 559-560.
* An estate in Derbyshire not far from Cavendish's home at Welbeck.
12 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
But Cavendish was not made Baron of Bolsover in the 1620 patent
creating him Viscount Mansfield, that honor coming with the
title of Newcastle eight years later. Shortly after, on December 4,
1628, the Barony of Ogle was revived in favor of his mother
(Lady Jane Ogle, her sister and joint heir, had died several
years before), and on her death in 1629 it descended to her
heirs general.^ This shows why Newcastle chose to have his
new Barony of Bolsover created by the royal patent, and how
he comes to be styled Baron of Ogle in right of his mother ;
for it seems that he waived all right to the latter Barony by his
first creation, that he might take it by descent as an old Barony
in fee, together with the family estate of Ogle.^ The title. Baron
Ogle of Bothal, which has sometimes figured in connection
with that of Viscount Mansfield, does not seem to rest on a
sufficiently secure basis, but may be due to a confusion of two
later baronies.^ There is a tail to the Viscount kite however.
Witness a state letter from John Woodford to Sir Francis
Nethersole on November 7, 1620:*
The parliament is now resolved ... for the accomodating of your
disputes between the heyrs of the late Earl of Shrewsbury and Sir
William Cavendish, a nephew of the Earl of Devonshire who hath
been intitled to some of those lands by the Countess of Shrewsbury,
^ Collins's Historical Collections, p. 24, and Welbeck Mss., II, 120.
2 Biographia Britannica, article on William Cavendish.
8 Cokayne's Complete Peerage, VI, 22, note a, says: "The creation of this
Barony is given in ' Courthope,' and almost all other peerage writers [including
Banks's Dormaitt and Extinct Baronage of England, III, 547] but the Viscounty
of Mansfield is given (as the sole creation) in the 'Creations 1483-1646' in
the ap. 47th Rep. D. K. Pub. [p. 105]. Neither is the Barony mentioned in
his M[onumental] inscription], where all his titles seem fully set out." Collins
also gives the " Ogle of Bothal " title, p. 25.
* State Papers {Foreign: Germany, States), XIX, 189, in The First Duke and
Duchess of Newcastle-iipon-Tyne, 1910, p. 12. The author's name is not given on
the title-page, but this book is by T. Longueville. It is a comprehensive but
unscholarly memoir and the only secondary work of which the entire bulk is
devoted to William and Margaret Cavendish.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 1 3
prisoner in the tower, as an expedient to create the said Sir William,
at the request of the heyres above mentioned, Viscount of Mansfield,
which is newly done by patent.
As a pendant to this bargain may be added an extract from a
letter of the new Viscount Mansfield to Buckingham. It is
dated February 27, 1626-1627 : ^
May it please your Grace,
Accordinge to your LoP commands I have treated with my cosen
Pierepont, and as effectually as I coulde, his answer in his own wordes
are these: he sayeth that Doctor Moore treated with him in King
James his times about Honor and tolde him that if he woulde be a
Baron he might and for 4000^ .... For my parte I never herde
that a Baron was under 9 or 10,000^, but for my one experience, I
had little more than in the quittinge of an olde debt.
Apparently traffic in peerages was well understood in that day,
and if Cavendish did not in cold blood put his money down on
the table, there was " value received " for his honors in the
cancelling of old claims or obligations.
The Duchess, unconscious of this political chicanery, goes on
to mention her husband's appointment as Lord Lieutenant of
Derbyshire, a post which he kept during the minority of "the now
Earl of Devonshire." She expatiates on his abilities in this office
and also as Lord Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire ^ and then comes
quickly down to 1628, the year in which he was created Earl of
Newcastle by Charles L^ At this time he was made Baron
Cavendish of Bolsover and, as his wife claims, also of Bothal
1 State Papers {^Domestic), Charles I, LV, No. 26, in First Duke and Duchess,
pp. 13-14. There is no reason to suppose Buckingham was jealous of Newcastle,
and Lodge's statement to that effect {Portraits, ed. 1850, VI, 2), may be due
to a confusion between the elder Buckingham and his son. Cavendish's rela-
tions with the second George Villiers will be discussed in another place.
^ For details about this period see Hist. Mss. Com?n., 12 Rep., App., Part I,
PP- 303' 32S) and especially pp. 443-445 concerning the punishment of a
criminal and Newcastle's gifts to the surviving relatives.
* "His arms were S, three Buck's Heads caboshed, Arg. attired O. A cres-
cent for difference." — Banks, III, 547.
14 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
and Heple.^ These latter titles have not been satisfactorily
authenticated, but her mere statement, being so nearly contem-
porary, ought to decide the matter ; besides, to any but an
extreme hero-worshipper great subsequent honors might easily
cause the less to be forgotten.
Now " in the year 1638, his Majesty called him up to Court,
and thought him the fittest person whom he might intrust with
the government of his son Charles, then Prince of Wales, now
our most gracious King, and made him withal a member of the
Lords of his Majesty's most honourable Privy Council," Thus
the Duchess, but again there is a seamy side to her story. This
appointment seems to have been the result of five and a half
years of deliberate scheming on Cavendish's part. We first find
the matter mentioned in a letter from Francis, Lord Cottington
to Newcastle, dated December 13, 1632 -.^
The King is now well though he still keeps his chamber, and my
Lord Deputy [i.e. Strafford] is precisely sent for, so that you will have
one friend more here. You are appointed to attend the King into
Scotland which I conceive might be a good motive for your friends
to put it to a period.
In accordance with this suggestion, when the royal visit to
Welbeck occurred in May, 1633, Newcastle made a sumptuous
feast, which reached its climax in a masque written for the occa-
sion by Ben Jonson, and which cost, according to the frequently
exaggerative Duchess, upwards of four thousand pounds.^ He
^ Cokayne, VI, 22, has this note in connection with his Marquessate :
" Also according to Doyle's ' Official Baronage,' Baron Bertram and Bolsover
and, according to Beatson's ' Political Index,' Baron of Bothal and Hepple.
Heylin asserts that he was a Baron of Bertram together with the Marquessate
of Newcastle. No mention, however, is made of any of these Baronies in the
' Creations 1 483-1 646,' tho' in his Garter plate his Baronial titles are given as
•Ogle, Bertrum and Bolsover.'" ^ i^r^n^eck Mss., II, 122-123.
3 Sir Edmond Moundeford writes on June 25, 1633: "Our King is well,
his entertainment great at his journey ; the Lord of Newcastle most famous
for his meat, the Bishop of York most famous for his drink." — Hist. Mss.
Comm., 10 Rep., App., Part II, p. 143.
■Q
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 1 5
also attended Charles on his Scottish journey, and of that, with
many other important things, we hear in a letter written to
Strafford, the Lord Deputy of Ireland:^
Welbeck, the 5th of August, 1633.
My most honoured Lord,
I heartily congratulate your Lordship's safe arrival in Ireland, next
I am to beg your pardon for not presenting my service to you by letter
all this while ; but in good faith, my Lord the reason was, I daily heard
you were going. I give your Lordship humble thanks for your noble
and kind counsel ; the truth is, my Lord, I have waited of the King
the Scottish journey both diligently, and, as Sir Robert Swift said of
my Lord of Carlisle, it was of no small charge unto me. I cannot find
by the King but he seemed to be pleased with me very well, and never
used me better or more graciously ; the truth is, I have hurt my estate
much with the hopes of it, and I have been put in hope long, and so
long as I will labour no more in it, but let nature work and expect the
issue at Welbeck ; for I would be loth to be sick in mind, body and
purse, and when it is too late to repent, and my reward laughed at for
my labour. It is better to give over in time with some loss than lose
all, and mend what is to come, seeing what is past is not in my power
to help. Besides, my Lord, if I obtained what I desire, it would be a
more painful life, and since I am so much plunged in debt, it would
help very well to undo me, for I know not how to get, neither know
I any reason why the King should give me anything. Children come
on apace, my Lord, and with this weight of debt that lies upon me,
I know no diet better than a strict diet in the country, which, in time,
may recover me of the prodigal disease. By your favour, my Lord, I
cannot say I have recovered myself at Welbeck this summer, but run
much more in debt than ever I did, but I hope hereafter I may. The
truth is, my Lord, for my court business, your Lordship with your
noble friends and mine have spoken so often to the King, and myself
refreshed his memory in that particular, so that I mean not to move
my friends, any more to their so great trouble, but whatsoever pleases
his Majesty, be fully contented, and look after some other little con-
tentment within myself, which shall well serve me during my life, and
if the King command me, I am at all times ready to serve him ; if no
1 Strafford's Letters, I, loi. A previous letter of Newcastle's to Wentworth
(I, 43) evidently refers to the writer's altercation with Lord Savile. See also
Calendar of State Pape7-s {^Domestic), idsS-idzg, p. i86.
I6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
commands, pray for him heartily. For, by my troth, my Lord, I know
no man in the whole world more bound unto his Majesty than myself.
For that point to try your Lordship's friends in my behalf, I humbly
thank you for the motion, and I desire your Lordship to follow it.
For the King's particular liking of my proper person, I think my Lord
of Carlisle would do best, or what doth your Lordship think to his
Lady, for further I would not willingly have it go ; but I assure your
Lordship I am most confident of the King's good opinion of me ; and
about my Lord Savile's business and mine, his Majesty pleased me
extremely, being never moved by me or any friend in my behalf that
I desired. My Lord Treasurer used me extreme well and extraordinary
kindly ; my Lord of Carlisle for your Lordship's sake, but the greatest
news is my Lord of Holland courted me extremely ; and so to conclude
with this business, I intend to be quiet and not press the King at all,
but to leave his Majesty to his own time, and rest quietly here in the
country ; and this I assure your Lordship is my resolution and my full
intention, and except it be to the purpose, their greatest friendship
is to let me rest here. I humbly thank your Lordship for your noble
favours to my old servant ; for my groom, my Lord, I beseech you
keep him, and I am sorry your Lordship will use such ceremony with
me. For La Roche, I always told your Lordship my opinion of him,
and in good faith, he is no such horseman, neither for anything I ever
saw, but got a great reputation with doing little : I would your Lord-
ship had taken Porter, but I know not how he is disposed of. I assure
your Lordship that horse you pleased to accept, I thought him the
fittest horse in the world for that purpose, but your Lordship doth not
write how you approve of him. My Lord, in a word, I desire no man's
favour and love more than yours, or would be more beholding to any
man sooner ; for I protest to God, I honour and love you heartily, and
I vow without any end or particular in the whole world ; your Lord-
ship's favours to me are merely your own goodness for I shall never
be useful to you in any kind, which makes my obligation, such that I
must ever be faithfully.
Your Lordship's most humble servant,
W. Newcastle
This letter is extremely interesting as showing the alternate
waves of hope and depression so characteristic of the office-
seeker : now, he will strain every nerve to the utmost ; again,
the cost seems far greater than the end desired. Newcastle
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE ly
finally succeeded in his aim, but the affair was to cause him
much more anxiety before it was terminated. On July 19, 1634,
Strafford wrote Newcastle from Dublin : ^
I have not got word from my Lord of Carlisle concerning your
Lordship, which certainly comes from no other cause than the uni-
versal negligence, which possesseth him in all his own affairs and in
all other things, but in doing civilities and courtesies to his friends, but
I have given my brother charge to renew it unto him very effectually
and this being of the King's at your house, I see will be a very fit time
to get from him his judgment. But upon the whole matter my opinion
is, that attending upon the King two or three days' journey, after his
going from Welbeck, you should yourself gently renew the motion to
the King, as one resolved to take it only as a personal obligation from
himself alone; and therefore if his Majesty should be inclined to
grant you that desire, which ariseth merely from a singleness of affec-
tion, you should receive it and value it, as the highest honour you can
have in this world to be always near him. On the other side, if in his
wisdom he should not conceive it fit, you should wholly acquiesce in
his good pleasure, and beseech him to reckon of you as a servant of
his, ready to lay down your life, wherever he should be pleased to
require it of you ; and be sure to express it plainly, that if he in his
grace toward you shall think good to take you so near him it shall be
your greatest comfort ; but to have it by any other means or interpo-
sition, which might expect any of the obligation from his Majesty, it
would in no degree be so acceptable unto you, that covet it not for
any private bettering of your fortune, but merely as a mark of his
respect and estimation of you, and that you might have the happiness to
spend your life near that person which you did not only reverence as
your sovereign, but infinitely love and admire for his piety and wisdom.
This second visit of the King to Welbeck occurred on July
30, 1634.2 According to the Duchess, Charles was so pleased
^ StrafforcTs Letters, 1,274. Other epistles from Strafford to Newcastle may
be found in the Letters, I, 410, and II, 256, 281. Also in Ellis's Original Letters,
Series II, Vol. Ill, pp. 281-286.
2 See a letter from Sir John Coke to Newcastle under this date, urging
him to scatter a multitude of miners assembled at Welbeck to present
Charles with a mutinous petition, " that their Majesties may peaceably enjoy
the honour you intend them without distraction or trouble." — Lfist. AIss.
Comm., 12 Rep., App., Part II, p. 60.
1 8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
with his previous entertainment that he asked Newcastle to
repeat it for Henrietta Maria, who was making a northern
progress. The King was to be with her, and Cavendish, in the
midst of court intrigues, naturally wished to put his best foot
foremost. He and his wife resigned Welbeck to the sovereigns
and moved to their other estate five miles distant, at Bolsover
in Derbyshire. Here a feast was held. The country gentry came
to wait on their Majesties, and Ben Jonson wrote another masque
for this occasion, Love s Welcome, the Kings mid Queen s enter-
taimnent at Bolsover. This magnificence was doubtless very
pleasing to Charles, but it did not accomplish Newcastle's
purpose at once and plunged him into the further expense of
;^ 1 4,000 or ;!^ 1 5,000. Nevertheless he did not give up his
design, for two years later we find him writing to his wife of his
varying success at court.^ On April 8 he feels that the King
is favorable despite contrary intrigues ; a week later he names
various other applicants, who he expects will be unsuccessful ;
but by May 23 we read, " I am very weary and mean to come
down presently. I was yesterday with the ' B.B.' ^ and for
anything I find it is a lost business."
Persistency was successful, however, and on March 19, 1637-
1638, Secretary Windebank wrote him of his official appointment
to the long-coveted post of tutor to Prince Charles. Strafford's
suggestions had been only too well followed, and, in accordance
with his letter to Newcastle already quoted, Windebank added
to the more formal announcement this statement : ^
His Majesty hath expressly commended me to let your Lordship
know, that you have no particular obligation to any whatsoever in this
business, but merely and entirely to the King's and Queen's Majesties
alone : who of their own mere and special grace and goodness have
made this choice, and vouchsafed you this honour.
1 Welbeck Mss., II, 127.
2 An abbreviation for " Bishop."
8 Clarendon State Papers, II, 7-8.
■"t^
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 19
Newcastle's reply was conventional enough, but Strafford's let-
ter of congratulation to him demands consideration. It is of
June I and runs : ^
My very good Lord,
May all honour and joy crown your Lordship's leaving, as the taking
upon you this new employment : and certainly a mighty mark of his
Majesty's estimation of you, that intrusts you with the keeping of so
precious a jewel, indeed the dearest pledge of all which can be desired
or hoped, by King or people. . . .
My Lord, I right well know your own wisdom sufficient to direct
your course in the new world you are to come into, yet I trust the
excess of my affection may be well interpreted. Your Lordship hath
this charge put upon you immediately by the King, so (as it may be
thought) careful, you should so understand it, as to be jealous your
Lordship should have the least apprehension any other creature had
any share with him or you in this business. Good my Lord consider
seriously what might be the true English of this, in my opinion it is
certainly and easily understood, the reading of it very plain. As his
Majesty thus shews your obligation to be only his, consequently in-
structs you, that as well in justice, as discretion, your acknowledg-
ment ought not to divide into several streams, but intirely pour forth
themselves before him and to him.
Evidently the Deputy was anxious to have it thought this
appointment was spontaneous on Charles's part, which must
have pleased Newcastle tremendously, and by the advice given
the new tutor to abstain from court politics Strafford assured
his sovereign of at least one loyal, unselfish retainer. So by
a slight but diplomatic perversion of the truth, this matter was
at length settled to the satisfaction of all concerned.
The only information which we have as to Cavendish's
actual experiences with his pupil is contained in three contem-
porary letters.2 The eight-year-old Prince^ evidently refused
1 Strafford's Letters, II, 174.
2 Facsimiles of the first two are given in Airy's Charles II, 1901, fac-
ing p. 8.
8 Strickland's Lives of the Queens of England, 1851, V, 265.
20 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
to take his prescribed medicine, and Henrietta Maria sent him
a reprimand :
Charles I am sore that I must begin my first letter with chiding you
because I heere that you will not take phisike I hope it was onlei for
this day and that to morrow you will doe it for if you will not I must
come to you : and make you take it for it is for your healthe. I have
given order to my lord newcastell to send mi worde tonight whether
you will or will not therfore I hope you will not give mi the paines to
goe and so I rest your affectionate mother
^ , Henrietta Marie R.
To my deare
sone the prince.
Later Charles addressed his governor, who was then sick, and
humorously touched on the question of medicine again. This
letter, written in a round hand, between double-ruled lines,
shows real affection and no little wit on the Prince's part :
My Lord,
I would not have you take too much Phisick: for it doth allwaies
make me worse, & I think it will do the like with you I ride every
day ; and am ready to follow any other directions from you. Make
hast to returne to him that loues you. Charles P.
One other note from the Prince to his tutor survives : ^
My Lord
I thank you for your New Years guift ; I am very well pleased
with it, especially with the brass Statues. On Munday by three of the
clock I shall be glad to meete you at Lambeth. Charles
During Newcastle's tutorship occurred an event about which
we may safely follow the Duchess, as she is backed up by
Clarendon and Rushworth.^ At the time of the insurrection in
Scotland, Newcastle lent his monarch ^ 10,000 and furnished
a volunteer troop of horse, which his popularity in the north
^ Ellis, Original Letters, Series I, Vol. Ill, p. 287.
2 Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, Book III, § 23, and Rushworth's
Collections, II, ii, 929-930 and 946.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 21
country enabled him to raise. ^ It was known as Prince Charles's
troop, and when, during a march over the Scottish border, the
Earl of Holland put this company in the rear, Newcastle
ordered his Prince's colors lowered, rather than have them
so subordinated.^ King Charles apparently learned that the
cause of this occurrence was Holland's jealousy, for he com-
mended Newcastle, shortly after made him a member of the
Privy Council, and ordered that the troop should be commanded
by no one but himself. Thereafter a duel was to be fought
between these two Earls, but Holland did not appear at the
rendezvous, Charles learned of what had happened, and peace
was restored.^ The Duchess does not mention her Lord's oppo-
nent by name, in accordance with her husband's instructions*
not to particularize about his enemies, and it was probably for
this same reason that the bracketed words in the following
sentence were carefully inked out before publication :
Thus they (the troop) remained upon duty, [without receiving any
payment or allowance from his Majesty,] until his Majesty had reduced
his rebellious subjects, and then my Lord returned with honour to his
charge, viz. the government of the Prince.
His position was not to continue for long, however. In
1 64 1, when Newcastle learned that the Parliament, now in
complete control of affairs, had resolved to displace him, he fore-
stalled them by voluntarily resigning. Our authoress does not
probe further into the causes, but they seem to lie in the fact
that the so-called " Army Plot " had been discovered. The
responsibility for this plan to bring the army south, that it
might support Charles by overawing Parliament, rested chiefly
1 Mrs. Hutchinson's Memoirs, I, 163-164.
2 See Hist. Mss. Comm., 12 Rep., App., Part V, I, 512, 517.
' See also Hist. Mss. Comm., 12 Rep., App., Part II, p. 240, and RIemoirs of
the Vemey Family, I, 322.
* "The Preface," Firth, p. xliii.
22 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
upon Suckling and Jermyn ^ ; and as Strafford was now in the
tower and Northumberland still invalided, the conspirators set-
tled upon Newcastle as commander. When these facts became
known to Parliament, it was impossible that Prince Charles
should remain longer in his governor's hands, and the inevi-
table result followed .2 Newcastle retired to the country, perhaps
not altogether unwillingly, for during his three years of office
he had run ^40,000 in debt.^
Yet he was to get only a few months' leisure before the
King had more work for him to do.^ Early in January, 1642,
Charles wrote Newcastle bidding him hasten to Hull and take
command there. A commission had previously been given him
in expectation of future trouble, because in that town were
assembled all the ammunition and supplies for a Scotch cam-
paign. Newcastle arrived on January 14 and had himself pro-
claimed as Governor, but when Parliamentary troops headed
by Hotham and a Royalist force under Legg appeared before
the walls of Hull, the mayor refused admittance to both.
Within three days the House of Peers sent for Newcastle to
appear before them,^ and the vacillating Charles ordered him
to obey. Cavendish was cleared as acting under royal com-
mission, but Hull with its precious contents was irretrievably
lost to Charles.
Not long after, matters became so desperate that the Queen
was forced to flee the country, while her husband repaired to
York. Thither Newcastle was summoned and put in charge
i"Mr. Jermaine named my Lord of Newcastle." — Welbeck Mss., I, 12,
and also 20, 22.
2 S. R. Gardiner's History of England, 1603-1642, IX, 313 ; Firth, p. 8, n.
3 Firth, p. 6, n., quotes a letter in the record office by Thomas Wiseman.
* The King seems to have been on very close terms with Newcastle.
The Duchess states that Charles even created peers at her husband's request
(Firth, p. loi) and Cavendish certainly exerted what influence he possessed
(Hist. Mss. Comm., 12 Rep., App., Pait II, pp. 120-121).
6 Clarendon, Book IV, § 215.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 23
of his titular stronghold, with jurisdiction over the four northern
counties of Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmoreland, and
Durham. Almost the first problem that presented itself was
a mutiny of train-band soldiers in the Bishopric of Durham,
which demanded his immediate presence ; "where at his arrival,"
says the Duchess, " (I mention it by the way, and as a merry
passage) a jovial fellow used this expression, that he liked my
Lord very well, but not his company (meaning his soldiers)."
This uprising was quickly subdued, with the result that most
stringent rules were enforced as to church government there ;
Dr. Cosin, Dean of Peterborough, was to censor all sermons
and see that they were leavened with good Royalist sentiment.
At about this time ^ 500, with a consignment of arms under
the escort of Davenant and Cook,^ was received from her
Majesty in Holland, while a shipload of ammunition and
weapons came from the King of Denmark. Thus encour-
aged, Newcastle resolved to raise an army. Charles approved,
of course, as it would mean no personal inconvenience for
himself, and sent the Earl a commission as general, with
power to confer knighthood or coin money. A regiment of
foot and a troop of horse had already been raised,^ but Charles
saw fit to detain the latter when it escorted Henrietta Maria's
ammunition to him. Newcastle's popularity and family con-
nections in the north ^ now enabled him to get together an
army of 8000 horse, foot, and dragoons, which was later
enlarged to 100,000 men, according to an almost incredible
1 Letters of Henrietta Maria, ed. Green, p. 121.
2 In Book III (Firth, p. 90) the Duchess says that Charles appropriated
both regiment and troop.
^ Compare Mrs. Hutchinson, I, 164: "He had, indeed, through his great
estate, his liberal hospitahty, and constant residence in his country, so en-
deared them to him that no man was a greater prince in all that northern
quarter ; till a foolish ambition of glorious slavery carried him to court, where
he ran himself much into debt, to purchase neglects of the king and queen
and scorns of the proud courtiers."
24 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
statement by the Duchess. Among the number were 3000
that the general had chosen for his own regiment. "They
were called White-coats, for this following reason : my Lord
being resolved to give them new liveries, and there being not
red cloth enough to be had, took up so much of white, as
would serve to clothe them, desiring withal, their patience
until he had got it dyed ; but they, impatient of stay, requested
my Lord, that he would be pleased to let them have it undyed
as it was, promising they themselves would dye it in the
enemy's blood. Which request my Lord granted them, and
from that time they were called White-coats,"^ or sometimes
" Newcastle's Lambs."
No sooner was this high-spirited force organized than there
came to its general a plea from the Yorkshire Royalists that
he would come to their assistance. Lord Fairfax and his
untrained Parliamentary troops had driven Charles's supporters
into the town of York, where they laid siege to that meagrely
defended stronghold. After negotiations which lasted through
September and October, 1642,2 Newcastle decided to grant
their request, publishing first a declaration "for his resolution
of marching into Yorkshire, as also a just vindication of him-
self from that unjust aspersion laid upon him for entertaining
some Popish recusants in his service." As a matter of fact
he pleads guilty to the latter offense, but with eminent success
defends himself for committing it.^ His march to York was
repeatedly interrupted by the enemy, most notably at Pierce-
bridge on December i, but nevertheless it was accomplished
in an unusually short time. " It cannot be denied," says
Clarendon, "that the Earl of Newcastle, by his quick march
with his troops, as soon as he had received his commission
1 Firth, p. 84. 2 Letters reprinted by Firth, pp. 188-191.
8 Rushworth, III, ii, 78-81. Charles had instructed him to employ Catholics
(Ellis's Original Letters, Series I, Vol. Ill, p. 291).
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 25
to be general and in the depth of winter, redeemed or rescued
the city of York from the rebels, when they looked upon it
as their own, and had it even within their grasp." ^ Once
arrived, he had a tax levied to support his army, rather than
that the soldiers should forage for their own supplies, which
was stringently forbidden.
It was winter and Newcastle might well have stayed within
the walls of York, but he hastened out to attack the enemy at
Tadcaster, although a little more deliberation would have made
for greater efficiency in the end. As events turned out, it
took three separate expeditions to subjugate the West Riding,
notwithstanding that his forces were greatly superior to those
of Parliament. The Duchess, of course, is so completely blind
to any deficiency of her Lord's that she can only admire his
activity and daring. Indeed, the first mishap was due to no
fault of his. Tadcaster stood on the west bank of a river,
accessible from York only by a stone bridge, which Fairfax
had broken down and afterwards fortified. Since this position
was exceedingly difficult to attack, Newcastle planned a simul-
taneous movement from two sides of the town. He himself
led the foot from the east, but the Lieutenant-General who
was to appear on the west with the horse failed to arrive at
his appointed hour. In Drake's Eboractim^ it is stated that
this delinquent was the Earl of Newport. The Duchess, of
course, does not mention his name, but clearly says that it was
the "then Lieutenant-General of the army" and in another
passage assigns that office to "first Earl of Newport, afterwards
the Lord Eythin." Lord Ethyn, better known as General King,
was appointed to the position sometime in January, partly as
a result of this error on Newport's part.^ A curious mistake
1 Clarendon, Book VIII, § 84. 2 j, 193.
3 See Ellis's Original Letters, Series I, Vol. Ill, pp. 295-296, and Firth,
p. 18, n. I.
26 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
has been recently made^ in identifying this "Lieutenant-
General " with Lord Goring, General of the Horse, and a
pretty moral pointed as to having intemperate and jealous
officers in any army. Newcastle's subordinates were unwisely
appointed no doubt,^ but Goring must be acquitted of this par-
ticular blunder. The real reason for it is even more obscure,
although difficulties in Newport's march ^ and a letter forged
by the enemy* make concrete our authoress's charges of " neg-
lect or treachery," Surprisingly enough, however, Newcastle's
single attack coupled with a shortage of ammunition ^ (this lat-
ter extenuating circumstance is not mentioned by our historian)
caused the rebels to evacuate Tadcaster. " My Lord " entered
the town and garrisoned it, thence moving on to Pomfret,
where he repeated this performance.
During his stay at Pomfret an important episode occurred
very detrimental to Royalist hopes and significantly not men-
tioned in the Life^ Sir William Saville was sent to capture cer-
tain manufacturing towns in the West Riding, of which Leeds
and Wakefield soon submitted. At Bradford, however, he was
severely repulsed, and a few days later Sir Thomas Fairfax
took charge of the local forces, Leeds was recaptured, and
about five hundred prisoners were taken. Meantime Newark
in Nottinghamshire had been garrisoned, and on January 27,
1 64 2- 1 64 3, Newcastle returned to York to obtain some ammu-
nition which he had had sent from the north. Its dilatory
arrival cannot offset General King's splendid defense of the
convoy when it was attacked at Yarum Bridge,
1 First Duke and Duchess, p. 80.
2 Henrietta Maria had a hand in the appointments of both King and
Goring. See Clarendon, Book VI, § 264, and Letters of Henrietta Maria,
pp. 149-150-
8 Sir Henry Slingsby's Diary, ed. 1836, p. 86.
* Drake's Eboranim, I, 193.
^ Letter of Lord F'airfax, December 10, 1642, in Rushworth, III, ii, 92.
^ Firth, p. 17. n. Cf. Catalogue of the Thomasoft Tracts, I, 208, 213.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 2/
On February 22 Henrietta Maria ^ landed at Burlington in
the East Riding. All accounts agree as to the difficulties
attendant on her arrival and as to a subsequent bombardment
of the house where she lodged. Newcastle had marched down
to meet his Queen, and afterwards he escorted her safely back
to York. She " graciously accepted " ^^3000 sterling from
him, but the arms she had brought she sent on to Charles,
who in true Stuart fashion " was pleased to keep with him
for his own service" their guard of 1500 men. The Queen's
arrival aided Newcastle in winning over Sir Hugh Cholmley,
Governor of Scarborough Castle, and thus gaining that strong-
hold by peaceful means.'^ The Duchess, as we might expect,
credits her husband with this entire exploit, nor does she
mention his subsequent failure to enlist the Hothams on
Charles's side.^ These negotiations, which began in March of
this same year, accomplished nothing for the King but resulted
in the ultimate execution of those unfortunate officers as
traitors to Parliament.
A second expedition from York was begun in March, 1642-
1643, when Lord Goring was sent with some horsemen to
intercept the enemy's march. He met them on Seacroft Moor
and there, according to all accounts, effected a complete rout.
Newcastle then ordered out another party, which had like
success at Tankerly Moor, and finally took the field himself
with his main army. He passed by Leeds to besiege Wake-
field, which soon capitulated. While his troops were still
surrounding this town, their commander left them for some
days to treat with Hotham and to bury his first wife, who had
^ She had planned to come before, but Newcastle dissuaded her until the
situation grew somewhat better. See Letters of Henrietta Maria, p. 145.
2 Gardiner's History of the Great Civil War, I, 122.
' For an elaborate account of these proceedings, see First Duke and
Duchess, pp. 89-98 ; Welbeck Mss., I, 105-109 ; and Clarendon State Papers, II,
181-183.
28 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
died on April 17.^ The recently victorious Goring and Sir
Francis Mackworth — these names were printed in the margin
of the Life, but carefully inked out before publication — were
left in command at Wakefield, while Newcastle went on to
fresh successes at Rotherham and Sheffield. The former is
chiefly notable because this town was plundered contrary to
treaty^ (this, of course, is unmentioned by the Duchess), the
latter for some iron works near by, which were thenceforward
employed to cast Royalist cannon. Shortly after came news
that the Fairfaxes had retaken Wakefield with all its garrison.
Newcastle was discouraged as well as angry and immediately
retired to York again. On June 4 the Queen set out for
Oxford accompanied by an escort, which, as usual, Charles
kept for his own service. The Duchess, prone to overestimate
her Lord's losses in the good cause, gives the number as
7000, but it is unlikely that accurate figures would have
exceeded 4500 to 5000.^ Her Majesty had difficulty in getting
even this number, for ' ' notre general et tous les gentilshommes
du pais sont contre. Cette armee est appelee I'armee de la
royne, mais j'ay bien petit pouvoir et je vous asseure que, si
j'en avois, tout iroit mieux qu'il ne va." ^
The third expedition to drive the rebels from Yorkshire
was commenced this same month, when Howley House, a well-
fortified stone building, was battered down by cannon and
captured. " The governor, having quarter given him contrary
to my Lord's orders, was brought before my Lord by a person
of quality, for which the officer that brought him received a
check ; and though he resolved then to kill him, yet my Lord
would not suffer him to do it, saying, it was inhuman to kill
1 Letters of Henrietta Maria, p. i88 ; and Firth, p. ii6.
2 Rushworth, III, ii, 268. See Rev. John Shaw, Dedication to his sermon,
"The Three Kingdoms Case," in Yorkshire Diaries, 1, 136, 385 (Surtees Society).
3 Letters of Henrietta Maria, p. 222 ; and Firth, p. 23, n.
* Baillon's Leitres inedites de Henriette-Marie, p. 135.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 29
any man in cold blood. Thereupon the governor kissed the
key of the house door, and presented it to my Lord ; to which
my Lord returned this answer : ' I need it not,' said he, " for
I brought a key along with me, which yet I was unwilling to
use, until you forced me to it.' " After this victory Newcastle
moved on to Bradford, which had previously given him much
trouble, but on his way met the enemy drawn up on Atherton
or Adwalton Moor, prepared to give battle. They had so very
much the advantage of position that for a time success seemed
to be theirs, until Newcastle rallied his troops and with the aid
of his own regiment turned defeat into victory. Indeed Adwal-
ton Moor was the Earl's most brilliant achievement in his
entire northern campaign. The enemy fled, Bradford was oc-
cupied, and Lady Fairfax captured, although Newcastle's unfail-
ing courtesy set her at liberty almost immediately. Secondary
effects were even greater : Halifax, Leeds, and Wakefield were
abandoned by the Parliamentarians, who retired to Hull, their
only remaining stronghold in Yorkshire. After three attempts,
then, Newcastle had practically cleared the rebels from that
county and was now prepared to go on to further activities in
other fields. The Duchess tells us that her husband sent a
letter to the Governor of York bidding him intercept Fairfax's
retreat towards Hull, but a post's neglect prevented the com-
plete annihilation of those fugitives.
Meanwhile, as news had come from Lincolnshire of upris-
ings there. General King was sent down to adjust matters.
Before his arrival, however, the King's forces suffered a de-
feat and their commander was killed, which brought Newcastle
himself south as well. His first capture was Gainsborough,
a garrison but recently fallen to the enemxy. The Earl of
Kingston, its previous commander, was being taken as pris-
oner to Hull on a pinnace, when some of "' my Lord's " forces
shot at the pinnace in an effort to stop it and killed Kingston
30 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
by mistake. Our historian definitely places the blame in re-
marking that, "by the way," these forces were under com-
mand of Lord Ethyn ! Another incident connected with this
capitulation was even more unfortunate. Gainsborough sur-
rendered upon fair terms, but, for some reason or other, they
were not carried out. The Duchess, always ready to explain
away anything disagreeable, states that some prisoners in the
town first began to plunder, after which the besieging forces
joined in, " although it was against my Lord's will and orders."
After having garrisoned Gainsborough, Newcastle also occupied
and garrisoned Lincoln " with intention to march towards the
south, which if it had taken effect, would doubtless have made
an end of that war."
But this plan did not take effect, and its failure was the
turning point in Newcastle's military career. His motives for
return are so mixed as to defy analysis. The Duchess, we may
be sure, sets forth only defensible ones, chiefly a persistent
demand from Yorkshire that he come back to drive the disturb-
ing enemy out of Hull.^ On the other hand we have evidence
that Newcastle did not care to go south, where he must subject
himself to a superior. Charles had repeatedly desired his pres-
ence ; witness Sir Philip Warwick's mission to the north for
this very purpose early in that summer. " But I found him
very averse to this, and perceived that he apprehended nothing
more than to be joined to the king's army, or to serve under
Prince Rupert ; for he designed himself to be the man that
should turn the scale, and to be a self-subsisting and distinct
army wherever he was."^ That there was reason for Caven-
dish's fearing slights in the south is evidenced by letters he had
received from Captain John Hotham in the previous April : ^
1 This was undoubtedly correct, for it is corroborated by Sir Henry Slingsby
in his Diary, p. 99. ^ Sir Philip Warwick's Memoirs, 1813, p. 268.
3 Welbeck Mss., I, 701. No doubt this caused Charles's reprimand to New-
castle at that time, of which we hear in the Queen's Letters, pp. 181, 191-193.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 31
But now to give you a taste that all is not as you think at Court, I
shall freely tell you this, that within this four days some very near
her Majesty spoke such words of contempt and disgrace of you as
truly for my part I could not hear them repeated with patience, and
you will plainly see, if they dare it, you will have a successor. . . . The
words were these : " that you were a sweet General, lay in bed until
eleven o'clock and combed till twelve, then came to the Queen, and
so the work was done, and that General King did all the business."
They were spoken by my Lady Comwallis in the hearing of Mr. Port-
ington, a fellow cunning enough ; and this to my father and another
gentleman with many words of undervaluing, which he said were
spoken by others.
Letters from Henrietta Maria to Newcastle on June 18 and
August 13 1 show persistent demands on Charles's part for
Newcastle's presence, demands which the Queen herself op-
posed. "The truth is that they envy your army," she writes
under the latter date. So it may be seen that there were
undoubtedly personal reasons why Newcastle preferred to stay
in Yorkshire. Nevertheless when he had achieved the great
victory of Adwalton Moor and fate had brought him into
Lincolnshire, his loyalty perhaps asserted itself, so that he had
every intention of continuing to the south. ^ Then came the
summons from Yorkshire to return, and Newcastle could con-
scientiously send word to Charles, "that it was impossible for
him to comply with his commands in marching with his army
into the associated counties, for that the gentlemen of the
country, who had the best regiments, and were amongst the
best officers, utterly refused to march, except Hull were first
taken ; and that he had not strength enough to march and
1 Letters, pp. 219, 225.
^ The King " showed us letters from the Earl of Newcastle, wherein he
offered to join his Majesty with a detachment of 4000 horse and 8000 foot,
if his Majesty thought fit to march southward, and yet leave forces sufficient
to guard the north from any invasion." — Defoe's Meinoirs of a Cavalier.
George D. Sproul, New York, 1903, p. 228.
32 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
to leave Hull securely blocked up." ^ This explanation was
deemed sufficient by S. R, Gardiner,^ but we must agree with
Professor Firth ^ that Newcastle's withdrawal had in it some-
thing of il gran rifinto.
Whatever the cause, in August, 1643, he marched back to
the north, his good fortune ended. After capturing the small
town of Beverley, he invested Hull by request of the York-
shire gentry. They promised to send ten thousand men for
that purpose, but no more was heard of them, although we
■ may be sure the Duchess chronicles this disappointment.
Sir Philip Warwick,^ who had been dispatched north again
at this time, states that General King was supposed to have
advised the siege. Warwick goes on to relate an episode that
throws a good deal of light on the commanding general and
his way of waging war :
I went down to see his trenches and works, and found (the season
having been very wet) his men standing ancle deep in dirt, a great
distance from the town ; so, as I conceived, those without were Ukelier
to rot than those within to starve ; and by assault there was not the
least probability to carry it. Upon my return to him, relating but
faintly and modestly my thought, (for he knew I had not the least
part of a soldier to warrant a discourse upon that subject) he merrily
put it off, saying, " You often hear us called the Popish Army ; but
you see we trust not in our good works."
This siege began on September 2, but it was raised on
October 11,^ which latter event the Life attributes to the
Royalist defeat at Winceby or Horncastle in Lincolnshire.
The contributory cause, nearer home, was a successful sally
made by the Hull garrison, in which many of Newcastle's
1 Clarendon, Book VII, § 177. This message must have been sent before
the siege of Hull, despite Clarendon's assertion, which has been a source of
further error in Fi7-st Duke and Duchess.
2 English Historical Review, 1887, pp. 172-173 ; and History, I, 229.
3 " Editor's Preface " prefixed to the Life, p. xi.
* Memoirs, pp. 294-295. ^ Rushworth, III, ii, 280-281.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 33
guns were taken and some of his fortifications destroyed,^ It
is instructive to contrast our historian's complete suppression
of this failure with her full account of an earlier sally that
was brilliantly repelled. At all events the siege was ended ;
Newcastle returned to York and soon after was elevated by
Charles to a marquessate.^
During November he took the field in Derbyshire on hear-
ing that the Parliamentarians were stirring there. From his
headquarters at Chesterfield in that county, a force was sent
back to York to ensure the Mayor's reelection, for he was
Newcastle's candidate, but not overpopular in the city. After
Wingfield Manor, a small hostile garrison, had been taken,
the general marched on to inspect his family estates at Bol-
sover and Welbeck. On this occasion he tried to persuade
Colonel Hutchinson to surrender the garrison of Nottingham,
but the attempt was unsuccessful and the Duchess ignores it.^
Again he was called back to York, however, this time because a
great army of Scotch were reported to be invading England.
Warning of this attack had been given several months before
by the Marquis of Hamilton, but Newcastle then sent to
Oxford for instructions and refused to break the treaty with
Scotland by garrisoning Berwick or Carlisle.'* The Duchess
does not tell us about this but makes much of the Yorkshire-
men's further false promises and of Cavendish's difficulty in
raising more troops. Colonel John Bellasis was left in charge
of York, while the main army marched north to Newcastle,
where it arrived on February 2, 164 3- 1644. Just one day later
^ Welbeck Mss., I, 13S. Mrs. Hutchinson says that Cavendish was "forced
to rise with loss and dishonour from the unyielding town." — Memoirs, I, 333.
2 " By the Queen's interest, he is now, from Earl, made Marquis, as we
see." — Carlyle's Cromwell, ed. S. C. Lomas, I, 131.
3 Mrs. Hutchinson's Memoirs, I, 288-293 and 369-378 (Appendix).
* Warwick, pp. 296-297 ; and Burnet, Lives of the Hamillons, ed. 1852,
p. 310, in Firth, p. 33, n. i.
34 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
the Scotch appeared, 22,000 strong and amazed to find the
town already occupied. Newcastle's sorties compelled them to
keep quartered up in the hills, but consequently when the Duke
wanted a pitched battle he always had a disadvantageous posi-
tion. This campaign was well conducted, however, in spite
of trying conditions : the English were far outnumbered ; they
were comparatively unaccustomed to severe winter weather ;
and, continues the Duchess, " there was so much treachery,^
juggling, and falsehood in my Lord's own army, that it was
impossible for him to be successful in his designs and under-
takings." Presently the enemy moved to Sunderland, and
Newcastle countered to Durham. This time luck was with
him, for a great snowstorm prevented any interference with the
manoeuvres .2 His object was to cut off the Scots' supplies by
his cavalry, and so well did he succeed that sometimes they
were entirely without meat or drink, while they never had
more than twenty-four hours' provisions on hand.^ A minor
incident in this period was the Earl of Montrose's obtaining
some forces for an expedition into Scotland ; the Duchess says
he was given two hundred men by her husband, but Wishart ^
states they were "ad centum equites, sed equos strigosos et
male habitos (non imperatoris culpa, sed aliorum invidia)."
What the outcome of this fencing with the Scotch would
have been, it is difficult to say, but presently news came of
a great misfortune in Yorkshire. Bellasis was a man of so
much more valour than prudence that he had attempted the de-
fense of Shelby, an untenable town. He was defeated by the
Fairfaxes, his army routed, and himself taken prisoner. This
put an entirely different face on the situation farther north, for
1 King, who was Newcastle's most efficient general, was at this time accused
of favoring his countrymen, the Scotch. See Warwick, pp. 307-308.
2 John Willcock's Life of Sir Hemy Vane the Younger, p. 137.
2 Rushworth, III, ii, 615.
* De Rebus Auspiciis Caroti, 1647 ed., chap, iii, p. 32.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 35
now Newcastle was between two hostile armies and safety was
the first consideration. Consequently, on April 13I he com-
menced a retreat to York, which was successfully accomplished
in six days despite the enemy's constant harrying of his rear.
Next day Fairfax and Leven joined forces to besiege the city,
being later joined by Manchester with a Rebel army from the
"associate counties." ^ Newcastle was indeed in a sorry plight
by this time. For some months past he had been writing the
King for reinforcements against his rapidly increasing oppo-
nents, and the intrigues against him, of which we have heard
something, must have been a constant source of discourage-
ment. It looks as if he had even threatened to resign, judging
from a significant royal letter, dated at Oxford, April 5 : ^
New Castell
By your last dispach I perceave that the Scots are not the only, or
(it may be said) the least ennemies you contest withall at this tyme ;
wherefore I must tell you in a word (for I have not tyme to make
longe discourses) you must as much contem the impertinent or malitius
tonges and pennes of those that ar or professe to be your frends, as
well as you dispyse the sword of an equall ennemie. The trewth is,
if eather you, or my L. Ethen * leave my service, I am sure (at least)
all the Northe (I speake not all I thinke) is lost. Remember all courage
is not in fyghting ; constancy in a good cause being the cheefe, and
the dispysing of slanderus tonges and pennes being not the least
ingredient. I '1 say no more, but, let nothing disharten you from doing
that which is most for your owen honnor, and good of (the thought
of leaving your charge, being against booke)
Your most asseured reall
constant frend
Charles R.
1 April 13, Old Style, bringing the juncture of Fairfax and Leven on the
20th, O. S. Newcastle's letter after this occurrence (Warburton's Pri?ice
Rupert, II, 434) is dated April 18, but this is N.S., so that there is no
real contradiction. ^ Rushworth, III, ii, 615.
3 Harleian Ms. 6g88, art. 104. Entirely in the King's hand. Reprinted in
First Duke and Duchess, p. 121.
* King seems to have felt very deeply the charges of treachery which had
been brought against him.
36 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Encouraged by such a personal appeal together with promises
of present assistance, Newcastle, putting his shoulder to the
wheel afresh, made ready to defend York, First he ordered
his cavalry under Sir Charles Lucas to Derbyshire or Notting-
hamshire, where they might be well quartered and best harass
the enemy .1 Then having sent renewed dispatches to Charles,
he instituted a strict surveillance upon provisions. Even with
this precaution, as months wore on, food and ammunition be-
gan to fail, until there came grateful news that Prince Rupert
was marching north to relieve the city. York could not have
held out much longer apparently, for in early June we find
Newcastle engaging the enemy in useless negotiations,^ that
with their quibblings and cross purposes could only have been
meant to gain much-needed time. On the i6th.^ there occurred
an episode upon which the Duchess lays considerable emphasis :
a mine was sprung under St. Mary's Tower, so that numbers
of besiegers could pour into the Manor Yard. For a moment
confusion ensued, but my Lord led his White-coats against the
invaders and repulsed them, killing or capturing 1500. As
a matter of fact the assault had been prematurely hastened
because of jealousies among the Parliamentarians,^ while their
actual loss was not above 300 in all.^
At last on July i, when Rupert's forces with Newcastle's
own cavalry, now under the command of Goring, appeared
before York, the enemy withdrew precipitously. The town was
saved, and if well enough had been let alone, it might have
been possible to recover much lost ground. Prince Rupert,
1 Clarendon, Book VIII, § 20.
2 For the documents see Rushworth, III, ii, 624-631.
3 Gardiner says the 17th, but it was Sunday, the i6th. See Rushworth, III,
ii, 631; and Drake's Eboracnm, I, 202.
* Markham's Fairfax, p. 148; and Baillie Letters, II, 195.
^ Rushworth, III, ii, 631. Slingsby, who was there, estimates the strength
of this storming party at 500, of whom 200 were captured. See Diary, p. 109.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 37
however, encouraged by King Charles's ambiguous commands,
wished to pursue the besiegers that he might defeat them in
a pitched battle ; Newcastle's advice was to wait for reinforce-
ments from the north or for rumored divisions among the
rebels. 1 These considerations had been discussed in dis-
patches ^ on the day of Rupert's arrival and the question came
up again on the morrow, as is vividly related in some notes of
Clarendon's on the northern campaign : ^
The next morning the Marquis went out of the city to attend the
Prince, and found him upon his march and the enemy having placed
themselves upon a hill ; and when the Marquis overtook the Prince
they both alighted, and after salutations went again to horse, and the
Prince said " My Lord, I hope we shall have a glorious day." So the
Earl asked whether he meant to put it to a day, and urged many rea-
sons against it ; the Prince replied " Nothing venture, nothing have "
etc. Several persons had that morning reported that the Prince had
an absolute commission to command those parts, and that the Mar-
quis's power was at an end. When Major-General King came up
Prince Rupert showed the Marquis and the Earl a paper, which he
said was the draught of the battle, as he meant to fight it, and asked
them what they thought of it. King answered " By God, sir, it is very
fine in the paper, but there is no such thing in the fields." The Prince
replied " Not so " etc. The Marquis asked the Prince what he would
do ? His Highness answered " We will charge them tomorrow morn-
ing." My Lord asked him, whether he were sure the enemy would not
fall on them sooner ; he answered, No ; and the Marquis goes to his
coach hard by, and calling for a pipe of tobacco, before he could take
it the enemy charged, and instantly all the Prince's horse were routed.
Thus began the famous battle of Marston Moor,^ by which
northern England was lost to Charles's forces. The details of
this fight may concern us no more than they do the Duchess,^
1 Sanford's Studies and Illustrations of the Great Rebellion, p. 591.
^ Rupert and Newcastle did not meet till the morning of the fight. See
Cholmley's Memorials in English Historical Review, April, 1890, p. 345.
^ Clarendon State Papers, No. 10S5. Reprinted by Firth, p. 39.
* Sometimes known as Hessom Moor and so called by the Duchess.
* A very readable account is given in Defoe's Memoirs of a Cavalier, pp. 252-
259, where Newcastle is referred to as "that always unfortunate gentleman."
38 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
for, as we have seen, Newcastle practically resigned his com-
mand to Rupert and fought that day as a private gentleman.
"And though several of my Lord's friends advised him not
to engage in battle, because the command (as they said) was
taken from him : yet my Lord answered them that happen
what would, he would not shun to fight, for he had no other
ambition but to live and die a loyal subject to his Majesty."
He bore himself valiantly we may be sure, and when he had
no sword left, killed three men with his page's half-leaden
one, refusing to deprive any of the other capable fighters.
His White-coats also distinguished themselves, for they,
" being veteran soldiers, and accustomed to fight, stood their
ground, and the fury of that impression of Cromwell, which
routed the whole army besides ; nor did the danger nor the
slaughter round them make them cast away their arms or their
courage ; but seeing themselves destitute of their friends, and
surrounded by their enemies, they cast themselves into a ring,
where though quarter was offered them, they gallantly refused
it, and so manfully behaved themselves, that they slew more of
the enemy in this particular fight, than they had killed of them
before. At last they were cut down, not by the sword, but
showers of bullets, after a long and stout resistance, leaving
their enemies a sorrowful victory, both in regard of them-
selves whom they would have spared, as in the regard of the loss
of the bravest men on their own side, who fell in assaulting
them. A very inconsiderable number of them were preserved,
to be the living monuments of that Brigade's loyalty and
valour." ^ Again, " This sole regiment, after the day was lost,
having got into a small parcel of ground ditched in, and not
of easy access of horse, would take no quarter ; and by mere
valour, for one whole hour, kept the troops of horse from
1 James Heath's Chronicle of the Civil Wars of England, Scotland and
Ireland, 1 67 6, p . 6 1 .
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 39
entering amongst them at near push of pike : when the horse
did enter, they would have no quarter, but fought it out till
there was not thirty of them living ; those whose hap it was
to be beaten down upon the ground as the troopers came near
them, though they could not rise for their wounds, yet were
so desperate as to get either a pike or sword, or piece of them,
and to gore the troopers' horses, as they came over them,
or passed by them. Captain Camby, then a trooper under
Cromwell, and an actor, who was the third or fourth man that
entered amongst them, protested he never, in all the fights
he was in, met with such resolute brave fellows, or whom
he pitied so much, and said ' he saved two or three against
their wills.' " 1
Newcastle stuck to his post till the very end, but when he
saw that all was lost, rode back to York late at night, with
his brother and one or two servants. The next day he an-
nounced to Rupert that his resources were at an end and that
he intended to leave the kingdom ; "I will not endure the
laughter of the court" is said^ to have been his valediction,
a farewell quite in keeping with the character of this Cavalier,
as we have come to know him.
The question now arises whether Newcastle was justified
in fleeing from England. The Duchess, of course, expatiates
upon his devotion to the King and the very gray prospects
before him at home. She intimates that Rupert thought there
was sufficient justification for flight, since the Prince agreed
^ W^illiam Lilly's History of His Life and Times, ed. 1822, pp. 178-180.
Lilly also says (pp. 177-178) : "There was some animosity at or before the
fight betwixt the Earl of Newcastle and Prince Rupert ; for Newcastle being
General of his Majesty's forces in the north, a person of valour and well
esteemed in those parts, took it not well to have a competition in his con-
cernments: for if the victory should fall on his Majesty's side, Prince Rupert's
forces would attribute it unto their own General, viz. Rupert, and give him
the glory thereof."
^ Warburton's Prince Rupert, H, 468.
40 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
to inform Charles that her husband " had behaved himself
like an honest man, a gentleman and a loyal subject." That
he carried out his promise may be inferred from the King's
subsequent letter, full of gratitude and affection, without a
single word of criticism : ^
Right trusty and entirely beloved Cousin and Councellor Wee greete
you well. The misfortune of our Forces in the North, wee know is
ressented as sadly by you as the present hazard of the losse of soe
considerable a porcion of this our Kingdom deserves : which also
affects us the more, because in that losse so great a proporcion fals
upon your self ; whose loyalty and eminent merit we have ever held,
and shall still, in a very high degree of our royall esteeme. And albeit
the distracted condition of our Affaires and Kingdom will not afford
us meanes at this present to comfort you in your sufferings, yet we
shall ever reteyne soe gracious a memory of your merit, as when it
shall "please God in mercy to restore us to peace, it shalbe one of
our principall endeavours to consider how to recompense those that
have with soe great affection and courage as yourself assisted us in
the time of our greatest necessity and troubles. And in the mean time
if there be any thing wherein we may expresse the reality of our good
intentions to you, or the value we have of your person, we shall most
readily doe it upon any occasion that shalbe ministred. And soe we
bid you very heartily farewell. Given at our Court at Oxford the
28th day of November 1644.
By his Ma's command
Edw. Nicholas
Decidedly a Stuart knew how to reward and how to promise
as well.2
On the other hand there is room for grave criticism of
Newcastle's flight. Since York itself held out for nineteen
days after both commanders fled, its resources could not have
been completely exhausted.^ Rupert collected 6000 men and
joined Montrose at Richmond ; * the Marquis might have gone
1 Ellis's Original Letters, Series I, Vol. Ill, pp. 303-304.
- The Queen also wrote to the defeated general with no lack of generosity.
See Letters of Henrietta Maria, p. 261.
3 Heath, p. 6i. ^ Warburton, II, 470.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 41
with them had not his jealousy at being subordinated to a youth
of twenty-two prevented. The truth is that Newcastle had been
supreme for so long, that now, when success for the Royal
cause depended on complete cooperation among all its sup-
porters, his Cavalier spirit would not admit of the necessary
team-play. Lack of discipline is said to have ruined the
Northern Army, and that may have been a model in little for
the Stuart cause. When a general is courageous, daring, and
spirited, but at the same time jealous, improvident, and unre-
strained, his soldiers will be patterned after him, and his party
will inevitably suffer in the long run. "' Like master, like
man," the saying goes, and to push back this comparison
farther, in not a few respects did Newcastle resemble his
sovereign ; they were men of the same generation, they had
been brought up in much the same environment ; and when
the pinch came, they were prepared to meet it in the same
way. Individual differences, with Charles's unusual responsi-
bilities and problems, caused the distinctions. For while
both were pleasure-loving, selfish, and determined, the King
abounded in a trickery and deceit entirely foreign to the
nobleman ; but while the Stuart fought to the last ditch and
met his destruction, game to the very end, the fair-weather
Newcastle turned his back at the first hint of misfortune to
seek security and peace amid more grateful surroundings. ^
That he was not completely acquitted in his own day is
plain from contemporary evidence. Shortly after the event
John Constable wrote to his father. Sir Henry, Viscount Dun-
bar, from Amsterdam: 2 " For the news that is here stirring,
1 It is rather amusing to find Newcastle fifteen years later (January 23, 1659)
writing to Nicholas : " There are many noblemen, or at least lords, that are
corned over to Paris it is true, but those lords that can take such sudden
apprehensions of fears so far off, I doubt will hardly have the courage to help
our gracious Master to his throne." — Letter in Egerton Mss., Firth, p. 207.
2 Calendar of State Papers [Domestic), 1644, Charles I, p. 378.
42 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
first Prince Rupert is here mightily condemned for his rash-
ness, but the Marquis of Newcastle much more for coming
away." Again, before leaving England, the Marquis spent
two days with Sir Hugh Cholmley, Governor of Scarborough,
who told him quite significantly, ^ "that for my own part,
though the place was in no defensible posture, I meant not to
surrender till I heard from the King, or was forced to it."
Finally Clarendon lays his share of obloquy on the delinquent
and in the course of the attack launches into one of his famous
character-portraits, which is easily the most important single
testimony as to Newcastle that we have : ^
This may be said of it, that the like was never done or heard or
read of before ; that two generals whereof one had still a good army
left, his horse, by their not having performed their duty, remaining,
upon the matter, entire, and much the greater part of his foot
having retired into the town, the great execution having fallen upon"
the northern foot ; and the other, having the absolute commission over
the northern countries, and very many considerable places in them
still remaining under his obedience, should both agree in nothing else
but in leaving that good city and the whole country as a prey to the
enemy. . . .
All that can be said for the marquis is, that he was so utterly tired
with a condition and employment so contrary to his humour, nature
and education, that he did not at all consider the means or the way
that would let him out of it, and free him forever from having more
to do with it. And it was a greater wonder that he sustained the vex-
ation and fatigue of it so long, than that he broke from it with so
little circumspection. He was a very fine gentleman, active and full
of courage, and most accomplished in those qualities of horsemanship,
dancing, and fencing, which accompany a good breeding ; in which
his delight was. Besides that, he was amorous in poetry and music,
to which he indulged the greatest part of his time ; and nothing could
have tempted him out of those paths of pleasure which he enjoyed in
a full and ample fortune, but honour and ambition to serve the King
when he saw him in distress, and abandoned by most of those who
1 Memoirs of Sir Hugh Cholmley, 1787, I, 50.
2 Clarendon, Book VIII, §§ 76, 82, 85, 86, 87.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 43
were in the highest degree obliged to him and by him. He loved
monarchy, as it was the foundation and support of his own greatness ;
and the Church, as it was well constituted for the splendour and secu-
rity of the Crown ; and religion, as it cherished and maintained that
order and obedience that was necessary to both ; without any other
passion for the particular opinions which were grown up in it and dis-
tinguished it into parties, than as he detested whatsoever was like to
disturb the public peace. . . .^
He liked the pomp and absolute authority of a general well, and
preserved the dignity of it to the full ; and for the discharge of the
outward state and circumstances of it, in acts of courtesy, affability,
bounty and generosity, he abounded ; which in the infancy of a war
became him, and made Iiim for some time very acceptable to men of
all conditions. But the substantial part, and fatigue of a general, he
did not in any degree understand, (being utterly unacquainted with
war,) nor could submit to, but referred all matters of that nature to the
discretion of his lieutenant general King, who, no doubt, was an officer
of great experience and ability, yet, being a Scotsman, was in that
conjuncture upon more disadvantage than he would have been if the
general himself had been more intent upon his command. In all actions
of the field he was still present, and never absent in any battle ; in all
which he gave instances of an invincible courage and fearlessness in
danger; in which the exposing himself notoriously did sometimes
change the fortune of the day when his troops begun to give ground.
Such articles of action were no sooner over than he retired to his
delightful company, music, or his softer pleasures, to all which he was
so indulgent, and to his ease, that he would not be interrupted upon
what occasion soever ; insomuch as he sometimes denied admission to
the chiefest officers of the army, even to general King himself, for two
days together ; from whence many inconveniences fell out.
From the beginning, he was without any reverence or regard for
the Privy Council, with few of whom he had any acquaintance ; but
was of the other soldiers' mind, that all the business ought to be done
by councils of war, and was always angry when there were any over-
tures of a treaty ; and therefore, (especially after the Queen had landed
in Yorkshire and stayed so long there,) he considered any orders he
received from Oxford, though from the King himself, more negligently
than he ought to have done; and when he thought himself sure of
^ Cf. the opinion of George Con, the Jesuit, in Gardiner's History of Eng-
land, 1603-1642, VIII, 244. Also see M. Montegut in La Duchesse et le Due de
Newcastle, pp. 279-283.
44 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Hull, and was sure that he should be then master entirely of all the
north, he had no mind to march nearer the King, (as he had then orders
to march into the associated counties, when, upon the taking of Bristol,
his majesty had a purpose to have marched towards London on the
other side,) out of apprehension that he should be eclipsed by the Court,
and his authority overshadowed by the superiority of prince Rupert,
from whom he desired to be at distance. Yet when he found himself
in distress, and necessitated to draw his army within the walls of York,
and saw no way to be relieved but by prince Rupert, who had then
done great feats of arms in the relief of Newark, and afterwards in his
expedition into Lancashire, where he was at that time, he writ to the
King to Oxford, either upon the knowledge that the absoluteness and
illimitedness of his commission was generally much spoken of, or out
of the conscience of some discourse of his own to that purpose, which
might have been reported, that he " hoped his majesty did believe that
he would never make the least scruple to obey the grandchild of King
James " : and assuredly if the prince had cultivated the good inclinations
the marquis had towards him, with any civil and gracious condescen-
sions, he would have found him full of duty and regard to his service
and interest.
But the strange manner of the prince's coming, and undeliberated
throwing himself, and all the King's hopes, into that sudden and
unnecessary engagement, by which all the force the marquis had raised
and with so many difficulties preserved was in a moment cast away and
destroyed, so transported him with passion and despair, that he could
not compose himself to think of beginning the work again, and involv-
ing himself in the same undelightful condition of life, from which he
might now be free. He hoped his past meritorious actions might out-
weigh his present abandoning the thought of future action ; and so,
without farther consideration, as hath been said, he transported himself
out of the kingdom.
II
"THE SECOND BOOK" (1644-1667)
The Second Book of the Life deals with Newcastle's sixteen
years of exile and his return at their completion. The prevalent
atmosphere is indicated at once, when his steward tells him
there is only ;^90 with which to adventure. From then on, the
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 45
question of money became a pressing and predominant one,
for our Cavalier had no conception of how to economize. He
had been accustomed all his life to have everything he could
desire, nor are the habits of years easily broken. Certainly
Newcastle was not experienced in the art of self-denial, so that
his existence became a continual struggle to provide the where-
withal for his comfort. Borrowing on insufficient security,
cajoling creditors by his pleasing manners, robbing Peter to
pay Paul, he soon became an adept in how to live on nothing
a year. Upon his first arrival in Germany, a wagon had to serve
him for a coach, until credit procured an elegant carriage and
nine Holsatian horses. Seven of these were later given to
Henrietta Maria, but from this time, at least two horses were
always an essential part of his establishment ; and it is to be
noted that even when in dire straits the fine gentleman could
not forgo some kind of conveyance nor be expected to take
to the legs with which Nature had provided him.
On July 4, 1644, Newcastle set sail from Scarborough and
four days later landed at Hamburg. With him were his two
sons, his brother, and a company of Royalists, among them
General King, who is said to have counselled the flight.^ On
the voyage his oldest son Charles, Lord Mansfield, fell sick of
the smallpox, and not long after Henry, the younger brother,
had an attack of measles, but both recovered. From July, 1644,
to February, 1644- 164 5, the Marquis remained at Hamburg,
thence setting out for Paris that he might present his respects
to the exiled Queen. He took boat to Amsterdam, and, from
there on, his journey assumed the nature of a triumphal prog-
ress. At Rotterdam he tendered his service to the Prince
of Orange and to the Queen of Bohemia (in whose honor
VVotton wrote, " You meaner Beauties of the Night ") ; at
Brussels he was visited by the Marquis of Castle Rodrigo
1 This statement is made by Sir Hugh Cholmley. See Firth, p. 42.
46 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
and Count Piccolomini ; at Cambray and Peronne he gave the
watchword for the night. Arrived at Paris in April, he went to
wait on Henrietta Maria, when for the first time he laid eyes
upon Margaret Lucas, a lovely girl of about twenty-two, " I
being then one of the Maids of Honour to her Majesty ; and
after he had stayed there some time, he was pleased to take
some particular notice of me, and express more than an ordi-
nary affection for me ; insomuch that he resolved to choose
me for his second wife. For he, having but two sons, pur-
posed to marry me, a young woman that might prove fruitful
to him, and increase his posterity by a masculine offspring.
Nay, he was so desirous of male issue that I have heard him
say he cared not (so God would be pleased to give him many
sons) although they came to be persons of the meanest
fortunes ; but God (it seems) had ordered it otherwise, and
frustrated his designs by making me barren, which yet did
never lessen his love and affection for me."
Margaret Lucas was born at St. John's near Colchester in
Essex "about the latter end of the reign of King James the
first," 1 as it has been the custom for her biographers to say.
This assertion comes presumably from her own remark that when
her father died (September 25, 1625) she was still an infant,
and indeed farther than this it is difficult to go with security.
Those of a more exact turn of mind have guessed the year 1624,
but an interrogation mark has been necessary after that date.^
A twelvemonth earlier seems even more likely. We know that
her death occurred on December 15, 1673, and the most nearly
contemporary evidence is that of Anthony a Wood, who states
that she was fifty years old at that time,^ Cokayne remarks
that she died in her fifty-seventh year/ but that would run her
^ Ballard's Memoirs of British Ladies, p. 20g.
2 Did. Nat. Biog., which gives her death as 1674.
^ The article on Walter Charleton in Athefia; Oxoftienses, Vol. IV, Col. 755.
* Also Cokayne puts their marriage in April instead of December, 1645.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 47
birth back to 16 17, too early for her to have been an infant
in 1625, or such a very "young woman" twenty years later.
Moreover, in her Poems and Fancies, when telling her own
story under the likeness of a ship, Margaret writes, that
In a calm of peace she swims alone,
No stormes of war at that time thought upon
But when that she had past nineteen degrees
The land of happiness she no longer sees
For then rebellious clouds foule black did grow,
And showers of blood into those seas did throw. ^
The rebellion broke out in 1642, and taking her simile at its
face value, 1623 may be accepted tentatively as the year of
her birth, although as yet we have no absolutely conclusive
testimony .2 Her early life was all spent in the quiet home
circle, until she left for Oxford to become a lady-in-waiting at
Henrietta Maria's court. Here again we find a confusion as
to dates. The Queen joined Charles from the north on July 13,
1643, and was with him for nine months, till April, 1644,
within which period the future Duchess must have become
attached to her Majesty. Historians have generally assigned
this event to the former year, but unless they are reckoning
Old Style, it seems more likely to have occurred in the latter,
for in Margaret's autobiography the attendant circumstances
are related. It appears that she cajoled her mother into letting
her go to court, but once there she was so overcome by
modesty that she wished to return home at once. " But my
mother said it would be a disgrace for me to return out of the
Court so soon after I was placed ; so I continued almost two
years, until such time as I was married from thence."^ As
we have seen, the love affair commenced about April, and it
1 1653 ed., pp. 155-156.
2 This year is also assumed in an article on " The Duchess of Newcastle,
and her Works" in The Retrospective Review^ 1853, I, 334.
3 From A True Relation^ Firth, p. 162.
48 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
reached a happy ending in December, 1645. If, then, we are to
trust the Duchess concerning events in her own Hfe, she could
not have gone to Oxford before the end of December, 1643.
" The marquis had before heard of this lady, for he was a
patron and friend of her gallant brother, lord Lucas, who com-
manded under him in the civil wars. He took occasion one
day to ask his lordship what he could do for him, as he had
his interest much at heart ? To which he answered, that he
was not sollicitous about his own affairs, for he knew the worst
could be but suffering death or exile in the Royal cause,^ but
his chief sollicitude was for his sister, on whom he could be-
stow no fortune, and whose beauty exposed her to danger :
he represented her amiable qualities, and raised the marquis's
curiosity to see her, and from that circumstance arose the mar-
quis's affection to this lady."^ Even with this auspicious start,
the course of true love did not run with especial smoothness,
as at first their friends tried to break off the match and after-
wards the Queen proved an obstacle ; but finally Newcastle
triumphed over circumstances, so that they were married at
Sir Richard Browne's chapel^ early in December. On the
20th Madam Lucas wrote her new son-in-law with every evi-
dence of approbation and satisfaction.^ She regretted, how-
ever, that the bad times prevented Margaret's bringing him
a suitable portion.
The dowry would have been very welcome, since Newcastle
was entirely without funds. Now there were two mouths for
him to fill in no more substantial a way than by the good
nature of his creditors ; " yet they grew weary at length, inso-
much that his steward was forced one time to tell him that he
was not able to provide a dinner for him, for his creditors
1 He was shot on August 28, 1648, by sentence of court martial after the
surrender of Colchester. ^ Gibber's Lives of the Poets, II, 163.
3 Evelyn's Diaiy, ed. Wheatley, II, 217. * Welbeck Mss., II, 137.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 49
were resolved to trust him no longer. My Lord being always
a great master of his passions, was — at least showed himself
— not in any manner troubled at it, but in a pleasant humour
told me that I must of necessity pawn my clothes to make so
much money as would procure a dinner. I answered that my
clothes would be but of small value, and therefore desired my
waiting-maid to pawn some small toys which I had formerly
given her, which she willingly did. The same day, in the
afternoon, my Lord spake himself to his creditors, and both
by his civil deportment and persuasive arguments, obtained
so much that they did not only trust him for more necessaries,
but lent him money besides to redeem those toys that were
pawned." In these extremities the Marchioness sent home
for her wedding portion and her husband tried to get aid from
England, — in vain, because he had been publicly proclaimed
a traitor by Parliament. His two sons were also dispatched
across the Channel to join their sisters, in hopes of contracting
rich marriages, and in that way becoming independent.^ By
these (and doubtless other similar) precautions, affairs mended so
in two years' time that the Newcastles were enabled to move from
lodgings to a rented house, which they themselves furnished ;
likewise the Marquis procured two Barbary horses to 'exercise
in the art of manage, one at a cost of 200 pistoles, the other
from Lord Crofts for ^100, payable on his return to England.
Meanwhile Newcastle kept in touch with the Royalist move-
ments. At a council of war in Saint Germains he gave it as
his advice that assistance must come from Scotland, " but her
Majesty was pleased to answer my Lord that he was too
quick." Shortly after. Prince Charles took it into his head
to visit Holland, and the Queen requested Newcastle to follow
his former pupil, who presumably needed supervision. There
1 The boys did not undertake those rich matches which had been offered
to Newcastle, but both married advantageously later on.
50 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
was considerable difficulty about getting the creditors' permis-
sion for him to leave Paris, but much giving and taking of
bonds procured the desired result, Henrietta Maria took his
obligations on herself, which was no small favor as she had
already given him outright ^2000 sterling. He left the city
in the third week of July, 1648,1 and "that day . . . the
creditors, coming to take their farewell of my Lord, expressed
so great a love and kindness for him, accompanied with so
many hearty prayers and wishes, that he could not but prosper
on his journey." Along the way he received great hospitality,
notably at Cambray, where the Governor handed over the
keys of the city and requested him to give the word that night,
as he had done on his previous visit. Rotterdam was settled
on as a residing-place, whither Newcastle sailed from Antwerp
and where he procured lodgings with a loyal widow, Mrs.
Beynham by name. Prince Charles had gone to sea, so that the
Marquis equipped a boat and prepared to follow him but
was dissuaded by his wife's fears. Lord Widdrington^ and
Sir William Throckmorton undertook the task, and were ship-
wrecked on the coast of Scotland for their pains. Later, news
came that Charles was at The Hague, where Newcastle fre-
quently attended him until some time in January, 1648-1649.
Then, after nearly six months in Rotterdam, he decided to
move to Antwerp, actuated chiefly by motives of economy.
For in the Dutch city he had kept open house, that he might
gain recruits to the Stuart cause, and had plunged himself
more than ;^3000 in debt during that short period. What
was worse, he had but little ready money to hand, so that
seeing small possibility of a return to England he resolved to
1 See a letter of Sir Richard Browne in Evelyn's Diaiy, IV, 340.
2 Lord Widdrington had been made a peer on the recommendation of
Newcastle, " for whom he had a very particular and entire friendship." They
fought together and were together in exile for many years. See Clarendon,
Book XIII, §69.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 51
retrench and live as became a private gentleman. A change
of milieu was also desirable, no doubt, to one so dependent
upon credit, — at all events it was determined to shift to
Antwerp. Here the Marquis and his lady first stopped at
a public inn, until Mr. Endymion Porter insisted on their
taking lodgings in his house, which they ultimately left for
an establishment of their own. Another exiled Cavalier,
Mr. William Aylesbury, lent them ;^200 of the Duke of
Buckingham's, thus enabling them to fit out their new home
and establish the credit so indispensable to their mode of exist-
ence. Thanks to these favorable circumstances, Newcastle's
exemption from taxes, ^ and the increase of English exiles
after Charles I's execution on January 30, Antwerp became
a very pleasant place in which to reside. When they first
arrived, there were only four coaches that " went the Tour," i.e.
drove "where all the chief of the town go to see and be seen,
likewise all strangers of what quality soever, as all great princes
or queens that make any short stay ";2 yet at the end of their
sojourn there were more than a hundred equipages in that
city. All the members of the Royalist colony were equally
impecunious, of course, but they made light of their misfor-
tunes and even got some merriment out of them. A vivid
account of this society is given in a letter of Newcastle's
which was intercepted in its passage and published in a con-
temporary newspaper : ^
None will lend me two shillings here, but flye me and know not
how to put bread into my mouth, as if I was the arrantest knave and
Rogue in the World, I vow to God the ridiculousness of it makes me
laugh heartily. . . . Againe to pass the time away withall, my Lord
Bishop of Derry, my Lady Oneale and my selfe gravely set in Councel,
^ See Calendar- of Clarendon Papers, IH, 154.
^ From A True Relation, Firth, p. 173.
^ Several Proceedings in Parliament, September 18-2J, 16^1. Reprinted in
Firth, p. 205.
52 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
as wise and provident Parents to provide the best we could for our
children, agreed upon a Match between my son Harry and her daugh-
ter, and gravely articled, bought eighteen pennyworth of Ribond for
the wooing, the old Lady a lean Chicken in a Pipkin for the Dinner,
with three preserved Cherries and 5 drops of Syrup by them for the
banquet. One wiser than the rest asked how it should be performed,
which our wisdomes never thought of before, so when my estate was
examined, besides the Parliaments selling of it. That my debts were so
great with what was intailed upon my Son Charles as I could estate
nothing. The old Lady was very angry at that, but I had more reason
than modesty, I examined her, having examined old Ladies in my
time, and found she had as little. So the times have broke that grave
intention — yet the joynture and portion being alike one might think
it might go on. And so Harry is a lusty Batchelor begging homeward
for England, but the young lady truly is very deserving and vertuous.
Newcastle also got unbounded pleasure from training the
two Barbary horses he had procured in Paris, until one of
them died. Thereupon he gradually replenished his stock
till they numbered eight in all, although it may well be re-
marked that this was not in accordance with strict economy.
However, the Cavalier's luxuries were not to be lightly for-
gone, and, as his wife had heard him say, " good horses
are so rare as not to be valued for money, and that he who
would buy him out of his pleasure (meaning his horses) must
pay dear for it." She goes on to give specific examples, as
when he told a prospective buyer " that the price of that horse
is jCiooo today, tomorrow it will be ^2000, next day ;^3000,
and so forth." Another time the Duke of Guise sent an offer
of 600 pistoles from Paris for a certain jumping gray,^ " but
my Lord was so far from selling that horse, that he was dis-
pleased to hear that any price should be offered to him : so
great a love hath my Lord for good horses ! And certainly I
have observed and do verily believe, that some of them had
^ As a matter of fact, the Duke tells us in A New Method and Extraordi-
nary Inventio7i that this horse was dead by the time the offer came, but the
Duchess's remark is none the less pertinent.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 53
also a particular love to my Lord ; for they seemed to rejoice
whensoever he came into the stables, by their trampling action,
and the noise they made ; nay, they would go much better in
the manage, when my Lord was by, than when he was absent ;
and when he rid them himself, they seemed to take much
pleasure and pride in it. But of all sorts of horses, my Lord
loved Spanish horses and barbs best ; saying that Spanish
horses were like princes, and barbs like gentlemen in their
kind.i And this was the chief recreation and pastime my Lord
had in Antwerp."
Meanwhile important political events were going on, which,
following the Duchess's example, we shall mention only in so
far as they affected her husband. She does not even allude to
Charles I's death, but we soon hear of "His Majesty (our new
gracious King, Charles the Second)." Before the new sover-
eign sailed for Scotland, he held some negotiations at Breda
in the spring of 1650, to which Newcastle, soon to be a
Knight of the Garter, was admitted as privy-councillor, and
where he distinguished himself by his " customary swearing." ^
He agreed with Charles that an alliance with the Scotch must
be made at all costs and advised him to favor the Earl of
Argyle's party, while attempting to reconcile that noble with
the Duke of Hamilton. Newcastle wished to accompany his
King, but the Scots absolutely refused to permit it ; and per
conseqiienciam, as the Duchess intimates, this expedition
^ In "To the Readers," prefixed to A New Method and Extraorditiary
Invetition, Newcastle says this same remark was repeated to Don John of
Austria : " W^hich answer did infinitely please the Spaniards ; and it is very
true, the horses are so as I said."
^ On April 6 according to Doyle (II, 557), and there is no real contradic-
tion with Nicholas's letter in Carte's Original Letters, I, 376, which is dated
April 3/13, i.e. April 13, Old Style. Firth falls into error here. For the
swearing incident, see Calendar of Clarendon State Papers, II, 54. He was
elected to the Garter on January 12, 1651-1652 (Collins, p. 41), but not installed
until April 15, 1661.
54 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
resulted in total failure. Certainly the Marquis's counsel was
not carried out, for Argyle grew discontented and Hamilton
alone marched with Charles into England. During his sover-
eign's absence Newcastle received offers of Royalist assistance
from the Elector of Brandenburg and the Duke of Neuberg,
now newly reconciled, but the Stuart defeat at Worcester on
September 3, 165 1, together with certain other inconveniences,
prevented this aid from materializing.^ After that time Caven-
dish took little share in politics, which Firth thinks was per-
haps due to Hyde's growing influence.^ These two noblemen
were not always on the best of terms,^ and only a year before
Hyde wrote, " The Marquis of Newcastle is a very lamen-
table man, and as fit to be a general as a bishop." ^ Yet by
November 30, 1653, the Marquis had sent him a "very com-
fortable letter of advice,"^ so that their relations could not
have been entirely severed.
About this time, i.e. early in November, 165 1, the Duchess
and her brother-in-law, Sir Charles Cavendish, made a trip into
England, hoping that they might secure further means of sub-
sistence there. Sir Charles's estate was about to be sold unless
he returned and compounded for it, which he was very loath
to do until persuaded by Clarendon on Newcastle's solicitation.
The Marquis had long since given up any scruples he might
have had about money-getting and had become quite Jesuitical
in his methods, as is shown in his letter of September 23, 1648,
to Robert Long : " The Prince having promised that as soon
as the gold was coined I should have ;j^iooo that I may not
starve, I request that the bearer, Mr. Lovinge, may be put in
1 For the correspondence, see Calendar of Clarendon State Papers, II,
105-107.
"^ The article on William Cavendish, first Duke of Newcastle, in Diet. Nat.
Biog.
" Calendar of Clarendon State Papers, I, 341, and III, 44, 51, 53.
« Ibid., II, 63. 6 Ibid., II, 280. See also IVelbeck Mss., II, 139-141.
I
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 5 5
a way to effect it." ^ He may almost be said to have dunned
the King,^ who is " grieved to hear from the Duke of New-
castle of his sufferings on account of his loyalty " ; and he
evidently tried to pull strings of policy as well, for the Duke
of Buckingham writes in a letter that he is^ "sorry I have
not been able to serve your Lordship at this present as I
desired, but the gentleman that delivers this to you will lett
you know how earnestly I have solicited his Majesty in your
lordship's business." Charles's intentions were the best in the
world, but his resources were sinking to a low ebb and his
impecunious lords must now shift for themselves. In fact the
King wrote to Cavendish, advising "him to endeavour the
preservation of his estate in England, in regard of his pov-
erty. " ^ As a result Newcastle's wife and brother set out on
their journey, although they were so short of funds that they
could not have got further than Southwark had not Sir Charles
pawned his watch to pay for their night's lodging and for the
remainder of their journey into town.
Arrived, the Duchess put in a claim to a portion of her
husband's property ; but that was useless,^ " for they sold all
my Lord's estate, which was a very great one, and gave me
not any part thereof, or any allowance thereout, which few or
no other was so hardly dealt withal. Indeed I did not stand
as a beggar at the Parliament door, for I never was at the
Parliament House, nor stood I ever at the door, as I do know
or can remember, I am sure, not as a petitioner. Neither did
^ Hist. Mss. Comm., Report on the Pepys Mss., p. 228.
^ Calendar of Clarendon State Papers, II, 150.
3 VVelbeck Mss., II, 137. Also a letter from the King to Newcastle in
Calendar of Clarendon State Papers, II, 391, shows there were wheels within
wheels among the exiled Royalists.
^ Hist. Mss. Comm., Report on the Pepys Mss., p. 307.
5 From A True Relatiott, Firth, p. 167. Part of the estates had gone to a
Major Widmerpoole. See Memoirs of Coloiiel Hutchinson, II, 387.
56 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
I haunt the committees, for I never was at any, as a petitioner,
but one in my life, which was called Goldsmith's Hall, but I
received neither gold nor silver from them, only an absolute
refusal I should have no share in my Lord's estate. For my
brother, the Lord Lucas, did claim in my behalf such a part
of my Lord's estate as wives had allowed them, but they told
him that by reason I was married since my Lord was made
a delinquent, I could have nothing, nor should have anything,
he being the greatest traitor to the State, which was to be the
most loyal subject to his King and country. But I whisper-
ingly spoke to my brother to conduct me out of that ungentle-
manly place, so without speaking to them one word good or
bad, I returned to my lodgings, and as that committee was
the first, so was it the last, I ever was at as a petitioner." It
is symptomatic that while here the authoress gives the true
cause of her being refused,^ in the panegyrical Life she has
worked herself up into stating that her brother " received
this answer, that I could not expect the least allowance, by
reason my Lord and husband had been the greatest traitor of
England (that is to say, the honestest man, because he had
been most against them.)" Since facts reflected no especial
credit on her Lord, they are omitted, and fancy supplies the
necessary radiance.
Meanwhile, Sir Charles negotiated for his estate, but the
process of compounding was so slow, laborious, and unproduc-
tive that credit alone enabled them to keep body and soul
together. Newcastle's two sons were also in England without
means, and, in addition to all this, came a plea from the
Marquis at Antwerp. His creditors were growing impatient,
he wrote, and they would trust him no longer. In this strait
Sir Charles managed to scrape ;;^200 sterling together upon
credit and sent it off to the Continent, but before it reached
^ Calendat- of the Proceedings of the Committee for Compounding, p. 1733-
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 57
its destination affairs had come to a head. Newcastle had
assembled his creditors and harangued them with such effect
that, melted to pity by his misfortunes, they promised to assist
him in whatever way they could. Then came the ;^200 from
England, and a feast took the place of the famine. Sir Charles
was having worse luck, for after he had agreed to pay ^^4500
for his estate. Parliament ordered it surveyed again. In this
way the sum was increased by ;^500, which he had to raise
by selling some of his land at an underrate. Also, when the
Marquis's estate was to be sold outright, Sir Charles deter-
mined to save the two chief houses of Welbeck and Bolsover
and was compelled to sacrifice more of his land to accomplish
this object. Bolsover had already been bought by some one, who
was pulling it down to make money from the materials ; ^ but
despite its almost complete demolition. Sir Charles had to pay
a much higher price than if he could have got it at first hand.
The Duchess tells us that while in England she led a very
retired life, only going out to make half a score of visits, to hear
music three or four times at the house of Henry Lawes, and
to drive with her sisters in Hyde Park.^ She wrote a good deal
both at this period and after her return to Antwerp, which
occurred toward the middle or end of 1653, upon her receiving
a report of the Marquis's malaise. Sir Charles planned to
accompany her but was seized by an ague that prevented and
that ultimately caused his death, on February 23, 1653-1654.^
The news plunged Newcastle into grief, for his brother was
not only brilliant but also most lovable, as we learn from
1 This is the Duchess's statement, but on June 23, 1649, ^^ Council of State
had already ordered that Bolsover should be made untenable. See Calettdar
of State Papers {Do?nestic), id^g, pp.204, 217-218.
2 A Tnie Relation, Firth, pp. 169-170.
^ Firth puts it on February 4, without authority. But see Calendar of
Clarendon State Papers, II, 317, No. 1742; the preceding Monday was the
23rd.
58 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Clarendon, who marvels at the strength and beauty of his mind
and soul as compared with his small deformed body.^ The
Duchess says that " even his enemies did much lament his
loss " and elsewhere pays him a still more flattering tribute,
when for the only time she indulges in a comparison unfavor-
able to her husband and admits that he " has not so much of
scholarship and learning as his brother Sir Charles Cavendish." ^
Before this sad event the Duchess had arrived safely at Ant-
werp, whereupon their creditors, supposing she had brought
back a large sum of money, thronged to the Marquis anew and
anew had to be appeased by eloquence or empty promises. Yet
in November of this year (1653) we find Newcastle negotiating
over pearls valued at ^10 for his wife, doubtless a gift in
honor of her return.^ The palliation, if there be any, lies in
the husband's devotion, which was so great that, we are told, he
"' confined himself most to her company . . . yet with honour,
and decency, and with much respect paid him by all men." ^
Not a few important strangers passed through Antwerp in
these days, and apparently all of them visited Cavendish,^
whose manage was one of the sights of the town, while his
authoritative work on horsemanship was already receiving at-
tention. King Charles himself honoured Newcastle's house
with the Royal presence, when on his way towards Germany.
Both the Duke of Oldenburg and the Prince of East Friesland
presented him with horses of their own breed. The Landgrave
of Hesse after being at the Marquis's stables wrote him " by a
very kind letter " that he would add two steeds to the estab-
lishment, but his early death prevented that gift. " The Prince
1 Clarendon, Book VI, § 29. 2 pirth, p. 106.
^ Cale7idar of Clarendon State Papers, II, 277, 284, 313.
* Life of Clarendon by himself Oxford, 1827, I, 292.
^ Sir John Reresby remarks that at the time of his visit, "The old Duke of
Newcastle (though then but Marquis) lived at Antwerp, but I durst not visit
him for fear of being discovered." — Memoirs, p. 35.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 59
of Cond^ himself, with several Noble-men, and Officers,
was pleased to take the pains to go twice to my Mannage :
And though the French think. That all the Horsemanship
in the World is in France ; yet one of them, and he a very
great Man in his Country, was heard say, directing his Speech
to me : Par Dieu (Monsieur) il est bien hardi qui monte de-
vant vous : And another said, at another time : II n'y a plus
de Segnieur comme vous en Angleterre." ^ When Don John
of Austria, the governor of those provinces, stayed in Ant-
werp, more than seventeen coaches waited on the Marquis
in a single morning, Don John was kept away by the multi-
plicity of his affairs but sent most lavish apologies and was
exceedingly gracious when Cavendish came to call upon him,
desiring to see the book on horsemanship before it was
printed.2 His successor, the Marquis of Caracena, was very
anxious to watch Newcastle ride, and although he was not in
good practice, having been sick for six weeks or two months
previously, the stranger's urgent requests prevailed. Of this
incident he gives us a technical but at the same time a most
suggestive account : ^
The Marquess of Caracena was so civilly earnest to see me ride,
that he was pleased to say that it would be a great satisfaction to him
to see me on horseback, though the horse should but walk. And see-
ing that no excuses would serve (though I did use many) I was con-
tented to satisfy his so obliging a curiosity; and told him, I would
obey his commands, though I thought I should hardly be able to sit
in the saddle. Two days after he came to my manage, and I rid first
a Spanish horse called Le Superbe, of a light bay, a beautiful horse,
and though hard to be rid, yet when he was hit right, he was the
readiest horse in the world. He went in corvets, forward, backward,
side-ways, on both hands ; made the cross perfectly upon his voltoes ;
and did change upon his voltoes so just, without breaking time, that
a musician could not keep time better ; and went terra k terra perfectly,
^ " To the Readers," prefixed to A New Method and Extraordinary Invention.
2 Ibid. 3 Ibid.
/
6o THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
The second horse I rid, was another Spanish called Le Genty ; and
was rightly named so, for he was the finest-shaped horse that ever I
saw, and the neatest ; a brown bay with a white star in his forehead ;
no horse ever went terra a terra like him, so just and so easy ; and for
the piroyte in his length, so just and so swift that the standers-by
could hardly see the rider's face when he went and truly when he had
done, I was so dizzy, that I could hardly sit in the saddle. The third
and last horse I rid then was a Barb, that went a metz-ayre very high,
both forward and upon his voltoes and terra k terra. And when I had
done riding the Marquess of Caracena seemed to be very well satis-
fied ; and some Spaniards that were with him, crossed themselves, and
cried Miraculo !
On returning from Germany Charles rode in the manage,
for he had learned the art from Newcastle himself in the days
of his tutorship. Also, since it chanced that the Princess-
Royal, the Duke of York, and the Duke of Gloucester were all
in Antwerp, Newcastle gave them an elaborate entertainment
at his house. Sir Charles Cottrell describes it in a letter to
Secretary Nicholas : ^
At the ball at Lord Newcastle's was the Duchess of Loraine and her
son and daughter, with the King and his brothers and sister, several
French people and some of the town. The King was brought in with
music, and all being placed. Major Mohun, the player, in a black satin
robe and garland of bays, made a speech in verse of his lordship's own
poetry, complimenting the King in his highest hyperbole. Then there
was dancing for two hours, and then my Lady's Moor, dressed in
feathers, came in and sang a song of the same author's, set and taught
him by Nich. Lanier. Then was the banquet brought in in eight great
chargers, each borne by two gentlemen of the court, and others bring-
ing wines, drinks, etc. Then they danced again two hours more, and
Major Mohun ended all with another speech, prophesying his Majesty's
re-establishment.^
This was in February, 1658, and two years later Royalist
hearts beat high, for the prophecy was fulfilled, Charles was
; ^ Calendar of State Pape7-s, i6jy-i6j8, pp. 296, 311.
/ ^ No wonder on a later occasion Charles " did merrily, and in jest, tell me
I that he perceived my Lord's credit could procure better meat than his own." —
Firth, p. 63.
'■^
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 6 1
recalled to the English throne, and Newcastle's sixteen-year-long
exile was ended. Some difficulty arose because of his per-
ennial creditors, despite such excellent management as the
Duchess describes when characterizing their menage ; for
" my Lord, partly with the remainder of his brother's estate
(which was but little, it being wasted by selling of land for
compounding with the Parliament, paying of several debts,
and buying out the two houses aforementioned, viz. Welbeck
and Bolsover) and the credit which his sons had got, which
amounted in all to ^^2400 a year, sprinkled something amongst
his creditors, and borrowed so much of Mr. Top and Mr. Smith
(though without assurance) that he could pay such scores as
were most pressing, contracted from the poorer sort of trades-
men, and send ready money to market, to avoid cozenage (for
small scores run up most unreasonably, especially if no strict
accounts be kept, and the rate be left to the creditor's pleasure)
by which means there was in a short time so much saved, as
it could not have been imagined." Notwithstanding all these
precautions, if one will give elaborate entertainments to pro-
claim his loyalty and buy costly pearls to deck out his wife, he
must expect his bank account to diminish. This poverty of
the Newcastles was not due to their having too little, but to their
wanting too much. But 1660 had arrived, the King had come
into his own again, and nothing must stand in the way of a
return. Therefore Newcastle conceived the idea of having his
wife stay as a hostage to their creditors, while he set sail even
before Charles. The Duchess evidently thought this not at
all unnatural, for she relates the story of his journey home
with an elation and sincerity that make it one of her most
successful passages — the particular instance, while never for a
moment forgotten, taking on an almost universal aspect :
In the meantime, whilst my Lord was at the Hague, his Majesty
was pleased to tell him, that General Monk, now Duke of Albermarle,
had desired the place of being Master of the Horse ; to which my
62 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Lord answered, that that gallant person was worthy of any favour that
his Majesty could confer upon him : and having taken his leave of his
Majesty, and his Highness the Duke of York, went towards the ship
that was to transport him for England (I might better call it a boat,
than a ship ; for those that were intrusted by my Lord to hire a ship
for that purpose, had hired an old rotten frigate that was lost the next
voyage after ; insomuch, that when some of the company that had
promised to go over with my Lord, saw it, they turned back, and
would not endanger their lives in it, except the now Lord Widdrington,
who was resolved not to forsake my Lord.)
My Lord (who was so transported with the joy of returning into his
native country, that he regarded not the vessel) having set sail from
Rotterdam, was so becalmed, that he was six days and six nights upon
the water, during which time he pleased himself with mirth, and passed
his time away as well as he could ; provisions he wanted not, having
them in great store and plenty. At last, being come so far that he was
able to discern the smoke of London, which he had not seen in a long
time, he merrily was pleased to desire one that was near him, to jog
and awake him out of his dream, for surely, said he, I have been six-
teen years asleep, and am not thoroughly awake yet. My Lord lay that
night at Greenwich, where his supper seemed more savoury to him,
than any meat he had hitherto tasted ; and the noise of some scraping
fiddlers he thought the pleasantest harmony that ever he had heard.
In the meantime my Lord's son, Henry, Lord Mansfield, now Earl
of Ogle, was gone to Dover with intention to wait on his Majesty, and
receive my Lord his father, with all joy and duty, thinking he had
been with his Majesty ; but when he missed of his design, he was very
much troubled and more when his Majesty was pleased to tell him that
my Lord had set to sea, before his Majesty himself was gone out of
Holland, fearing my Lord had met with some misfortune in his journey,
because he had not heard of his landing. Wherefore he immediately
parted from Dover, to seek my Lord, whom at last he found at
Greenwich. With what joy they embraced and saluted each other,
my pen is too weak to express.
Naturally Newcastle strained every means to redeem his wife
from pawn, but as it was uncertain whether he was to have his
estate, the borrowing of money was extremely difficult. At
last he procured what seemed enough from one Mr, Ash, but
the Duchess had been meantime running up bills herself and
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 63
travelling expenses also must be paid. The sum fell short by
;^400, which she finally obtained from Mr. Shaw, a near kins-
man to the aforesaid Ash. When her preparations for departure
were completed, the magistrates of Antwerp came to offer their
respects and afterwards sent a farewell present of wine, accord-
ing to the custom. Flushing was to have been the Duchess's
port of sail, but as no English man-of-war had arrived there,
she was fain to cross on a Dutch ship, that favor being granted
her by the government. At London her husband was dwelling
in lodgings not suited to his position, " neither did I find my
Lord's condition such as I expected." This phrase may mean
that Newcastle was so old-fashioned as not to fit easily into the
court life surrounding Charles IL His past services had to be
recognized and rewarded,^ but one gathers that he was made
to feel \im\^Q\.i persona non grata in the new regime. His wife,
with a woman's intuition, seems to have comprehended the
situation at once, for " out of some passion " she urged him to
leave town forthwith and retire into the country. At first he
reproved her impatience and moved to better quarters in
Dorset House but shortly after announced his decision to take
her advice.
There is something infinitely pathetic in this picture of the
man who has outlived his age. Newcastle was now nearly sev-
enty years old, and in those shifting days, the England to
which he returned was hardly recognizable as the England he
had left. The last trace of the old Elizabethan spirit had died
out, and the " Restoration " with all that it connotes had come
into being. It was inevitable that the Cavalier whose interests
had been in horsemanship and weapons, whose faults were the
result of an excessive but spirited pride, should have little
in common with the effeminate and amorous courtiers that
^ On September 13, 1660, Charles gave his assent to an act restoring
to Newcastle all his possessions.
64 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
surrounded Charles II. The pre-Revolutionary court had had
its weakness which went hand in hand with its strength ; now
its vices and virtues were together broken down and a different
atmosphere prevailed. Newcastle had given up his ease at
home, sacrificed much, and fought bravely for the Stuarts;
since his flight he had been as devotedly loyal to a forlorn
cause. When the King was executed, his affections and hopes
were transferred to the Prince, for whom he had worked, and
in whom he had believed through his years of exile. " My
Lord was never without hopes of seeing yet (before his
death) a happy issue of all his misfortunes and sufferings,
especially of the restoration of his most gracious King and
master, to his throne and kingly right, whereof he always
had assured hopes, well knowing, that it was impossible for
the kingdom to subsist long under so many changes of gov-
ernment ; and whensoever I expressed how little faith I had
in it, he would gently reprove me, saying I believed least what
I desired most." ^ Now that Newcastle saw his quondam pupil
raised to the throne, he had every reason to expect an important
share in the general exultation over restored freedom and power.
Instead, he found himself set aside in favor of younger and
more entertaining companions. Presently the new favorite,
Buckingham, became incensed at a comparison made by the
Earl of Bristol in the House of Lords between his past loyalty
and Cavendish's. A duel was about to take place, but Charles
intervened to protect his friend.^ There could be no possibility
of misunderstanding the situation later, when in 1663 New-
castle became involved in an altercation with Buckingham over
Colonel Hutchinson's imprisonment and was humiliatingly
forced to withdraw the promises of freedom he had given to
^ Firth, p. 59.
2 Hist. Mss. Comm., j Rep., App., pp. 155, 177. This was on August 6, 1660,
Buckingham being the second duke of that name.
I
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 65
that Rebel officer.^ Charles cannot be blamed if he resented
the intrusive presence of an older man, which must have been
unpleasantly suggestive of paternal and tutorial surveillance,
but that does not soften the essential tragedy of Newcastle's
position.
At all events, Charles seems to have made no demur when
the Marquis requested leave of absence from London. ^ The
Life intimates as much by the very things it leaves unsaid,
though it is probably true that Cavendish's loyalty did not in
the least abate :
My Lord, before he began his journey, went to his gracious Sov-
ereign, and begged leave that he might retire into the country, to reduce
and settle, if possible, his confused, entangled, and almost ruined estate.
" Sir," said he to his Majesty, " I am not ignorant, that many believe
I am discontented ; and 'tis probable, they '11 say, I retire through dis-
content : but I take God to witness, that I am no kind or ways dis-
pleased ; for I am so joyed at your Majesty's happy restoration, that
I cannot be sad or troubled for any concern to my own particular ; but
whatsoever your Majesty is pleased to command me, were it to sacri-
fice my life, I shall most obediently perform it ; for I have no other
will, but your Majesty's pleasure." Thus he kissed his Majesty's
hand, and went the next day into Nottinghamshire, to his manor-
house called Welbeck.
Love of the country was given out as his reason for retiring,
but it is more likely that the Duchess's unsuitability to society
and their lack of funds were contributory causes. In addition,
^ Memoirs of Colonel Hutchhison, II, 290-292.
^ Clement Ellis, Newcastle's chaplain, thus comments on his retirement in
the prefatory epistle to a sermon preached on May 29, 1661 : "With much
pleasure I have hearkened to you discoursing of that satisfaction you reaped
from that sweet privacy and retirement his Majesty is pleased to grant your
Lordship here in the country. Indeed, the greatest reward his Majesty can
possibly recompense your services withal, is thus to bestow you upon your-
self, and I know you think it greater happiness to enjoy my Lord Marquis of
Newcastle at Welbeck, than all the offices and honours which your exem-
plary loyalty has merited." — Kennet's Ecclesiastical and Civil Register, p. 455,
in Firth, p. 68, n.
66 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Newcastle was very fond of his northern estates, and he wished
to do all that he could towards restoring their former glory.
Welbeck and Bolsover, it will be remembered, were secured by
Sir Charles Cavendish, but after his death they had passed into
the hands of Charles, Viscount Mansfield, the Marquis's elder
son. When this Charles died in June, 1659, they were trans-
ferred to his younger brother Henry, afterwards Earl of Ogle.
The hangings and pictures were on the point of going to
pay Charles's debts, but letters from Antwerp had persuaded
Henry to redeem them : ^
1659 Oct. II. — Your sister [in-law] not being with child makes us
know we can pretend but little interest in her. What her jointure is
I know not. Now for what is in our power, I pray you live at your
own houses, We[lbeck] and Bo[lsover], which will much conduce to
your health. The next is for the goods, which troubles me much, that
so long gathering by your ancestors should be destroyed in a moment.
This is my earnest advice to you. First they are appraised, and goods
are never appraised at a third part of their value ; and then you may
buy them and no ill bargain if you took the money at interest or your
father-in-law laid out the money and had all the goods in his hands
for his security. My intention is but to save the goods for you, that
is all the design my wife and I have in the business, for she is as kind
to you as she was to your brother and so good a wife as that she is all
for my family, which she expresses is only you.
1659 Oct. 25. — I can write no more about the goods except that I
and my wife give all our interest therein to you wholly and totally.
There are many good pictures besides Vandykes and " Stennickes "
[Steenwijcks]. Pray leave your dovecot where you are now and live
at Wel[beck], which will conduce much to your health and your Lady's
and the little Ladies'.
1659 Nov. 15. — I give you hearty thanks for preserving the rem-
nants of those goods. I believe your sister[in-law's] servants have made
great spoil of the goods, for the painter told me the cases of crimson
velvet for the chairs in the parlour at Bolsover were there a little
before your brother Charles died. But we must part fair with her, and
repair it as well as we can. The gold lace and embroidery of the purple
1 Welbeck Mss., II, 143. Newcastle wrote under the name of Robert
Deane.
I
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 67
velvet bed was worth ^300 at least, and five chambers at Bolsover
were furnished with very fine hangings at £^ a stick. The pictures
there were most rare, and if you think they are a little spoiled, I will
send over the painter to you again.
If ever I see you I will make W[elbeck] a very fine place for you.
I am not in despair of it, though I believe you and I are not such
good architects as your worthy grandfather. If I am blessed with the
happiness of seeing you, it will be a thousand pounds a year better
for you than if I should die before.
Now Newcastle found the two houses in bad repair, Bolsover
indeed being half pulled down, as we have seen. Many of his
other lands he had difficulty in obtaining because of the Act
of Oblivion, and some he sold to buy the Castle of Notting-
ham or to pay his outstanding debts. What he succeeded in
retaining was much injured ; of his eight parks, only one,
Welbeck, was not completely destroyed. In especial Clipston
Park (its pale-row alone had been worth ^2000), where his
Grace had been wont to hunt, hawk, and fish, was totally ruined.
" And although his patience and v/isdom is such, that I
never perceived him sad or discontented for his own losses and
misfortunes, yet when he beheld the ruins of that park I ob-
served him troubled, though he did not express it, only saying,
he had been in hopes it would not have been so much defaced
as he found it, there being not one timber-tree in it left for
shelter. However, he patiently bore what could not be helped,
and gave present order for the cutting down of some wood
that was left him in a place near adjoining, to repale it, and
got from several friends deer to stock it." Also he stocked
and manured his other lands, as well as rebuilding the two
manor-houses.
At this stage in her work the Duchess launches forth into
a lengthy account of her husband's possessions and what ex-
traordinary losses he suffered during the Rebellion. The very
briefest summary will suffice. His property came through
68 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
three women : his grandmother on his father's side, EHzabeth
Hardwick, who afterward married Sir Wilham St. Loo and
finally George, Earl of Shrewsbury, both without issue ; his
own mother, Catharine, daughter and only surviving heir of
Cuthbert, Lord Ogle ; and finally his first wife, Elizabeth
Basset of Blore, widow of Henry Howard, younger son to
the Earl of Suffolk. These three rich alliances explain the
vast estate which accumulated for Newcastle and the otherwise
almost incredible figure at which his wife places his total loss
— ;^94i,303- This sum is arrived at by reckoning, item by
item, the annual rents for eighteen years, the damage to parks,
the lands lost in present possession and in reversion, those
sold to pay his debts, and the composition of his brother's
estate, so that there is no reason for doubting the calculations.
This does not include the loss of his personal estate, i.e. the
furnishings and appointments of houses and parks, nor the
expense from lawsuits and rehabilitating the property, which
was incurred after 1660. Thus in a perfect whirlwind of facts
and figures the Duchess brings her Second Book to a close,
leaving the reader overwhelmed by Newcastle's stupendous mis-
fortunes and the consequent extent of his loyal self-sacrifice.
HI
"THE THIRD AND FOURTH BOOKS" (1667-1676)
It remains to describe the last years of the Duke and
Duchess, as they became on March 16, 1 664- 166 5. ^ In 1661
the King had created Newcastle Chief-Justice in Eyre Trent-
North, but this post seems to have been more onerous than
^ On May 5 " the Duke of Newcastle [came to town, and the next day
waited on his Majesty to render his humble thanks for the addition of honour
lately conferred on him, which his Majesty was pleased to accept with such
favour as showed not only a regard to his merit, but an affection for his
person." — Hist. Mss. Comm., The Mss. of J. M. Heathcote, p. 191.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 69
decorative/ so that it was natural for the Marquis to look
toward higher advancement. Moreover, as we have seen, he
was a politician by nature, and Charles owed him large sums
of money, which there was little likelihood that he would ever
get back. All things seemed to work together, then, especially
when it was flatly announced that only the ^3500 principal
of a £,<^2dp debt was to be paid, and a large part of that by
"privy seal." 2 As a result Newcastle felt not only justified
but also fairly confident in applying for the much-desired, if
comparatively inexpensive, dukedom. That he showed no
hesitancy in doing so, is plain from a letter of Charles's
written to him on June 7, 1 664 : ^
I have received yours by your son, and am resolved to grant your
request. Send me therefore word what title you desire to have, or
whether you will choose to keepe your old and leave the rest to me.
I do not tell you I will despatch it tomorrow ; you must leave the time
to me, to accomodate it to some other ends of myne ; but the differing
it shall not be long nor with any circumstance that shall trouble you.
I am glad you enjoy your health for I love you very well.
The Marquis chose to keep his same title and accordingly
became Earl of Ogle and first Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
Yet, despite these new honors, his later days were spent
quietly in the country, far from the activities of a busy world.
Witness his letter written to Colonel Legg on August 2, 1666 :^
Noble Sir,
I am borne to trouble you — and this nowe is to desire you to pre-
sente my moste humble dewtye and service to his Majestic, and tell
him I congratulate with my sole his Majesties late and most glorious
victory over his enemies, which will make all his neyghbor kinges
stoope to him — and I praye, Sir, aquainte his Majestie that I have
a fine roebuck, and to knowe whether I shall sende him upp or no;
1 See Welbeck Mss., printed in Firsi Duke and Duchess, pp. 2 16-217.
2 Ibid., p. 218.
8 Welbeck Mss., II, 145.
* Hist. Mss. Comm., ji Rep., App., Part /^ p. 14.
JO THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
he was taken att my litle farme in Northumberlande, theye are melen-
collye neshe peevishe thinges, — beleve mee, Sir, I ame pationatlye
Your olde and most faythful servante
W. Newcastle
He was, no doubt, one of the most conspicuous figures in north-
ern England, as we may imagine from his friendly relations
with that arch-Puritan, Colonel Hutchinson,^ and from Sir John
Reresby's proud assertion that the Duke " used to say that he
hoped to see five generations of my family ; that he knew Sir
Thomas Reresby very well, and desired to be godfather to my
son, if he lived till one was born to the family." ^ Newcastle
and his wife paid occasional visits to town ; at all events we
know they were there for an extended stay in April and
May, 1667. On April 10 the King visited them, and on
May 30 the Duchess attended a meeting of the Royal Society.
Samuel Pepys records these facts and also his very decided
impressions about the lady, which we will leave for a more
particular study, together with John Evelyn's account of her
eccentricities. Later Newcastle returned with his wife to
Welbeck and there resumed the even tenor of rural life.
Nothing more need be added here but the chronicle of
their deaths. The Duchess went first, on December 15, 1673,
and was buried the following January 7 in the North Transept
of Westminster Abbey.^ Her husband, now a man of eighty,
survived for what must have been a lonely three years, dying
on Christmas Day, 1676. He was succeeded by his son Henry,
Earl of Ogle, who was evidently more to Charles's liking than
the father had been, for that monarch greeted the news of
* Memoirs of Colonel Hutchinson, II, 274, 286.
* Memoirs, p. 79, and see also p. 92 for another reference to the friendly
relations existing between the two gentlemen.
' " Mr. Fulman, in the fifteenth volume of his manuscript collections in
Corpus Christi College Archives states that she died in London." — Ballard's
Memoirs of British Ladies, p. 213. For Charles's grant of the burying place
ittHisi.Mss. Comm.,js Rep., App., Fart VI/,p.yS (News-letter of May 13, 1671).
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 71
Newcastle's end with these words: "I should be most sorry
for the death of my old friend but that so very honest and
worthy a man is the better for it." ^ The Duke was buried
beside his wife under the monument he had himself erected.
'" Against the Skreen of the Chappel of St. Michael you
behold a most noble spacious Tomb all of white Marble, but
adorned with Two Pillars of black Marble, with Entablatures
of the Corinthian Order, embellished with Arms and most
curious Trophy-works, on the Pedestal whereon you see Two
Images in full Proportion, of white Marble in a cumbent
Posture in their Robes." ^ Beneath appears the following
appreciative inscription :
Here lyes the Loyall Duke of Newcastle and his Dutchess, his sec-
ond wife by whom he had noe issue : Her name was Margarett Lucas,
youngest sister to the Lord Lucas of Colchester, a noble familie ; for
all the Brothers were Valiant, and all the Sisters virtuous.^ The
Dutchess was a wise, wittie and Learned Lady, which her many Books
do well testifie ; she was a most Virtuous and a Loveing and careful!
wife and was with her Lord all the time of his banishment and miseries
and when he came home, never parted from him in his solitary
retirement.
Washington Irving in the paper on "Westminster Abbey" in
his Sketch Book writes of these lines, "There was a noble way,
in former times, of saying things simply and yet saying them
proudly, and I do not know of an epitaph that breathes a
loftier consciousness of family worth and honorable lineage." ^
The Life was published in 1667, as has been said, and con-
sequently that year is the later limit of the Duchess's biography.
The Third Book of the four into which it is divided contains
1 Welbeck A/ss., II, 152.
2 Joducus CruU's T/ie Atitiquities of St Peter's, or the Abbey-Church of
Westminster, 17 13, p. 276.
^ Addison is "very much pleased" with this passage, apropos of courage
in men and chastity in women. See Spectator, No. 99, Saturday, June 23, 171 1.
* Works, 1857, II, 218.
72 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
little new material, but it recapitulates and rehearses much
of what has gone before, grouping it under sixteen particular
heads. Needless to say, only the most laudatory topics are
admitted and these so emphasized as to be mainly responsible
for the impression made upon the reader. Countless repeti-
tions and constantly recurring tables do much to mar the effect,
but in its essential plan this part of her book is the highest
manifestation of our author's unconscious literary skill. The
first divisions are especially striking and worthy of attention,
because of their lively portraiture and vivid anecdotes. "Of his
Power " contains an account of Newcastle's success in raising
troops, together with a history of the White-coats, their forma-
tion, their valor, their loyalty, and their destruction. A specific
incident is used to drive these points home, and it is only to be
regretted that the Duchess neutralized her story's force by fol-
lowing it with tabular lists of officers and garrison governors :
My Lord being in Antwerp, received a visit from a gentleman, who
came out of England, and rendered my Lord thanks for his safe escape
at sea; my Lord being in amaze, not knowing what the gentleman
meant, he was pleased to acquaint him, that in his coming over sea
out of England, he was set upon by pickaroons, who having examined
him, and the rest of his company, at last some asked him, whether he
knew the Marquess of Newcastle? To whom he answered, that he
knew him ver)' well, and was going over into the same city where my
Lord lived. Whereupon they did not only take nothing from him, but
used him with all civility, and desired him to remember their humble
duty to their Lord-General, for they were some of his White-coats that
had escaped death; and if my Lord had any service for them, they
were ready to assist him upon what designs soever, and to obey him
in whatsoever he should be pleased to command them.
"Of his Misfortunes and Obstructions" and "Of his Loyalty
and Sufferings " recount most of the lets and hindrances which
confronted Newcastle, the former being a brief resume of all
those obstacles to his military success already enumerated in
the First Book and coming to a close with his defeat at
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 73
Marston Moor. The fourth section, " Of his Prudence and
Wisdom," is thrust in next, with the Duchess's usual naive
disregard for the natural sequence, which would make number
five, " Of his Blessings," follow " his Loyalty and Sufferings."
Said prudence and wisdom consisted in a prophecy of the
Civil War, in his excellent management of the Northern Army
and of his own private affairs (" although my Lord naturally
loves not business, especially those of state"), and in the " Little
Book " which he wrote during his exile to tell Charles II how
the kingdom should be governed. The most unexpected bless-
ing is item three (many of these sections have subcataloguing)
and coming from such an outspoken and frank second wife,
it is no mean tribute :
That He [God] made him happy in his marriage ; (for his first wife
was a very kind, loving and virtuous lady) and blessed him with duti-
ful and obedient children, free from vices, noble and generous, both
in their natures and actions ; who did all that lay in their power to
support and relieve my Lord their father in his banishment as is
before mentioned.
Number six is a formal list " Of his Honours and Dignities";
number seven, a memorandum " Of the Entertainments he
made for King Charles the First."
In the other divisions the Duchess becomes even more
personal and particular. " His Education " has been considered
in its proper chronological place ; " His Natural Wit and
Understanding " is largely occupied with an account of his
relations with Hobbes ; "Of his Natural Humour and Dis-
position " is a panegyric on his numerous and varied virtues,
ending with this equivocal reservation :
In short, I know him not addicted to any manner of vice except that
he has been a great lover and admirer of the female sex; which,
whether it be so great a crime as to condemn him for it, I '11 leave
to the judgment of young gallants and beautiful ladies.
74 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Sections 11-15 inclusive are all short, but each gives an inti-
mate and important account of some phase of her husband's
personality, so that they deserve to be considered in full :
II. Of his Outward Shape and Behavior
His shape is neat and exactly proportioned ; his stature of a middle
size, and his complexion sanguine.
His behaviour is such, that it might be a pattern for all gentlemen ;
for it is courtly, civil, easy and free without formality or constraint;
and yet hath something in it of grandeur, that causes an awful respect
towards him.
Now the Duchess's way of saying that her husband ought to
have been the mould of form is quite as important as the fact,
which seems true enough. Newcastle's education and his sub-
sequent career must have tended to develop a pleasing and
agreeable dignity of manner.
12. Of his Discourse
His discourse is as free and unconcerned as his behaviour, pleasant,
witty, and instructive ; he is quick in repartee or sudden answers, and
hates dubious disputes and premeditated speeches. He loves also to
intermingle his discourse with some short pleasant stories and witty
sayings, and always names the author from whom he hath them ; for
he hates to make another man's wit his own.
This ability in repartee is exemplified by a traditional anecdote,^
which has been taken to cast some doubt on Newcastle's
tolerant affection for his Duchess and may perhaps help to
explain it. Mr. Jonathan Richardson,^ the younger, on the
authority of a Mr. Fellows, relates that a friend congratulated
Cavendish on having such a very wise woman as his wife.
"Sir" replied the Duke in almost Johnsonian fashion, "a
1 Compare also the bon mot related by Warwick at the siege of Hull. See
above, p. 32.
2 Richardsoniana, pp. 249-250, in First Duke and Duchess, p. 268.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 75
very wise woman is a very foolish thing," This may be con-
sidered the expression of a passing mood or the unthinking
retort of a habitual wit, but it may scarcely be supposed to offer
serious testimony against the Newcastles' married happiness.
13. Of his Habit
He accoutres his person according to the fashion, if it be one that
is not troublesome and uneasy for men of heroic exercises and actions.
He is neat and cleanly; which makes him to be somewhat long in
dressing, though not so long as many effeminate persons are. He
shifts [i. e. changes his clothes] ordinarily once a day, and every time
when he uses exercise, or his temper is more hot than ordinary.
14. Of his Diet
In his diet he is so sparing and temperate, that he never eats nor
drinks beyond his set proportion, so as to satisfy only his natural
appetite. He makes but one meal a day, at which he drinks two good
glasses of small-beer, one about at the beginning, the other at the end
thereof, and a little glass of sack in the middle of his dinner ; which
glass of sack he also uses in the morning for his breakfast, with a
morsel of bread. His supper consists of an egg, and a draught of
small beer. And by this temperance he finds himself very healthful,
and may yet live many years, he being now of the age of seventy-three,
which I pray God from my soul to grant him.
15. His Recreation and Exercise
His prime pastime and recreation hath always been the exercise of
manage and weapons ; which heroic acts he used to practice every
day ; but I observing that when he had overheated himself, he would
be apt to take cold, prevailed so far, that at last he left the frequent
use of the manage, using nevertheless still the exercise of weapons ;
and though he doth not ride himself so frequently as he hath done,
yet he takes delight in seeing his horses of manage rid by his escuyers,
whom he instructs in that art for his own pleasure. But in the art of
weapons (in which he has a method beyond all that ever were famous
in it, found out by his own ingenuity and practice) he never taught
^6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
anybody but the now Duke of Buckingham,^ whose guardian he hath
been, and his own two sons.
The rest of his time he spends in music, poetry, architecture, and
the like.
The sixteenth and last section is "Of his Pedigree," which
the Duchess proudly states goes back to the family of Ger-
nouns in the time of William the Conqueror. The length
and detail of this narration shows how important it was to the
authoress, but for the sake of record we may briefly summarize
her facts by a diagram, shown on the opposite page.
The Fourth Book is distinctly inferior to the others, yet at
the same time it contains some valuable material which one
would not wish omitted. It consists of " several Essays and
Discourses Gathered from the Mouth of my noble Lord
and Husband " and may be roughly divided into two parts.
The first sixty-three observations tend to be somewhat formal,
they are introduced by the words " I have heard my Lord say,"
and each commences with a subordinate "that." Fifty-six of
them, having to do with government, are concise statements
of ideas expanded in the " Little Book " and will be considered
in connection with it. The following seven deal with more
universal qualities of human nature and, as Newcastle was
not an important original thinker, are of less importance.
Number LVIII, " That men are apt to find fault with each
other's actions ; believing they prove themselves wise in find-
ing fault with their neighbours," is no more platitudinous than
the average. From the sixty-fourth on, these notes assume a
familiar tone, as though the Duchess recalled the conditions
under which each statement was made. Now and then she
records what she herself said on the occasion and sometimes
gives the remarks of other participants in the conversation.
1 Buckingham was brought up with Charles I's sons. See Lady Burghclere's
George Villiers, p. i8.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CA VENDISHE 77
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This enables us to get a good idea of the Duke's already
vaunted repartee, which, truth to tell, is variable and often
worse than mediocre. Number LXXIV descends to such
a commonplace as, " My Lord being in banishment, I told
him that he was happy in his misfortune, for he was not
subject to any state or prince. To which he jestingly answered,
that as he was subject to no prince, so he was a prince of no
subjects"; but again, as in Number LXXXIII, he strikes
most palpable fire, " My Lord discoursing some time with
a learned doctor of divinity concerning faith, said, that in his
opinion, the wisest way for a man was to have as little faith
as he could for this world, and as much as he could for the
next world."
Frequently in these later paragraphs Newcastle's overwhelm-
ing loyalty is reiterated, while there are not a few hints that
he felt hurt by Charles II's aloofness and disregard for serv-
ices rendered. Certainly when Number LXIX is considered,
the reason for Newcastle's retirement from London cannot be
very far to seek :
I have heard him say several times that his love to his gracious master
King Charles the Second was above the love he bore to his wife, chil-
dren, and all his posterity, nay, to his own life : and when, since his
return into England, I answered him that I observed his gracious
master did not love him so well as he loved him ; he replied, that he
cared not whether his Majesty loved him again or not ; for he was
resolved to love him.
Despite the Duchess's abominable use of pronouns, the Cava-
lier's spirit rings out nobly from this paragraph, and Firth well
parallels it with Butler's lines : ^
Loyalty is still the same
Whether it win or lose the game,
True as the dial to the sun
Although it be not shined upon.
1 Hudibras^ Paft III, Canto 2, 11. 173-177.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 79
The eighty-fifth and last division consists of an incident which
emphasizes this same consciousness of neglect, expressed with
a tang that savors of Wolsey's lines in Henry VIII:
After my Lord's return from a long banishment, when he had been
in the country some time and endeavored to pick up some gleanings
of his ruined estate; it chanced that the widow of Charles, Lord Mans-
field, my Lord's eldest son, afterwards Duchess of Richmond, to whom
the said Lord of Mansfield had made a jointure of £ 2000 a year, died
not long after her second marriage. For whose death, though my
Lord was heartily sorry, and would willingly have lost the said money,
had it been able to save her life ; yet discoursing one time merrily
with his friends was pleased to say, that though his earthly king and
master seemed to have forgot him, yet the King of Heaven had
remembered him, for he had given him ^2000 a year.
Had the Duchess been content to end her work here, she
would have had a striking if rather trivial conclusion, but to
the Fourth Part proper we have added " Some Few Notes of
the Authoresse," which from an artistic point of view are
utterly destructive. It is extremely typical of Margaret Caven-
dish, however, to jot down whatever observations occurred to
her in passing, and the only wonder is that she confined her-
self to seventeen heads. The first seven exalt her husband,
as might be expected : in one she compares him with Caesar,
to the latter 's disadvantage, while in another, Number III,
she expatiates on his honesty and truthfulness. When some
of the political shifts of Newcastle's younger days are remem-
bered, his wife seems to pull a long bow in asserting " that
my noble Lord has always had an aversion to that kind of
policy that now is commonly practised in the world, which in
plain terms is dissembling, flattery, and cheating under the
cover of honesty, love, and kindness. But I have heard him
say that the best policy is to act justly, honestly, and wisely,
and to speak truly ; and that the old proverb is true, ' To be
wise is to be honest.' " The Duchess's ten final remarks diverge
8o THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
from the unifying principle of her work and wander off
into vague generalizations that have nothing at all to do with
her theme. The Life breaks down into the formless philoso-
phizing of its authoress's ill-regulated mind, and as it does so
its value as a work of art consistently decreases.
Yet, all things considered, this book is Margaret's most
important contribution to literature, and as literature it should
be regarded, despite an air of historical veracity. For the
authoress's purpose was not to chronicle facts, although she
thought it was, but to put on paper a highly specialized por-
trait of the Cavalier, par excelletice. She never deliberately
falsified, for sincerity and frankness were too deeply ingrained
in her character ; but ignorance of certain facts, suppression of
others, with the whole seen through hero-worshipping eyes,
give a total impression far removed from truth. Unity of feel-
ing resulted in an artistic unity which no other of her writings
possesses and a lack of which is the chief defect of her
undoubted genius. Here for once this singleness of tone is
fortuitously obtained, so that, coupled as it is with her usual
vivacity and natural naivete, a delightful work of enduring
art has been created. The Duke of Newcastle as presented
in this biography might be a personage of fiction in so far
as the material about him is selected and proportioned. Yet
at the same time he lives for us as do only the great figures
in our literature, by virtue of those countless details which were
actual facts and so convey an impression of life itself. Strangely,
these minor realities do not distract one's attention from the
larger significance intended or mar the structural proportion
of the whole work. If this completed sketch had been faith-
ful to actual conditions in feeling and atmosphere, it might
have been safely compared with Boswell on a diminished
scale, but fine as the total effect is, it must be judged by other
standards, for it is not true.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 8 1
A comparison of Clarendon's brilliant and unbiassed descrip-
tion with almost any important passage from the Life reveals
this difference at once. The Duchess was looking at a pre-
conceived situation from a rigidly narrow point of view, she
interpreted events in accordance with it, and as a result, in
cases where her knowledge was only second-hand, she felt free
with her material. It will be recalled that her information for
the First Book came chiefly from Cavendish's secretary, John
Rolleston, and in it, as we have seen, history goes far askew.^
Most notable are the omissions : there is not a word of New-
castle's intrigues to get his earlier advancements, of the shortage
in ammunition that helped to occasion Fairfax's abandonment
of Tadcaster, of the Royalist defeats following it, of the Queen's
instrumentality in converting Cholmley, of the failure to win
over the Hothams and Hutchinson, or of the breach of capit-
ulation terms at Rotherham, all events tending to decrease
the Duke's credit. His wife overestimates his levy of soldiers
in the north, the size of Henrietta Maria's escort to Oxford,
and the number of prisoners taken at St. Mary's Tower. She
excuses the breach of the conditions of Gainsborough's capit-
ulation, emphasizes two vain promises of the Yorkshire people
that they would raise 10,000 men, and mentions only the un-
successful sally made by Hull's garrison. Regarding the Scotch
expedition, she does not say that Newcastle had been several
times warned of this invasion but would not act, yet takes
pains to show how his force was weakened by aiding Mont-
rose. In accordance with her husband's wishes the names of
1 It is interesting to compare the Duchess's earUer dictum concerning a
history, which " cannot be exactly true, because there are so many several
Intentions interwoven with several Accidents ; and several Actions divided
into so many several Parties and several Places ; and so many several
Reporters of several Opinions, Partialities, Understandings, Judgments, and
Memorials, which gave such various relations of one and the same Action,
that an Historian (being but one Man) cannot possibly know the truth." —
Nature's Picture, p. 701.
82 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
various delinquents are not given, but it does not take great
effort to infer that Newport blundered at Tadcaster, Goring
foolishly lost Wakefield, a post at York prevented the enemy's
complete annihilation after Adwalton Moor, and that General
King was in command when the Earl of Kingston was acci-
dentally shot. The defeat of Bellasis in Yorkshire is seen to
be as patently unnecessary as it was detrimental to Newcastle's
operations against the Scots. In our writer's own words, " It
is remarkable, that in all actions and undertakings where my
Lord was in person himself, he was always victorious, and
prospered in the execution of his designs ; but whatsoever
was lost or succeeded ill, happened in his absence, and was
caused either by the treachery or negligence and carelessness
of his officers." ^
When it comes to any problem on which historians are not
yet agreed, we can be sure to get little satisfaction from the
Duchess, and therefore we are not surprised to find her
bigotedly opinionated on the two moot questions in Newcastle's
career, — was his return north from Lincoln dictated by selfish
motives ? and was his flight to the continent justified ? Her
answer to both is for-all practical purposes identical : the king
can do no wrong. This is not the stuff trustworthy biographers
are made of, to be sure, and it shows that as an historical
record the Life must be thrown out of court. Moreover, little
of what is true in it is important. Such an eminent and
widely read authority as Professor Firth finds ^ "that 'the
generous and high born men ' who follow the recommen-
dation of the Cambridge Senate and study this Life as a
contribution to military history will find little in it which
they could not learn more fully and accurately from the
pages of Rushworth or Whitelock. An occasional incident or
anecdote, the name of a forgotten officer, or the locality of
1 Firth p. 41. ^ P- viii.
THE LIFE OF WILLIAM CAVENDISHE 83
an obscure skirmish, an account of the Duke's personal share
in one or two engagements, sum up the amount of its con-
tributions to the miHtary history of the civil wars." And as
the First Book contains little else, its value is comparatively
insignificant.
The rest of this work is of a different nature, because on a
sounder and less important historical basis. Events become of
small account, while the man in whom they centre occupies
our entire attention. He lives vividly on every page, in his
constant hope throughout the years of exile, in his efforts to
live well on credit, his pride in noble horses, his dignity in
misfortunes, the return to his native country, the almost curt
dismissal by Charles, and finally the retirement to his country
seat in an effort to restore a shattered estate. In like manner
but more personally the authoress tells of his conversation, his
diet, his family relations, his dress, and his habits, as only by
years of affectionate association she could have learned to
know them. Here facts are almost impeccable (save for the
rhapsodic excuse she offers for the rebuff at Goldsmith's Hall),
but the spirit behind them tends to obscure trustworthy record.
The Duchess tells of her husband's expensive horses even as
she laments his debts and boldly acknowledges being herself
pawned that he might return home. Yet she never admits a
doubt as to his motives. These actions which bespeak extrava-
gance and selfishness are to the devoted wife unavoidable evils
attendant on his misfortunes. She does not conceive of any
other interpretation for them and, what is more, nearly per-
suades the reader by her sincere conviction. As a result the
idealized portrait of Newcastle which one gets in her book is
almost nearer fiction than history ; by mere chance it comes to
have the qualities of art rather than of nature. So successful
was the Duchess in her method that, when Mrs. Hutchinson
came to undertake a similar work, she modelled her Memoirs
84 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
of the Colonel quite directly on the Life} The significance
in this imitation from our point of view is that, somehow or
other, the Duchess here stumbled on effective literary devices,
which were thought worthy to be copied and which have allowed
the book to survive despite its mediocre historical value.
It is, then, in this intimate description of a seventeenth-
century nobleman that the value of her work lies, and if he is
not drawn in his habit as he lived, there is no reason for a
critic of literature to complain. The portrait as it stands is
far more clear, striking, and effective than it would have been
if all sides of Newcastle's character had been touched upon.
In consequence it has been enjoyed by a larger public than any
authoritative chronicle could possibly have attracted. Human
nature delights in worshipping idols even as it does in follow-
ing a rake's progress, and upon this universal truth the
Life of William Cavetidishe depends for its popularity.
Other writers of that century consciously tried to cloak
lurid tales with a mantle of reality ; the Duchess of Newcastle
unknowingly commits as great a deception in foisting upon
her readers excessive panegyric under the guise of facts. The
authoress's personality has worked upon these facts and fash-
ioned them, until their hero emerges as a person of her own
fertile imagination, yet maintains much that is typical of his
age, more of his individual character, and something common
to all time. Her intense loyalty to him was as sincere as that
which he felt for his King, and together these traits brought
about her glorified picture of the Duke, the cavalier, the man.
Its popularity and intrinsic value alike depend not upon the his-
torical fabric of which it purports to be composed but upon that
transforming magic of fancy and art which directed the design.
1 A. H. Upham has pointed this out in Anglia, 1912, XXXVI, 200-220,
although his accepting 1592 as the year of Newcastle's birth partially throws
out his argument as to dates of composition.
CHAPTER II
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS "
I
EARLY PATRONAGE (1617-1636)
No doubt Gerard Langbaine's appreciation of William Cav-
endish is, like the Duchess's own estimate, largely gross hyper-
bole, but there is a measure of truth in his assertion that
"no Person since the Time of Augustus better understood
Dramatick Poetry, nor more generously encourag'd Poets ; so
that wef'may truly call him our English Maecenas." ^ At all events
a nobleman whose interest in letters began with Ben Jonson and
extended to Shadwell, who was on terms of intimacy with Hobbes,
Shirley, and Dryden, is not to be disregarded in the history of
English patronage. Many a dedication both before and after
Newcastle's exile testifies that he was easy of access to struggling
authors and generous of his bounty, in evil times as well as in
prosperity. Money could always be found for his fine horses on
the Continent, and after coming home he could never bring
himself to turn away a needy writer. Dabbling in literature was
one of the Duke's passions, and one he ceaselessly indulged.
Perhaps he realized how very mediocre his own creative talents
were and resolved by way of compensation inextricably to entangle
his literary reputation with the names of his great contemporaries,
believing with one whom he would have delighted to honor,
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.^
1 An Account of the Dramatick Poets, 1691, p. 386.
^ Shakespeare, Sonnet XVIII.
85
86 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Cavendish's youth showed no tendency towards learning
except his early proficiency in French, a necessary part of
every fine gentleman's equipment ; in general the boy cared
little for any activity which required perseverance and applica-
tion. It is small wonder, then, that he took no interest in
books until after his education had been completed and all
compulsion relating to studies had been removed. An easy
enjoyment of art was more congenial to him, as his early pur-
chase of a "singing-boy" bears witness. His travels abroad
with Sir Henry Wotton must have done much to foster the
growth of his aesthetic taste, and life at Charles I's court may
well have taught him that every man of the world was expected
to be a man of letters as well. Certainly one way or another
Cavendish managed to assimilate the old Elizabethan attitude
towards literature and to carry it, comparatively untouched,
down to the other times and manners of the Restoration. His
long life, spanning as it does the mid-seventeenth century,
helps to illustrate changing conditions and ideals within that
period.
Rare Ben Jonson was the first author to come into close
relations with Newcastle, Their connection must have begun
as early as 1617, for on April 4 of that year Sir Charles
Cavendish died and the poet, now at the height of his career
as literary dictator, composed his epitaph. In it the dead man
addresses " his posterity " : ^
Sons, seek not me among these polished stones,
These only hide part of my flesh and bones,
Which, did they e'er so neat and proudly dwell,
Will all turn dust and may not make me swell.
Let such as justly have outlived all praise,
Trust in the tombs, their careful friends do raise ;
I made my Life my monument, and yours,
Than which there 's no material more endures,
1 Ben Jonson's Works, ed. GifEord-Cunningham, 1875, I^> 324-
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 87
Nor yet inscription like it writ but that ;
And teach your nephews it to emulate :
It will be matter loud enough to tell
Not when I died, but how I lived — farewell.
These verses were doubtless written before Jonson's walking
trip to Scotland in 1618-1619; and shortly after his return
he composed an interlude for the christening of Sir William's
eldest son.i Prince Charles deigned to bestow his own name
on the baby, and consequently every preparation was made at
the house in Black Friars to honor his presence. No evidence
exists that King James was there as Gifford states ; in fact
that seems very improbable, since the interlude contains fre-
quent compliments for Charles but no mention at all of his
father. It commences with the speech of a Forester, who calls
attention to the table laden with sweetmeats representing a
hunting scene, and continues with the appearance of three
gossips whose unrestrained chatter furnishes the backbone of
this entertainment. Duggs, the wet nurse, and Kecks, the
dry nurse, contend as to the importance of their respective
functions, while Holdback, the midwife, vaunts her ability in
foreknowing the sex of a child. A Mathematician, i.e. an
astrologer, prophesies all good things for the boy and at the
same time contrives to flatter the noble guest. Finally, the Water-
men of Black Friars are introduced with a rollicking song :
They say it is merry when gossips do meet,
And more to confirm it, in us you may see 't,
For we have well tasted the wine in the street,
And yet we make shift to stand on our feet.
As soon as we heard the Prince would be here,
We knew by his coming we should have good cheer ;
A boy for my lady ! then every year.
Cry we — for a girl will afford us but beer :
1 Jonson, IX, 327-336.
88 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
That we may say
Another day
My Lord be thanked
We had such a banquet
At Charles' christening
Was worth tlie listening,
After a year
And a day, for I fear
We shall not see
The like will be.
To sample he,
While working the Thames
Unless 't be a James.
In 1625 occurred the death of Lady Jane Ogle, Cavendish's
aunt, the widow of Edward, eighth Earl of Shrewsbury, and for her
Jonson wrote an epitaph.^ The substance of it is that every tablet
in the church offers the usual compliments to its deceased, but
hers is unique in truthfully stating that after the Earl's decease she
no longer wished to live. When her sister Catharine, Cavendish's
mother, died four years later, Ben wrote no less than three poems
in her memory .^ The most pretentious and most successful runs :
She was the light (without reflex
Upon herself) of all her sex.
The best of women ! — Her whole life
Was the example of a wife,
' Or of a parent, or a friend !
All circles had their spring and end
In her, and what could perfect be
And without angles, IT WAS SHE.—
All that was solid in the name
Of virtue ; precious in the frame.
Or else magnetic in the force.
Or sweet, or various, in the course :
What was proportion, or could be
By warrant called just symmetry
In number, measure or degree
Of weight or fashion, IT WAS SHE.—
1 Jonson, IX, 326. ^ ibid., IX, 324-326.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 89
Her soul possest her flesh's state
In freehold, not as an inmate ;
And when the flesh here shut up day,
Fame's heat upon the grave did stay,
And hourly brooding o'er the same,
Keeps warm the spice of her good name,
Until the ashes turned be
Into a Phoenix — WHICH IS SHE.
Best of all this poet's work in connection with the Cavendish
family are the two epigrams he wrote upon William himself.
They are to be found in Underwoods and, purposely no doubt,
deal with two of the Earl's accomplishments in which he
realized his own excellence, — fencing and horsemanship : 1
They talk of fencing, and the use of arms,
The art of urging and avoiding harms,
The noble science, and the mastering skill
Of making just approaches how to kill ;
To hit in angles and to clash with time :
As all defence or offence were a chime !
I hate such measured, give me mettled, fire,
That trembles in the blaze, but then mounts higher !
A quick and dazzling motion ; when a pair
Of bodies meet like rarefied air !
Their weapons darted with that flame and force.
As they out-did the lightning in the course ;
This were a spectacle, a sight to draw
Wonder to valour ! No, it is the law
Of daring not to do a wrong ; 't is true
Valour to slight it, being done to you.
To know the heads of danger, where 't is fit
To bend, to break, provoke or suffer it ;
All this, my lord, is valour : this is yours,
And was your father's, all your ancestors !
Who durst live great 'mongst all the colds and heats
Of human life ; as all the frosts and sweats
Of fortune, when or death appear'd or bands :
And valiant were, with or without their hands.
1 Jonson, IX, 15-16.
90 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
In the other epigram, deaUng with Newcastle's pet hobby,
Jonson rises to the occasion and fairly outdoes himself : ^
When first my lord, I saw you back your horse,
Provoke his mettle and command his force
To all the uses of the field and race,
Methought I read the ancient art of Thrace,
And saw a centaur, past those tales of Greece,
So seem'd your horse and you both of a piece !
You shew'd like Perseus upon Pegasus,
Or Castor mounted on his Cyllarus ;
Or what we hear our home-born legend tell.
Of bold Sir Bevis and his Arundel ;
Nay, so your seat his beauties did endorse.
As I began to wish myself a horse : ^
And surely, had I but your stable seen
Before, I think my wish absolv'd had been.
For never saw I yet the Muses dwell.
Nor any of their household, half so well.
So well, as when I saw the floor and room,
I look'd for Hercules to be the groom ;
And cried, Away with the Caesarian bread !
At these immortal mangers Virgil fed.
Just what remuneration the poet obtained for all these labors
we do not know, and in the days of his prosperity it mattered
very little. By 1629, however, after his quarrel with Inigo
Jones and the failure of The New Inn, things had sunk to a
low ebb with Ben. They were made worse in 163 1, when on
September 19 the City withdrew his fees as chronologer, as
he announced to Newcastle in a famous, characteristic phrase : ^
"' Yesterday the barbarous Court of Aldermen have withdrawn
^ Jonson, VIII, 427-428.
2 Compare Sir Philip Sidney's comment on John Pietro Pugliano's praise
of horsemanship : " If I had not beene a peace of a Logician before I came
to him, I think he would have perswaded mee to have wished my selfe a
horse." — Apologie for Poetrie, ed. E. Arber, 1912, p. 19.
8 See Masson's Milton, I, 391 ; and Ward's English Dramatic Literature,
II, 320.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 91
their chanderly pension for verjuice and mustard, jCss 6s. 8d."
Naturally this letter contained a petition for relief ^ and a more
imperative note followed in the next spring : ^
My noblest Lord and best Patron,
I send no borrowing epistle to provoke your lordship, for I have
neither fortune to repay, nor security to engage, that will be taken ;
but I make a most humble petition to your lordship's bounty to
succour my present necessities this good time of Easter, and it shall
conclude all begging requests hereafter on behalf
of your truest beadsman and
most thankful servant,
B.J.
Newcastle most certainly responded, for it is evident that he
and Jonson were on intimate terms in the ensuing years. On
February 4, 1632, Ben says that he is reluctantly obeying his
patron's request to forward^ "a packet of my own praises;
which I should not have done if I had any stock of modesty
in store : — but ' obedience is better than sacrifice,' — and you
command it." Again the poet sent Cavendish part of a book
which cannot now be identified, apologizing for its fragmentary
condition : ^
It is the lewd printer's fault that I can send your lordship no more
of my book. I sent you one piece before the fair by Mr. Witherington,
and now I send you this other morsel. The fine gentleman that walks
the town ; the Fiend ; but before he will perfect the rest, I fear, he
will come himself to be a part under the title of the absolute knave,
which he hath played with me.
My printer and I shall afford subject enough for a tragi-comedy ; for
with his delays and vexation, I am almost become blind ; and if heaven
be so just, in the metamorphosis to turn him into that creature which
he most resembles, a dog with a bell to lead me between Whitehall
and my lodging, I may bid the world good night.
And so I do.
Ben Jonson.
^ Jonson, I, cxxxiii. 2 ibid., cxxxiv, from Harleian Ms. 4g5S.
^ Ibid., cxxxv. * Ibid., cxxxviii, from Harleian Ms. 4g^J.
92 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Nor was the regard all on one side, as is so often the case in
such a relationship. Newcastle was wise enough to see the
poet's real greatness ; in fact, like so many of the "sons of Ben,"
he was rather inclined to magnify it. "I never," says the
Duchess in her CCXI Sociable Letters, " I never heard any
man read well but my husband ; and I have heard him say,
he never heard any man read well but B. J. ; and yet he hath
heard many in his time." ^
Naturally enough, when King Charles was to be entertained
at Welbeck in the spring of 1633, Jonson was employed to
write the masque for that occasion. Love's Welcome. TJie
Kings Entertaitiment at Welbeck, i7i Nottinghamshire is a
very slight work, but it served its purpose not unsuccessfully,^
though M. Montegut writes of it, " La chaleur et la clartd
manquent et ce masque qui dans des temps meilleurs lui eut ete
une occasion de se surpasser est la plus faible de ses oeuvres."^
" Master A. B. C. Accidence, school-master of Mansfield," and
" father Fitz-Ale, herald of Derby," are the chief interlocutors,
and the action concerns the marriage of Fitz-Ale 's daughter
Pem to Stub, a yeoman of that county. In honor of his wed-
ding he has challenged the neighbors to run a course at quin-
tain, and six of them accept, attired respectively in red, green,
blue, tawny, motley, and russet hoods. These contestants ride
with varying luck, but considerable skill must have been shown
by the losers as well as by the successful competitors. At all
events, Charles was pleased with the entertainment, as he had
every reason to be, since his host spared neither cost nor pains
in preparing it. Clarendon remarks^ that this "would still be
thought very prodigious if the same noble person had not within
a year or two afterwards, made the King and Queen a more
1 Letter CCXXIII.
2 Jonson, VIII, 1 17-130.
3 La Duchesse et le Due de N'ewcastle in Le Marichal Davoiit, 1895.
* Book I, § 167.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 93
stupendous entertainment ; which (God be thanked), though
possibly it might too much whet the appetite of others to
excess, no man ever after imitated."
Jonson wrote the masque for this second visit also.^ In it
two quarrelHng cupids, Eros and Anteros, are reconciled by the
peaceful atmosphere prevailing about the King and Queen,
but a more interesting episode is that in which the author
keenly satirizes his old enemy, Inigo Jones :
Enter Coronel Vitruvius, speaking to some without.
Vit. Come forth, boldly put forth, in your holiday clothes, every
mother's son of you. This is the king and queen's majestical holiday.
My lord has it granted from them ; I had it granted from my lord ;
and do give it unto you gratis, that is bona fide, with the faith of a
surveyor, your coronel Vitruvius. Do you know what a surveyor is
now ? I tell you, a supervisor. A hard word that : but it may be
softened, and brought in to signify something. An overseer ! one that
overseeth you. A busy man ! and yet I must seem busier than I am,
as the poet sings, but which of them, I will not now trouble myself
to tell you.'^
Various mechanics come in, whom Vitruvius orders about, and
when they begin to dance, he cries out :
Well done, my musical, arithmetical, geometrical gamesters ! or rather
my true mathematical boys ! it is carried in number, weight and measure,
as if the airs were all harmony, and the figures a well-timed pro-
portion ! I cry still, deserve holidays, and have 'em. I'll have a whole
quarter of the year cut out for you in holidays, and laced with statute-
tunes and dances, fitted to the activity of your tressels to which you
shall trust, lads, in the name of your Iniquo Vitruvius.
Whatever else it may have lost, Jonson's pen was not without
its gall in his old age.
1 Jonson, VIII, 131-140. M. Montegut says, " Cette oeuvre trahit encore
plus que la precedente I'essouflement de la verve. Mais elle est moins obscure
et va droit a son but par des moyens plus naturels."
2 Swinburne observes that Jonson " is as ready with a quotation from
Chaucer as Goody Polish in The Magnetic Lady or Lovel in The JVezo Inn."
— A Study of Ben Jottson, pp. 85-86.
94 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
This work certainly did not go unrewarded, as we have
Ben's letter of thanks for the bounty which must have meant
so much to him in those needy last years : ^
My noble Lord, and my best Patron,
I have done the business your lordship trusted me with ; and the
morning after I received by my beloved friend, master Payne, your
lordship's timely gratuity — I style it such, for it fell like the dew of
heaven on my necessities — I pray to God my work may have deserved
it ; I meant it should in the working it, and I have hope the perform-
ance will conclude it. In the mean time, I tell your lordship what I
seriously think — God sends you these chargeable and magnificent
honours of making feasts, to mix with your charitable succours, dropt
upon me your servant ; who have nothing to claim of merit but a
cheerful undertaking whatsoever your lordship's judgment thinks me
able to perform. I am in the number of your humblest servants, my
lord, and the most willing ; and do joy in the good friendship and
fellowship of my right learned friend, master Payne, than whom your
lordship could not have employed a more diligent and judicious man,
or that hath treated me with more humanity ; which makes me cheer-
fully to insert myself into your lordship's commands, and so sure a
clientele. Wholly and only your lordship's
Ben Jonson.
Among all Cavendish's proteges none is more pathetic than
this once prosperous author, his proud head now bowed in
servility as the price of a rich man's munificence.
By this time Newcastle's open-handedness must have been
common knowledge, for in 1634, the year of the Bolsover enter-
tainment, John Ford dedicated to him that remarkable play.
The Chronicle Historic of Pcrkin Warbcck. It is evident from
the style of this address that he of the " folded arms and melan-
choly hat " had as yet received no favors from Cavendish but
was merely making an effort to gain the nobleman's attention:^
Eminent titles may, indeed, inform ivho their owners are, not often
what. To yours the addition of that information in both cannot in
any application be observed flattery, the authority being established by
1 Jonson, I, cxxxix-cxl. "^ Ford's Works, ed. Gifford-Dyce, II, 112.
"OUR ENGLISH MAECENAS" 95
truth. I can only acknowledge the errors in writing mine own ; the
worthiness of the subject written being a perfection in the story and
of it. The custom of your lordship's entertainments — even to strangers
— is rather an example than a fashion : in which consideration I dare
not profess a curiosity ; but am only studious that your lordship will
please, amongst such as best honour your goodness, to admit into
your noble construction John Ford.
That philosophy as well as literature interested Newcastle,
his friendship with Thomas Hobbes bears witness. The first
we hear of this relationship is in a letter from the philosopher
dated January 26, 1633-1634, and during the three years that
followed he frequently wrote to Welbeck, Hobbes was at this
time tutor to the young Earl of Devonshire (also a William
Cavendish, and cousin to our hero), with whom he later made
an extended tour on the Continent. He writes : ^
My first businesse in London, was to seeke for Galileo's Dialogues ;
I thought it a very good bargain, when at taking my leave of your
Lordship I undertooke to buy it for you, but if your Lordship should
bind me to performance it would be bad enough, for it is not possible
to get it for money. There were but few brought over at first and they
that buy such bookes, are not such men as to part with them againe.
I heare say it is called in, in Italy, as a booke that will do more hurt
to their religion then all the bookes have done of Luther and Calvin,
such opposition they thinke is between their religion and naturall
reason. I doubt not but the translation of it will here be publiquely
embraced, and therefore wish extremely that Dr. Webbe would hasten
it. There is no news at Court but of maskes, which is a stay to my
Lords going to Oxford because he is one of the maskers, which I am
glad of for this cause, that I shall have the more time for the business
I have so long owed to your Lordship, whose continual favors make
me ashamed of my dull proceedings, savinge that into the number of
these favours I put your Lordship's patience and forbearance of me.
On August 25, 1635, Hobbes writes at some length from
Paris.2 He begins by thanking Newcastle for a gift, but with
a finer spirit than is noticeable in many dependents :
1 Welbeck Mss., II, 124. 2 ibjd., H, 125-126.
96 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
If the world saw my little desert, so plainely as they see your great
rewards, they might thinke me a mountibancke and that all that I do
or would do, were in the hope of what I receave. I hope your Lord-
ship does not think so, at least let me tell your Lordship once for all,
that though I honour you as my Lord, yet my love to you is just of
the same nature that it is to Mr. Payne, bred out of private talke,
without respect to your purse.
Then follows some news of a horse called Le Superbe, which
may be coupled with Hobbes's pamphlet entitled " Considera-
tions touching the facility or Difficulty of the Motions of a
Horse on streight lines, & Circular," ^ to show that the phi-
losopher had some slight knowledge of horsemanship. His
letter goes on to cast grave doubts upon the pretensions of a
Mr. Warner, who claims that he has invented a multiplying
glass and a burning glass of infinite strength ; even if the
theories be correct, says Hobbes, it may be impracticable and
hence useless. Evidently he distrusted the Earl's excessive
generosity, for he adds :
I hope your Lordship will not bestow too much upon the hopes;
but suffer the liberall sciences to be liberall, and after some worthy
effort your Lordship then may be liberall also, as I doubt not but
you will.
Finally, some of the writer's own early ambitions peep out
from this advice concerning Warner :
For the soule I know he has nothing to give your Lordship any
satisfaction. I would he could give good reasons for the facultyes and
passions of the soule, such as may be expressed in playne English, if
he can, he is the first — that I ever heard of — could speake sense in
that subject. If he cannot, I hope to be the first.
By June 13, 1636, the travellers, after many months in
Italy, were at Paris again, where the tutor seems to have
chafed under his pupil's continuous activity : ^
1 Preserved in the library at Welbeck. See S. A. Strong's Catalogue, where
it is reprinted, p. 237. 2 Welbeck Mss., II, 128.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 97
Wee are unsettled, I have no time — for going up and downe with
my Lord — neyther for myself, nor for Mydorgius, nor for bookes.
All I study is a Nights, and that for a Uttle while is the reading of
certayne new bookes, especially Mr. Seldens RIare Clatisum and a
booke of my Lord of Castle Islands concerning truth, which is a
high point.^
On July 29 he proclaims the uncertainty of all science : ^
In thinges that are not demonstrable, of which kind is the greatest
part of naturall philosophy, as dependinge upon the motion of bodies
so subtile as they are invisible, such as are ayre and spirits, the most
that can be atteyned unto is to have such opinions, as no certayne
experience can confute, and from which can be deduced by lawfull
argumentation, no absurdity, and such are your Lordship's opinions
in your letter of the 3rd of July which I had the honour to receave the
last weeke ; namely. That the variety of thinges is but variety of locall
motion in the spirits or invisible partes of bodies. And that such
motion is heate.
He goes on to attack Warner again, this time criticizing his
tract on the place of the image in concave or convex glasses
and suggesting other explanations to account for the phenomena.
The conclusion apparently refers to Cavendish's disappointed
office-seeking :
I am sorry your Lordship finds not so good dealing in the world as
you deserve. But my Lord, he that will venture to sea must resolve
to endure all weather, but for my part I love to keepe a'land. And it
may be your Lordship now will do so to, whereby I may have the
happinesse which your Lordship partly promises me in the end of
your letter, to conferre meditations for a good time together, which
will be not onely honour to me, but that happinesse which I and all
that are in love with knowledge, use to fancy to themselves for the
true happinesse in this life.
The letter of October 16 is written from Byfleet,^ "which
is the period of my Lords travel but not of mine. For
though my Lady and my Lord do both accept so well of my
1 Lord Herbert of Cherbury's De Veritate.
2 Welbeck Mss., II, 128-129. 3 ibid., II, 129-130.
98 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
service, as I could almost engage my self to serve them as a
domestique all my life, yet the extreame pleasure I take in
study, overcomes in me all other appetites. I am not willing
to leave my Lord, so as not to do him any service that he
thinkes may not so well be done by another ; but I must not
deny my selfe the content to study in the way I have begun,
and that I cannot conceave I shall do anywhere so well as at
Welbecke, and therefore I meane if your Lordship forbid me
not, to come thither as soone as I can, and stay as long as I
can without inconvenience to your Lordship." The rest of
this epistle is a treatise on the inverted position of an object
shown on white paper when the light has passed through a
hole ; truly no subject was too complicated or too insignificant
to occupy the mind of Thomas Hobbes. The last letters ^
of this series reiterate acknowledgments for favors received
and plans for coming soon to visit the Earl : "I expect now
onely a safe time of travelling to come to wayte upon your
Lordship at Welbeck — the sicknesse now decreasinge —
I hope may be within little more then a moneth."
It is doubtful whether the visit ever took place. Newcastle
was at this time entangled in court politics. He soon obtained
the long-coveted appointment as governor to Prince Charles,
and from then until after Marston Moor his active life allowed
small leisure for contemplation. The truth is, that this interest
in philosophy and science, although not confined to his asso-
ciation with Hobbes,^ was, like his other activities, only a
pastime. When nothing more important came to hand, the
Earl no doubt felt a genuine curiosity in the fundamental
principles of human nature and in the system of society to be
1 Welbeck Mss., II, 130.
2 See a letter to him from Matthew Boucherett on certain mineral waters,
Welbeck Mss., II, 131 ; and his " Opinion" added to the 1663 edition of Philo-
sophical and Physical Opinions.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS" 99
built upon them, as Hobbes tells us in his dedication ^ to TJie
Elements of Law, Natural and Politique. Nevertheless Caven-
dish was incapable of giving himself up wholeheartedly to that
or any other project. For the next few years public life was
to engross all his energies ; yet, when in Paris he again encoun-
tered Hobbes's tremendous personality, they easily slipped back
into their former relationship. But of that more in its place.
Meanwhile, the art of painting was receiving Newcastle's
patronage. We have a letter written by him to Sir Anthony
Van Dyck in February, 1636-1637, which shows his intimate
acquaintance with that fashionable artist : ^
The favours of my friends you have so transmitted unto me as the
longer I looke on them the more I think them nature and not art.
It is not my error alone. If it be a disease, it is epidemical, for such
power hath your hand on the eyes of mankind. Next the blessing of
your company and sweetness of conversation, the greatest blessing
were to be an Argus or all over but one eye, so it or they were ever
fixed upon that which we must call yours. What wants in judgment,
I can supply with admiration, and scape the title of ignorance since I
have the luck to be astonished in the right place, and the happiness
to be passionately your humble servant.
That the nobleman sporadically continued this enthusiasm for
pictorial art may be imagined well. In Antwerp he and his
wife often had their portraits painted by Abraham Diepenbeck,
and they lived in a house which belonged to the widow of that
artist's master, "a famous picture-drawer, Van Ruben." ^
Newcastle seems to have patronized also a minor poet named
William Sampson,^ for in 1636 that author addressed to him
the opening lines of Virtns post Funera vivit, or Honour
Tryumphing over Death, being true Epitomes of Honorable,
1 Dated May 9, 1640, but the book was not published until 1650 and then
broken up into two parts.
2 Welbeck Mss., II, 131.
* The Duchess's Life of her husband, ed. Firth, p. 50.
* The article on William Sampson in Diet. Nat. Biog.
lOO THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Noble, Learned, mid Hospitable Personages. The Cavendishes
fare exceedingly well in this work, which is dedicated in prose
to Christian, dowager Countess of Devon, and in verse to
Charles, Viscount Mansfield, Newcastle's elder son ; Elizabeth
Talbot, the Earl's grandmother, and William, Earl of Devon,
are among the thirty-two persons commemorated in heroic
couplets. There is likewise extant an unprinted poem by
Sampson, inscribed to Margaret Cavendish, Marchioness of
Newcastle, and entitled Love' s Metamorphosis, or Apollo and
DapJme} Sampson was a yeoman's son and by profession a
serving man, so that his deference seems quite natural. It is
only to be wondered at that he did not earlier attempt to
interest Cavendish in certain plays of his, which are now
better known than his poetry.
II
PATRONAGE IN PROSPERITY (1636-1644)
Among the more prominent dramatists associated with
Newcastle was James Shirley, who, like Ford, first attracted
his patron's notice by dedicating a play to him. In 1635 The
Traitor was published, upon presenting which the author wrote :
My Lord,
The honour of your name, and clearness of soul, which want no liv-
ing monuments in the heart of princes, have already made the title of
this poem innocent, though not the author ; who confesseth his guilt
of a long ambition, by some service to be known to you, and his bold-
ness at last, by this rude attempt to kiss your Lordship's hands.
This application was evidently successful, for we soon find the
two men on familiar terms. Wood in his Athence Oxonienses
'^ Harleian Ms. dg^y (Nos. 41 ff., 318-336) in Diet. Nat. Biog., article on
William Sampson. The first line runs, " Scarce had Aurora showne her
crimson face."
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " loi
says of Shirley that "when the rebelHon broke out, and he
thereupon forced to leave London, and so consequently his
wife and children (who afterwards were put to their shifts) he
was invited by his most noble patron William, earl (afterwards
marquess and duke) of Newcastle to take his fortune with him
in the wars, for that count had engaged him so much by his
generous liberality towards him, that he thought he could not
do a worthier act, than to serve him and so consequently his
prince." The only extraneous confirmation this fact receives
is to be found in the last stanza of Shirley's song To Odelia}
but the testimony seems circumstantial enough : ^
Cherish that heart, Odelia, that is mine,
And if the north thou fear,
Dispatch but from thy southern clime
A sigh, to warm thine here ;
But be so kind
To send by the next wind,
'Tis far,
And many accidents do wait on war.
Among Shirley's miscellaneous poems there is also one
to Newcastle himself, which could not have been written
before 1642 : ^
Hail, great preserver of the king,
And your own honour ! Such a thing
At court but rare appears ;
And when in calmer years
So much virtue, so much crime
Shall be read both at one time.
Treason shall want a child, and, your worth known,
Posterity shall thank the kingdom's groan.
^ Shirley's Works, ed. Dyce, II, 408.
^ Nason \r\ fames Shirley, Dramatist, p. 137, thinks this is purely Cavalier
lyric convention, but it sounds rather too specific for that.
8 Shirley, II, 435.
I02 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
When I before did fancy men
Of a most glorious soul, my pen
Did prophesy of you
To whom so much is due
That each patriot must rise
To court you with a sacrifice,
And boldest writers telling ages why,
Need fear no fiction in their poetry.
Great both in peace and war, thus fame
Did honour Sidney ; on your name
Two laurels grow, and they
That speak them both, may say,
Thus the fluent Ovid wrote.
And thus, too, wise Caesar fought,
For when your story shall be perfect, you
May both deserve, and have their envies too.
Wood further states that " our author Shirley did also much
assist his generous patron William duke of Newcastle in the
composure of certain plays, which the duke afterwards pub-
lished," and this has been conclusively proved in the case of
at least one, The Country Captain. Dyce was the first to point
out that the song at the beginning of Act IV, "Come let us
throw the dice," ^ occurs as a sort of rebus among Shirley's
poems, but there is evidence still more striking. In 1883
Mr. A. H. Bullen published in the second volume of his
Collection of Old English Plays an anonymous and unnamed
comedy which he had found in the Harleian Manuscript 'j6^0?
He followed Halliwell {Dictiotiary of Old English Plays'^)
in calling it Captain Underwit and attributed it to James
Shirley, saying :
In the notes I have pointed out several parallelisms to passages in
Shirley's plays; and occasionally we find actual repetitions, word for
word. But apart from these strong proofs, it would be plain from
1 Dyce's Introduction to Shirley's Works, pp. xlii-xliii, and VI, 439.
2 Bullen, Old English Plays, II, 315-316. » P. 42.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 103
internal evidence that the present piece is a domestic comec'y of
Shirley's, written in close imitation of Ben Jonson. All the characters
are old acquaintances. Sir Richard Huntlove, who longs to be among
his own tenants and eat his own beef in the country ; his lady, who
loves the pleasures of the town, balls in the Strand, and masques ;
Device, the fantastic gallant, — these are well-known figures in Shirley's
plays. No other playwright of that day could have given us such
exquisite poetry as we find in " Captain Underwit." The briskness,
too, and cleverness of the dialogue closely recall Shirley.
Now the remarkable thing about this higher criticism of
Mr. Bullen's is that the play under consideration is Newcastle's
Country Captain. In all essentials the two works are identical
and their differences only show that the manuscript preserves
its original form, which, with the cuts and additions suggested
in acting, gives the printed version. Many lines are omitted,^
long speeches are broken up by ejaculations from the other
characters,^ additional coarseness is injected,^ and there are
one or two rearrangements of material.^ In a word, all variants
1 The CouTitry Captain omits the whole interview between Sir Richard,
the Captain, and Engine in Act V {Captain Unde7-wit, pp. 408-409) and all
mention of the latter at the final curtain {Captain Underwit, p. 415); in Act IV
some fifteen short speeches are left out of the drunken scene ( Captain Under-
wit, pp. 378-379), and Thomas's part receives curtailment both here and
in the first two acts {Captain Undenvit, pp.381, 322, 338) ; the scornful dia-
logue between Courtwell and the sister is somewhat cut {Captain Underwit,
pp. 382-383).
2 Sir Richard's long disquisition on the pleasures of the country is inter-
rupted in the printed play by interjections of the Lady's, " Soe Sir," " You are
pleasant. Sir," which would naturally tend to relieve monotony {Country
Captain, pp. 8-9; Captain Undetivit, pp. 324-325).
8 Device's satirical utterance on these same country pleasures is further
spiced to gain the plaudits of an audience {Country Captain, p. 15; Captaift
Underwit, p. 332).
* Sir Francis does not tell Engine he knows him, when announcing that a
man of that name is to be hanged, and thereby makes the situation much more
amusing {Captaitt Uidenuit, p. 354). Act IV not only includes the dicing
song, mentioned in the text, but has incorporated in it a drunken scene with
musicians which appeared at the end of the earlier copy but which Bullen
placed at the very beginning of this act {Country Captain, pp. 58-61 ; Cap-
tain Underwit, pp- 373-376).
I04 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
from the original version were made for dramatic effect, and
some practical man of the theatre may be held responsible
for them.
That Shirley had a large share in the earlier form of The
Cotmtry Captain is quite indisputable after the evidence
brought forward by Bullen, and more recently by Dr. R. S.
Forsythe in The Relations of Shirley s Plays to the Eliza-
bethan Drama. Each of the strands in its triple plot has an
analogue in Shirley's acknowledged plays : ^ Lady Huntlove's
dangerous intrigue with Sir Francis Courtwell and subsequent
reconciliation with her husband is the story of Sir Thomas
and Lady Bornwell in The Lady of Pleasure ; Master Court-
well's jeering wooing of the Sister resembles that of Carol by
Fairchild in Hyde Park ; while the waiting maid Dorothy's
deception of Captain Underwit comes from the similar trick
played on Sir Nicholas Treedle by Sensible in The Witty
Fair 07te. The foolish servant Thomas falls naturally into
place with Treedle's Tutor, and Device draws his affectations
through Caperwit of Love in a Maze from their common
progenitor. Master Matthew of Every Man hi His Humour.
Indeed, the Jonsonian influence runs throughout this whole
drama, although often turned into unaccustomed channels by
the leaven of Shirley's romantic manner, which cannot con-
ceal that the humor of Underwit is that of Master Stephen,
that Captain Sackbury is a lesser Bobadill, and that the very
name of Engine suggests the projector Meercraft's assistant
in The Devil is an Ass!^ Engine's proposed monopoly of
periwigs^ is thought by KoeppeH to be copied from Brome's
Court Beggar^ as it may be, but in the last analysis both
1 Forsythe, p. 424.
2 M. Kerr's The Influence of Ben Jonson on English Comedy, pp. 112-117.
3 Bullen, p. 354.
■* Ben JonsoJt's Wirkung, p. 179.
^ Act I, scene i, Works, I, 192.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 105
situations go back to father Ben's inventive genius. The Jon-
sonian touches are no doubt due to Newcastle's loyal sonship,
but these are greatly in the minority and it is Shirley who
really directs The Country Captaiiis progress. Its conclusion
sees the two unsuccessful sinners, Sir Francis Courtwell and
Lady Huntlove, forswear all further evil intentions with a
fervor that would do justice to sentimental comedy, but with
that lack of sincerity which distinguishes Shirley's numerous ^
and superficial conversions.
Not only does the general course of the plot suggest this
dramatist's workmanship but specific resemblances to his
authentic plays abound. Forsythe has pointed out^ that the
law- French^ suggests Shirley's hand, that the intriguer's
efforts to gain a rendezvous are not unlike Fowler's pre-
tended sickness in The Witty Fair One,^ and that the latter's
mock praise of Penelope's charms^ parallels Master Court-
well's irony to the Sister.^ He also comments significantly
on the word " rotten," '^ occurring in The Humorous Courtier
(III, i) and The Constant Maid (III, 2), with the meaning
" to have by heart," for which Bullen mistakenly conjectured
" rooted." Bullen himself noted that Device's allusion to the
scholar authors who refuse to take money for their work is
repeated by Treedle in The Witty Fair One (IV, 2),^ and
that the Sister's parody on Master Courtwell 's ornate speech
runs in the vein of Celestina's rebuff to Lord A in The
Lady of Pleasure (V, i).^ In The Duke's Mistress (IV, i)
appear the lines,
You shall lead destiny in cords of silk,
And it shall follow tame and to your pleasure,
1 Forsythe, pp. 58, 71. ^ Bullen, p. 383.
2 Pp. 426-428. 7 Ibid., p. 366.
* Bullen, p. 351. * Ibid., p. 330.
* Act III, scene iv. ^ Ibid., p. 350.
5 Act I, scene iii.
io6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
which may be compared with The Country Captains
We will make lawes to love ; teach him new motion
Or chaine him with the cordage of his haire.^
What is more, Bullen has discovered one line which appears
identically in The Bird in a Cage (IV, i) i^
She and the horse
That snorts at Spam by an instinct of nature
Should have shown tricks together.
In Act V Engine says :
In a puppet play
Were but my storie written by some schoUer,
Twould put downe hocas pocas and the tumblers
And draw more audience than the Motion
Of Ninevie or the dainty docile horse
That snorts at Sfiaine by an instinct of Nature.
It is noteworthy that in The Country Captain none of the
lines are printed as blank verse,^ but that many of them
ought to be, seems plain on the most cursory reading. Indeed,
there is throughout this play abundant evidence of a poetic
vein not found elsewhere in Cavendish's literary accomplish-
ment. For instance, when Device refuses to defend himself
against the Sister's attack his speech cannot be mistaken for
prose, even though printed as such : *
I 'le rather bleede to death then lift a sworde | in my defence ;
whose inconsiderate brightnesse | may fright the roses from your
Cheekes, and leave | the lyllyes to Lament the rude divorce: | but
were a man to dare me, and your enemie, | my rage more nimble
then the Median shaft | should fiye into his bosome, and your eye
I change Anger into smiles, to see me fight. |
1 Bullen, p. 353.
2 Ibid., p. 409. Engine's lines do not occur in T/ie Cotintry Captain.
8 Except in Act II where the Sister bids Courtwell to woo her in that fash-
ion, and there of course it is labelled. This episode occurs on pages 34-35.
In Captain Undenvit, however, division into lines has been made. See above.
* Country Captain, p. 80.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 107
And Shirley's fine Italian hand may also be detected in
Sir Francis's dream : ^
What ? have I slept ? some witchcraft did betray
My eyes to so much darkness, yet my dreame
Was full of rapture, such as I with all
My wakinge sence would fly to meete ; me thought
I saw a thousand cupids slyde from heaven
And landing heere made this there scene of Revells
Clappinge their goulden feathers, which kept time
While their own feete struck musick to their dance
As they had trod, and touched so many Lutes :
This done within a cloude form'd like a throne,
She to whom love had consecrate this night,
My Mistresse, did descend, and cominge towards me
My soule that ever wakes, angry to see
My body made a prisoner, and so mock'd,
Shook of the chaines of sleepe, least I should loose
Essentiall pleasure for a dreame. Tis happie :
I will not trust my selfe with ease and silence
But walke and wayte her comming that must blesse me.
The Country Captain is easily the best of the dramatic work
ascribed to Newcastle, a fact we must lay to Shirley's credit,
for its similarity to his other plays in general outline as well
as in detail is marked and Cavendish's unassisted productions
are decidedly inferior. This verdict has been generally ac-
cepted by modern scholars, including Swinburne,"^ Gosse,^
Koeppel,^ Firth,^ and Forsythe ; ^ the only real '' dissenter is
Fleay,* who seems to have been actuated by personal pique
1 Country Captain, p. 74 ; and BuUen, pp. 393-394.
2 Fortnightly Review, April, 1890, p. 476.
' Mermaid Series, volume of Shirley's plays. Introduction, p. xxv.
* Shakespeare's Wirkung, p. 64 ; and Ben Jonson's IVirkutig, p. 178.
^ Pp. xvii-xviii.
* Pp. 419-422.
' W^ard does not altogether accept Bullen's ascription to Shirley, III, 120;
also see Nason, pp. 153, 452.
^ Chronicle 0/ the English Drama, I, 48-49.
io8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
against Bullen. Forsythe^ goes so far as to suggest the iden-
tification of this play with Looke to the Ladie, a lost drama
of Shirley's which was entered in the Stationers Register,
March ii, 1639-1640,^ but apparently never printed nor acted
under that name. About this time the author returned from
his Irish sojourn, and although there is evidently some con-
nection between his reappearance in London and the unful-
filled entry, just what it is has never been satisfactorily
explained. Forsythe offers the hypothesis^ that "Williams
and Egglesfield (the would-be publishers) had obtained a
MS. of Captain Underwit, which they renamed, and were
preparing to publish as Shirley's when that author returning
to England discovered their intention and put a stop to the
publication of the play." This suggestion necessarily throws
the date of The Country Captain back before 1636, when
Shirley left England, a theory which may be supported by two
independent considerations. Pepys saw the comedy revived on
October 26, 1661, and records that this was "the first time it
hath been acted this twenty-five years, a play of my Lord
Newcastle's, but so silly a play as in all my life I never saw,
and the first that ever I was weary of in my life " ; a judg-
ment this indefatigable theatre-goer confirmed when he saw
it performed again on November 25 of that same year, on
August 14, 1667, and May 14, 1668, for each time it is labelled
" a dull play " or "a very ordinary play." Pepys's '" twenty-five
years" if taken literally would settle 1636 as the date of its
first production, but we are hardly justified in being so pre-
cise when dealing with such a palpable round number and
such an inaccurate historian.
The other evidence for placing this comedy before Shirley's
removal to Ireland is an allusion to the " Proclamation com-
manding the gentry to keep their residence in at their mansions
^ Pp. 422-424. 2 Stationers' Register, transcribed by Arber, IV, 501. ^ p. 422.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 109
in the Country and forbidding them to make their habitations
in London and places adjoining," which was promulgated
June 20, 1632.1 "This would seem to indicate an earlier
date for the play than any heretofore offered," writes For-
sythe,^ " since it seems unlikely that a proclamation at least
seven years earlier would be alluded to among other strictly
contemporary references." Yet the plot makes such a refer-
ence, even if out of date, peculiarly appropriate. Sir Richard
Huntlove is about to take his wife and her Sister away from
London, which causes Device's remark concerning "the pitti-
ful Complaint of the Ladies when they were banish 'd the
Towne with their husbands to their Country houses." This
fits the situation perfectly and enables the affected fop to
expatiate on what a stupid existence the women will lead in
their exile. There are, however, two other contemporary allu-
sions which definitely place the present form of this play
several years later : one to the Great Ship, built in 1637,^
and one to "the leager at Barwick and the late expeditions,"^
which must mean Charles I's march to Scotland and the
Pacification at Berwick in June, 1639. Forsythe would have
these passages later interpolations in his supposed version of
1635,^ but this seems hardly necessary when the only reason
for imagining an earlier form is the mere title of a lost drama
recorded in 16 39- 1640.
Moreover, if Williams and Egglesfield chose the exact time
of Shirley's return to London for publishing a surreptitious
copy of his comedy, they were less astute than the average
publishers of their day.^ If, on the other hand, it was done
1 Bullen, p. 331. 2 p. 422. 3 BuUen, p. 369. * Ibid., p. 321.
6 P. 423.
® T/ie Tragedy of Saint Albans was licensed for printing on the previous
February 14 but evidently never appeared. Shirley may have come home
during the intervening period, but in any case the status of the lost St. Albans
is a separate problem. See Forsythe, pp. 150-152.
no THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
with Shirley's permission, he must have been the acknowledged
author of Look to the Lady, for it was licensed in his name.
Had there been such a previous work by him, it could never
have been produced, or Newcastle's later plagiarism would have
been detected at once ; while if no such play was ever acted,
it is idle to speculate upon its existence. Another reason for
imagining that The Country Captain was not given until 1640
is its performance " by His Majesties Servants at the Black-
fryers," 1 a fact attested by its appearance in the list of "Plays
of the King's Men," dated August 7, 164 1.^ Now before Shir-
ley's withdrawal to Dublin, he wrote almost exclusively for the
Queen's Men, and only one of his plays, The Brothers, — and
that as far back as 1626, — was given at Blackfriars.^ After
his return the dramatist transferred his activities to the King's
Men, and they produced all his later works with the exception
of The Politician and The Gentleman of Venice. The occa-
sion for this shift in the performance of Shirley's plays has
been variously explained,^ but the fact lends color to supposing
that his collaboration with Newcastle falls within the later
period. Indeed, there is no evidence at all which demands
that The Country Captain should be dated as previous to 1639 ;
on the other hand every indication serves to show that it was
written and acted in that or the following year.
There can be no doubt, however, that Look to the Lady
would be a most suitable name for the comedy in which
Lady Huntlove's underhand plottings have so large a share,
and the temptation to relate the two dramas becomes well-
nigh irresistible when it is remembered that the single men-
tion of Shirley's lost play also occurs in 16 39- 1640. It seems
possible to establish such a connection if we imagine that the
^ Title-page of the edition.
2 Malone Society Collections, pp. 368-369, where it follows Shirley's Imposture.
8 Forsythe, pp. 26-27. * Nason, pp. 1 22-1 31.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " III
author's return to England, instead of preventing the publica-
tion of Look to the Lady, was the occasion of its entry in the
Stationers' Register. He may have come back from Ireland
with the idea for a new play, if not actually a rough draft of
it, which he promised to finish for performance. As a result
the publishers might well feel justified in preparing to print
the work before it was acted. Then something interfered, per-
haps it was Newcastle, who had recently developed a penchant
for dramatic writing and who naturally would have turned for
assistance to his former successful protege. The diplomatic
Shirley might very well hand over his new scenario to the
Earl, help the nobleman extensively in its composition, and,
when the comedy was completed, produce it under another
title with an attribution to his patron. Then, until modern
scholarship came into the field, who was to imagine that The
Country Captain by the Earl of Newcastle was identical with
Look to the Lady by James Shirley } Perhaps, too, this explains
why the completed play was not published until Newcastle
chose to issue it ten years later, and why John Williams and
Francis Egglesfield printed no more of Shirley's dramas. That
these men did in 1640 bring out The Arcadia, which was
licensed on November 29, 1639, a few months before Look
to the Lady, is an evidence that the connection between them
and Shirley was not broken off immediately on his arrival in
London. Forsythe tries to show that The Arcadia may have
been issued before the dramatist's return,^ and although this
is possible, it is not likely, as a more probable hypothesis
places the break somewhat later. Meanwhile The Arcadia
might have appeared while Shirley was discovering that it
was more profitable to write for the nobility than for unap-
preciative publishers, even if in the former case you could not
acknowledge your own productions. Naturally one supposes
^ P. 422, i.e. in the very beginning of 1640 (Old Style).
112 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
that such industry had its reward, since Newcastle was no
niggard of his favors and the dramatist's loss from withdraw-
ing Look to the Lady must have been considerable. Moreover,
if Shirley had a conscience, it had to be salved for the
disappointment to his printers.
But this is romancing, and whatever truth may be in it,
there is no proof thereof. What we know is, that on March 1 1,
1 6 39- 1 640, Look to the Lady was licensed ; that in that month
or the preceding ^ Shirley returned to London ; and that not
long after The Country Captain, in which he had a large
share, was produced by the King's Men at Blackfriars. The
inference is not difficult to draw, but that does not necessitate
an earlier date for the play's original composition. Dr. Forsythe
is to be given complete credit for first suggesting this rather
obscure identification, but in imagining a previous version he
has gone unnecessarily far astray. Nor, while we recognize
the influence of Shirley, must we forget that this drama con-
tains some share of Newcastle's writing, probably in the low
comic scenes where any poetic feeling would have been super-
fluous. Its authorship has been generally ascribed to the Earl,
although on the 1649 title-page it is said to be "Written by
a Person of Honor." ^ We have seen that Pepys mentions
Newcastle as responsible, and there are some verses by a
Mr. Joseph Leigh to the same effect. They appeared in the
165 1 collection of Wflliam Cartwright's works in an address
to Humphrey Moseley, the printer, naming the books that he
has presented to the public ; among them
fam'd Newcastle's choice Variety
With his brave Captam held up Poetry.
1 Nason, pp. 118-119.
2 On the separate title-page no author is mentioned, but the printer is
given as " Samuell Broun English Bookseller at the Signe of the English
Printing House in the Achter-ome." Apparently Moseley obtained complete
possession of this Hague edition.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 113
The Variety is always published with The Country Captain,
but one would not insult Shirley by suggesting that he is
responsible for any part of it, although Wood says " certain
plays," a distinct plural, and no others by Newcastle were
presented before the Civil War. There is in it no hint of
Shirley's manner beyond the fact that Monsieur Gaillard, the
French dancing master, recalls Le Frisk in The Ball, and that
Mistress Voluble's discourse to the ladies has come through
the Compliment School in Love Tricks?- The ultimate source
for this general type of scene seems to be The Cloiids of
Aristophanes,^ but it came into Elizabethan drama through
the comedies of Ben Jonson. Cynthia s Revels, The Silent
Woman, and The Devil is afi Ass all have some kind of
"Academy," and it is very likely that Newcastle took the
idea directly from those works. After the Earl's intimate
acquaintance with Ben, it is quite natural to find him fol-
lowing that master, as was discernible even in the mixed style
of The Cojmtry Captain and as comes out strongly in the
more unadulterated Variety. Here the Jonsonian theory of
drama reigns supreme, and almost every character is a familiar
type : the Jeerers, Major and Minor, are reminiscent of The
Staple of News ; Simpleton, the country chouse, is Master
Stephen again, this time with the addition of a cross-eyed
mother ; while Form-all's propensity to impart court secrets
confidentially, brings to mind Sir Politick Would-be of Vol-
pone? Manley's humor for praising the past to the extent
of arraying himself as Leicester might almost have been sug-
gested by Jonson himself, especially as this lover of old times
^ Forsythe, p. 430. But Voluble speaks in Act II, scene i, not Act III as
Forsythe says.
2 This is pointed out by Edmund Gosse in Mermaid Series, volume of
Shirley's plays, Introduction, p. xii.
^ M. Kerr's Influence of Ben Jonson, pp. 112-117.
114 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
engages in a parody ^ of Ben's well-known lines beginning : 2
Have you seen but a bright lily grow,
Before rude hands have touch'd it ?
One and all, these humors are properly punished at the end
with good Jonsonian morality and according to the Duchess's
assertion that her husband's chief design was "to divulge and
laugh at the follies of mankind, to persecute vice and to
encourage virtue . " ^
It can be seen that The Variety lives up to its name, but
otherwise little praise may be afforded this wretched produc-
tion, which is indeed only a farrago of diverse characteriza-
tions. Plot there is none, except for a liberal use of the
deceitful marriage device that does service in The Country
Captain. That is well enough in its way but becomes unen-
durable when employed wholesale as in the conclusion of
Act V, where the Justice, Sir William, and Gaillard are re-
spectively duped by Voluble, Simpleton's Mother, and the
pert chambermaid, Nice, Our author only redeems himself
by two lyrics sung in the inevitable drinking scene, which are
worth all the rest of this play put together. One deals with
woman's charms : ^
Thine eyes to me like sunnes appeare
Or brighter starres their light ;
Which makes it summer all the year,
Or else a day of night.
But truly I do thinke they are
But eyes, and neither sunne nor starre.
Brow, cheek, nose, and neck undergo the same disillusionment
in true Cavalier lilt. The other song,^ a serenade, is even
1 Act III, scene i. Simpleton sings the original words and Manley adds
ridiculous ones.
2 The last stanza of his Triumph of Char is. * The Variety, p. 62
s Firth, p. 109. 5 Ibid., pp. 60-61.
I
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 115
more finished, and more typical of its age :
I conjure thee, I conjure thee, by thy skin that is so faire,
Thy dainty curled haire,
And thy favour and thy grace,
With the patches on thy face.
And thy hand that doth invite
The cold dullest appetite
Appeare appeare.
Upon these termes I doe invite thee,
And if thou com'st I will delight thee.
If not so, I doe not care,
Though thy breasts be ne're so bare,
Roses rich, with shooe that 's white
Or thy Venus best delight.
If not touch thy softer skin
What care I for thee a pin,
Appeare appeare.
For to heare, and not to see
Is a dull flat history.
And to see and not to touch
If you thinke the last too much
Know all woman's but one toy
If we men not them enjoy.
Appeare appeare.
The subsequent history of The Variety is really of greater
importance than the play itself. There was made out of it
a droll, called The French Dancing Master, which enjoyed
considerable popularity after the Restoration. It was acted
by Killigrew's company on March 11, 1661-1662,1 and on
May 21 Pepys attended a performance, remarking that, "The
play pleased us very well ; but Lacy's part, the Dancing
Master, the best in the world." This impersonation won the
piece its vogue and delighted Charles II so extremely that
1 Malone's Shakespeare, ed. Boswell, III, 275.
ii6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
he had the actor painted as Gaillard.^ The droll was appar-
ently based on two scenes from The Variety, that of Act II
where the dancing master proclaims that wit lies in one's
toes, and another from Act III, in which like Monsieur
Jourdain's Maitre a Danser^ he urges that people be made
" to dance, and to make a de boon reverence, for begar dat
will make de King de great King in de Varle. . . . Ven dey
are so bissey to learn a de dance, dey vill never tink of de
Rebellion, and den de reverence is obedience to Monarchy,
and begar obedience is ale de ting in de Varle," These two
episodes were printed under the name of The Hmnoiirs of
Monsieur Gaillard in the 1672 edition of Francis Kirkman's
The Wits, or Sport npon Sport^ a famous collection of drolls
and farces.^
The Variety cannot be given a definite date, but it may be
approximately placed with its companion piece in 1639- 1640.
It was also produced by the King's Men at Blackfriars accord-
ing to its title-page, but does not appear on the list of their
plays reprinted in the Malone Society Collections. This sug-
gests that it might have appeared after that date, August 7,
1 64 1, but on the other hand its omission may be due to earlier
lack of success, a hypothesis supported by one of Richard
Brome's poems. The verses set forth before his comedy of
TJie Covent Garden Weeded are inscribed, " To my Lord of
Newcastle, on his Play called The Variety. He having com-
manded to give him my true opinion of it." In them Brome
1 Langbaine, p-3i7-
2 In Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, Act I, scene ii, particularly the speech :
" Tous les malheurs des hommes, tous les revers funestes dont les histoires
sont remplies, les bevues des politiques, et les manquements des grands capi-
taines, tout cela n'est venu que faute de savoir danser." — QLuvres ComplHes
de Moliere, Oxford, 1900, p. 487-
3 Pp. 134-139-
* Many of them are said to have been performed at fairs or taverns during
the Puritan ascendency by Robert Cox, the comedian. See the article on
Kirkman in Diet. Nat. Biog.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 117
says that he has considered himself a poet for seven years, and
as the first ascertainable trace of his work is The Northern
Lass, which was acted a short time before its printed appearance
in 1632, The Variety can be traced back to 1639. Neither was
its reception markedly enthusiastic, if Brome's " true opinion "
be taken for a criterion, although he was able cleverly to equivo-
cate out of Gil Bias's dilemma. The cunning rogue must have
chuckled to himself as, without perjuring his immortal soul,
he wrote :
I could not think these seven yeares, but that I
In part a poet was, and so might lie,
By the Poetick License. But I finde
Now I am none, and strictly am confin'd
To truth, if therefore I subpaena'd were
Before the Court of Chancerie to swear.
Or if from thence I should be higher sent.
And on my life unto a Parliament
Of wit and judgement, there to certifie
What I could say of your Variety :
I would depose each Scene appear'd to me
An Act of wit, each Act a Comedy,
And all was such, to all that understood.
As knowing Johnson, swore By God 't was good.
About this same time (in 1640) Brome dedicated his play
The Sparagtis Garden to Newcastle,^ but he was too keen to
trust in future rewards and had obtained his compensation
in advance :
My Lord !
Your favourable Construction of my poore Labours commanded my
Service to your Honour, and, in that, betray'd your worth to this
Dedication : I am not ignorant how farre unworthy my best endeavours
are of your least allowance ; yet let your Lordship be pleased to know
you, in this, share but the inconveniences of the most renowned Princes
as you partake of their glories : And I doubt not but it will more
divulge your noble Disposition to the World, when it is knowne you
1 Brome's Works, 1873, m> m-
Il8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
can freely pardon an Officious trespasse against your Goodnes. Caesar
had never bin commended for his Clemency, had there not occasion
beene offered, wherein hee might shew, how willingly he could for-
give : I shall thanke my Fortune, if this weake presentation of mine
shall any way encrease the Glory of your Name among Good Men,
which is the chiefest ayme and onely study of
Your Honours devoted servant
Richard Brome
During the period of Newcastle's dramatic activity he held
his post as governor to the Prince and in connection with this
office produced another, very different piece of literature. It is
a letter of instructions ^ written to Charles "for his studies, con-
duct, and behaviour," the keynote of which seems to be modera-
tion and diplomacy. As to education, he must learn languages
and the arts of war, " though I confess, I would rather have
you study things than words, matter than language ; for seldom
a critic in many languages hath time to study sense, for words ;
and at best he is or can be but a living dictionary. Besides I
would not have you too studious, for too much contemplation
spoils action and virtue consists in that . . . the greatest clerks
are not the wisest men ; neither have I known bookworms
great statesmen ; some have heretofore and some are now, but
they study men more now than books, or else they would prove
but silly statesmen. For a mere scholar, there is nothing so
simple for this world." Prince Charles must beware of being
too religious, a fault to which his tutor thinks him inclined,
but still he must pray to God, lest his subjects wax disobedient,
and lest " if any be Bible mad, over much learned with fiery
zeal, they may think it a service to God to destroy you and
say the Spirit moved them and bring some example of a king
with a hard name in the Old Testament." The letter con-
cludes with more practical advice, such as to be courteous,
1 Printed by Firth, pp. 184-187, and in Ellis's Original Letters, Series I,
Vol. Ill, p. 288.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " II9
civil, and ceremonious ; but enough has been quoted to show
that it is a remarkable document, intrinsically of greater worth
than the Earl's pretentious dramas.
While governor in the royal household, Newcastle was asso-
ciated with other men of letters besides Shirley and Brome,
so it may have been then that Robert Davenport addressed a
manuscript volume of poems to him.^ In 1638 Jasper Mayne
translated Lucian's Dialogues "for your private entertain-
ment," as he tells his patron when they were finally published
in 1664. In his dedication to the Marquis he explains the
delay by saying, " whether it were Malice or Mistake I know
not, but they were here in this place taken for Wanderers ;
And when they went to the Presse, met the Whipping-Post in
their way, by the over severe persecution of some needlessly
morose." ^ He adds that he would have translated more, "' if
the late barbarous Times had not broke into my Study. And
by raising a Rebellion against Learning, and their Prince, had
not called You away to lead an Army into the Field." Of
this period also is a charming letter to Cavendish from gay
Sir John Suckling, who is at court, and wonders why his
friend stays so long away with the young Prince : ^
January 8. London — Are the small buds of the white and red
rose more delightful than the roses themselves? And cannot the
King and Queen invite as stronglie as the roiall issue ?
Or has your lordship taken up your freinds opinion of you to your
owne use, so that when you are in my Lord of Newcastle's companie
you cannot think of anie other. Excuse me — - my Lord — I know it
is a pleasure to enioy a priveledge due to the highest excelence —
which is to be extreamlie honored and never seen — but withall I
believe the goodnesse of your nature so great that you will not think
yourself dearlie borrowed, when your presence shall concerne the
fortune of an humble servant. I write not this — my Lord — that
you should take a journey on purpose, that were as extravagant as if
1 See Thorpe's Catalogue of Mss., 1836 (No. 1450), and the article on
Robert Davenport in Diet. Nat. Biog. ^ P. A2. ^Welbeck Mss., II, 133.
I20 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
a man should desire — the universall benefactor — the sun, to come a
month or two before his time, onelie to make a spring in his garden.
I will as men doe his, wait — my Lord — your comming and in the
meantime promise myself good howres without the help of an
astrologer, since I suddenlie hope to see the noblest planett of our
orb in conjunction with your Lordship.
Suckling's association with Newcastle was, of course, on an
equal footing ; there could be no question of patronage when
two courtiers met together with a common interest. It will be
remembered, also, that Sir John was largely responsible for
entangling Cavendish in the ill-fated Army Plot, which by its
discovery cost the Earl his position. Yet there is no sign that
anything but the pleasantest relations ever existed between
these two kindred spirits.
Another literary man connected with the unlucky conspiracy
was William Davenant, who fled to France on its failure. He
did not return until after the Civil War had broken out, when
he was sent by the Queen with stores to Newcastle and (per-
haps by her recommendation i) became an officer in the North-
ern Army. Sir Philip Warwick sneers at this appointment in
his criticism of Cavendish ^ :
He was a gentleman of grandeur, generosity, loyalty, and steady and
forward courage ; but his edge had too much of the razor in it : for
he had a tincture of a romantic spirit, and had the misfortune to have
somewhat of the poet in him ; so as he chose Sir William Davenant,
an eminent good poet, and loyal gentleman, to be lieutenant-general
of his ordnance. This inclination of his own and such kind of witty
society (to be modest in the expression of it) diverted many counsels,
and lost many opportunities, which the nature of that affair this great
man had now entered into required.
Davenant did not receive his knighthood from Newcastle
as Aubrey asserts,^ although the general had that power by
1 Firth, p.xviii, suggests this, citing Letters of Henrietta Maria, ed. Green,
p. 134. 2 Metnoirs, p. 235.
3 Aubrey's Lives, ed. 1898, I, 206, and the article on Davenant in Did.
Nat. Biog.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 1 21
commission, but from King Charles in person at the siege of
Gloucester, After the defeat of the royal army, Sir William
again cautiously sought refuge in Paris and must have met
the Marquis there. In view of their close connection, it is
astonishing that no notice of it finds a place in Davenant's
works, with the exception of a short poem Upon the Marriage
of the Lady Jane Cavendish zvith Mr. Che?tey. (Her sister
Elizabeth wedded Lord Brackley, who took the part of the
Elder Brother in Contus, and this is the only link between
Newcastle and the greatest writer of his age.) Davenant's
verses do not seem appropriate to their subject as they run:^
Why from my thoughts sweet rest ; sweeter to me
Than young ambition's prosp'rous travels be,
Or love's delicious progresses ;
And is next death the greatest ease ?
Why from so calm a heav'n,
Dost call me to this world, all windy grown ;
Where the light crowd, like lightest sand is driven,
And weighty greatness, even by them, to air is blown ?
During his campaigns Cavendish's own creative work was
naturally brought to a standstill, or rather he turned his talents
into unaccustomed channels. All his energies were occupied
by proclamations and reports, of which the declaration "' for
marching into Yorkshire " is worth considering for its sim-
plicity of outline and its clean-cut argument.^ His defense for
coming is (i) that he has been invited, (2) that he does not
come to pillage or plunder, (3) that he intends to put an end
to violent encroachments, and (4) that he will take counsel
with his supporters in York and withdraw when his object is
accomplished. That he has accepted Popish recusants into his
army is freely admitted, but the Parliamentarians had enter-
tained them first. Also it is perfectly legitimate to receive aid
1 Works, p. 291. 2 Rushworth, III, ii, 78-81. See p. 24, above.
122 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
from people of different denominations, as precedent and ex-
pediency go to prove, nor is there any reason why they should
prove disloyal. Finally, he will see to it that these Papists
" do nothing against the Lawes of this Kingdome, for I have
received them, not for their Religion, but for the Allegiance
which they profess to so gratious a King : whom I pray God
to Protect, and long continue amongst us, and let all good
People say, Amen."
ni
PATRONAGE IN EXILE (1644-1660)
Newcastle's excellent proclamations could not make up for
his mediocre military ability, however, and by 1645, ^s we have
seen, he found himself a refugee in Paris. Here he encoun-
tered Hobbes again ^ and almost at once became embroiled
in one of that philosopher's theoretical disputations. Bishop
Bramhall of Londonderry, a staunch Royalist and a friend of
Cavendish's, had fled with him after Marston Moor,^ and he
was to be Hobbes's antagonist. The two men had a temperate
discussion on the question of free-will before Newcastle, but
as no conclusion was reached Bramhall set his views down
on paper and sent them to the nobleman to be answered in
like manner by Hobbes.'^ At the request of his patron,
Hobbes did answer them in a letter dated from Rouen,
August 20, 1646, humbly beseeching "your Lordship to
communicate it only to my Lord Bishop." ^ Bramhall replied,
1 Here, too, Newcastle and his brother were " pleased to take notice of "
Sir William Petty, on Hobbes's recommendation. See Vaughan's Protectorate
of Cronnvell, II, 368. It was Cavendish's influence also, no doubt, which at
this time procured Hobbes his position as tutor in mathematics to Prince
Charles. See LesHe Stephen's Hobbes, p. 38.
2 Bramhall's Works, I, x, and III, Preface.
3 Hobbes's English Works, V, 2, 22 ; and Bramhall's Works, IV, 17, 23.
* Hobbes's English Works, IV, 238-278.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 123
and as his opponent remained silent, the controversy seemed
Hkely to be dropped ; but before the Bishop's second epistle
had been received, a French gentleman obtained permission
from Hobbes to have his letter translated by a young English-
man, " who being a nimble writer, took a copy of it for him-
self." In 1654 this surreptitious copy was printed, without
the philosopher's knowledge or consent,^ but much to the
indignation of Bramhall, who believed Hobbes had rudely
violated their confidential correspondence. He thereupon
published in 1655 all three tracts, item by item, under the
name of A Defence of True Liberty from Antecedent and
Extrinsecal Necessity, and dedicated it to Newcastle with a
preface, stating in no uncertain terms the author's supposed
grounds for complaint against his enemy .^ The following year
Hobbes set forth the entire transaction again, calling it The
Questions Concerning Liberty, Necessity and Chance, explain-
ing the circumstances of the pirated version, and adding " ani-
madversions " on each several section.^ Bramhall retaliated
with Castigations of Mr. Hobbes his last Animadversions * and
then carried the argument into broader fields by his Catching
of Leviathan^ 1658. The final chapter in this dispute was
Hobbes's answer, probably written ten years later but only
given to the public posthumously. ^
Newcastle's name, it may be seen, disappears early in the
discussion but crops up again in a sort of sequel to it. In
1676 Benjamin Laney, Bishop of Ely, issued a tract against
the original 1646 letter on liberty and necessity, to which it
is alleged by Richard Blackburne that Hobbes replied in an
address to the Duke.'^ No trace of this answer has been found,
^ Hobbes's English Works, V, 25-26. * Bramhall, IV, 197-506.
2 Bramhall, IV, 5-196. « Ibid., IV, 507-597.
' Hobbes's English Works, V. ^ Hobbes's English Works, IV, 279-384.
"^ Vlt<£ HobbiancB auctarium in Hobbes's Latin Works, I, Ixvii.
124 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
and very probably it never existed .^ We have, however, in
manuscript still another work dedicated to Cavendish : A
miimte or first draught of the Optiqites. In two parts. By
Thomas Hobbes. At Paris, 1 6^6? The first part, On Illumi-
nation, was never printed, but the second, Ojt Vision, appears
in Latin as part of the De Homine. Its introduction states
that " the desire of knowledge and desire of needlesse riches
are incompatible, and destructive one of another " and that
this treatise "is grounded especially upon that wh^^ about
1 6 years since I affirmed to your Lopp at Welbeck, that light
is a fancy in the minde, caused by motion in the brain." The
hope is further expressed "that your lordship, after having
performed so noble and honourable acts for defence of your
countrie, may thinke it no dishonour in this unfortunate lea-
sure to have employed some thoughts in the speculation of the
noblest of the senses, vision!' Newcastle was not the sort of
man to lament his lost opportunities, and when the theatre of
affairs was closed to him he speedily sought consolation in
his earlier and less exacting pursuits ; patronage of science
or art was always a congenial occupation for him.
Association with Hobbes, together with Sir Charles Caven-
dish's practical knowledge of science,^ brought the Marquis
into relations with foreign men of learning. " I have heard
Mr. Edmund Waller say," writes Aubrey,^ " that W. Lord
Marquis of Newcastle was a great patron to Dr. Gassendi, and
M. Des Cartes, as well as to Mr. Hobbes, and that he hath
dined with them all three at the Marquis's table at Paris."
The Duchess gives some support to this statement when she
1 Robertson's Hobbes, p. 202, n.
^ Harleian Ms. 3360. See Hobbes's English Works, VW, 467-471, where
the dedication and concluding paragraph are given.
^ See Vaughan's Protectorate of Cromwell, Vol. II, App. ; Halliwell's Letters
on Scie7itific Subjects, 1841 ; and Hobbes's Englisk Works, VII, 455-462.
* Lives, ed. 1898, I, 366.
''OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 125
defends herself against having appropriated opinions from the
two latter : ^
I cannot say but I have seen them both, but upon my conscience I
never spoke with monsieur De Cartes in my life, nor ever understood
what he said, for he spake no English, and I understand no other
language, and those times I saw him, which was twice at dinner with
my Lord at Paris, he did appear to me a man of the fewest words I
ever heard. And for Master Hobbes, it is true I have had the like
good fortune to see him, and that very often with my Lord at dinner,
for I conversing seldom with any strangers, had no other time to see
those famous Philosophers ; yet I never heard Master Hobbes to my
best remembrance treat, or discourse of Philosophy, nor I never spake
to Master Hobbes twenty words in my life, I cannot say I did not ask
him a question, for when I was in London I met him, and told him
as truly I was very glad to see him, and asked him if he would please
to do me that honour to stay at dinner, but he with great civility re-
fused as having some businesse, which I suppose required his absence.
Possibly in view of her habitual silence on previous occasions,
he did not anticipate that her Ladyship would give him a very
stimulating evening's entertainment.
Still the Duchess was very proud of the connection with
Hobbes, for in the Life she records his delight in some of her
husband's sayings. The conversation turned on whether it
might be possible for men to fly with artificial wings, and " my
Lord declared, that he deemed it altogether impossible, and
demonstrated it by this following reason. Man's arms, said
he, are not set on his shoulders in the same manner as birds'
wings are ; for that part of the arm which joins to the shoulder
is in man placed inward, as towards the breast, but in birds
outward, as toward the back ; which difference and contrary
position or shape hinders that man cannot have the same flying
action with his arms as birds have with their wings. Which
argument Mr. Hobbes liked so well, that he was pleased to
1 In " An Epiloge to my Philosophical Opinions," prefixed to Philosophical
and Physical Opinions, 1655.
126 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
make use of it in one of his books called Leviathan, if I
remember well."^ Later they talked of witches, and Hobbes
said he would not believe there were such things except that
they admitted it themselves. Newcastle gave it as his opinion
" that the confession of witches and their suffering for it, pro-
ceeded from an erroneous belief, viz. that they had made a
contract with the devil to serve him for such rewards as were
in his power to give them, . . . and this wicked opinion makes
them industrious to perform such ceremonies to the devil, that
they adore and worship him as their god, and choose to live
and die for him. Thus my Lord declared himself concerning
witches, which Mr. Hobbes was also pleased to insert in his
fore-mentioned book."^ Professor Firth says he has not been
able to find these arguments in the Leviathan,^ and it is abso-
lutely certain that the former does not appear in it. There is
an allusion to witches, however, which may be held roughly
to coincide with Cavendish's expressed view. In a brief and
unimportant passage the author states : ^
As for witches, I think not that their witchcraft is any real power ;
but yet that they are justly punished for the false belief they have
that they can do such mischief, joined with their purpose to do it if
they can ; their trade being nearer to a new religion than to a craft
or science.
The Duchess did not "remember well" in the first instance
and her second example is hazy, to say the least, but she comes
out of the ordeal with her reputation for intentional veracity
unimpeached, if condemned more strongly than ever as an
over-ardent hero-worshipper.
This lady took her turn at patronage, too, after her marriage
to Newcastle and while they were still in Paris. The recipient
of her favor was John Birkenhead, editor of the Mercuritis
^ Firth, pp. 106-107. ^ Ibid., p. 106, n.
2 Ibid., p. 107. * English Works, III, 9.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 127
Auliais, of whom Aubrey writes : ^ " He went over into
France, where he stayed some time, I thinke not long. He
received grace there from the dutchess of Newcastle, I remem-
ber he tolde me." This must have been in 1648, the year of
Birkenhead's arrival and of Descartes's long stay in Paris.
In July the Marquis and the Marchioness left France for the
Low Countries, where they resided during the remainder of
their exile. Here there were few literary men with whom they
could foregather, and as neither husband nor wife cared much
for reading,^ they both turned to composition according to
their individual taste and genius.
The most interesting work that Newcastle produced in this
period is thus described in his biography : ^
And here I cannot forbear to mention, that my noble Lord, when he
was in banishment, presumed out of his duty and love to his gracious
master, our now sovereign King, Charles the Second, to write and
send him a little book, or rather a letter wherein he delivered his
opinion concerning the government of his dominions, whensoever
God should be pleased to restore him to his throne, together with
some other notes and observations of foreign states and kingdoms ;
but it being a private offer to his sacred Majesty, I dare not presume
to publish it.
Two manuscript copies of this document survive, one, evidently
the royal copy, bound in white parchment, with fine gold tool-
ing and blue silk strings, among the Clarendon Manuscripts
in the Bodleian Library,^ the other in the Duke of Portland's
possession. This letter was printed in 1903 by S. A. Strong
in his Catalogue of Letters and Other Historical Doctmtents
1 Lives, ed. 1898, II, 105.
2 S. A. Strong's Caialog2te, p. 173; "A Preface to the Reader," prefixed to
Philosophical Letters ; and " To the Reader," prefixed to Observations upon
Experimental Philosophy.
3 Firth, p. 100.
* Madan's Summary Catalogue of the Western Mss., Vol. Ill, No. 16,195,
where it is ascribed to Clarendon.
128 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
preserved m the Library at Welbeck'^ and is an important
addition to our knowledge of the man and his period. Mon-
sieur Emile Montegut, in complete ignorance of this treatise,
prophesies of it with startling accuracy i^ " Nous connaitrions
les vraies opinions de Newcastle sur le gouvernement civil et
la religion, et il est probable que nous verrions qu'elles furent
elles meme d'un Hobes modere, prudent et sans insolence
agressive." They are moreover the views of an overpractical
Hobbes and thus form an instructive corollary to the Hobbesian
theories by applying them more specifically.
The "Little Book" begins with the assertion that "these
discourses are oute off my longe Experience " and plunges at
once into the question of militia, " for withoute an Armeye In
your owne handes you are butt a kinge Uppon the Courteseye
of others" — a good Leviathan principle with which to start.^
That monster is actually named in urging that its head, Lon-
don, be mastered, " for so you master all Englande, & as one
sayde whatt shoulde they bee Armde for, butt In time off
peace to playe the fooles, In finsburye feeldes, In trayninge
there, — Ande in time of warr to playe the Rebells agaynst
their kinge, so still I Conclude Master London & you have
dun your worke." He advises that trained bands be kept in
every county, that two forts be built on each side of the Thames
below Greenwich as was done at Antwerp, and that good gar-
risons be kept in port towns. This last move will help insure
the safety of shipping, which according to the old saying " is
the Brason walls off Englande." Closely connected with that
1 Pp. 173-236. 2 pp_ 271-272.
8 John Selden, who also was a follower of Hobbes, writes : " If the Prince
be serviis natiira, of a servile base Spirit, and the Subjects liberi, free and
Ingenuous, oft-times they depose their Prince, and govern themselves. On
the contrar)', if the People be Servi Natura, and some one amongst them of
a free and Ingenuous Spirit, he makes himself King of the rest ; and this is
the Cause of all changes in State : Commonwealths into Monarchies, and
Monarchies into Commonwealths." — Table-Talk, CIX, 9.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS" 129
is a plea for encouraging trade, " Itt is the merchante thatt
onlye bringes Honye to the Hive," and with true seventeenth-
century ring, the theory that was to reach its highest develop-
ment under Colbert, " Trade muste bee considerde, thatt the
merchante maye Exporte, more than Importe, that hee Carrye
oute more Comodeties than he bringes in." The more trade,
the greater custom revenues for the King, but of late there
has been too much confusion in collecting them. Let monopo-
lies be abolished, the rate of interest be lowered, and an excise
adopted as the fairest tax possible, although, even so, "a
Rich Curmougin thatt will almoste Starve him selfe, with rawe
Porke and Candles Endes maye have advantage for the Purse
though nott the Bellye, butt thatt can nott bee helpte." Since
manufacture is of the utmost importance for enriching a coun-
try, it would be an excellent plan to bring into England foreign
industries such as the production of silk and of linen, " so for
all maner off fine thred lases, as fianders famous for Itt, Iper
& Gaunte hath been famous above 300 yeares for chaser
[Chaucer ! ] speakes off Itt."
As in his letter to Charles when a prince, Newcastle con-
siders the Church as merely a political tool. This is strictly
in accord with Hobbes's idea that religion must ever be sub-
servient to the State, by the very nature of the contract
implied in all government.^ Consequently the Church of
England is the only permissible form of observance, "for
Indeed, Popery, & Presbetery, though theye looke divers wayes,
with their heads, yett theye are tied together like Samsons
Foxes by theyr Tayles Carienge the same fierbrandes off
Covetusnes & Ambition, to putt all Into a Combustion wher-
soever theye coume, thatt will nott Submit to them." In
Catholicism the jurisdiction of the Pope interferes with civil
1 As Selden expresses it, " Every law is a Contract between the King and
the People, and therefore to be kept." — Table- Talk, LXXVII, 4.
I30 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
administration, and " for presbetrye Itt Is as distructive to
monarchye as uncomlye in it, & a litle to sauseye with God
Almightye sans seremoneye, butt lett anye tell mee wher anye
monarkeye Is wher Itt Is planted, naye wher theye are butt
aloude as In France whatt worke have theye made howe manye
Civell warrs, untill Cardnall Richelewe tooke order with them
In takinge a waye all theyr stronge Holdes." Then certain
practical truths as to the regulation of Episcopacy are pro-
pounded. The bishops should be wise men, as they have a
right to sit in the upper house and are to supervise the schools,
so that no weaver can scatter heresy among the pupils, "' for
sertenlye as wee are Bred, off thatt Religion or opinion wee
are off for the moste parte." Let each minister have but one
living ; let the preachers confine themselves to printed ortho-
dox sermons and catechisms that they may prevent fanaticism
from creeping into the fold. "The Bible in Englishe under
everye wevers & Chambermadyes Arme hath dun us much
hurte," writes Newcastle, as he reviews the Rebellion in the
light of Hobbes's system. Therefore only Latin books of con-
troversy can be permitted, the press must be subjected to a
rigid censorship, and the number of students in colleges and
schools limited. Part of the bishops' function is to report
public opinion, together with the movements of all dangerous
persons. " But S"" ther Is nothinge can so well setle the
church & keepe Itt In order as the power to bee In your owne
handes, which Is the Drum & the Trumpett, for disputts will
never have an Ende, & make newe & greate disorders, butt
force quietts all thinges & so this amongeste the reste."
One great protection for the King against the Church was
law, but of late that has increased to such an extent that it must
be regulated. Lawyers have multiplied like grasshoppers, until
now one cannot get a decision in any court because of the red
tape which is the livelihood of that profession. Chancery of
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 131
course is the most dilatory tribunal, and by contrast the Star
Chamber the most efficient. "They will saye Indeed whoe-
soever Coumes ther, iff hee scape a broken pate hee Is shure
to have a Scratchte face, butt one shoulde aske him whye hee
coumes Ther." A merciful judge turns out to be more cruel
in the end than a severe magistrate, who soon gets his juris-
diction so well in hand that leniency is not needed. A corrupt
judge ought to be examined by the King in person, and the
sovereign should establish a record office in each county to
diminish the need of lawyers. By these means he will be able
to keep all departments under his control and, when this has
been accomplished, to govern through kindness, " I shoulde
wishe your Ma^^® to Governe by both Love & feare mixte
together as ocation serves, — havinge the power which Is forse
& never to use Itt butt uppon nesesetye, when ther Is eyther
Comotion, or to prevente Itt, when anye what soever begins
to Sowe sedition between the kinge & his People & to Governe
as God Almightye doth by promise & Threatninges ; Rewardes
for doinge well & punishmentes for those that offende."
Here Newcastle clearly reveals the justification of Hobbes's
philosophy when carried out to its impractical ideal, which is
not so very different from many another Utopia ; but danger
often lies in the methods advocated to gain this common end.
Specific suggestions on the government of Scotland and Ire-
land (not Home Rule, needless to say) and on diplomatic rela-
tions with foreign countries follow, though their particularity
puts them beyond the province of literature.
Again the Marquis asserts the importance of ceremony in
accents strongly reminiscent of the King in Hejiry IV^: "' Sere-
monye & order with force, Governes all both In Peace & Warr,
& keepes Everye man & Everye thinge within the Circle off
their owne Conditions," — a sentiment which finds even more
^ Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part I, Act III, scene ii.
132 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
striking expression in Selden's Table-Talk : " Ceremony keeps
up all things : 'T is like a Penny-Glass to a rich Spirit, or some
excellent Water ; without it the Water were spilt, the Spirit
lost." ^ Therefore the King is to hold aloof from the common
herd as Queen Elizabeth did, and not to endure familiarity
even in his bedchamber. He must honor the nobility, who at
the worst would only depose him in favor of another ruler,
while the commons are hostile to all monarchy. At the same
time his courtiers must continually be kept up to a high level,
for sometimes foppery has found its way in so ruinously that
the greatest noble in England would be jeered, " iff hee did
nott make the laste monthes Reverence A La Mode thatt Came
with the laste Danser frome Paris packte upp In his fidle
Case." The royal privileges are not even open to discussion,
much less should Parliament be allowed supreme power, and
to prevent this the King must keep plenty of money by him
— good advice for a Stuart, if only he would follow it. This
money is for rewarding friends, not to bribe enemies, a mis-
take frequently made in former times, and one that Hobbes
condemned with severity. To Newcastle it is "the Greateste
Error off State thatt Ever was Committed In these two laste
Raynes." " The Cardinall de Richelewe was the wiseste &
Greateste States-Man in his times, & hee went playnlye to
worke withoute litle Juglinges hee had butt two thinges which
hee did All withal, which was moneye & Armes, sayenge iff
the moneye would nott doe the Armes woulde, & iff the
Armes fayled the moneye would & iff theye weare Singlye
to weake beinge joyned theye woulde Effecte moste thinges
In this worlde."
Although Newcastle warned Charles against extravagance,
he also added to his pamphlet a section, " For Your Ma^^^s Dever-
tisementes." They were to include masks, balls, and plays,
1 Table-Talk, XI, i.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 133
riding horses in the manage, tiltings on coronation days, hunt-
ing and hawking, and elaborate progresses through the coun-
try. The people also must have diversions to keep them
contentedly loyal ; the " Thou shalt nots " of the Protectorate
had already prevented gaiety and happiness too long. Paris
Garden, the home of bear-baiting, and all the theatres shall be
open wide again, there will be puppet plays and rope danc-
ing "with Guglers & Tumblers, — Besides strange Sightes, off
Beastes, Birdes, Monsters & manye other thinges with severall
Sortes off Musike, & dansinge, — Ande all the olde Holedayes,
with their Mirth, & rightes sett up agen ; Feastinge daylaye
will be in Merrye Englande, for Englande Is so plentifull off
all provitiones, that iff wee doe nott Eate them theye will Eate
Use, so wee feaste In our Defense." ^ Many of these amuse-
ments shall go travelling up and down the country-side as they
were wont to do, but the rural folk have their own relaxations
as well : " Maye Games, Moris Danses, the Lords off the Maye,
& Ladye off the Maye, the foole, — & the Hobye Horse muste
nott bee forgotten. — Also the whitson Lorde, & Ladye, —
Thrashinge off Hens at Shrove-tite, — Caralls & wassells att
Christmas, with good Plum Porege & Pyes which nowe are
forbidden as prophane ungodlye thinges, wakes, — Fayres &
markettes mentaynes Comerse & Trade, — Sz: affter Eveninge
Prayer Everye Sundaye & Holedaye, — The Countereye People
with their fresher Lasses to tripp on the Toune Greene about
the Maye pole, to the Louder Bagg-Pipe ther to be refreshte
with their Ale & Cakes." With what gusto the Marquis writes
of the good old days, and with what anticipation he looked for-
ward to their renewal ! It is sad to think how changed was the
1 Compare " An Apology for English Gluttony " in Reliqtiice Antique, I,
326-327 : " The thyrde cause is for drede ; we have so grete aboundance
and plente in ower realme, yf that we shulde not kyll and dystroye them,
they wolde dystroy and devoure us, bothe beste and fowles." — Harleian Ms.
23^2, fol. 84, v° (of Henry VIII's time).
134 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
England to which he went back, and sadder still to realize what
Fate held in store for Newcastle himself. The "Little Book"
did not hold counsel pleasing to the second Charles, if we may
judge from subsequent events, under a regime where pleasure
and not policy was at the helm.^ It contained much sound prac-
tical advice none the less, which if followed might have delayed
the Stuart downfall. As it stands, the work is an invaluable com-
mentary on Hobbes's philosophy and an important contribution
to the political literature of that day. It does not look forward,
but, turning backward with the keen eye of experience, it
pierces the tangled causes of the Great Rebellion. The
extreme Royalist view is set forth, after a lapse of years had
allowed passions to cool and reason to reassert itself ; the im-
petuosity of the Cavalier has been tempered with the careful
deliberation of a Hobbes. The author's personality and past
history merge in the product, which is as unique as it is remark-
able — Newcastle never wrote with less thought of the public,
but never with better effect.
There is also in existence at Welbeck Abbey a book "' con-
taining songs and sketches of plays in the handwriting of the
Duke " which, to judge from the scant selection given by
Mr. Strong,^ must have been composed during the stay in
Flanders. One poem was to have been spoken before a
pastoral drama at Antwerp and evidently to an audience of
English refugees, since it defends entertainments given in the
gloomy days of exile. Another is Upon Giving Mee The Late
Kinges Picture ; a third was to be set to music by Mr. Lanier.
We know that such a song was rendered at the ball in honor
of Charles (1658), and this may have been the identical lyric
sung by the Duchess's Moor :
1 It is true that Charles carried out some of Newcastle's precepts, especially
in regard to amusements (Airy, Charles II, p. 114), but the spirit of his reign
was entirely opposed to the " Little Book."
^ Catalogue of Letters etc. at Welbeck, pp. 57-60.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 1 35
Her absence makes mee suffer for her,
Nott greefe, or sorowe, butt whatts Hor-rer,
Fanside [fancied] softe Virgins murderde, Bledinge,
On those pewre streames sawe Tigers feedinge,
Then vewde distracted Parentts Lienge,
Cursinge their Fates, Fininge, & Dyenge.
There follow three other verses of " hor-rer " which cause the
poet to exclaim,
Therefore returne with loves Intention,
For frome Hells thaughts, Ther is redemtion.
This is pretty poor stuff, and the other printed verses are
scarcely better.
In 1658 Newcastle had published at Antwerp his first book
on horsemanship, which, with his second work on the same
subject, has secured for him a large portion of his present
fame.i With that fame has also come no small share of ridi-
cule, for riding in the manage soon ceased to be a fashionable
diversion, and nothing is more absurd than an outworn fad.
Bishop Warburton in his edition of Clarendon ^ succinctly
labelled the Duke " a fantastical virtuoso on horseback," and
the occasion was too good for Walpole to let slip without a
passing sneer : ^
He was fitter to break Pegasus for a manage than to mount him on
the steeps of Parnassus. Of all the riders of that steed, perhaps there
have not been a more fantastic couple than his grace and his faithful
duchess who was never off her pillion.
^ Many books on horsemanship had already been published during the last
part of the sixteenth and the first part of the seventeenth century, notably
those by Gervase Markham : A Discorirse of Horsefnanshippe ; Cavelarice, or the
English Horseman, etc. See Cambridge History, IV, 364-369, and F. N. Huth's
Works on Horses and Equitatio7i. Newcastle seems to have owed little or
nothing to them, however, for in such writing the author's own experience is
all-important ; nor would the Duke have condescended to sit at the feet of
any master in this, his chosen subject.
* VII, 77. 8 A Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors, ed. Park, III, 189.
136 THE FIRST. DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
The full title of the earlier volume is La M^thodc Nouvelle et
Invention extraordinaire de dresser les Chevaiix les travailler
selon la Nature et parfaire la nature par la siibtilte de Vart ;
la quelle na jamais ete treitvee que Par Le trcs-noble haiit et
tres-puissant Prince Guillaiinie, Marqnis et Comte de New-
castle etc. etc. Traduit de VAnglois de VAntenr en Francois
par son Conimandcment} Concerning the circumstances of its
appearance Newcastle writes to Nicholas on February 15,
1656-1657:2
I am so tormented about my book of horsemanship as you cannot
believe, with a hundred several trades, I think, and the printing will
cost above ^1300, which I could never have done but for my good
friends Sir H. Cartwright and Mr. Loving ; and I hope they shall lose
nothing by it, and I am sure they hope the like.
In 1743 it was translated back into English to form the first
volume of A General System of Horsemanship in all its
Branches, printed by John Brindley, Bookseller to the Prince
of Wales.
The Introduction states Descartes's opinion that horses can
reason as well as human beings and the author's deduction
that they must therefore be taught like children, i. e. by
rewards and punishments. The First Book is occupied with
considerations of color and shape in horses, with their breed-
ing, rearing, and breaking. Book II explains Newcastle's
great invention, a new way to fasten the reins of the cavesson,^
which has turned out to be a panacea for ills in the man-
age. Lessons are given on how to supple a horse's shoulders,
how to make him obey the heel or bridle, how to work him
with the false reins, with the bit, or with the reins held in
the left hand. All these exercises are given for the gait of
1 On June 29, 1653, Newcastle asks Edgeman to procure a translator for
him. See Calendar of Clarendon Papers, II, 220.
3 State Papers (Domestic), Record Office. See Firth, p. 206.
* A caveison is a kind of stiff noseband used in training horse*.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 137
terra-a-terra, but the next book treats of the so-called " airs " :
corvets, groupades, caprioles, balotades, and demi-airs. For
these airs, the horse is tied to the single pillar by a rather
short rope and pricked with a poinson ^ to help out the rider's
instruction. One essential quality in a well-trained horse is
being put easily upon his haunches and another is to turn
readily. Book IV treats of ways to attain these and other
virtues ; as a last resort one is to let the horse have his own
way, until he becomes tired of it and willing to obey his rider.
The steed must not bear too heavily on the hand, nor should
he be too light upon it, that is, not to have a good appuy.
An "Epitome of Horsemanship" emphasizes certain preceding
points, such as not to work the croup of a horse before his
shoulders upon a circle, while an Appendix of afterthoughts
brings the treatise to a conclusion.
Much more interesting to the average reader than the text
of this volume are the illustrations, which consist of forty-two
— with the title-page, forty -three — copper-plate engravings,
designed by Abraham Diepenbeck and executed by various
skilled workmen. The majority show Newcastle and his master
of horse. Captain Mazarin, executing the different gaits and
evolutions of their steeds.^ One depicts the Marquis and
Marchioness, their three daughters and sons-in-law, together
with their two daughters-in-law, watching the feats of their
two mounted sons. In another, Charles II is guided by Pallas
and led by Mars, with Mercury as lackey and Cupid as page.
Newcastle himself is often glorified, for we see him crowned
by angels, drawn in a chariot by satyrs, and, most frequently,
worshipped by horses. Verses are sometimes appended, com-
posed by a Mr, D. V., of whom we would know more, for
he writes :
1 The wielder of this instrument stands not far off on foot.
2 The landscape frequently contains the buildings at Bolsover or Welbeck.
138 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Apres rhomme le Cheval le plus noble animal
Est rendu par ce Seigneur si juste et si ^gal.
Par cette Methode, que tout le monde admire
Qu'on voit aisement qu'il est sujet de Son Empire.
And again, describing the picture so exactly that one feels it
was drawn to fit his poem :
II monte avec la main les eperons et gaule
Le Cheval de pegase qui voile en Capriole ;
II monte si haut qu'il touche de sa teste les Cieux
Et par ses merveilles ravit en extases les Dieux.
Les Chevaux corruptibles qui Ik-bas sur terre sont
En Courbettes demi-airs, terre k terre vont
Avec humilitid, soumission et bassesse
L'adorer comme Dieu et auteur de leur adresse.
In 1667 Newcastle published his English book on the
subject, "' being neither a Translation of the first, nor an
absolutely necessary Addition to it." ^ Such a warning seems
necessary, for the title is an exact equivalent of the French
already cited. There are no engravings to lighten this disquisi-
tion, but its style is, per contra, rather informal and conver-
sational. For instance, there is a defense of the refinements
of life, riding in the manage being one, that does not lack
virility or force :
It is True that if there was nothing Commendable but what is Use-
ful, strictly Examined ; we must have nothing but Hollow Trees for
our Houses, Figg-leaf -Breeches for our Clothes, Acorns for our Meat
and Water for our Drink ; for certainly most things else are but
Superfluities and Curiosities.
Frederic Grison, the Neapolitan authority on horses, and his
translator Mr. Blundeville are subjected to cutting satire :
They Bid us take Heed, by any Means, Not to make the Horse too
Weak-Neckt ; which is a Prime Note ! But Mr. Blundevile did not
know that all Horses are a stiff-Necked Generation.
1 " To the Readers."
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 139
The Duke's simple egotism and pride speak out in a most
straightforward and attractive manner :
There is no Horse-man but shall Make my Horses go, for his Use,
either in a Single Combat, or in the Wars, better than he shall any
bodies Horses else ; and that 's Sufficient : for, to make them go in
Perfection as I can, were too much, and too great a Miracle.
Sir Walter Raleigh is mentioned twice, once as having " told
me, That in the West-Indies there were the Finest Shap't
Horses, and the Finest Colours in the World, beyond all
Spanish Horses and Barbs that ever he saw ; and they knew
there so little the Use of Horses that they killed them for
their Skins" — a most engaging traveller's tale! Again it is
recorded that " Sir Walter Rawley said well, That there are
Stranger Things in the World than between Stains and
London."
The plan of this 1667 volume follows the early work ^ but
differs materially in its proportions. Each separate breed of
horses is taken up for a careful analysis, the division treating
of farriery and the veterinary art is somewhat augmented, and,
indeed, the whole book seems merely an elaboration of certain
points in the earlier treatise. The author says it " may be of
use by it self," but that must be for those who already know
something of the manage ; for uninitiated readers La M^thode
Nouvelle is more instructive, though "both together will
questionless do best." The Duke had his second text also
turned into French and published both versions in the same
year at London. A French copy fell into the hands of
Monsieur de Solleysel, whose own knowledge of horsemanship
enabled him to detect the faults in translation and who wrote
to Newcastle asking permission to undertake a more perfect
rendering. This the Englishman granted, and afterwards, with
* Both have four parts and an " Epitome of Horsemanship " added.
140 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
his grandson as intermediary, he approved certain notes and
explanations added by de Solleysel.i ^ German translation
by Johann Philipp Ferdinand Pernauer followed in 1700. It
was printed at Nuremberg with the French in a parallel
column and was adorned by essentially Teutonic attempts to
reproduce the plates of Newcastle's earlier work. Thus it may
be seen that the Marquis's two books had a decided vogue
and at once became the authorities on manage, which they
have ever since remained,
Gerard Langbaine confirms this popularity, both directly by
anecdote and indirectly by an admission of his own indebtedness
to Cavendish : ^
Signior del Campo, One of the most knowing Riders of his Time,
said to the Duke (upon his Dismounting) as it were in an Extasie, //
faut tirer la Planche ; The Bridge must be drawn -up : Meaning that
no Rider must presume to come in Horsemanship after him. M. De
Soleisel (one of the best Writers that I have met with amongst the
French) when he enlarged his Le Parfait Mareschal, borrowed the
Art of Breeding from the Duke's Book, as he owns in his Avis au
Lecteur: and stiles him Un des acco7nplis Cavaliers de notre teinps.
But having nam'd this Foreigner's borrowing from his Grace, I should
justly deserve to be branded with Ingratitude, should I not own, That
'tis to the Work of this Great Man, that I am indebted for several
Notions borrow'd from his Grace, in a little Essay of Horsemanship,
printed 8° Oxon. 1685.
This refers to The Hunter: a Discourse of Horsemanship,
published by Leonard Lichfield and bound up with the third
edition of Nicholas Cox's Gentleman s Recreation? Langbaine's
predisposition in favor of Newcastle, whether as general or
author, may perhaps rest on this common interest in horseman-
ship, a subject at which the nobleman excelled both in his age
and for all time,
1 See reprint with the German version. ^ Langbaine, p. 388.
' The article on Langbaine in Diet. N'at. Biog. ; and The Gentleman^ s Recrea-
tion, 1686.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 141
While the Marquis and Marchioness were still on the Con-
tinent, they acquired one literary friend whose name was to
echo down the ages in no very dignified manner. What is
more, they became so extremely intimate with Richard Fleck-
noe that a great admiration developed on both sides. The
earliest indication of it was some verses by Newcastle prefixed
in 1655 1 to this poetaster's A Relation of Ten Years Travels
in Europe, Asia, Ajfrique, and America. Three years later
Flecknoe first brought out his Enigniaticall Characters, all
taken to the Life from several Persons, Hnmoiirs, and Dis-
positions, and again Newcastle launches into hyperbolic com-
pliment. Here there are two introductory poems by him, of
which the first runs :
Fleckno, thy Characters are so full of wit
And fancy, as each word is throng'd with it,
Each line 's a volume, and who reads would swear,
Whole Libraries were in each Character :
Nor Arrows in a quiver struck, nor yet
Lights in the Starry Skies are thicker set.
Nor Quils upon the Armed Porcepine,
Than wit and Fancy in this Work of thine.
The complacent author reciprocates this flattery, for his char-
acter "Of a certain Nobleman" ^ is evidently drawn from New-
castle, whom, as we shall see, he later mentions by name in
similar terms. The anonymous nobleman here " remembers
his Ancestors more to their praise than his own . . . swels
not with speaking big, but is courteous and affable to all,
holding courtesie so main an ornament of Nobility, as that
Nobleman (he imagines) disguises but himself, and puts on
Pesants cloathing, who is discourteous ; above all he holds
loyalty so essential to a Nobleman, as who proves disloyall
once (he imagines) not only degrades himself, but even his
posterity of their Nobility."
^ The article on Flecknoe, Diet. Nat. Biog.^ gives the date as 1656. ^ p 103.
142 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
After the death of Cromwell, in 1658, Flecknoe published
a panegyric upon him,^ so that when the Restoration occurred
he found it wise to bring out his Heroick Portraits to ingra-
tiate himself with the new administration. Charles led the
array, and among the other descriptions was one of Newcastle,
praising the Marquis for his ability, wisdom, and generosity. To
him Flecknoe dedicated, in 1664, Love's Kingdom. A Pastoral
Trage-Comedy . Not as it was acted at the Theatre near Lin-
coln s Lnn, hut as it was written atid since corrected? Attached
to it was A Discourse of the English Stage in the form of a
letter to his patron, which Langbaine takes ^ "to be the best
thing he has extant." A Farrago of Several Pieces appeared
in 1666, dedicated to the Duchess as a thank offering for her
hospitality and assistance. It contains a prose " pourtrait " of
her and various verses celebrating the two Newcastles. Among
them are To James. Recommending Welbeck to him. On New-
yearsday 1666, The Birth-Day, and
Of Welbeck
The Duke of Newcastles house
Where he entertain'' d
The last King so magnificently ^ Anno jj.*
On the Dutchess of Nezvcastles Closset breathes an atmosphere
of the most sycophantic abasement : ^
What place is this ? looks like some sacred Cell
Where ancient Hermits formerly did dwell
And never ceast importunating Heaven,
Till some great blessing unto Earth was given ?
Is this a Ladies Closset? 't cannot be,
For nothing here of vanity we see,
Nothing of curiosity, nor pride.
As most of Ladies Clossets have beside.
^ Printed in 1659. ^ The earlier version was known as Love's Dominion.
^ P. 203. * Lohr's dissertation on Flecknoe, p. 85.
^ Epigrams of 1670, p. 26; and Lohr's dissertation, p. 85.
''OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 143
Scarcely a Glass, or Mirror in 't you finde
Excepting Books the Mirrors of the minde.
Nor is 't a Library, but onely as she
Makes each place where she comes a Library.
Here she 's in rapture, here in extasie.
With studying high, and deep Philosophy :
Here those cleer lights descend into her minde,
Which by reflection in her Books you finde :
And those high Notions, and Idea's too,
Which but her self, no Ladies ever knew.
Whence she 's the chiefest Ornament and Grace
O' th' times, and of her Sex. Hayle sacred place,
To which the world in after-times shall come
As unto Homers Shrine, or Virgils Tomb ;
Honouring the Walls, wherein she made aboad.
The air she breath'd, & ground whereon she trod.
So Fame rewards the Arts, and so agen
The Arts reward all those who honour them ;
Whilst those in any other things do trust,
Shall after death lye in forgotten dust.
The incongruities of this piece are only equalled by its utter
lack of sophistication.
Flecknoe dedicated his Danioisclles a la Mode (1667) to
the Duke and Duchess, and in the Epigrams of all Sorts,
made at Divers Times on Several Occasions of 1670 he offers
additional homage to them. In this collection are reprinted some
of the Cavendish poems contained in the Farrago and one new
effort, contrasting Newcastle with " an unworthy Nobleman " : ^
But now behold a Nobleman indeed,
Such as w' admire in story when we read ;
Who does not proudly look that you shud doff
Your hat, and make a reverence twelve score of ;
Nor take exceptions, if at every word
You call him not his Grace or else my Lord;
But does appear a hundred times more great
By his neglect of 't, than by keeping state.
^ Epigrams, p, 34.
144 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
He knows Civility and Curtesie,
Are chiefest signes of true Nobility ;
And that which gains them truest honourers,
Is their own Vertues, not their Ancesters.
By which through all degrees that he has past,
Of Viscount, Earl, Marquis, and Duke at last,
H'as always gain'd the general esteem
Of honouring those, more than they honour'd him.
These verses appear again in A Collection of the Choicest
Epigrams and Characters of Richard Flecknoe, 1673, with
other of the earlier panegyrics and an elegy On the Death of
the Lady Jean Cheney} who, one supposes, was Newcastle's
eldest daughter. Euterpe Revived, 1675, is still another col-
lection of epigrams old and new, one being occasioned by the
Duchess's life of her husband : ^
Ne'er was life more worthy to be writ,
Nor pen more worthy of the writing it.
She makes you famous, and you her agen
By th' famous subject you afford her pen.
Whence 't is a question ever will remain,
Whe'er fame makes writers, or else writers, fame.
So, whilst you live i' the life that she does give,
And she in writing of your life will live,
Betwixt you both your fame will never die,
But one give t' other immortality.
Flecknoe's literary ability was mediocre, if not worse, and it
may even deserve the consummate scorn heaped upon it by
his contemporaries and immortalized by Dryden. Cavendish,
however, seems to have been blind to the writer's defects, as
he was to those of any author who would flatter him highly and
consistently enough. So it was that the persistent Flecknoe
praised him for the course of twenty years and no doubt
throughout that period received the reward of his devotion.
^ p. 13. Quoted in Walpole's Catalogue, ed. Park, III, 147, n.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS" 145
IV
PATRONAGE AFTER THE RESTORATION (1660-1676)
Meanwhile Newcastle had returned from Flanders to the
changed England of the Restoration. If he ever wrote a
comedy, The Exile, attributed to him by Whincop/ its title
would assign it to this period. Yet no other mention of this
work is found any more than of TJie Heyresse, which Pepys
deposes to have been " wrote, they say, by my Lord New-
castle." ^ The Duke did, however, produce a play entitled
The Humorous Lovers not long after his home-coming. It
was published posthumously in 1677, but must have been
acted at least ten years earlier, for Pepys saw it on March 30,
1667, at the Duke of York's Theatre. He wrongly attributes
it to the Duchess and perhaps for that reason labels it " the
most silly thing that ever come upon a stage. I was sick to
see it," but adds, "yet would not but have seen it, that I
might the better understand her." As the title of this comedy
suggests, it is also of the Jonsonian school, slightly adapted to
accord with changing fashions in the theatre. Furrs, for ex-
ample, the old gentleman always wrapped up for fear of catch-
ing cold, is a palpable modification of Morose with his dislike
of noise and, like him, furnishes excellent comic material.^ On
the other hand, his illegitimate daughter, the innocent Dameris,
who is country bred but instructed in worldly wisdom by crafty
Mistress Hood, savors far more of the Restoration ingenue
than of the preceding era. It is true that we do not see her
actually employing feminine arts, save for the simple " I have
seen nothing Sir, but the Paradise in Shoo-lane";^ yet her
1 Theatrical Records, p. 75 ; and Walpole's Catalogue, ed. Park, III, 192, n.
2 February i and 2, 1 688-1 689.
' As when his proposed rival strips off the coverings and hales him out
under a pump. * P- 33.
146 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
old schoolmistress's advice foreshadows such characters as
Miss Prue and Miss Hoyden. Courtly and Emilia are com-
monplace lovers, while Sir Anthony Altalk, who lives up to
his surname, falls into line with many another loquacious
" pretender."
What originality and interest there are in the play rest on
the main plot concerning Colonel Boldman and the widow.
Lady Pleasant. This story of feigned madness is only a frame-
work for strange conceits and fantastic poems, but its essence
is that used by Congreve for the Angelica- Valentine portion
of Love for Love. The later dramatist too is almost as obscure
as Newcastle in regard to " whys " and '" wherefores." Such a
lack of motivation and the fact that what explanation is vouch-
safed occurs after the event, centres the attention not on the
persons but on their peculiar actions. This procedure causes
a loss in dramatic effect, but the low order of entertainment
that results is successful for a time if the surprises are made
striking enough. Boldman's disregard for all women is upset
by his swift capitulation to the Widow, and her subsequent
floutings at his assumed powder and perfume give cause for
the lover's insanity, which becomes even more diverting. The
Colonel's threats to haunt Lady Pleasant and his lunatic
attempts to square a circle are followed by the scene in which
he gazes at his loved one through a perspective glass, as though
he were at Calais and she on Dover Cliff. Finally the maid
Tatle describes how the madman attempted to climb up a chim-
ney and was pulled down, only to escape from surveillance
again, an adventure which explains his extraordinary tirade : ^
In my Loves despair I fell
Down to that Furnace we call Hell :
The first strange thing that I did mark
Was many fires, and yet 't was dark :
1 Pp. 47-48.
*'OUR ENGLISH M^XENAS " I47
Instead of costly Arras there
The walls poor sooty hangings were ;
Spirits went about each Room
With pans of sulphur for perfume :
Sod tender Ladies in a pot
For broths, and jellies they had got ;
The spits were loaded with poor sinners
That Devils wasted for their dinners ;
While some were drying damned souls,
Others made rashers on the coals :
The waiting Women they did stew.
That robb'd their Ladies of their due :
Gammons of Us'rers down were taken.
That hung i' th' chimney for their bacon :
Here Lawyers bak'd in Ovens stand,
For couzening Clients of their Land :
In throngs where new-come sinners stood,
A Reverend Lady lost her hood :
A Chamber-maid cry'd out, alas,
A Devil had broke her Looking-glass ;
A Merchant cry'd, burnt was his Stuff,
A City Wife did singe her Muff :
A Purchaser did howling cry
Alas, his Deeds and Seals did fry :
A Courtier lost his Perriwig,
A Hector lost his looking big :
Of Whoremasters, there was great store
Who pleaded, they'd been burnt before :
The Drunkards that were in the rout.
At last did piss the fires out :
Hell being spoil'd I came away.
And sinners now make holy day.
As a corollary to this astounding document may be noted
the conceit of an aerial banquet to which the madman invites
Lady Pleasant : ^
Unto a Feast I will invite thee.
Where various dishes shall delight thee ;
1 Pp. 51-52-
148 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
The steeming vapours drawn up hot
From Earth, that 's Nature porridge-pot
Shall be our broth ; we '1 drink my dear
The thinner air for our small beer ;
And if thou lik'st it not, I 'le call aloud,
And make our Butler broach a cloud ;
Of paler Planets, for thy sake,
White-pots, and trembling Custards make ;
The twinkling stars shall to our wish
Make a Grand Salad in a dish ;
Snow for our sugar shall not fail
Fine candied ice, comfits of hail ;
For Oranges gilt clouds we '1 squeeze,
The milkie way we '1 turn to cheese ;
Sun-beams we '1 catch, shall stand in place
Of hotter Ginger, Nutmegs, Mace ;
Sun-setting Clouds for Roses sweet,
And Violet skies strow'd for our feet ;
The Sphears shall for our Musick play,
While Spirits dance the time away ;
When we drink healths, Jove shall be proud
Th' old Cannoneer to fire a Cloud,
That all the Gods may know our mirth,
And trembling Mortals too on earth ;
And when our Feasting shall be done
I 'le lead thee up hill to the Sun,
And place thee there that thy eyes may
Add greater lustre to the day.
The conclusion of the affair between these " humorous
lovers " turns the tables in a carefully planned surprise end-
ing. When the Widow is at last reduced to tears by Bold-
man's continued ravings, it transpires that she has been the
victim of a plot hatched by the others against her unreason-
able and unnecessary contempt for the Colonel. They are
united of course, none the less, but other, more unlooked-for
occurrences take place. Furrs marries not Mistress Hood, as
one would expect, but Tatle, while the schoolmistress contents
herself with James, Master Furrs 's manservant. Sir Anthony
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 149
is beguiled into wedding the penniless Dameris on the sup-
position that she is her father's heir, in the manner we have
seen Newcastle employing so frequently throughout his earlier
dramas. There can be little doubt that this comedy is, like
The Variety, largely, if not entirely, his own work. It shows
the constant use of Surprise for Suspense so common with
the inexperienced playwright ; it is composed for the most
part of humors, eccentricities, and conceits ; and it contains
at least one Cavalier lyric,
I love the fat, I love the fair,
The lean, that 's nimble full of air ; ^
written in the same strain as those of The Variety.
Finally, the masque in Act III ^ may well be the work of
Cavendish, for whom Ben Jonson had long before written two
similar entertainments. After the Restoration that form of
diversion was held outworn and in small esteem, so that any
author incorporating it in his play unmistakably characterized
himself as a contemporary of the first Charles. Thus it was
that the Duke, reverting to the pleasures of his youth, intro-
duced a masque, with the professed purpose of weaving an
enchantment around Boldman but really to bring in Cupid
and Venus, their songs and dances. The Colonel is repre-
sented by a lay figure, into which the deities of Love stick
poisoned arrows ; but somewhat livelier is an antimasque of
the Winds, who appear with bellows to plague old Master
Furrs. This divertisement has no organic right to exist, nor
is it justified by any beautiful, if unnecessary, adornment asso-
ciated therewith ; indeed, it is merely a dim reflection of more
spacious and more distant glories. Greater genius than that
of Newcastle would have been needed to revive interest in
the masque, at a court where stately pleasures were no longer
1 P. 2. 2 Pp. 28-32.
I50 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
the mode, so that naturally the lesser man met with neglect
and derision. Except for Pepys's reference and the partial
Langbaine's mild comment that " this Play equals most Com-
edies of this Age," the work seems to have passed at once
into oblivion. After reading The Humoroics Lovers, one can
hardly wonder.
Perhaps because of the comparative failure of his unassisted
production, Newcastle shortly after took to collaboration again,
this time with the dominant figure in Restoration literature.
On August 1 6, 1667, Sir Martin Mar-all ; or The Feign d
Innocence was originally acted, the author being unnamed,
although the play was entered at Stationers' Hall as by
Cavendish. There is no doubt that the nobleman was in some
way connected with it, for Pepys, who attended the first per-
formance and who was generally well up on theatrical gossip,
calls it, "a play made by my Lord Duke of Newcastle, but,
as every body says, corrected by Dry den." The next year it
was published anonymously, but a reprint of 1691 definitely
attributes it to the greater writer, ^ whom every subsequent
copy names as the author. Downes in his Roscius Anglicanus,
or an Historical Reviezv of the Stage 1660-IJO6, dated in
1708, furnishes the most specific external evidence we have,
asserting that Newcastle gave Mr. Dryden^ "a bare Transla-
tion of it, out of a Comedy of the famous French Poet,
Monsieur Moleiro : He Adopted the Part purposely for the
Mouth of Mr. Nokes and curiously Polishing the whole." The
Duke, it will be remembered, had his works on horsemanship
turned into French by some one else, but no doubt he knew that
language well enough to translate Moliere ; residence abroad
could not have failed to perfect his youthful accomplishment.
1 This reprint is part of the 1695 edition of Dryden's works. In the Scott-
Saintsbury edition and elsewhere the independent edition of 1697 is men-
tioned as being the first to have Dryden's name.
2 Reprint of 1886, p. 28.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 151
If Downes's assertion is correct, it definitely limits the
amount of Newcastle's participation in Sir Martin, since a
very small proportion of that play comes direct from L'Etourdi.
Even what does derive from it is radically changed,^ for in
Dryden the heroine Millisent marries not her blundering suitor,
but Warner, his clever servant. Quinault's LAmant Indiscret
furnishes a large share of Acts I and II, and the adapter's
own invention is responsible for much new material. Dryden
must be held the inventor of that famous scene in which
Sir Martin pretends to play upon his lute and — a much
graver charge — of the entire "' Feigned Innocence " story with
all its objectionable features. The final result was most satis-
factory, as the extreme popularity of this piece testified. After
its premiere at the Duke of York's Theatre (probably given
here at the request of Newcastle, for Dryden was employed
by the other house), it ran thirty-two nights and had more
than four performances at court.^ Pepys saw it seven or eight
times and records with an ever-increasing crescendo of enthu-
siasm : "It is the most entire piece of mirth, a complete
farce from one end to the other, that certainly was ever writ.
I never laughed so in all my life. I laughed till my head
ached all the evening and night with the laughing ; and at
very good wit therein, not fooling";^ and again, "saw 'Sir
Martin Marr-all,' which the more I see, the more I like." ^ De-
spite its coarseness, this play is by far the most amusing of
Dryden's comedies, the humor is by no means contemptible,
and it must act capitally. Even if Downes's account of the
collaboration is rejected, Newcastle's share in it shrinks to
a minimum, as the Duke shows nowhere a particle of the
dramatic skill employed in the construction of Sir Martin
^ L. Albrecht's Dryden's ^^ Sir Martin Mar-all" in Bezug auf seine Quellen^
Rostock, 1906. ^ August 16, 1667.
2 Downes, Reprint of 1886, p. 31. * April 25, 1668.
152 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Mar-all, much less any ability to write pointed and animated
dialogue. What is more, Newcastle has already been found
with Shirley's work masquerading under his name, and it will
later be seen that he also received literary assistance from
Shadwell. In the case under consideration Dryden was to
father his comedy on Newcastle, but the truth gradually leaked
out and after the nobleman's death there was no reason why
its rightful authorship should be concealed. The ethics of
such a substitution presumably troubled neither party to it,
in a day when literature was merely an adjunct of society ;
but time, as so often, has set the matter right, rendering
honor to whom honor is due.
That this arrangement may have rested upon a pecuniary
basis seems quite likely, for the very next year, 1668, Dryden
brought out An Evening s Love ; or, The Mock Astrologer. It
was soon printed, with a dedication ^ to Newcastle ^ owning
" my great obligations to your grace," and revealing Dryden's
marked tendency to crook the pregnant hinges of the knee.
Yet it is written as only Dryden in his day knew how to write,
in such fluent and well-rounded prose as was never addressed
to Newcastle by any other hand. Smoothly and felicitously it
reviews the course of the Duke's life :
I As you came into the world with all the advantages of a noble birth
and education, so you have rendered both yet more conspicuous by
your virtue. Fortune, indeed, has perpetually crowned your under-
takings with success, but she has only waited on your valour, not
conducted it. She has ministered to your glory like a slave, and has
been led in triumph by it ; or, at most, while honour led you by the
hand to greatness, fortune only followed to keep you from sliding
back in the ascent. That, which Plutarch accounted her favour to
1 Scott-Saintsbury Dryden, III, 229-236.
2 In speaking of the fact in his " Life of Dryden," Dr. Johnson moralizes after
this fashion : " It is unpleasing to think how many names, once celebrated, are
since forgotten. Of Newcastle's works nothing is now known but his Treatise
on Horsemanship." — Lives of the Poets, ed. Waugh, II, 141.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 153
Cymon and Lucullus, was but her justice to your grace ; and, never to
have been overcome where you led in person, as it was more than
Hannibal could boast, so it was all that Providence could do for that
party, which it had resolved to ruin. Thus, my lord, the last smiles
of victory were on your arms ; and everywhere else declaring for the
rebels, she seemed to suspend herself, and to doubt, before she took
her flight, whether she were able wholly to abandon that cause, for
which you fought.
But the greatest trials of your courage and constancy were yet to
come : Many had ventured their fortunes, and exposed their lives to
the utmost dangers for their king and country, who ended their loy-
alty with the war ; and, submitting to the iniquity of the times, chose
rather to redeem their former plenty, by acknowledging an usurper,
than to suffer with an unprofitable fidelity (as those meaner spirits
called it) for their lawful sovereign. But, as I dare not accuse so
many of our nobility, who were content to accept their patrimonies
from the clemency of the conqueror, and to retain only a secret ven-
eration for their prince, amidst the open worship which they were
forced to pay to the usurper, who had dethroned him ; so, I hope, I
may have leave to extol that virtue which acted more generously ; and
which was not satisfied with an inward devotion to monarchy, but pro-
duced itself to view, and asserted the cause by open martyrdom. Of
these rare patterns of loyalty, your grace was chief : Those examples
you could not find, you made. Some few Catos there were with you,
whose invincible resolution could not be conquered by that usurping
Caesar. Your virtue opposed itself to his fortune, and overcame it, by
not submitting to it. The last and most difficult enterprise he had
to effect, when he had conquered three nations, was to subdue your
spirit ; and he died weary of that war, and unable to finish it.
In the meantime, you lived more happily in your exile, than the other
on his throne. Your loyalty made you friends and servants amongst
foreigners; and you lived plentifully without a fortune ; for you lived on
your own desert and reputation. The glorious name of the valiant and
faithful Newcastle was a patrimony which could never be exhausted.
Thus, my lord, the morning of your life was clear and calm ; and
though it was afterwards overcast, yet, in that general storm, you
were never without a shelter. And now you are happily arrived to
the evening of a day, as serene as the dawn of it was glorious ; but
such an evening as, I hope, and almost prophesy, is far from night :
'Tis the evening of a summer's sun, which keeps the day-light long
within the skies.
154 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
There is more in the same manner, further classical allusions,
some flattery addressed to the Duchess, with a final word on
Newcastle's patronage of former and better poets :
But, though all of them have surpassed me in the scene, there is one
part of glory, in which I will not yield to any of them : I mean, my
lord, that honour and veneration which they had for you in their
lives ; and which I preserve after them, more holily than the vestal
fires were maintained from age to age ; but with a greater degree of
heat, and of devotion, than theirs, as being with more respect and
passion than they ever were,
Your Grace's
Most obliged, most humble,
and most obedient Servant,
John Dryden
With such prose as this for a criterion, it is no wonder that
its author found Thomas Shadwell's frequent addresses to the
Duke and Duchess awkward and inflated. Once he scathingly
refers to his enemy as " the Northern dedicator," ^ and again,
in the satiric lines of Flecknoe's advice to his successor,
writes with utter contempt : ^
And when false flowers of rhetoric thou wouldst cull,
Trust nature ; do not labour to be dull,
But write thy best, and top ; and, in each line.
Sir Formal's ^ oratory will be thine :
Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,
And does thy northern dedications fill.
The first of these dedications was that to The Stdleit Lovers:
or, The Impertinents, printed in 1668, but Shadwell had evi-
dently received favors from Welbeck already, for after expa-
tiating on Newcastle's courage and wit he continues : " Those
Excellencies, as well as the great Obligations I have had the
1 Vindication of the Duke of Guise, Scott-Saintsbury, VII, l8o.
2 Mac-Flecknoe, lines 165-17 1. See Scott-Saintsbury, X, 455.
^ Sir Formal Trifle is a florid and conceited orator in The Virtuoso, by
Shadwell.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 155
Honour to receive from your Grace, are the Occasion of this
Dedication." This experiment resulted so well for the honest
author that in 1671 we find him offering The Humourists to
the Duchess :
The favourable Reception, my Impertinents found from Your Excel-
lent Lord, and my Noble Patron, and the great Mercy, Your Grace
has for all Offenders of this kind, have made me presume humbly
to lay this Comedy at Your Feet. . . . You have not been content
only to surmount all Your own Sex in the excellent Qualities of a
Lady and a Wife ; but you must overcome all ours in Wit and Under-
standing. All our Sex have reason to envy You, and Your own to be
proud of You, which by You have obtained an absolute Victory over
us. It were a vain Thing in me to Endeavour to commend those ex-
cellent Pieces that have fallen from your Grace's Pen, since all the World
does. And this is not intended for a Panegyrick, but a Dedication.
Quite as obsequious is the address to Newcastle before
Epsom Wells, acted in 1672 and printed the following year,
in which he calls his patron " the only Maecenas of our Age ;
I am sure, the only one I can boast of. You are He, who still
preserves and maintains the Magnificence and Grandeur of
our ancient Nobility ; and being one that 's truly great in Mind
as well as Fortune, you take Delight in rewarding and encour-
aging of Art and Wit : And while others detract from Poetry,
or at least neglect it, your Grace not only encourages it by
your great Example, but protects it too. Welbeck is indeed
the only Place, where the best Poets can find a good Recep-
tion." "The Epistle Dedicatory" to The Virtuoso (1676) is
largely a defense and explanation of the Jonsonian humors
exemplified in that play : " When I shew'd your Grace some
part of this Comedy at Welbeck, being all that I had then
written of it, you were pleased to express your great liking for
it, which was a sufficient Encouragement for me to proceed in
it ; and when I had finished it, to lay it humbly at your Feet."
These two "sons of Ben" agreed so well in literary matters
156 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
that it is not remarkable they got on admirably in more
personal ways. Something of their relationship is to be dis-
covered in " hasty " ^ Shadwell's fifth and last '' northern
dedication," that to The Libertine, also of 1676 :
So vast was your Bounty to me, as to find me out in my Obscurity,
and oblige me several Years before you saw me at Welbeck; where
(when I arrived) I found a Respect so extreamly above the Mean-
ness of my Condition, that I still received it with Blushes, having
nothing to recommend me, (but the Birth and Education, without the
Fortune, of a Gentleman) besides some Writings of mine, which your
Grace was pleased to like. . . .
Then (by the great Honour I had to be so daily admitted into
your Grace's publick and private Conversation,) I observed that ad-
mirable Experience and Judgment surmounting all the Old, and the
Vigorousness of Wit, and Smartness of Expression, exceeding all the
Young I ever knew ; and not only in sharp and apt Replies, the most
excellent Way of pursuing a Discourse ; but (which is much more
difficult) by giving easie and unforced Occasions, the most admirable
Way of beginning one; and all this adapted to Men of all Circum-
stances and Conditions : Your Grace being able to discourse with
every Man in his own way ; which, as it shews you to be a most accu-
rate Observer of all Mens Tempers, so it shews your Excellency in
all their Arts. But when I had the Favour daily to be admitted at your
Grace's more retir'd Conversation, when I alone enjoyed the Honour,
I must declare, I never spent my Hours with that Pleasure or Improve-
ment ; nor shall I ever enough acknowledge that, and the rest of the
Honours done me by your Grace, as much above my Condition
as my Merit.
A year or two before these last dedications, which imme-
diately preceded Newcastle's death, the Duke brought out his
last drama, The Triumphant Widow, or the Medley of
Humours^ but not without marked aid from his latest proteg6.
Langbaine^ puts the shoe on the other foot and accepts facts
^ The epithet is Rochester's. See An Allusion to the Tenth Satire of the
First Book of Horace, line 43.
2 This play was, like The Humorous Lovers, published in 1677.
8 P. 387.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 157
at their face value, when he writes : " This was thought so
excellent a Play by our present Laureat [i.e. Shadwell], that he
has transcrib'd a great deal of it in his Bjiry Fair." There can
be no doubt of that, for Sir John Noddy, "an arch wag, a
coxcomb full of monkey-tricks," ^ is taken over exactly in Sir
Humphry of the same name. Many of their practical jokes are
identical, as the striking away a cane upon which some one
is leaning,^ the pushing another gentleman into a " plash" of
water,^ and tying an unsuspecting victim to his chair or to a
companion.^ Then there is the word-play on rabbit (raw-bit !),
goose, and woodcock, with the dinner story of a doctor of
divinity, whose wife used to entertain him with three dishes
every day, "bitter, pout, and tart." The effect of telhng this
tale was to make the ladies " tihee " under their napkins, and
the te-hee catching one old lady as she was drinking, "she
squirted the beer out of her nose, as an Indian does tobacco."^
Both the Noddies become embroiled in comic duels as well,
so that it is quite evident that this portion of Bury Fair
came straight from The Triumphant Widow. But there
are other considerations.
Each play has a number of incidents which do not appear
in the other, although all seem much of a piece. In New-
castle's comedy Sir John pulls off the Justice's periwig,^ pushes
down a servant carrying dishes,'^ and narrates how he made
some other man sit on a hot stone ; ^ the additional puns are
upon " plaice," " owl," " gull," " about " (a bout), and on cheese,
not from Cheshire, but Windsor, " because it is near Eaton." ^
Btiry Fair shows us Sir Humphry tweaking the pseudo Count's
^ Dramatis Personge.
2 Triumphant Widow, Act II ; and Bury Fair, Act III.
^ Triunipha?it Widoiv, Act I.
* Triumphant Widow, Act V ; and Bury Fair, Act I.
^ Triumphant Widozu, Act III; and Bii?y Fair, Act III.
« Act II. 7 Act III. 8 Act II. 9 Act III.
158 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
nose,i cudgelling the impostor,^ and pluming himself on having
" twirled another fellow's hat over a little river, that was not
navigable ; and he was forced to go a mile about to fetch it." ^
The comic dialogue turns on a wainscot's being weak because
" the weakest goes to the wall," a window mutinous " for 'tis
full of quarrels," a looking-glass ill-natured "because it makes
reflections," and a day scabby "because the sun's broken
out."^ Such humor is of a very low order, but it runs in
much the same vein throughout and appears indisputably to
be the work of a single hand. When one remembers that
Bury Fair was not brought upon the stage until 1689, thir-
teen years after Newcastle's death, that nowhere in the Duke's
other writings is there this strong tendency towards knock-
about farce, and that at the time of The Tnumphmit Widow s
production the nobleman had Shadwell for an intimate depend-
ent, Firth's conclusion that the real author of this portion
of the play " was only reclaiming his own property " ^ be-
comes very nearly a certainty. That, too, is quite in accord
with Newcastle's habit of engaging silent partners in his
dramatic labors.
What share each playwright had in the remainder of the
piece is not so easy to determine. The low-life scenes among
assorted servants, one of them a military cook,^ may be attrib-
uted to the Duke, if only for their similarity to his portion
of The Lady Contemplation. In this work by the Duchess,
Newcastle furnishes the encounters between Mall Mean-bred
and various gentlemen from town,'^ who promise more than
they are willing to perform. She later berates Sir Golden
Riches after this fashion : ^
1 Act III. * Act III.
* Act IV. 6 Firth, Introduction, p. xix.
8 Act I. « Pp. 27, 46-48.
' Part I, Scenes xvii, xx, xxiv, and Part II, Scenes xxv, xxxv.
8 Flayes, 1662, pp. 245-246.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 159
As I am a true woman which he knows I am, I never had more
than this white fustion wastecoat and three pence to buy me three
pennyworth of pins, for he would allow me no incle to tie it withal,
and this old stamel petticoat, that was his great Grandmother's in
Eighty eight . . . and the garters he talks of were lists of cloth,
which a Taylor gave me for my New-years-gift.
Certainly this is in the same manner as Gervas's gift to Cicely
in The Triumphant Widoiv of^ "a white Fustian Wastcoat,
and a brave Stamel Petticoat regarded with black Velvet " or
the billingsgate between James and Margery, in which he
describes her mother ^ "with a Petticoat of more patches than
one can number, indented at the bottom and so short, I saw
up to her old cruel Garters with her stockings of three colours,
three stories high, with Incle about her Hat, knitting at the
Gate for an Alms," Lady Haughty, the widow, seems to owe
something to Newcastle's influence also, for, although a lady
courted by many suitors is not a distinctive creation, it is
unusual for her to accept none of them in the end and to con-
tinue "triumphant." Yet this was an ideal very common in
the Duchess's theoretical plays, which her husband may well
have taken over for actual stage presentation.^ Its originality
will not carry alone, and a complete lack of psychological
analysis leaves the main plot very dull indeed.
Of Lady Haughty's admirers, foolish Justice Spoilwit and
Colonel Bounce have little individuality, the Colonel's raison
d'etre being chiefly to furnish a mate for Isabella, the widow's
witty kinswoman. We have already seen that Sir John Noddy
is a creation of Shadwell's, but his tricked marriage to the
maid Nan in Act V is the old device of which Newcastle
appears to have been so fond that he introduces it at least
once into each of his dramas. This time the victim is told he
1 Act I, p. 4. 2 Act IV, p. 64.
8 Compare also Lady Haughty's objections to her suitors, pp. 8-12, with the
refusal of various wooers in the Duchess's Fublick Wooing (Playes, 1662).
l6o THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
should be satisfied, for " her father was a Gentleman, your's
an Ironmonger at London ; her's was ruin'd by Loyalty, as
your's was raised by Rebellion." A similar Cavalier ring is
found in a wooing song of Noddy's, which the Duke probably
inserted, though it is not probable that he composed it :
I dote, I dote, but am a Sot to show it,
I was a very Fool to let her know it,
For now she doth so cunning grow,
She proves a friend worse than a foe.
She '1 neither hold me fast nor let me go ;
She tells me I cannot forsake her.
When straight I endeavour to leave her,
She to make me stay
Throws a kiss in my way :
O then I could tarry for ever.
But good Madam Fickle be faithful,
And leave off your damnable dodging,
Either love me or leave me.
And do not deceive me,
But let me go home to my Lodging.
The first ten lines had appeared as the first stanza of an
anonymous song, The Drtcnkett Lover. J. D. Delight, in Wit
Res tor d, 1658, while the last five occur in its seventh stanza.^
The Bag ford Ballads'^ attributes this entire performance to
Newcastle, but it is more likely that he already knew the
longer version and made use of certain snatches from it.
Such slight differences as do exist in the two forms would
be almost inevitable after oral transmission had taken place,
and The Drunken Lover was in existence fifteen years before
The Trinmphajit Widow.
The most striking character in this play is Footpad, a rogue,
whose song on his first appearance sounds the keynote of his
personality : ^
1 Pp. 165-168.
2 II, 514-515. It is reprinted here, and the various other appearances of
it noted ; the title is given as " The Lover's Mad Fits." ^ P. 3.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " i6i
Since e'ry Profession 's become a lewd Cheat,
And the little, like fish, are devour'd by the great ;
Since all Mankind use to rob one another ;
Since the Son robs the Father, the Brother, the Brother ;
Since all sorts of men such Villains will be
When all the world plays the Rogue, why should not we ?
We see him thereafter as a peddler singing hke Autolycus,
" Come Maids, what is it that you lack ? " ^ as a fortune-telling
and pocket-picking gypsy,^ as a fiddler,^ and finally as a
crippled beggar.^ His clever attempts to escape detection are
successful in arousing the reader's sluggish interest, while
his ultimate capture seems thrilling in comparison with the
greater part of this comedy. The lucky Constable with his
" Mr. Matthew Mattical " and " Geogrecum " learning adds
not a little to a scene, which ends almost climactically with
Footpad's line, " I have had a merry life, though a short one."
In the last act he is brought to the gallows amidst a question-
ing, babbling populace, so vividly depicted that perhaps the
author drew it from life. The realism in this scene resembles
that employed upon the three pairs of servants, and these
passages may all be the work of Newcastle, — that is the
only hope for the Duke's artistic reputation as a dramatist.
Footpad makes a speech to the people, saying he is a me-
mento mori to them and admitting quite candidly his regret
that he cannot escape. His reprieve comes just in the nick of
time, and, though the assembled throng feels cheated of its
legitimate pleasure, the audience is completely reconciled to
a pardon for this fascinating but unprincipled rascal.
It remains to consider two other characters, Codshead, "a
coxcomb," and his friend Crambo, "an heroick poet," whose
humors have their place in the medley. With them we come
1 Act I. 8 Act III.
2 Act II. * Act IV.
l62 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
upon further unmistakable traces of Shadwell, and this time
Og is revealed by no less a person than Doeg, his companion
in infamy. It seems strange that Elkanah Settle, who in 1682
was to be pilloried with Shadwell by the arch-satirist Dryden,
should in 1675 have been an object of their joint animosity.
The main facts about the case are as follows : ^ In 1673 young
Settle's popular play The Empress of Morocco was published,
with a sneering reference to the failure of Dryden's Assigna-
tion ; the following year this provoked a reply entitled Notes
and Observations on the E^npress of Morocco. Shadwell and
Crowne assisted Dryden with the pamphlet, and in their turn
were mentioned in Settle's answering defense. Shadwell, to
whom were ascribed many of the strictures on the fourth act,
was let off very easily as,^ " The Authour of Epsom-Wells,
that has Wit if he can keep it." Nevertheless Og's enmity
seems rather increased than diminished thereafter, for soon
Settle complains after this fashion : ^
And yet so much Civility had only this effect upon him, Having a
Play, call'd the Triumphant Widow, given him to bring into the
Duke's Play-house, he spitefully foists in a Scene of his owrn into the
Play, and makes a silly Heroick Poet in it, speak the very words he
had heard me say, and made reflexions on some of the very Lines
he had so sencelessly prated on before in his Notes. And the reason
he gives for this scurrilous Language in his Preface to the Libertine,
was, that I had abused him in a Postscript to Love and Revenge,
which if I had done, had been but just after his ill usage in that
Triumphant Widow.
Love and Revenge was printed in 1675 with the malicious
postscript, which does not appear in the 1674 manuscript ver-
sion.^ This reference, then, firmly dates Newcastle's play and
as surely proves that Shadwell had a hand in its composition.
1 F. C. Brown's Elkanah Settle, His Life and Works, pp. 50-61.
'^ " The Preface to the Reader," prefixed to Ibrahim, the Illustrious Bassa.
2 Ibid. * Harleian Ms. dgoj. See Brown, p. 60.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 163
Specific citations from The Empress of Morocco do not,
however, occur in the pubhshed version of the Duke's comedy,
possibly because discretion prevented a printed hbel when
the spoken word had been found to give offense. Nor can we
identify Settle's "very words," if indeed the interpolated scene
be present in any form. Yet Crambo's entire character sug-
gests satire at once, so that with a hint such as "heroically
mad " ^ Elkanah gives us, he is himself revealed as the object
of this ridicule. The absurdities inherent in an abstract heroic
poet necessarily react upon the most prominent of that genus,
and Shadwell's hostility towards Settle has already been noticed.
Despite a lack of particular evidence, there can be little doubt
that the Crambo-Codshead portion of The Triumphant Widow
is only one more attack made by the future laureate upon
his unfortunate enemy. Crambo rails against dull or common
similes, against oaths, curses, and petty affectations,^ but he is
easily put to confusion by his inamorata, the witty Isabella.^
The poet says that when his lady came out of doors, "the
Garden smiled, and put on a fresh Verdure," whereupon she
tries to disconcert him by replying, " It seems the Garden is
merrily disposed." He is so stupid that he cannot make one
quibble when all the others are punning madly,^ and he steals
with avidity Codshead's similes ^ that breath is like a heavenly
dew and teeth like " Oriental Pearls, or Twin Lambs newly
shorn." The heroic tendency towards rhetorical questions and
elaborately costumed dances is burlesqued,^ and Crambo sets
forth a translation which was to do duty again in Bury Fair?
The Latin ^
Mittitur in disco mihi piscis ab Archiepisco —
Po non ponatur, quia potus non mihi datur
^ Absalom and Achitophel, Part II, line 417. ^ P-44-
2 Act I. « Act V.
^ Pp. 22-23. ^ •^'-t ^-
* Pp. 37-38- ' P- 82.
1 64 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
is notably rendered
Here in a Dish
Is sent me some fish
By the Archbish,
Hop was not there,
Because he sent me no Beer.
The poet also writes a scene ^ with which his friend Cods-
head is to woo the Widow, composing both the suitor's pro-
testations and the lady's answers. But after she is compared
to a lily, instead of replying,
Your Phrases make my modesty to blush,
her prosaic remark is, " Methinks I do not look so very pale
as a Lily, though I confess I am very pale." Consequently
the following lines beginning.
Then you appear like the new budded Rose,
fall rather fiat, and afterwards matters go from bad to worse.
When, about this time. Crambo is taken sick because of his
fustian and heroic couplets, the Doctor is at a loss how to
cure him. 2 Various ancients and moderns are proposed as
remedies, but Shakespeare has too much wit, while " Fletcher
and Beaumont have so much of the Spanish Perfume of
Romances and Novels."^ As was unavoidable in a play by
two loyal sons of Ben, Jonson's works finally perform the
miracle, for although Crambo reviles that author as dull and
without wit, '" he was the Honour of his Nation, and the Poet
of Poets." ^ The Doctor's charm, which aids in effecting the
recovery, hints again at plagiarism and has a word or two in
definition of the true poet that are not without their significant
relation to Newcastle's own life : ^
1 Pp. 61-63. 8 p. 60. 5 p 72.
2Pp. S9-6i. *P.6i.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 165
Ye Gods this Poet now restore,
Or else he never will write more ;
Him with Poetick flames inspire,
And give him a Celestial fire.
Give him fresh Fancies, new, unknown,
Ne're let him write but what 's his own.
A Poet is not made, but born,
All helps of reading he should scorn,
Ne're vexes Authors, but will look
On the whole World, that is his Book.
Let him not here languishing lye.
Restore him now, or let him dye.
Cavendish certainly never troubled books, but neither unfortu-
nately was he born with a poetical genius. Nor does his work-
manship on The Triumphant Widow demand any important
place for him in the memory of after ages.
The Duke's share in the quarrel between Shadwell and
Settle did not terminate with the production of his play. In
1675, as we have seen, Elkanah brought out the tragedy of
Love mid Revenge, adding a violent postscript to attack his
enemy and dedicating the whole to Newcastle :
That so worthless a Present to so Eminent a Person, is a piece of
Arrogance, I am as Conscious as I am that your Grace has Goodness
to Pardon it ; for if sins of Presumption could not be forgiven, the
punishment of offences would put a restraint on Virtue, and make
Mercy one of the noblest Ornaments of Greatness a Stranger to it;
and at that rate a Patron would be as confined as a Judge, who at the
same time he is a Kings Representative and presides over Justice, is
a Slave to it ; whilst his Sentence is but the voyce of Law, & his
Favour or Cruelty not voluntary, but prescribed.
The stock adulation here offered is almost identical with that
Brome prefixed to his Sparagus Garden, but in spirit these
two dedications are as far apart as the poles. Brome, who had
already obtained favor, is almost jocular in tone ; Settle, a man
of another sort, humbly fawns for the bone that has not yet
l66 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
been cast to him. The chances are that he ultimately received
it, although the Duke was by this time on intimate terms with
Shadwell. That author, it will be remembered, offered two
plays to his patron during the next year and prefixed to one.
The Libertine, still further abuse aimed at Settle. Newcastle,
however, was of an easy-going disposition and he may have
tried to ride both horses at once ; besides, he was an old man
now, caring little for the fiery disputes of youth. At any rate,
when Ibrahim was published in 1676 and Settle took a final
fling at his enemy, he deposed that "he [Shadwell] has not
laboured only to blast my Plays, but made it his study by all
interest and subtilty, with all the scandalous Aspersions he
could invent to mine me in the esteem of that Honourable
Family, whose smiles, though with more zeal than Merit, above
all my other interest in the World I study to preserve. Yet
methinks he might have had so much Wit in his anger, or at
least as much good Manners, as not to have thought so meanly
of Persons of such Worth and Honour as to imagine their
Favours could be alienated by Malice or their Judgements
byass'd by Villany.''^ The "Honourable Family" was presum-
ably the Cavendishes, who in the person of Newcastle must
have shown continued impartiality to both contestants.
On Christmas Day of the same year, 1676, the Loyal
Duke's long life came to an end amid these petty bickerings
of Restoration poetasters. He whose literary associations had
begun with the towering personality of father Ben had lived
to witness momentous changes in England's artistic atmos-
phere. He had seen the philosophy of Hobbes form, expand,
and fall away, until the stage was nearly set for the appear-
ance of John Locke. He had seen the portraits of Van Dyck
give place to Sir Peter Lely's artful imitations of them. He
had seen the long rich stream of Elizabethan drama reach its
1 Preface to Ibrahim.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 167
end in Ford, Shirley, and Brome, and the rise of a new order
in the work of Davenant and Shadwell, Settle and Dryden.
He had known the lyrics of Suckling and Waller ; he had been
cosmopolitan enough to patronize the foreign men of science,
Descartes and Gassendi. To each he offered the hand of
friendship and assistance ; each voices grateful affection for
their common patron. If Newcastle was not deep or strong
in character, he was broad and catholic in his interests, and
that basically explains his position in history. He was not a
great general, but he was a noble gentleman ; and he truly appre-
ciated the fine arts, if he was too weak to be a creator in them.
He was too sincere to be called a dilettante, too superficial to
make an imprint on his age, but too influential to be com-
pletely forgotten. He is remembered not for what he did
himself, but for his association with the lives of others.
It is not to be wondered at that, in his position as Maecenas,
Newcastle tried his own hand at literature of many kinds, nor
that in the drama he collaborated with his proteges, Shirley,
Dryden, and Shadwell. When the work of these men is dis-
counted, very little remains to the Duke's credit ; a complete
lack of sense for situation and dialogue, a palpable ignorance
of his audience, and a smug self-satisfaction are the most
striking features. He begins his career with the ultra-didactic
attitude of Ben Jonson, at the same time often deliberately
pandering to his public. This is a course frequently adopted
by professed moralists, who must lure an audience to their
plays before it is worth while to commence a sermon. The
extreme view of popularized drama is stated in an Epilogue
to The Triufnphant Widow :
'T is not the Poet with celestial fire,
Nor all the Muses that can him inspire
To write well, 't is in you the power is had,
'T is as you make it either good or bad.
1 68 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
But the author who follows Horace's advice and " miscuit utile
dulci " ^ is likely to find, unless he be as uncompromisingly-
ethical as Jonson, that the pleasant soon drives out the greater
part of the useful — at least that was the case in Restoration
drama, and Newcastle seems to have proved no exception to
the rule. For him, however, catering to the public taste brought
little popularity in his own time, while it must serve now to
heap further critical opprobrium upon him.
Yet Cavendish had a certain skill in realistically picturing
such scenes as he saw among the common people, whether it
were his own servants or the country folk dwelling near at hand.
Combined with that aptitude was a more or less uneven lyric
gift, which he shared with many of his contemporaries. Some-
times he produced as fine a piece as the serenade in The
Variety, again his muse brought forth the unpublished dog-
gerel cited by Mr. Strong. In sum and substance Newcastle's
specifically literary accomplishments amounted to little, and
one can understand how the author of The Session of the
Poets'^ made him base his claim to eminence on the Duchess's
writings. Rochester, if it was he, coarsely writes to the tune
of Cock Laurel:"^
Newcastle and 's Horse for entrance next strives,
Well stuff'd was his Cloakbag, & so was his Breeches.
And unbutt'ning the place where Nature's Posset-maker lives,
Pulled out his Wife's Poems, Plays, Essays & Speeches.
Whoop, quoth Apollo, what a Devil have we here,
Put up thy Wife's Trumpery, good noble Marquiss,
And home again, home again, take thy Career,
To provide her fresh Straw, and a Chamber that dark is.
In less professedly artistic ways Newcastle accomplished far
more. His books on horsemanship have gained their place
among our standard works, but his political writings are too
1 Ars Poetica, line 343. ' Poems on Affairs 0/ State, I, 206-21 1. • P. 209.
"OUR ENGLISH M^CENAS " 169
slightly known. Numerous proclamations and dispatches, the
letter of advice to Prince Charles, and above all the " Little
Book " deserve a wider, more general reputation. Many of the
Duke's ideas on government are to be found in the last part
of the Life, but to get a full and final statement of them one
must study his address to the King. It has already been sug-
gested that this document is a masterpiece in little, a clean-
cut if roughly formed work of the utmost importance to phi-
losophers, to historians, or to artists. For a man who tries to
combine the functions of all three and would worm himself
close to the life of a bygone day, who would strive to obtain
a cross-section view of seventeenth-century England, to feel its
pulsing vitality surge now as it did three hundred years ago,
Newcastle's manuscript is invaluable. It takes hold of things
at their roots, and whereas more imaginative forms of literature
may reveal a nation's manners, morals, and general atmosphere
with greater beauty or more skill, this little treatise, in criti-
cizing past history, interprets present conditions from that
economic standpoint which is at the basis of all human
society. Nor can the hand of an art-lover be concealed in its
workmanship, where proportion, balance, and specific incident
usurp the place of the scientist's dry statistics. Newcastle has
small right to literary fame, but his " Little Book " assures
him of one permanent memorial.
Not, however, as a creator but as a patron is the Duke
chiefly important. The length and breadth of his career have
been sufficiently discussed to prove Langbaine's comparison of
him to Maecenas not absurd. Like the Roman, Newcastle
was actively interested in affairs of state ; like him he wrote
with rather poor success, while like him his main function
was to assist and stimulate more talented artists. Both men
were absolutely sincere, which explains the great affection
each kindled among his followers, since it is not easy to care
I70 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
for one's condescending benefactor. Maecenas had the more
definite ideal, for to him hterature must be used to upbuild the
government and it is doubtful whether Newcastle had any such
ulterior motive. He assisted artists because he was genuinely
interested in them and their work; giving such assistance was
one of the unnecessary pleasures as essential to him as life
itself. But in gathering about him these authors the Duke
produced a larger effect than he dreamed of ; in fact he was
exerting a decided influence upon the rising tide of patronage.
In the Elizabethan days, to be sure, there had been noblemen
interested in letters : the Earl of Leicester, who befriended
Spenser and Ascham ; the Earl of Southampton, eternally
immortalized by his connection with Shakespeare ; Sir Philip
Sidney ; and William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke. These,
however, were rather the exception than the rule, so that the
supply was greatly surpassed by the ever-increasing demand
made by professional writers under the Renaissance revival.^
It was not until the seventeenth century that almost every
courtier came to have his proteges. Then there set in that
leech-like condition of successful authorship, which Swift ridi-
culed so keenly in 1 704 when he dedicated The Tale of a
Tub to "His Royal Highness, Prince Posterity," but which
was to continue until Dr. Johnson sounded its death knell by
his letter to Lord Chesterfield in 1755. Among the men
responsible for the rapid growth of this system none was more
influential than Newcastle. His connection with the artistic
world, extending from 161 7 to 1676, roughly sixty years, his
position in politics and his inclination, all helped to make him
a vital factor in shaping the course of English literary history.
His influence may not have been an elevating one, yet he is a
figure to be reckoned with, a moving force in the literature
of his day and generation.
1 Phoebe Sheavyn in Tke Liiera?y Profession in the Elizabethan Age, pp. 9-38.
CHAPTER III
THE MINOR WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS
I
POEMS AND PSEUDO-SCIENCE (1653-1668)
The Duke of Newcastle's importance in literary history is,
as we have seen, not dependent on his original productions,
but the Duchess gains her importance chiefly by virtue of the
books she wrote. Their value, however, does not consist in
form or contents, but in the mere fact that they exist. Easily
the best is her Life of William, Cavendishe, which has already
been sufficiently discussed to show that, in spite of a vivid fic-
tional tendency, its success is largely fortuitous, its scheme es-
sentially haphazard. What then shall be said for the Duchess's
other works ? Plays, poems, scientific treatises, letters, orations,
fantasies, they present a bewildering array of documents, as
extended as it is various.^ When the numerous volumes con-
taining them have been read and thoroughly digested, it must
be admitted that little of permanent interest is to be found
there. Yet one needs to remember that masterpieces have
seldom been produced by a pioneer and that Margaret Caven-
dish was one of the first English women seriously to under-
take written composition. Until the seventeenth century had
run half its course, an authoress in print was a practically
unknown phenomenon, although between 1650 and 1700 more
1 John Nichols in the notes to his Select Collection of Poems, 1780-1782,
Vol. IV, p. 353, says that the manuscripts of the Duchess were given to her
husband's college (St. John's, Cambridge), where they were to be found in
good order.
171
1/2 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
than one talented woman entered the profession of literature.
Mrs, Aphra Behn and " the matchless Orinda " share with the
Duchess the distinction of being the first of their sex to attract
notice by published works. Each of the three had a distinct
and sharply defined personality, each came to her career by a
different approach, but all together mark a common tendency,
the growing importance of women and specifically their entrance
into the world of letters.
The development of this tendency, whether consciously
or not, was largely through French influence, to which the
Duchess was particularly subjected. In 1644, at the age of
twenty-one, she had accompanied Henrietta Maria to France,
living at Paris during four impressionable years, and after
that, as we have seen in Chapter I, residing nearly as long
in the Low Countries. This continental atmosphere must
have had its effect on the girl, since in 1649 she commenced
her first mature work. At any rate that appears to be the
date, for in an " Epistle to her Braine," prefixed to Philo-
sophical Fancies, appears the following verse : ^
For seven yeares 't is, since I have married bin.
This line must have been written in 1652, and near the close
of the same volume she gives the reader further information
as to times and seasons : ^
I begun a booke about three years since, which I intend to name
The IVorld^s Olio, and when I come into Flanders, where those
papers are, I will (if God give me life and health) finish it, and send
it forth in print.
This places the Duchess's earliest extant production in 1649,^
two years before Mrs. Philips's first published poems * and four
1 Walpole's Catalogue, ed. Park, III, 153.
2 Ibid., Ill, 154.
^ " I writ most part of it before I went into England." — A True Relation,
Firth, p. 170. * The article on Katherine Philips in Diet. Nat. Biog.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 173
previous to her own public appearance as a writer. In 1653 ^
she brought out the Poems a)id Fancies,'^ which was composed
under the circumstances described in an introductory epistle,
"To the Reader" :3
If any do read this Book of mine, pray be not too severe in your
Censures. For first I have no children to imploy my Care, and at-
tendance on ; And my Lords Estate being taken away, had nothing
for Housewifery or thrifty Industry to imploy my selfe in. . . . Thirdly,
you are to spare your severe Censures, I having not so many yeares
1 Though dated so the book may have been out by 1652, for under that
date was written, " Upon y<^ La Margaret Marchioness of Newcastle her rare
poems new come forth." See Hist. Mss. Comm., lo Rep., App., IV, p. 47.
2 " In the British Museum is a copy of the Poems and Fancies with ms.
notes by the authoress which are mentioned in the catalogue, but are neither
many, nor curious, they occasionally inform us, these lines my lord writ." —
Dyce's Speciviens of British Poetesses, pp. 89-90. Originally there seems to
have been prefixed a portrait by Diepenbeck, representing the authoress
seated " before a table on a balcony ; four cupids above her head hold up the
folds of a curtain, and prepare to crown her with a laurel wreath; a tablet
below is inscribed with the following verses :
Studious She is and all Alone
Most visitants, when She has none,
Her Library on which She looks
It is her Head, her Thoughts, her Books
Scominge dead Ashes without fire
For her owne Flames doe her Inspire."
See Grolier Club Collections and Notes. Wither to Prior, I, 136. In some
copies this plate is lacking, and in some, other portraits have been inserted.
On the fly-leaf of a copy in Mr. Henry E. Huntington's library, the Earl of
Westmoreland has written a poem of eighteen lines ending,
The Stile, the Method & the phrase
Doe heighten soe the Authoress' prayse
That I should too iniurious be
To cast into such Treasury
For all the Graces heer are mett
To make a Pearle of Margeret.
^ The Duchess does not profess great ability in poetry, " for though I am a
poetess, yet I am but a poetastress, or a petty poetess, but howsoever, I am a
legitimate poetical child of nature, and though my poems, which are the body
of the poetical soul, are not so beautiful and pleasing as the rest of her poeti-
cal childrens bodies are, yet I am nevertheless her child, although but a
hxovin&V — C CXI Sociable Letters, Letter CXLVI.
174 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
of Experience, as will make me a Gariand to Crowne my Head ; onely
I have had so much time, as to gather a little Poesie to stick upon
my Breast. Lastly, the time I have been writing them, hath not been
very long, but since I came into England, being eight Yeares out, and
nine Months in ; and of these nine Months, onely some Houres in the
Day, or rather in the Night. For my Rest being broke with discon-
tented Thoughts, because I was from my Lord, and Husband, know-
ing him to be in great Wants, and my selfe in the same Condition ;
to divert them, I strove to turne the Stream, yet shunning the muddy
and foule waies of Vice, I went to the Well of Helicon and by the
Wells side, I have sat, and wrote this Worke.
The volume is appropriately dedicated to Sir Charles Caven-
dish, who, we know, was her companion in England, but there
are also introductory letters, "To All Noble, and Worthy
Ladies," "To Mistris Toppe," i "To Naturall Philosophers,"
and not a few verses which set forth the authoress's trepida-
tion about publishing. The last begs that the reader
Condemne me not for making such a coyle
About my Book, alas it is my Childe.
Just like a Bird, when her Young are in Nest,
Goes in, and out, and hops and takes no Rest ;
But when their Young are fiedg'd, their heads out peep,
Lord what a chirping does the Old one keep.^
The first division of this book deals with physics, or, in the
phrase of that day, "natural philosophy." It is chiefly impor-
tant as marking the Duchess's earliest statement of her original
scientific system, which is not science at all, but fancy, pure
and simple. Its form of rhymed, almost jingled, couplets
seems strongly reminiscent of the gnomic verses and mock
epitaphs in the Hesperides, and it is probable that Herrick's
poetry was well known to her. However, the Duchess is for
the most part so occupied with her thought that she takes little
1 Her waiting maid (Firth, p. 46). She is "Lady Toppe " in the third
edition, 1668.
2 " An Excuse for so much writ upon my Verses."
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 175
pains in expressing it, and once or twice she even relapses
into prose the better to explain her idea.^ Still, an occasional
approach to poetic feeling appears in her writing ; witness
" Of Shadow and Echo " : ^
A Shadow fell in love with the bright Light,
Which makes her walke perpetually in her sight
And when He 's absent, then poore Soule she dyes,
But when He shewes himselfe, her Life revives.
She sister is to Eccho loud, and cleere
Whose voice is heard, but no Body appeare :
She hates to see, or shew her selfe to men,
Unless Narcissus could live once agen.
Near the end of each part occurs a strange heading, " The
Claspe," which seems meant to connect what goes before with
that which follows. Her first Clasp begins with these astonish-
ing lines, describing the throes of composition,
When I did write this Booke, I took great paines.
For I did walke, and thinke, and break my Braines ;
and continues with an application of arithmetical laws to the
passions. How this relates natural to moral philosophy may
have been known to the Duchess, but it seems singularly
obscure to us Philistines. At any rate her second division
consists chiefly of "Dialogues" or Debates, — between man
and nature, earth and cold, joy and discretion, wit and beauty,
and "betwixt an Oake and a Man cutting him downe," with
many other like discussions. One wonders if that " between
a Bountifull Knight and a Castle ruin'd in War " was occa-
sioned by knowledge of Bolsover's condition, for the castle
bewails its plight as follows :
^ P. 20, n., and just before " Of Elements." Also " A Circle Squar'd in
Prose (Note : Because my Lines are too long for my Rhimes, therefore I put
them in Prose)."
2 Of this poem Southey writes, " Never was fancy more poetically con-
ceived or unpoetically expressed." — Common-place Book., 4th Series, p. 334.
176 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Where every Feild, like Gardens, is inclos'd,
Where fresh green Grasse, and yellow Cowslips grow'd
There did I see fat Sheep in Pastures go,
Hearing the Cowes, whose bags were full, to low
By Wars am now destroy'd, all Rights o'repowr'd
Beauty, and Innocency are devoured.
Quite the best of all these colloquies is " A Dialogue of
Birds," 1 which has never been reprinted but deserves to be
known for its sympathetic description of nature. The different
birds lament how badly man treats them but explain that
Nature should receive no blame :
For Love is Natures chiefest Law in Mind,
Hate but an Accident from Love we find.
Tis true. Self- Preservation is the chiefe,
But Luxury to Nature is a Theefe.
Such a benevolent statement of the struggle for existence is
hardly typical of the seventeenth century or those Hobbesian
principles that underlay it, but it clearly reveals the Duchess's
innate goodness. So does that delightful picture she draws of
the birds' nest-building and their return home at night :
But none did labour like the little Wren,
To build her Nest, to hatch her young Ones in.
She laies more Eggs than all the rest.
And with much Art doth build her Nest.
The younger sort made love, and kiss'd each others Bill
The Cock would catch some Flies to give his Mistress still
The Yellow hammer cried, tis wet, tis wet,
For it vnll raine before the Sun doth set.
Taking their Flight, as each Mind thought it best,
Some fled abroad, and some home to their Nest.
Then did they stretch their Wings to flye fast home
And as like Men, from Market home they come,
Set out alone, but every Mile adds some :
1 Pp. 70-7 5.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 177
Untill a Troop of Neighbours get together,
So do a flight of Birds in Sun-shine weather.
When they their wings had prun'd and young ones fed,
Sate gossipping before they went to Bed.
Let us a Carroll, said the Black-bird, sing,
Before we go to Bed this fine evening.
The Thrushes, Linnets, Finches, all took parts,
A Harmony by Nature, not by Arts.
But all their Songs were Hymnes to God on high,
Praising his Name, blessing his Majesty.
And when they askt for Gifts, to God did pray.
He would be pleas'd to give them a faire day.
At last they drowsie grew, and heavie were to sleep.
And then instead of singing cried, Peep, Peep,
Thus went to rest each Head, under each wing.
For Sleep brings Peace to every living thing.
More famous is the " Dialogue between Melancholy and
Mirth," which gave rise to a lively description of the Duchess
in The Connoissetir} In what purports to be a vision, certain
female poets undertake to ride Pegasus, beginning in the
order of their seniority :
Upon this a lady advanced ; who, though she had something rather
extravagant in her air and deportment, yet had a noble presence, that
commanded at once awe and admiration. She was dressed in an old-
fashioned habit, very fantastic, and trimmed with bugles and points ;
such as was worn in the time of king Charles the First. This lady, I
was informed was the duchess of Newcastle. When she came to mount,
she sprung into the saddle with surprising agility and giving an entire
loose to the reins, Pegasus directly set up a gallop and ran away with
her quite out of sight. However, it was acknowledged, that she kept
a firm seat, even when the horse went at his deepest rate ; and that
she wanted nothing but to ride with a curb-bridle. When she came to
dismount, Shakspeare and Milton very kindly offered their hand to
help her down, which she accepted. Then Euterpe came up to her
with a smile, and begged her to repeat those beautiful lines against
1 No. LXIX for Thursday, May 22, 1775.
178 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
melancholy, which (she said) were so extremely picturesque. The
duchess, with a most pleasing air immediately began. . ,
Dull Melancholy . . .
She '11 make you start at ev'ry noise you hear,
And visions strange shall to your eyes appear.
Her voice is low, and gives an hollow sound ;
She hates the light, and is in darkness found ;
Or sits by blinking lamps, or tapers small,
Which various shadows make against the wall.
She loves nought else but noise which discord makes.
As croaking frogs, whose dwelling is in lakes ;
The raven hoarse, the mandrake's hollow groan ;
And shrieking owls, that fly i' th' night alone ;
The tolling bell, which for the dead rings out ;
A mill, where rushing waters run about.
She loves to walk in the still moon-shine night,
And in a thick dark grove she takes delight :
In hollow caves, thatch'd houses, and low cells,
She loves to live, and there alone she dwells.
There leave her to herself alone to dwell.
While you and I in mirth and pleasure swell. ^
All the while that these lines were repeating, Milton seemed very
attentive ; and it was whispered by some, that he was obliged for
many of the thoughts in his L' Allegro and // Penseroso to this
lady's Dialogue between Mirth and Melancholy.
As a matter of fact, Milton's lyrics were written twenty years
before the Duchess's, but the error has often been repeated ^
or ignored.
Following the "Dialogues" come "Moral Discourses," on
love, pride, ambition, humility, and other abstractions. "' Of
the Ant " shows minute observation of that insect's cooperative
faculty, likening its community to the Lacedaemonians', where
^ Leigh Hunt says there are some "very good lines" in this poem. See
Meti, Women, arid Books, H, loi.
2 Notably by D'Israeli in his Curiosities of Literature, where he writes that
her "verses have been imitated by Milton," ed. 1833, II, 61, from "A
Literary Wife." Kippis in his edition of Biographia Britannica, III, 341, " be-
lieves " this connection to be groundless; and cf. Rhys, Everyman edition of
the Life, p. xxii.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 179
everything was held in common. The next Clasp voices a
sentiment of pretty frequent occurrence in the Duchess's work :
Give me a Stile that Nature frames, not Art ;
For Art doth seem to take the Pedants part.
The formlessness of her book is seen by the immediate succes-
sion of "The Hunting of the Hare," ^ in which poor Wat's
ultimate end is lamented in a most astonishingly humanitarian
way, and " The Hunting of the Stag,"^ with its catalogue of
trees, which extends for some twenty lines. Of the latter verses
Edmund Waller is said to have " declared that he would give
all his own compositions to have written them ; and being
charged with the exorbitance of his adulation answered that
' nothing was too much to be given, that a Lady might be
saved from the disgrace of such a vile performance.' " ^ This
Clasp is completed by "Of an Island,"
Where Grasse growes up even to the Belly high,
Where Beasts, that chew their Cud, in Pleasure Lye,
and by " The Ruine of the Island " after the people became so
proud that they threw down the altars of their gods. Through-
out her work, fantastic and romantic as it is, the Duchess
never lets one entirely forget the unhappy state of England
and of its nobility.
The third division in Poems and Fancies is headed " To
Poets " and is composed of similes, wherein death becomes
likened to Nature's cook, the head to a barrel of wine, the
ipp. 110-113. 2 Pp. II •^_i 16.
3 Johnson's "Life of Waller," in Lives of the Poets, ed. Waugh, II, 50. Two
satiric lines written on the fly-leaf of Waller's copy of Philosophical and
Physical Opinions, 1663, may also be by that poet:
New Castles in the air this Lady builds.
While nonsense with Philosophy she guilds.
The volume containing this couplet is now owned by Mr. Henry E. Huntington
of New York City.
i8o THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
tongue to a wheel, and many another odd conceit appears such
as was possible only because of the Elizabethan tradition. One
passage compares " the Sea to Meadowes, and Pastures, the
Marriners to Shepheards, the Mast to a Maypole, Fishes to
Beasts," and, as though that mixture of metaphors were not
enough, a marginal note informs us that " the Ship is taken
for a Horse." The most interesting poems in this section
are two which come at the beginning and which illustrate
certain literary doctrines held by our authoress. One states the
importance of originality, and it is very fitting that the Duchess,
who gains her place in literature by that virtue, should place so
much emphasis upon it :
There 's None should Places have in Fames high Court,
But those that first do win Invention's Fort:
Not Messengers, that onely make Report.
The other hits at what she considers the common error of
paying too little attention to substance and too much to the
form of its expression :
Most of our moderne writers now a days
Consider not the fancy but the phrase :
As if fine words were wit or one should say
A woman 's handsome, if her clothes be gay :
Regarding not what beauty 's in the face,
Nor what proportion doth the body grace ;
" Fantasmes Masque " occupies the following Clasp. It is
supposed to take place in the brain and under the guise of
a ship's voyage narrates Margaret Lucas's wanderings. Her
setting forth, the haven of refuge in France, the union with a
noble lord, her subsequent poverty and expedition to the North
would leave no room for doubt as to this identification, even
if it were not for the couplet.
But when the Stormes of Dangers all were past,
Upon the Coast of it was cast.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS i8l
When the authoress was writing in England she did not know
on what shore her future lot would fall, but in the 1664 revi-
sion of her book the word " Flanders " is inserted to fill that
blank. The next part, "To all Writing Ladies," is mainly
given over to verses on the Queen of Fairies. The Duchess
wonders that people should not believe these little creatures
exist, " for Nature can as well make small bodies, as great,
and thin bodies as well as thicke. We may as well thinke
there is no Aire, because we do not see it." ^
There are four poems devoted to this subject : " The Fairy
Queen," " The Pastime and Recreation of the Queen of Fairies
in Fairyland," " The Pastime of the Queen of Fairies, when
she comes upon the Earth out of the Center," and " Her de-
scending downe." Naturally these themes give full play to the
Duchess's fancy, but the subject is not an original one. More-
over, echoes of Herrick and Shakespeare are well-nigh inevita-
ble in any work patterned upon theirs. The Newcastle fairies,
like Herrick's Oberon, eat off a mushroom table,^ feast on ants'
eggs,^ and have a palace illuminated by glowworms' eyes.*
The Duchess names her queen Mab, as Mercutio does, and
both mention the royal chariot's being made from a nutshell.^
Most striking parallel of all is the account of Hobgoblin's
pranks when compared with Puck's in A Midsummer- Nigh f s
Dreamt In every case the lady proves inferior to her
1 " To the Readers Concerning Fairies."
2 Hesperides, No. 294, line 7 ; and " Pastime and Recreation."
2 Hesperides, No. 294, line 3 ; and " Pastime and Recreation."
* Hesperides, No. 444, line 7 ; and " Pastime and Recreation."
^ Romeo ajid Juliet, I, 4 ; and " Pastime and Recreation."
^ Act II, scene i; and "Pastime of the Queen of Fairies." This and
other passages from A Midsummer Nighfs Dream are imitated in Drayton's
Nymphidia and in The Pranks of Puck. See notes to Rolfe's edition of the
play. Drayton was a connecting link in the fairy tradition but does not seem
to have had any direct influence on Margaret, in spite of the Cambridge His-
tory, IV, 193 ; the windows of his palace are made from cats' eyes and his
queen's chariot is the shell of a snail.
1 82 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
predecessors, as was to be expected; only in an "Epilogue"
to the series does she attain real novelty and real charm,
mingled with a most gracious account of her relations with
Newcastle's brother :
Sir Charles unto my chamber coming in,
When I was writing of my Fairy Queen ;
I pray, said he, when Queen Mab you do see
Present my service to her Majesty ;
And tell her I have heard Fame's loud report
Both of her beauty and her stately court.
When I Queen Mab within my fancy viewed,^
My thoughts bowed low, fearing I should be rude ;
Kissing her garment thin which fancy made,
Kneeling upon a thought, like one that prayed ;
In whispers soft, I did present
His humble service which in mirth was sent ;
Thus by imagination I have been
In Fairy court and seen the Fairy Queen.
For why, imagination runs about
In every place, yet none can trace it out.^
The following Clasp nearly spoils this fairy poetry by trying
to relate it to the Duchess's scientific system of atoms which
are at war within the human body. That brings in an "Epistle
to Souldiers " and introduces a section occupied with battles,
varying from one between courage and prudence to one be-
tween King Oberon and the Pygmies. These martial themes
1 Compare a stanza formerly supposed to be by John Donne, but now
ascribed to Sir John Harington {Cambridge History, IV, 209). Of his lady-love
he writes : g^ absence this good means I gain
That I can catch her,
Where none can watch her,
In some close comer of my brain ;
There I embrace and kiss her
And so enjoy her, and none miss her.
2 M. fimile Montegut with a truly Gallic point of view imagines that this
epilogue reveals a secret love the Duchess felt for her brother-in-law. See La
Duchesse et le Due de Newcastle, pp. 222-323.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 183
are appropriately succeeded by "A Register of Mournfull
Verses," that is, a series of laments without any special pur-
pose or unity. Appended to the poems is a prose treatise of
twelve pages 1 entitled "The Animall Parliament," where the
soul, the thoughts, and the body take order for the preser-
vation of their world. There are various complaints lodged
concerning abuses in ears, eyebrows, teeth, and stomach, but
the chief grievance is "that the Puritans and Roman Priests
cut downe all the stately and thick woods of Haire, as there
is almost none left grown to build ships of ornament with . . .
besides the prodigall effeminate Sex burns it up with Iron
workes, or breaks it off at the rootes, in making traps for
Lovers." Indeed, the Duchess seems to lay much censure
upon the dictates of fashion, which, as we shall see, she her-
self refused to follow.
The last three pages in this volume ^ are composed of sev-
eral short pieces, setting forth some of the authoress's main
hobbies. There is a prose as well as a verse statement that
expression of one's thought is not so important as the thought
itself, with a very frank confession of her own delinquencies
in rhyme and metre. There is comment upon the prevalence
of backbiting criticism, and a final word deals with the Duke's
excellences, this time in connection with literature :
A Poet I am neither born nor bred,
But to a witty poet married :
Whose brain is fresh and pleasant as the Spring,
Where Fancies grow and where the Muses sing.
There oft I lean my head, and list'ning, harke,
To heare his words and all his fancies mark :
And from that garden Flowers of Fancies take
Whereof a posie up in verse I make.
Thus I, that have no garden of my own,
There gather flowers that are newly blowne.
1 Pp. 199-2 H. 2 pp 211-214.
1 84 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Newcastle certainly reciprocated, for in the second edition
(1664) 1 he addressed a panegyric to his wife, which after com-
paring her in favorable terms with Spenser, Jonson, Fletcher,
and Shakespeare, not to mention Van Dyck, modestly concludes,
I thought to Praise you, but alas, my Way
To yours, is Night unto a Glorious Day.'^
An added note in the earlier edition declares, " Reader, I
have a little Tract of Philosophicall Fancies in Prose, which
will not be long before it appear in the World." This was
not, however, the first work on the subject that the Duchess
had written. In an "Introductory Epistle" to the Life she
placidly records that '" it pleased God to command his serv-
ant Nature to indue me with a poetical and philosophical
genius, even from my birth ; for I did write some books in
that kind, before I was twelve years of age, which for want
of good method and order, I would never divulge." ^ And in
another place : *
You desired me to send you the Sixteen Books I Writ in my Child-
hood; methinks they sound like the Twelve Labours of Hercules,
only that there are Four Labours more ... In my Sixteen Books is
Sense and No Sense, Knowledge and Ignorance, Mingled together,
so that you will not know what to make of it ; or in a Lower Com-
parison, you will find every Book like a Frippery, or Brokers-shop,
wherein is nothing but Remnants, Bits and Ends of Several things,
or Uke Taylors Shreds, that are not fit for any Use ; wherefore I can-
not Imagine why you should Desire them, unless out of a Friendship,
you will See, and Bum them before I Die, fearing I should Neglect
1 There was a third issue in 1668 under the transformed title of " Poems or
Several Fancies in Verse : with the Animal Parliament, in Prose."
2 Clarendon writes to Newcastle on May 30, 1653, that he has diligently
studied " my ladyes booke " (probably the Poems and Fancies) " and could not
have believed ... so many tearmes of arte, and such expressyons proper to
all sciences and to all kinds of learninge could have flowed from a person
unskilled in any but our mother tongue, which is now made much more
copyous than it was." — Calendar of Clarendon Papers, II, 209.
8 Firth, p.xxxvi. * C CXI Sociable Letters, Letter CXXXI.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 185
the Sacrificing of them my self, for you are Pleased not only to send
for One, but all the Sixteen. But, I suppose, you believe them to
be so many several sheets of Paper folded into Quarters, or Half
Quarters, as into little Baby-books, for it was in my Baby-years I
writ them, and it had been well they had been no Bigger than Baby-
Books, but the least of these Books are two or three Quires of
Paper ; Neither can you Read them when you have them, unless you
have the Art or Gift to Read Unknown Letters, for the Letters are
not only Unlegible, but each Letter stands so Cowardly from th' other,
as all the Lines of your Sight cannot Draw, or Bring them into Words.'^
. . . Moreover there are such huge Blots as I may Similize them
to Broad Seas or Vast Mountains . . . Also there are Long, Hard
Scratches, which will be as Bad for your Eyes, as Long, Stony
Lanes would be to your Feet ; wherefore let me persuade you as Your
Friend, not Desperately to Venture to Read them, since you can
neither receive Profit nor Pleasure in the Labour.
The World's Olio, her first fully developed work, contains
some few opinions on physics,^ which were first published
as Part I of Poems and Fancies, to be rearranged but not
materially altered in 1664. As the authoress asserts in pro-
testing their originality, " though the Opinion of Atoms is as
Old as from the Time of Epicnrns, yet my Conceptions of
their Figures, Creating and Disposing are New, and my Own." ^
She goes on to say that she felt the world could not be made
^ " You might think I had been bound to the Profession of a Scrivener
not to Write an Intelligible Hand, but to make Wast Paper, for they being
paid for the most part by the Sheets and not by the Letters, put as few Letters
in a Sheet of Paper as subtilly as they can, leaving a Large Space betwixt
every Line, and they make their Letters as Big, and Broad as they may, as
not to misshape them, also with Large and Long Flourishing Scratches." —
CCXI Sociable Letters, Letter CXXXIV.
^ Marvell in the Last Ifistructions to a Pahiter writes :
Paint then again her Highness to the life
Philosopher beyond Newcastle's wife.
See The Muses' Library, Satires, p. 22.
8 "Another Epistle to the Reader," prefixed to the 1663 edition of Philo-
sophical and Physical Opinions. Compare " Thats an old opinion of Atomes,
say some, witnesse Democrates and many others." — " An Epistle to Justifie the
Lady Newcastle" prefixed to Philosophical and Physical Opinions, 1655.
1 86 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
of atoms unless each one had Hfe and knowledge, yet all must
be under some mightier force, called God, or there would
be confusion amongst them. How this idea tended to subor-
dinate the conception of atoms is further explained in the
same context :
But my Opinion of Atoms, in my Book of Poems is, if the Infinite
and Eternal Matter be Atoms, that those Figures of Atoms, which I
there mention, as Round, Square, Long, Triangular, Pointed and all
other Figures, are part of those Figures which make Air, Fire, Water
and Earth, and how they are Disposed in the Creation of Animals,
Vegetables and Minerals ; also that the Weight and Quantity of each
Atom must be Alike, for if every Atom be so small as in Nature it
can be, then the Weight and Quantity of each Atom must be Alike,
all which I treat of in my Book of Poems ; but by reason it is in
Verse, it is not so Clearly or Solidly Expressed, as I might have done
it in Prose ; besides it was the First of my Works that I Divulged,
being Printed in the Year 1653, in which Year also I caused to be
Printed the first Edition of my Philosophical and Physical Opinions,
but since that time I have thought more of it, and could give Better
Reasons concerning Atoms than I could then, having since Spent the
most of my Time in Contemplations ; but now I Wave the Old Opinion
of Atoms, for it is not probable, they should be the Cause of such
Effects as are in Nature, and it seemeth not so Clearly to my Reason
as these my Own and Absolutely New Opinions of Natural Philosophy.
The 1653 edition of Philosophical and Physical Opinions,
to which allusion is here made, coincides with the " little tract
of Philosophicall Fancies " promised at the end of Poems and
Fancies. It was composed in 1652 and published on May 21
of the next year as Philosophicall fancies, written by the
Rt. Hon. the Lady Newcastle,^ but in its revision two years
later was known by the longer title. Before 1655 the Duchess
had already returned to Flanders,^ and accordingly her husband
introduced the reprint by a laudatory poem, with "An Epistle
To justifie the Lady Newcastle, and Truth against falshood,
1 Catalogue of the British Museum.
2 A True Eelatiofi, Firth, p. 170.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 187
laying those false, and malicious aspersions of her, that she
was not Author of her Books." The wonder of a woman as
writer may have caused these doubts, for otherwise it is diffi-
cult to understand how she could be considered a plagiarist.
All her writings, whether pseudo-scientific or professedly imagi-
native, are so fantastic and individual as to be indisputably
her own invention.^ Nevertheless the Duchess was much dis-
turbed by adverse criticism, especially that directed against
her originality, and herself wrote a lengthy address, " To the
Reader," repudiating these charges. There are numerous other
introductions set before the work and a dedication " ' To the
Two Universities," as they ought to encourage any idealistic
movement for the emancipation of women, " lest in time we
should grow irrational idiots ... for we are kept like birds in
cages to hop up and down in our houses, not suffered to fly
abroad to see the several changes of fortune, and the vari-
ous humours, ordained and created by nature ; thus wanting
the experiences of nature, we must needs want the under-
standing and knowledge and so consequently prudence, and
invention of men." ^
The difference in emphasis between Part I of Poems arid
Fancies and Philosophical and Physical Opinions may be seen
at a glance ; for the earlier interest centers in what kinds of
atoms compose diverse elements,
The Square flat Atomes as dull Earth appeare,
The Atomes Round do make the Water cleere.
The Long streight Atomes like to Arrowes fly,
^ Rhys (p. xviii) supposes " she had read and pondered " Hobbes's De-
cameron Physiologicum, which did not appear until 1678, five years after her
death. If Hobbes's basic theory of motion, as fully expounded in his De
Corpore (Latin Works, Vol. I), did have any influence on the Duchess, it was
of the slightest, and entirely unknown to herself. Even so, her imaginative
extension of this germinal principle justifies her claim to originality.
2 " To the Two Universities."
1 88 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Mount next the points and make the Aiery Skie ;
The Sharpest Atomes do into Fire turne,
Which by their piercing quality they burne.^
In the later book the first heading is "Of Matter and Motion,"
which, directed by figure, form Nature. Matter is infinite,
the Duchess claims, and its changed form is only motion,
external or internal, working upon it : ^
Motions do work according as they finde
Matter that 's fit and proper for each kinde.
All of which are possible improbabilities accounting for the
never-ending, inexplicable mystery of life. It should be borne
in mind, here, at the outset of any discussion concerning the
Duchess's scientific views, that there is nothing essentially
impossible about them, for they do not run counter to estab-
lished principles. At the same time they are not in the least
scientific, because they are not based upon observation and
experimentation ; their connection with recorded fact is of the
slightest and comes entirely from second-hand experience.^
The Duke in common with many men of his day felt a genu-
ine interest in scientific investigation, but the feminine mind
of his wife could grasp only the external trappings of such
research. For this lack of rational power she unconsciously
substituted an overactive imagination but wisely did not dis-
pute what had been already established by proof. Instead, she
began where others left off, and, her fancy soaring above
1 " The four principall figur'd Atomes make the foure Elements as Square,
Round, Long and Sharpe," in Poems and Fancies, Part I.
2 " Of the Working of several Motions of Nature," § 32 in Philosophical
and Physical Opinions, 1655.
8 It is illuminating to compare the Duchess's lack of scientific procedure
with Francis Bacon's superfluity of it. In the second book of the Novum
Orgaiium he exemplifies his methods in proving a thesis not unallied to the
Duchess's : that heat is a special case of motion. Even so much particularity
in such a limited field, however, did not attain the whole truth and nothing
but the truth. See Works of Bacon, ed. Spedding, Ellis, and Heath, I, 225-365.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 189
mundane things, attempted to pierce beyond human knowledge.
Her system does not explain the laws that govern our being,
nor does it offer a solution for the problem of existence. It
chooses a middle course, in professing to reveal the machinery
by which God rules his universe.
Part II of Philosophical and Physical Opinions treats " Of
Fortune," that is to say of Nature, with renewed emphasis
on the subject of motions : attraction, contraction, retention,
and the like. Part III continues in the same strain to show
how motion may change one element into another, without
any intrinsic shift of matter. Now the Duchess is so near
scientific truth as to assert that colors are broken lines of
light from the sun ; ^ and again, she fantastically declares
that tides are due to the extension of individual drops in the
ocean.^ '" Of the Motion of the Bodie," Part IV, explains
the two kinds of movable innate matter, rational and sensi-
tive, standing for mind and body respectively. The last part,
"The Natural Wars in Animal Figures," takes up various
diseases^ on the basis of those unnatural motions that are
supposed to cause them and suggests remedies calculated to
restore a normal condition in the human system. Thus con-
sumptions are said to be the result of unnatural expulsions ; ^
palsies, of supernatural extenuation of the nerves ; ^ pain in
general, of cross or jumbling motions.^ Finally, the impor-
tance of a proper correspondence between outward objects
and inward motions, whether sensitive or rational, is insisted
upon as necessary for all health and sanity.'^
1 § 120. 2 §§ 127-128.
3 " But would you know how we know the great Mystery of these Physical
terms, I am almost ashamed to tell you ; not that we have been ever sickly,
but by Melancholy often supposed ourselves to have such diseases as we
have not." — Newcastle's " Epistle to Justifie the Lady Newcastle," prefixed
to Philosophical and Physical Opinions, 1655.
* § 191. 5 § 193. 6 § 171. 7 |§ 204-206.
I90 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Then at the end of this strange book its author definitely
states that all her ideas are merely the working out of infinite
deity in terms of infinite matter and motion. Section 210,
"The Diatical Centers," is an expression of the Duchess's
broad, if vague, religious belief, summed up in the last
sentence :
And though nature is infinite matter, motion and figure creating all
things out of its self, for of matter they are made, and by motion they
are formed into several and particular figures, yet this Deity orders
and disposes of all natures works.
This creed is further formulated in a rhymed address to the
Divinity :
Great God, from Thee all infinites do flow ;
And by thy power from thence effects do grow ;
Thou orderest all degrees of matter, just
As tis thy will and pleasure move it must.
And by thy knowledge order'st all the best,
For in thy knowledge doth thy wisdom rest ;
And wisdom cannot order things amiss,
For where disorder is, no wisdom is.
Besides, great God, thy will is just, for why?
Thy will still on thy wisdom doth rely.
O pardon Lord, for what, I now hear speak
Upon a guesse my knowledge is but weak ;
But thou hast made such creatures as mankinde
And gav'st them somthing which we cal a mind,
Alwayes in motion, never quiet lies
Untill the figure, of his body dies,
His several thoughts, which several motions are
Do raise up love, hope, joyes, doubts and fear ;
As love doth raise up hope, so fear doth doubt
Which makes him seek to find the great God out :
Selflove doth make him seek to finde, if he
Came from, or shall last to eternity.
But motion being slow, makes knowledge weak,
And then his thoughts 'gainst ignorance doth beat,
As fluid waters 'gainst hard rocks do flow,
Break their soft streams, and so they backward go :
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 191
Just so do thoughts, and then they backward sUde,
Unto the place, where first they did abide ;
And there in gentle murmurs, do complain,
That all their care and labour is in vain ;
But since none knows, the great Creator must,
Man seek no more, but in his greatness trust.
The same thought occurs in '" An Epistle to the Reader "
prefixed to the 1663 revision of this book, in condemning any-
presumptuous attempt to prove there is a God :
Men cannot Prove, what they cannot possibly know, for God hath
not given any one Creature nor All Creatures, were they Joyned into
One, a Sufficiency to Know him, and since God is so much Above
Nature, or Natural Matter, as I a Single Creature cannot Guess at
Him, I will not Dispute on Him, but Pray to that Incomprehensible
and Inexpressible Deity, to Favour me with that which is Best
for me.
These passages are especially worth noting, as it has been
on several occasions ^ remarked that the Duchess lacked true
religious feeling. Her belief was perhaps neither supremely
intellectual nor ecstatically devout, but it was sincere and it
was not narrow. Moreover, it seems to have been ever present
in the background of her consciousness.
The second edition of Philosophical and Physical Opinions
varies so much from the original one as to demand special
consideration. Parts I, II, and III cover the same ground as
Part I in the earlier volume, a distinction being made between
animate and inanimate matter, the latter a medium through
which the sensitive animate matter works. Further emphasis
too is laid upon man as a specific figure, and his motions are
particularly examined. Parts IV-VII amplify Parts II-V of
the 1655 volume, treating each division in far greater detail.
The list of sicknesses with their remedies has increased
^ TTie Cavalier and his Lady, ed. Jenkins, p. 126, n. ; and Montegut's La
Duchesse et le Due de Neweastle, pp. 335-339.
192 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
exceedingly, and in the chapter on fluxes we get a personal
reminiscence combined with the prescription : ^
In all sorts or degrees of Fluxes there is nothing better than Lauda-
num, such as is prepared by Doctor Davidson's Prescription ; the
Quantity must be from One Grain to Two or Three, but above Four
must not be taken, and to put it in a Small Pill of Bread and so
Swallow it down ; the time of Taking is, when the Patient goes to
sleep, but the patient must not Eat nor Drink in Three Hours before
taking of it, and when taken, He still to Rest ; as for this Laudanum I
have had Experience, for when I was in France with the Queen of Eng-
land, I had Died of a Purging Flux if I had not taken Doctor Davidson's
Laudanum and he gave it to me every Night for a week together.
What the Duke thought of his wife's scientific views may-
be gathered from "His Opinion concerning the Ground of
Natural Philosophy" at the end of her book. As we have
seen in his relations with Hobbes, Newcastle had a real knowl-
edge of physics, so that he must have been gently poking fun
at the Duchess's theory of " motion " when he wrote :
Since now it is A-la-mode to Write of Natural Philosophy, and I
know, no body Knows what is the Cause of any thing, and since they
are all but Guessers, not Knowing, it gives every Man room to Think
what he lists, and so I mean to Set up for my self, and play at this
Philosophical Game as follows, without Patching or Stealing from any
Body. They talk that Motion doth every thing, I grant it, but this
Motion must be from Some-thing. They say, This Motion and Spirit
was put in at the Creation of the World . . . Why, then, thus for
my Opinion That Salt is the Life that giveth the Motion to all things
in the World.
He goes on to describe an experiment in which saltpetre and
inflamed brimstone appeared just like the sun, and concludes :
This is my Opinion, which I think can as hardly be Disproved as
Proved since any Opinion may be Right or Wrong, for anything that
anybody knows, for certainly there is none can make a Mathematical
Demonstration of Natural Philosophy, and so I leave it to the Mercy
of my Readers.
1 Edition of 1663, Part VII, § 43.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 193
The Duchess could hardly have perceived her husband's irony
here ; indeed, she seems to have been completely lacking in
a sense of humor. Otherwise she would not have admitted
this address into a work which she regarded with such lofty
seriousness. She even writes concerning it :
Of all my Works, this Work which I have Writ,
My Best Belov'd and Greatest Favorite,
I look upon it with a Pleasing Eye,
I Pleasure take in its Sweet Company ;
I Entertain it with a Grave Respect,
And with my Pen am ready to Protect,
The Life and Safety of it 'gainst all those,
That will Oppose it, or Profess it Foes :
But I am sure, there 's none Condemn it can,
Unless some Foolish and Unlearned Man,
That hath no Understanding, Judgment, Wit,
For to perceive the Reason that 's in it.
The Opinions were issued again in 1668 under another title,
Grotmds of Natural Philosophy Divided into Thirteen Parts :
with an Appendix cofttaining Five Parts. The Second Edi-
tion, mtich altered from the first which tvent under the Name
of Philosophical and Physical Opinions, and with a compre-
hensive dedication, "To all the Universities in Europe." The
alterations are extended enough to justify a change in title for
the work, although there are few new ideas expressed in it ;
rearrangements and amplifications make up the most radical
differences. After a general statement of her system (Part I),
the Duchess passes to a consideration of creatures (Part II),
and so to productions (Parts III and IV). That brings her to
man (Part V) and his motions (Part VI), notably sleeping or
waking (Part VII), together with irregular sicknesses (Parts
VIII-X). The marked diversity in creatures (Part XI) sug-
gests a discussion of elements (Part XII), of metals, and of
vegetables (Part XIII). It may be seen that our authoress has
194 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
attacked her material from a novel angle, but the results she
obtains are almost identical with her previously published
judgments.
Part I of the Appendix deals with Immaterials and Materials,
that is, God and Nature ; Parts II-IV consist in an argument
between parts of the mind about regular and irregular worlds.
These latter terms are found to be synonymous with happy
and miserable worlds, which the Duchess discusses at some
length. Part V, "Concerning Restoring-beds or Wombs," ^
shows how firmly her imagination had seized upon the subject
of reproduction, no doubt because of that problem's basic im-
portance and its absolute inexplicability. The theory of a con-
tinuous mobile existence for matter is fantastically set forth : ^
The last Conception of my Mind, concerning Restoring-Beds was,
That the Parts of my Mind did conceive, That the Center of the
whole Universe, was the Sea, and in the Center of the Sea was a
small Island ; and in the Center of the Island, was a Creature, like (in
the outward Form) to a great and high Rock : Not that this Rock was
Stone ; but, it was of such a nature, (by the natural Compositions of
Parts) that it was compounded of Parts of all the principal Kinds and
Sorts of the Creatures of this World, viz. Of Elemental, Animal,
Mineral and Vegetable kinds : and, being of such a nature, did pro-
duce out of it self, all kinds and sorts of Restoring-Beds . . . nor can
they produce new Creatures, but only restore former Creatures ; as,
those that had been Produced, and were partly Dissolved.
Truly the Duchess's muse knew no bounds, and she might
have gone on spinning fancies around her philosophy to the
end of the chapter. Each time she revised a book its bulk
was sure to increase, usually with a corresponding loss in artistic
value. Little harm was done to these pseudo-scientific works,
however, as at their best they are of slight literary importance
except as revealing the quality of our authoress's mind and
art. She was not even content with the numerous mediocre
1 Pp. 291-309. 2 pp 308-309.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 195
variations upon her Opinions but must needs produce more
works to set forth still other aspects of the physical system
she had created.
Such was the Philosophical Letters : or modest Reflectio7is
Up07i some Opinions in Natural Philosophy, mahitained by
several Famous and Learned Ajithors of this Age, Expressed
by way of Letters, printed at London in 1664. In " A Preface
to the Reader," the Duchess states that she has read much of
certain scientific writers lately and now better understands the
technical terms than she did before, " for my error was I began
to write so early, that I had not liv'd so long as to be able to
read many Authors ; I cannot say I divulged my opinions as
soon as I had conceiv'd them, but I divulg'd them too soon
to have them artificial and methodical," She admits her weak-
nesses but dislikes having concessions made because of her sex :
I have been informed, that if I should be answered in my Writings,
it would be done rather under the name and cover of a Woman, than
of a Man, the reason is, because no man dare or will set his name to
the contradiction of a Lady ; and to confirm you the better herein,
there has one Chapter of my Book called The Worlcfs Olio^ treating
of a Monastical Life, been answer'd already in a little Pamphlet,
under the name of a woman, although she did httle towards it;
wherefore it being a Hermaphroditical Book, I judged it not worthy
taking notice of.
The distinguishing feature of the Duchess's volume is its
form — that of letters to a supposed lady who has sent the
authoress the works of Hobbes, Descartes, Dr. More, and Van
Helmont, asking her opinion of their writings. In Section I she
takes up Hobbes's Leviathan and Elements of Philosophy,
with that part of Descartes which had been translated for her ; ^
Section II deals with Dr. More's Antidote and Of the Lmmor-
tality of the Soul; Section III is given over to Van Helmont.
^ See "A Preface to the Reader," where she states her ignorance of any
languages other than her native tongue.
196 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Each author is considered only in so far as he disagrees with
the Duchess's theories, the passages discussed are chosen quite
arbitrarily, and the whole plan simmers down into one more
statement of the Opinwns. Section IV in fact leaves actual
authors behind and ventures into whatever fields appear most
tempting. One or two matters of detail are worked out more
fully than in the earlier volumes, and some few terms are
changed. " Matter " is no more to be called " spirits " as it
was in the first edition of the Opinions} while "animate
matter," which with inanimate matter makes up Nature, is for
the future " corporeal self-motion," ^ " Perception " is defined
as " sensation," the working of sensitive animate matter .^
Generally this matter copies outward objects in the body's
inanimate matter but occasionally moves in itself without pat-
terns.^ Yet the other division of animate matter, the rational,
always works in its own essence and more often with no pat-
terns.^ The Deity, it is again asserted, is beyond human com-
prehension : ^ " Oh ! the audacious curiosity of Man ! Is it
not blasphemy to make the Infinite God of a frail and human
shape, and to compare the most Holy to a sinful Creature ? "
Philosophical Letters was dedicated to the University of
Cambridge, as was the Duchess's remaining scientific book,
Observatio7is upon Experimental Philosophy, printed first in
1666, and again in 1668. As usual there are numerous intro-
ductory epistles before this work, of which the most striking
is a dialogue between two speakers, headed "An Argumental
Discourse Concerning some Principal Subjects in Natural
Philosophy ; necessary for the better understanding, not onely
1 Section II, Letter XXXIV, and Section III, Letter XVI.
2 Section IV, Letter XXXIII.
3 Section II, Letter XVI.
4 Section I, Letter IV, and Section IV, Letter XXIX.
6 Section I, Letter VII.
6 Section III, Letter XXII.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 197
of this but all other Philosophical Works, hitherto written by
the Authoresse." It contains a simile well calculated to im-
press the Duchess's system on the reader, when the rational
part is likened to an architect, the sensitive to workmen, and
the inanimate to their material. As may be gathered from its
title, this volume was apparently intended to approach the sub-
ject from a truly scientific point of view. In the " Observations "
proper there are abundant references to magnifying glasses,^
the loadstone,^ to seeds ^ and telescopes,* but by the time "Fur-
ther Observations" are reached the author is pleading for more
contemplation and less experimentation in science.^ Then fol-
low certain "Observations upon the Opinions of some Ancient
Philosophers" treated in much the same manner as those
modern arguments she had discussed in the Letters. Finally,
"An Explanation of Some obscure and doubtful passages
occurring in the Philosophical Works, hitherto published by
the Authoresse," gives " matter " its latest name of " corporeal
figurative motion." Inanimate matter is said to have life and
self-knowledge according to its nature, but no self-motion, that
depending on the animate matter working through it. "Sense"
is interpreted as "life," and "reason" as "knowledge," but
there are practically no important deviations from the system
as originally propounded.
The vogue of these so-called philosophical books has, need-
less to say, been extremely restricted. They are valueless from
a scientific point of view but crowded with all the meticulous
detail demanded by that branch of human knowledge. The
fantasy in them is in such small proportion to their vast bulk
as to be scarcely worth the search. Their general style is so
redundant and complicated that one can understand it only
M3- '§6. 3 §15. 4 §34.
6 § I. She also quotes from Poems and Fancies, whence her system arose,
§ 8. She did this too in Philosophical Letters, Section IV, Letter IX.
198 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
with great labor and effort. It is no wonder that James Bristow
of Christ Church College, Oxford, did not get far in translat-
ing these volumes into Latin. He began " upon a desire of
those whom she had appointed to inquire out a fit person for
such a matter ; ^ but he finding great difficulties therein through
the confusedness of the matter, gave over."^ The world is no
whit the poorer for his failure, as it conceivably might be with-
out the original versions. Certainly they are unique and on
that score alone are worthy to be preserved. Likewise they
help to reveal the Duchess's eccentric personahty and fantastic
imagination, although fanciful science is a paradoxical form of
art not deserving extensive cultivation.
II
THE WORLD'S OLIO (1655) AND NATURE'S PICTURES {1656)
The World's Olio, as has been seen, was composed for the
most part in 1649, but was not published until 1655. "Most
of this Book was written five years since," it tells us,^ "and
was lock'd up in a Trunk, as if it had been buried in a Grave ;
but when I came back from England, I gave it a Resurrec-
tion : After a view, I judged it not so well done, but that a
little more care might have placed the words so, that the Lan-
guage might have run smoother, which would have given the
Sense a greater lustre ; but I being of a lazie disposition, did
chuse to let it go into the World with its Defects, rather than
^ Jasper Mayne undertook to find a translator. See his letter of May 20, 1663,
in the 1676 volume of Letters and Poems to the Duchess.
2 Wood's Athence, Vol. II, Col. 160. Also John Harmar latinized "one or
more of the plays of Margaret dutchess of Newcastle for which he was well
rewarded." — Wood, III, 920.
2 This sentence may very likely have been composed the year before its
appearance, which would make the statement quite correct.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 199
take the pains to refine it." ^ The Duchess dedicates this
volume to Fortune, explaining to her husband,^ "that when I
have writ all I mean to print, I intend (if I live) to Dedicate
all my Works together unto you." To Sir Charles Cavendish
she offers " payments of Prayers " ^ for his earlier generosity
and in another foreword begs that whoever reads this book
aloud will carefully articulate its words. ^ " The Preface "
proper excuses her deficiencies on the ground that " Nature
hath made Man's Body more able to endure Labour, and
Man's Brain more clear to understand and contrive, than
those of Women ; and as great a difference there is between
them, as there is between the longest and strongest Willow,
compared to the strongest and largest Oak." She goes on to
say that some women have complained because they do not
receive education,^ but those that have been instructed turn
out no better than the others ; they can only work " like Apes,
by Imitation." Finally, too much freedom is dangerous for
women, so that nature has given man strength to govern the
weaker sex.
The Olio^ itself lives up to its name, but the numerous
short sections, although individually unrelated, when taken
one after another trace their authoress's train of thought.
1 " Advertisement to the Reader."
2 "To his Grace the Duke of Newcastle," in 1671 edition.
2 " An Epistle that was writ before the death of the Noble Sir Charles
Cavendish, my most Noble Brother in law," in the 167 1 edition.
* Sociable Letter CLXXIII also takes up at some length the importance
and difficulty of oral reading.
5 This may refer to herself, for in " To the Universities," prefixed to the
1655 edition of Philosophical and Physical Opitiions, she strongly urges that
further opportunities be granted to women. The truth seems to be that the
Duchess's conviction and desire were at odds over this point.
^ In 1657 S. Du Verger published Humble Reflections Upon some Passages
of the Right Hoftorable the Lady Marchionesse of JVewcastW s Olio. Or An
Appeale from her mesinformed to her ozvti better informed iudgemetit. See
Hazlitt's Collections and Notes, Third Series, 1887, p. 21.
200 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
No general unity binds them together, yet each is connected
in idea with the preceding paragraph, however foreign it may
be to the preceding page. The result is a string of observa-
tions which might have been arranged in an artistic pattern,
but, as so often with the Duchess, nature here completely domi-
neers over art. Book I, Part I, expatiates on fame, whence
it logically passes to writings of various kinds, then proceeding
to translation, languages, discourses, wisdom, music, and inven-
tion. Part II condemns excesses in gluttony or asceticism,
dilates upon passion's power over mankind, and insists that
one's mind should rule one's body. Part III commences with
diplomacy and wars but soon enters upon analysis of human
nature. An interesting section, '" Of the Breeding of Chil-
dren," ^ advises parents not to permit baby talk, such as
"do, do" for "go," " tum " for "come," or "My Chid tant
open its Nies " instead of " My Child cannot open its Eyes."
The Duchess is quite modern in her theories, but it must be
remembered that there was no chance for her to be disillusion-
ized in practice. She felt that children should be instructed,
not entertained by games of " Bo-peep," " Blind-man-buff," or
" Cocks-hod," in which they " hide themselves behind Hangings,
and old Cupboards, or dirty Holes, or the like places, where
they foul their Clothes, disaffect the Brain with stincks, and
are almost choak't with Dirt, and dusty Cobwebs, and Spiders,
Flyes, and the like."^ Youth and age receive some atten-
tion, as well as husbands and wives. The authoress thinks
that marriages of interest are likely to be more happy than
those of fancy, a statement which is not without personal sig-
nificance. She supposes indifferent handsome women make
the best wives but permits them to paint their faces for at-
tracting men, except widows, who ought not to marry again.
Certain cosmetics, however, are dangerous, disfiguring, or
1 Pp. 123-126. "^ P. 125.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 201
sluttish, " especially in the Preparatives, as Masks of Sear-
clothes, which are not only horrid to look upon, in that they
seem as Dead Bodies embalmed, but the stink is offensive , , .
Oily Drops can be no grace to their Face. Dry Painting
shrivels up the skin so, that it imprints Age in their Face." ^
Part I of Book II is made up of fifty-eight Allegories, such
as Number 9 : ^
The World is a Shop, which sells all manner of Commodities to the
Soul and Senses : The Price are Good Actions and Bad, for which
they have Salvation or Damnation, Peace or Warr, Pleasure or Pain,
Delight or Grief.
Number 28 states that "Thoughts are like Pan-cakes, and the
Brain is the Pan, wherein they are tossed and turned by the
several Objects, as by several Hands." ^ Part II consists of
"Short Essays," the first hundred and five of which live up
to their designation. Number 99, for instance, reads : ^
Our natural English Tongue was significant enough without the help
of other Languages ; but as we have Merchandized for Wares, so
have we done for Words ; of which there is more brought in, than
carried out.
Numbers 107-122 are sufficiently long to have particular titles,
but their worth is not commensurate with their bulk. Part III
occupies itself with describing famous characters in English or
classical history. Queen Elizabeth is said to have " clothed
herself in a Sheeps-Skin ; yet she had a Lions Paw, and a
Fox's Head ; she stroked the Cheeks of her Subjects with
Flattery, while she pickt their Purses ; and though she seemed
loath, yet she never failed to crush to death those that dis-
turbed her way." ^ That is keen enough writing after its
kind, but many such fragments do not constitute a work of
art. The Olio, in addition to its authoress's usual faults,
is marred by immaturity and experimentation.
1 p. 178. 2 p. ig6. 8 p. 207. 4 p. 234. 5 p. 248.
202 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Book III, Part I, treats of men and beasts, their passions
and appetites. Love, envy, fear, and hate are severally
taken up, while afterwards courage is differentiated from
valour : the former follows appetite, the latter depends upon
"consideration." Part II contains a rough draft of the
Duchess's system in so far as it affects the elements. Part III
opens with her customary review of diseases and their reme-
dies, mentions royal favorites, and then comes to " The Inven-
tory of Judgment's Commonwealth ; which the Author cares
not in what World it is Established." Good Hobbesian prin-
ciples underlie this government, since it depends upon a con-
tract existing between king and people. Striking details are
that the monarch shall have a library rather than a collection
of knickknacks,! and that there shall be set times for popular
recreations. Also, "If a Gentleman must or will have a
Whore, let him have one of his own, and not feed upon
Reversions " ;^ " No Husband nor Wife, although but a day
married, shall kiss each other in publick, lest it turn the
Spectators from a lawful wholsome Appetite of Marriage, to a
Gluttonous Adultery ; or weaken the Appetite so much, as to
cause a loathing or an aversion to the Wedlock-Bed" ;^ and
Dancing is " commendable as a graceful Art in Maids or
Batchelors ; but shall be accounted an Effeminacy for Married
Men, a May-game for Old Men, and a Wanton-lightness for
Married Women." ^ Two short, irrelevant sections are in-
serted, " Of Noble Souls and Strong Bodies " and "' Of those
that steal from Books," after which the Duchess concludes^
1 p. 402. 2 p 4o5_ 8 p. 409. * P. 410.
^ The lines
Of all my Works, this Work which I have writ,
My best Belov'd, and greatest Favourite, etc.
follow, but in " To the Reader," prefixed to Philosophical and Physical Opin-
ions, 1655, she says they were intended for that book. There too she notices
this erroneous intrusion of " a character of the strength of the soul and body."
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 203
by breaking into verse anent her ideal ruler : ^
But I would have this Monarchy I make,
To have a Judg * that will good Counsel take :
One that is wise to govern and to see
What faults to mend, and what the Errors bee :
Making the Commonwealth his only Minion,
And striving to enlarge his own Dominion.
* I call the Chief Ruler Judg as they did in the old time.
The World's Olio was reprinted in 1671,2 and the same
year appeared a second edition of Natures Picture Drawn by
Fancies Pencil to the Life. Being several Feigned Stories,
Comical, Tragical, Tragi- comical, Poetical, Romancical^ Philo-
sophical, Historical, and Moral: Some in Verse, some in Prose ;
some Mixt, and some by Dialogues. The first edition of 1656
{some copies dated 1655)* also contained A Tme Relation of
my Birth, Breeding and Life, while its title had the plural
form, Nature's Pictures, etc. In 1671 it is preceded by an
enniched portrait of the authoress^ and by some laudatory
lines from her husband. " The Preface," after announcing
1 p. 420.
2 It is this edition to which the references above are made.
8 Charles Lamb using this word of certain writers adds in parenthesis " as
dear Margaret Newcastle would call them." See " A Complaint of the Decay
of Beggars in the Metropolis," j&^ayj of Elia, p. 194. Indeed, the redundancy
of this formation is typical of the Duchess's style.
* The article on Margaret Cavendish, first Duchess of Newcastle, in Diet.
Nat. Biog.
^ Under it are these lines :
Here on this Figure Cast a Glance,
But so as if it were by Chance,
Your eyes not fixt, they must not stay,
Since this like Shadowes to the Day
It only represents ; for Still,
Her Beuty's found beyond the Skill
Of the best Paynter, to Imbrace
Those lovely Lines, within her face.
View her Soul's Picture, Judgment, witt.
Then read those Lines which She hath writt,
By Phancy's Picture drawne alone
Which Peece but Shee, Can justly owne.
204 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
this book's moral purpose, tells under what circumstances it
was composed :
As I was writing, by a little fire,
These Feigned Histories ; I did desire
To see my Native Country, Native Friends,
That lov'd me well, and had no other ends
Than harmless mirth to pass away dull time,
With telling Tales either in Prose or Rime.
But though Desire did then like a Wind blow
The Sails of Wishes on Love's ship to go ;
Yet Banishment to my dear Lord, was then
A dangerous Rock, made of hard-hearted men.
And hearing of such dangers in my way,
I was content in Antwerp for to stay ;
And in the circle of my Brain to raise
The Figures of my Friends crowned with Praise.
This was found to be such a successful method of procedure
that the Duchess invited scholars and poets also, whom she
entertained with the stories that follow.
Those in Book I are told in verse and are connected by a
scheme roughly analogous to that of the Decameron or The
Canterbury Tales.
In vdnter cold, a Company was met,
Both Men and Women by the Fire were set ;
At last they did agree (to pass the time)
That every one should tell a Tale in Rhyme.
Most of their narrations deal with love, like the account of a
mournful widow, an easily consoled widower, an inconstant
woman, and a lover that deserts his pock-marked mistress.
"A Description of Constancy" recounts how two parted lovers
think each other dead, whereupon the man becomes a hermit.
The woman sings dirges over his supposed grave,^ until they
1 In the British Museum copy there is an entry in the Duchess's hand-
writing, " These songs my Lord writ." See Everyman edition of the Life^
p. XX. Rhys thinks the third of them the Duke's highest mark in verse.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 205
are united by a benevolent queen. One of the company doubts
that such steadfastness often exists and tries to prove his
point by a similar tale with a tragic ending. Humanity, De-
spair, and Jealousy are personified by another man, while a
merry lass tells of a husband's courting his wife's maid. One
moralizer states that students rarely can talk well ; the next
romance is of a brave stranger's freeing and marrying a captive
lady. A bachelor expatiates on feminine amorousness, which
in old age becomes spite :
And if a Lady dress, or chance to wear
A Gown to please her self, or curl her Hair,
If not according as the Fashion runs,
Lord, how it sets a-work their Eyes and Tongues !
Straight she's fantastical, they all do cry.
Yet they will imitate her presently ;
And for what they did laugh at her in scorn,
With it think good themselves for to adorn.
A tragic account of two young lovers who do not wait for the
marriage ceremony intervenes, followed by another philosophical
speech in praise of temperance. Then comes an argument
over the advantages and disadvantages of wedlock, the various
points being enforced by precept or example. A soldier tells
of how a princess falls in love with her father's slayer. " The
Surprisal of Death " relates the sudden end of a lovely
young girl.
To these rhymed stories Newcastle likewise contributed two
" mock-tales" and a poem called "The Philosopher's Complaint."
The first was of an old woman's marriage to a serving-man,
the second about an inconstant husband who is deserted by
both his wives. The philosopher laments in uninspired stanzas
that men have so many more responsibilities than beasts.
Other narratives are concerned with human doubts, foolish
pride, and ill-advised love. One man compares castles in the
206 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
air to the homes of spiders or silkworms, which he describes
with particular detail. " The Tale of the Four Seasons of the
Year " ^ contains as successful poetry as the Duchess achieves
in this volume : ^
The Spring is dress'd in buds & blossoms sweet,
And Grass-green Socks she draws upon her feet,
Of freshest air a Garment she cuts out,
With painted Tulips fringed round about,
And Unes it all within with Violets blew,
And yellow Primrose of the palest hew :
Then wears an Apron made of Lillies white,
And lac'd about it is with Rays of Light.
Finally comes "A Description of Civil Warrs," in which a lady,
evidently Margaret Cavendish herself, laments that,
My Brother then was murther'd in cold-blood,
Incircled round with Enemies he stood ;
VoUies of Shot did all his Body tear ;
Where his blood 's spilt, the Earth no Grace will bear,
As if, for to revenge his Death, the Earth
Was curs'd with barrenness ev'n from her birth.^
The Second Part of Natures Picture drops from poetry to
prose and gives up the unified setting of Part I. These
changes permit even freer rein to the Duchess's fancy, which
flies off in every possible direction. Men and women, France
and England, tobacco, schools, the court, one and all are
reviewed under the name of story-telling. " The Vulgar
^ Rhys calls it " a piece of tapestry in verse which is rare and fine." —
Everyman edition of the Life, p. xxi.
2P. lOI.
3 Cf. Evelyn, II, 85, when on July 8, 1656, he visited Colchester: "But
what was shewed us as a kind of miracle at the outside of the Castle, the wall
where Sir Cha. Lucas and Sir Geo. Lisle, those valiant and noble persons who
so bravely behav'd themselves in the last siege, were barbarously shot. . . .
The place was bare of grass for a large space, all y^ rest of it abounding
with herbage."
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 207
Fights," 1 contrasting unrest at home and in the street, comes
as near to real Hfe as any of these short paragraphs. Marriage
of course figures largely, with neglect, unfaithfulness, ambition,
or greed as its necessary concomitants. Metaphysical subjects
treated are " Love's Cure,"^ "The Propagating Souls "^ (their off-
shoots are meteors), " The Marriage of Life and Death," ^ and
"Of the Indisposition of the Mind."^ In one of these fantasies
the hero arrives at the center of the earth, where " he saw a
light like Moonshine ; of which, when he came near, he saw
that the first Circle about the Center, was Glow-worms Tails,
which gave that Light ; and in the Center was an old man,
who did neither stand nor sit, for there was no thing to stand
or sit on ; but he hung (as it were) in the Air ; nor ever stirr'd
out of his place ; and had been there ever since the World
was made ; for he, having never had a Woman to tempt him to
sin, never dyed." ^ "The Speculators "''' takes its title from three
glasses which show wonderful happenings in the firmament ; a
lady preacher comments on the text, " In the Land of Poetry
there stands a steep high Mount Named Parnasus. At the top
issues out a flame which ascends unto Fames Mansion." ^
There are three " moral tales " of an ant and a bee, in which
the bee generally comes out victorious, since it has a monar-
chical rather than a republican government. Other improving
dialogues are held between a woodcock and a cow on the
subject of wings, between a butcher and a fly, a man and a
spider, or between a lady and several interlocutors.
The first long story in this book is "The Contract,"^ and
here the Duchess enters upon the domain of the novel. Her
imagination has worked up a simple anecdote into sixty pages
1 Pp. 157-164. ®P-253.
2 Pp. 217-223. ^ Pp. 259-267.
8 Pp. 223-226. * Pp. 275-280.
* Pp. 231-234. 9 Pp. 321-389.
6 Pp. 234-236.
2o8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
of sustained interest, and that without tradition or precedent.
"The Contract" is indisputably a romance, but in the late seven-
teenth century extended prose romances were uncommon in
English letters. A tale like this could have exerted little
influence upon future novelists, but it demands notice amidst
the ferment which preceded the birth of a new form of art.
Its plot revolves around a Duke who breaks the betrothal con-
tract agreed to on his father's deathbed. He marries another
lady and thereafter meets his first fiancee, only to fall deeply in
love with her ; at last all obstacles are removed, so that the
happy pair may be united. This bare outline conveys no idea
of how vividly the story is told, since its characters are more
than the puppets customary in Margaret Newcastle's composi-
tions. For instance, the Duke's servant is a charming person,
and a parting of the lovers has genuine delicacy in feeling
and phrase : ^
Heaven direct you for the best, said she, it is late. Good night.
You will give me leave, said he, to kiss your hand ?
I cannot deny my Hand, said she, to him that hath my heart.
The climax occurs in an interview in which the Duke forces
his rival, the pusillanimous Viceroy, to abandon all claims upon
the lady. Their quick, staccato utterance makes this scene
dramatically alive from the Viceroy's first line,
And what is your Demand ?
My Demand, that you will never mary her.
How, says the Vice- Roy? Put the case you should die, you will
then give me leave to marrie her ?
No, said the Duke ; I love her too well, to leave a possibility of
her marrying you.
I will sooner die, than set my hand to this, said the Vice-Roy.
If you do not, you shall die a violent death, by Heaven, answered
he; and more than that, you shall set your hand never to complain
against me to the King : Will you do it 1 or will you not ? for I am
desperate said the Duke.
ip.367.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 209
The Vice-Roy said, You strike the King in striking me.
No disputing, says he ; set your hand presently, or I will kill you.
Do you say. You are desperate ?
Yes, answered he.
Then I must do a desperate Act, to set my hand to a Bond I
mean to break.
Use your own discretion, to that.
Come, said he, I will set my hand before I read it; for whatso-
ever it is, it must be done.-*^
Nor is the dialogue alone to be commended, for the heroine's
old uncle " was so pleased to see his Neece admired, that as
he went home, he did nothing but sing after a humming way ;
and was so frolick, as if he were returned to twenty years of
age." 2
" The Contract," marks the highest point in Natures Picture,
for those stories which follow it are of much less value.
" The Ambitious Traitor " ^ briefly narrates an evil coun-
sellor's fall and execution. "Assaulted and Pursued Chastity," ^
on the other hand, is a long-drawn out account of undeserved
persecutions. The heroine, variously named Miseriae, Travelia,
or Affectionata, endures the attentions of a certain married
prince in the kingdoms of Sensuality, Fancy, and Amity. The
second of these realms offers most opportunity to the Duchess's
imagination, so that it receives detailed consideration. Its in-
habitants were " of a deep Purple, their Hair as white as Milk,
and like Wool ; their Lips thin, their Ears long, their Noses
flat, yet sharp ; their Teeth and Nails as black as Jet, and as
shining ; their Stature tall, and their Proportion big," ^ all
except the royal family, who differed by being " of a perfect
Orange-colour, their Hair coal-black, their Teeth and Nails as
white as Milk ; of a very great height but well shaped." ^
1 Pp. 368-369. 8 Pp. 389-394. 5 p. 42 1 .
2 P. 347. * Pp. 394-5 1 4.
® p. 429. Cf. The Blazing World, where there are complexions of azure,
purple, scarlet, and other bright colors.
2IO THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Fish are closely associated with these people, for they sacrifice
fishes, their houses are built of fishbones and thatched with
fish scales, and one of their common beasts was " half Fish,
half Flesh." Our heroine arrives in this strange land, dis-
guised as a boy and accompanied by an old sailor. She learns
to talk like the inhabitants, and that accomplishment, together
with certain pistols which her friend is able to make, persuades
the native population that these strangers are divine messengers.
They do not use their new power for personal aggrandizement,^
but to reform the cannibalism and sexual promiscuousness ram-
pant throughout this kingdom. Travelia's teaching was that
"' The Gods were not to be known nor comprehended ; and
that all they have discovered of themselves to their Creatures,
was only by their Works, in which they should praise them."
"By which Doctrine," the Duchess adds, "they were brought
to be a civilized people." ^ Then our travellers make good their
escape to the Queen of Amity, who falls in love with Travelia
disguised but accepts the King of Amours on discovering her
inamorata's sex. Meanwhile Travelia has conquered Amours's
forces under command of her insistent pursuer, and his wife's
accommodating decease clears the way for these lovers to be
united. So after a hundred and twenty pages the Duchess,
feeling that she has clearly proved her point, i.e. that young
girls ought not to travel about unprotected, brings her story to
a haphazard close, which might have resolved all difificulties at
any previous point in the chronicle.
"The Tale of a Traveller" begins with a certain young
man's birth and education : ^
After he came to ten years old, or thereabouts, he was sent to a Free-
School, where the noise of each Scholar's reading aloud, did drown the
sense of what they read, burying the Knowledge and Understanding
1 Mr. Kipling has developed such a situation in The Man Who Would
Be King. "^Y.^^z. ® P- S'S-
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 211
in the confusion of many Words, and several Languages, yet were
whipt (for not learning) by their Tutors, whose ill teaching broke and
weakned their Memories with overheavy burthens . . . being afraid
of whipping, they got their Lessons by rote, without understanding
the sense.
Later he travels for some years, attends at court, but finally
settles down in the country, where his expenses become greater
than his receipts. A poor woman, whom he benefits one day,
warns him to be temperate in all things, and he decides to
follow her advice. As a result, he marries a moderately rich
and moderately handsome wife, settles down to a moderate
scale of existence, and lives happily ever after. This sketch
so well embodies the Duchess's view of an ideal life that it is
no wonder she recommends ^ it particularly to the reader, along
with "The She Anchoret," which follows next in Natures Picture.
Probably, too, this recommendation caused these pieces to be
reprinted in 1766 as an appendage to Alexander Nicol's
Poems on Several Subjects. Taken together they are entitled
A Treasure of Knowledge ; or The Female Oracle. Wherein
is delineated The Experienced Traveller ; likezvise the She
Anchoret ; in which tnany curious Qiiestiofis are resolved,
put by Natural Philosophers, Physiciatts, Moral Philosophers,
Theological Students, Preachers, Judges, Tradesmen, Masters
of Families, Married Men and their Wives, Nurses, Widowers,
and Widows, Virgins, Lovers, Poets and Aged Persons.
The list should also include orators, statesmen, soldiers,
and historians, for all these classes come to consult the " She
Anchoret," after her father's death has caused her to retire from
the world in single blessedness. To each she replies with some
fullness, so that this document alone gives the reader a very
good idea of Margaret Cavendish's intellectual processes —
they are those that we have seen repeated over and over again
1 " The Preface."
212 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
in divers forms under divers circumstances. The Duke con-
tributes to natural philosophers his explanation of why cats see
in the dark, a phenomenon which he takes to be caused by the
sea-water-green matter about their eyes, that being the same color
one finds in rotten wood and glowworms' tails. "' The times,"
Newcastle explains,^ "' give me leave to study the nature of all
things from the Mouse to the Elephant." The Anchoret tells
theologians that every religious opinion "judges all damned
but their own : and most opinions are. That the smallest Fault
is able to damn, but the most Vertuous Life, and innocent
Thoughts, not sufficient to save them,"^ a dictum of profound
if practical wisdom, quite in accord with seventeenth-century
latitudinarianism. Wives are told that to retain their husbands'
affections they " must act the Arts of a Courtizan to him, which
is very lawful, since it is to an honest End ; for the Arts are
honest and lawful, but the Design and End is wicked." ^
Many specific instructions are given for bringing up children,
the drawbacks to common and free schools are set forth, and
nurses come in for a large share of criticism. When children
cry, " Nurses most commonly take their Tears to be shed out
of a froward passion, rather than a mournful complaining, or
a craving redress ; which makes them only to sing, or prate,
or whistle, or rattle to them, to please them ; but not to search
about them, or observe them, to find out their Malady to ease
them ; but rather, by the dancing and rocking them, they put
them to more pain." ^ And further on,^ " Nurses feed Children
as if they had Ostritch's Stomacks, which is able to digest
Iron." The Duchess's love of didactic writing has here led
her far from such a narrative style as she was developing in
" The Contract." She refused to be confined within artistic
limits and consequently broke down the necessary restraints of
1 P. 570. 8 p. 665. 6 p. 669.
2 p. 614. 4 p. 666.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 213
story-telling, until "The She Anchoret" has become one more
conglomeration of assorted ideas, unified only by its creator's
imagination.^ An extreme antithesis to everything which has
gone before closes Natures Picture, for the chaos of the
volume is made complete by a critical review of noted men,
labelled " Heaven's Library, which is Fame's Palace, purged
from Errors and Vices." ^
III
PLAYS AND ORATIONS (1662-1668)
It would have been surprising if in her extended use of
literary forms the Duchess had neglected the drama. After
the Restoration, plays were more than ever a fashionable diver-
sion. Newcastle had tried his hand at them, and his wife
naturally followed suit. From the amount of work she pro-
duced in this genre, it seems clear that her genius felt itself
eminently at home in such writing, and, indeed, as she under-
stood the art, her fancy had limitless scope there. For the
setting of the Duchess's plays was her own brain, where per-
sonified abstractions could argue or debate as long as pen and
paper gave them leave. Any suggestion of dramatic technique
is completely lacking, for that would at once imply repression
and " I love ease so well as I hate constraint even in my
works." ^ Her theory was not altogether wrong when she
rebelled against the unity of time and the tradition of closing
fifth acts with a full stage, for in these respects posterity has
1 " You will find my Works like Infinite Nature," she herself writes, " that
hath neither Beginning nor End, and as confused as the Chaos wherein is
neither Method nor Order, but all Mix'd together, without Separation, like
Evening Light and Darkness." — Sociable Letter CXXXI, although here she
is referring to her early experimentations in philosophical writing.
2 Pp. 706-718.
* Playes, 1662, " To the Readers " (No. 3).
214 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
sustained her ; but in asserting that the characters need not all
be kinsfolk and acquaintance, she denied even the most primi-
tive artistic unity. As to the more subtle laws of play-writing,
the Duchess was entirely innocent, for no dramatic sense had
been granted to her by Providence. It is not remarkable, then,
that her plays were never accorded a single performance,
although she intended them for actual representation and ex-
plained that if they had not been given, it was merely because
of their length and the closing of theatres in England.^ Two
reasons always look like an excuse, and so it was to prove in
this case. Time went on and conditions changed, but still
the Duchess's plays remained unacted and unactable. They
are closet drama indeed — but closet drama so lifeless and so
dull that one shrinks from it even on the printed page. They
mark the lowest ebb of their authoress's literary production.
Her first volume of Playcs was printed in 1662 and con-
tains fourteen dramas, seven of them in two parts, making
a total of twenty-one pieces. There are ten epistles, " To the
Readers, " prefixed, a "General Prologue," and "An Introduc-
tion," of which the " Prologue " in verse is chiefly interesting.
For one thing, it asserts that she wrote all her plays in a
comparatively short time :
This shews my Playes have not such store of wit
Not subtil plots, they were so quickly writ
So quickly writ that I did almost cry
For want of work, my time for to imploy :
Some time for want of work, I'm forced to play,
And idlely to cast my time away :
And again, asserting her originality of plot, which no reader
of the plays would think of denying : ^
1 Playes, 1662, "To the Readers" (No. 2).
2 Langbaine, p. 391, thinks that for this reason, "she ought with Justice
to be preferr'd to others of her Sex, which have built their Fame on other
People's Foundations."
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 215
But, Noble Readers, do not think my Playes
Are such as have been writ in former daies ;
As Johnson, Shakespear, Beaumont, Fletcher writ
Mine want their Learning, Reading, Language, Wit :
The Latin phrases, I could never tell
But Johnson could, which made him write so well
Greek, Latin Poets I could never read
Nor their Historians, but our EngUsh Speed ;
I could not steal their Wit, nor Plots out take
All my Playes Plots, my own poor brain did make.
From Plutarchs story I ne'er took a Plot,
Nor from Romances, nor from Don Quixot,
As others have, for to assist their Wit,
But I upon my own Foundation writ.
The only play in her book which was not entirely novel
is that called The Apocriphal Ladies} According to its " Epi-
logue " the basis is a tale in English history, and this may be
identified as Geoffrey of Monmouth's legendary account of
Locrine, made familiar by Milton in Comus. The story, in
brief, is that King Locrine, the oldest son of Brut, becomes
enamored of Estrildis, a German captive, but is forced by
Corineus, Duke of Cornwall, to marry his daughter Gwendolen,
to whom the King was previously betrothed. Estrildis is kept
in an underground chamber for seven years, until Corineus dies,
when Locrine deserts Gwendolen to marry his love. Gwendolen
retires to Cornwall, collects an army, and kills Locrine in bat-
tle, while Estrildis and her daughter Sabrina are flung into
a river, thereafter known from this occurrence as the Severn.
Such a narrative made crude but dramatic material in the hands
of an Elizabethan author, but the Duchess's interest in the
story became much more sophisticated. Her mind was occu-
pied with the question of Gwendolen's claim to the throne after
Locrine's marriage to Estrildis ; and in order to make this
problem more difficult she supposes that Gwendolen was the
ip.635.
2i6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
rightful heir and Locrine king only by virtue of being his
wife's husband. Then she lowers the rank of the characters,
renames them "The Duke of Inconstancy," "The Unfortunate
Duchess," " The Comical Duchess," and lo ! here is subject
matter for a play.
Thus we have two " apocriphal ladies " to start with : the
rightful duchess, now deposed by the ducal power of her hus-
band, and his second wife, who has no real claim to the posi-
tion. To these are added "The Creating Princess," determined
to elevate a husband to her own rank, and " The Imaginary
Queen," royal by right of her fancy. There is no action in
the play except the Duke's leaving his second wife and her
subsequent continuation of a Duchess's state, and even this is
narrated not acted .^ One scene is taken up by a discussion
between three gentlemen on the subject of heraldry ; ^ in an-
other. Lady True Honour tells Madam Inquirer about the
importance of rank.^ The height of irrelevancy seems to be
reached in the description of Earl Undone's marriage to Mis-
triss Tip-tape, an alewife, and her elevation to share his title.
Yet the connection of all this outlying material becomes plain,
when we realize that our authoress was not telling a story but
dramatizing the abstract conception of Rank. Her thesis is,
" I perceive Great Noble Persons may do what they will," *
and that proves to be the conclusion of the whole matter ; but
instead of establishing her point by one carefully selected
instance, she multiplies disconnected fancies, until the complex
web of imagination obscures her original plan. It is only neces-
sary to contrast the Elizabethan Locrine with T/ie Apocriphal
Ladies to see the difference between a play and an argumen-
tative treatise, a comparison the Duchess invites by boldly ad-
mitting her historical sources. No better evidence could be
found of how utterly undramatic was her work and how little
1 Scenes xxi and xxiii. ^ Scene xiv. ^ Scene xx. * Scene xxii.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 217
she realized the fact. This latter consideration may mitigate
one's personal irritation towards the lady, though it cannot
soften a righteous critical severity.
To treat the remaining twenty plays in detail would be as
discouraging as useless — they do not demand or deserve a
minute analysis. Let it suffice to enumerate them and to notice,
in passing, their general outline or most significant character-
istics. The first, Loves Adventures, in two parts, tells that the
Lady Orphant serves Lord Singularity in the guise of a page,
Affectionata, and so gains his love ; that Lady Bashful is
wooed by Sir Humphry Bold, but won by Sir Serious Dumbe ;
and that Sir Peaceable Studious drives his wife from her
worldliness by himself plunging into the society of fair ladies.
These stories give rise to numerous incidental discussions,
among them the description of a wise husband,^ the satire
upon Puritan preachers,^ and a complaint that there is such a
majority of evil in the world. ^ This last point is typical of the
Duchess's cast of thought, which more than once betrays a
distinct tendency towards pessimism, quite in keeping with
those troublous times and her own unfortunate experiences. It
is only natural for the exiled and impoverished noblewoman
to write : ^
The general manner of the whole World is to offer more than
present, to promise more than perform, to be more faigning than
real, more courtly than friendly, more treacherous than trusty, more
covetous than generous and yet more prodigal than covetous.
Newcastle frequently contributed to his wife's plays, and at the
end of Love's Adventures he has a poem summarizing the
action, which begins,
Love in thy younger age
Thou then turn'd page.
1 Part I, scene xiv. ^ Part II, scene xi. ^ Part II, scene xxxiii.
* The plays were written while she was still abroad, although not published
until 1662. See " To the Reader," at the end of the book.
21 8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
The Duchess is always scrupulously careful about rendering
due credit to her husband for his assistance in composition, so
that again and again in her plays we come across the legend
"' This Scene was written by my Lord Marquess of Newcastle"
or "These Verses the Lord Marquess writ."
The Comedy named The Several Wits. The wise Wit, the
wild Wit, the cholerick Wit, the humble Wit, is sufficiently
described by its title. One of the female characters, Mada-
mosel Solid, is the first of those contemplative ladies that are
scattered in such profusion throughout the plays and who are
only so many variations of the authoress herself. Lady San-
parelle in the two parts of Youths Glory and Deaths Banquet
is a similar person, and to her is given also the gift of oratory.
She gets her father's permission for public speaking, and
lectures to a select audience upon nature,^ upon love and
hate,2 upon men's professions,^ and finally upon matrimony.'*
Strangely enough she upholds celibacy and remains true to
her creed, as do others of the Duchess's ideal characters.
Evidently their creator, although a notable exponent of happy
married life, did not theoretically believe in the institution of
wedlock. Youths Glory and Deaths Banquet is, as the name
implies, a tragedy, for not only does Lady Sanparelle meet
her death, but the Lady Innocence commits suicide because
the Lord de L' Amour has forsaken her. He learns too late
that Lady Incontinent has basely slandered Innocence and, to
expiate the crime, takes his own life.
The Lady Contemplation, in two parts, is largely concerned
with the Lady Virtue's disguise as a farmer's daughter and her
encounter with Sir Effeminate Lovely, Sir Golden Riches, and
Lord Title, who finally marries her. The same noblemen
accost the real country girl, Mall Mean-bred, in comic scenes
1 Part I, scene ix. ^ Part I, scene xv.
^ Part I, scene xi. * Part II, scene v.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 219
written for the most part by Newcastle. This play also
deals with Lady Ward's success in winning her husband,
Lord Courtship, from his mistress, the Lady Amorous. The
Lady Contemplation, who gives her name to the piece, is
another imaginative character, but she is finally persuaded to
leave her solitary life and become the bride of Sir Fancy Poet.
One episode in this drama is so vivid as to suggest that the
Duchess may be describing an actual incident, of which she
was the heroine during her early days at court. The Lady
Ward can see no difference between the word " baud " and
the more elegant " confident " and is severely reprimanded
by Nurse Careful for such ingenuousness : ^
O peace Child for if any body heard you say so, they would laugh at
you for a Fool, but 't is a sign you never was a Courtier, for I knew
a young Lady that went to Court to be a Maid of Honour ; and there
were two young Ladies that were Confidents to each other, and a great
Prince made love to one of them, but addresst himself to the other,
as being her Friend ; this young Maid askt why he did so, it was
answered, she was the Princes Mistresse Confident ; and just as you
ask me, what said she, is a confident a Baud ; whereupon the whole
Court laught at her and for that only question condemned her to be
a very fool, nay a meer Changling.
The Wits Cabal takes its name from a company of men
and women who spend most of their time in polite conver-
sation or extemporaneous rhyming. This is a device frequently
employed by the Duchess, for it reduces the plot of her play
to a minimum and at the same time gives her fancy boundless
scope. The only individual strands which may be disentangled
from ten acts of talk are old Mother Matron's amusing capture
of Monsieur Frisk and the union of Madamoiselle Bon Esprit
with Monsieur Satyrical, despite the latter's dislike of women
and the former's intention to make him ridiculous. Interesting
details are : Monsieur Sensuality's arguments for polygamy,^
1 Part I, scene xix. ^ Part I, scene v.
220 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
a masque of the Five Senses,^ and the cabal's " dialogue-
discourses " in prose and verse.^ One of them pointedly
asserts that " Widowers love their second wives better than
the first . . , but women, 'tis said, love their first husbands
better than the second." ^ In another, Chaucer is praised as
an example of how unimportant is literary form, for " certainly
Chancers Witty Poems and Lively Descriptions, in despite of
their Old Language, as they have lasted in great Esteem and
Admiration these three hundred years, so they may do Eter-
nally amongst the Wise in every Age." ^ The Unnatural
Tragedie relates a story of incest in the same calm philo-
sophical manner which distinguishes all the Duchess's plays,
and which in this instance contrasts most forcibly with her
passionate subject. After Monsieur Frere has forced his sis-
ter, he kills both her and himself, thus indirectly causing the
death of her husband, his own intended bride, and Monsieur
Pere. The underplot deals with Monsieur Malateste, his good
first wife, and the shrew he afterwards marries. The weaker
partner fares ill each time, for the " survival of the fittest "
doctrine is twice carried out to its logical conclusion. The
Sociable Virgins frequently interrupt the action by their
abstract utterances, once harping again upon the Duchess's
favorite string with a demand that women should have more
experience and education.^
Again they discuss historians and have something to say of
Camden, famous as Ben Jonson's master and as author of
the Britannia : ^
1 Part I, scenes xxi, xxiv, and xxvi.
2 Part I, scene xxxvii, and Part II, scenes ix and xxii.
* Part I, scene xxv.
* Part I, scene xxxvii. This was the standard seventeenth-century opinion,
given classical expression in Dryden's Preface to the Fables.
5 Scene x. The Duchess herself rebutted their argument in her Preface
to The World's Olio.
^ Scene xiii.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 221
Let me tell you that Chronologers do not only new dress truth but
they falsifie her, as may be seen in our late chronologers, such writers
as Camden and the like ... As for particular Families some Camden
hath mistaken and some of Antient Descent he hath not mention'd
and some he hath falsely mention'd to their prejudice and some so
slightly, as with an undervaluing, as if they were not worth the men-
tion, which is far worse than if he should rail or disclame against them :
But I suppose he hath done as I have heard a Tale of one of his like
Profession, which was a Schoolmaster as Camden was, which went to
whip one of his Scholars, and the boy to save himself, promised his
Master that if he would give him his pardon, that his Mother should
give him a fat pig ; whereupon the fury of the Pedant was not only
pacify'd, but the boy was strok'd and made much of. . . . I have ob-
serv'd one Errour in his Writing that is, when he mentions such Places
and Houses, he says the ancient situation of such a worthy Family,
when to my knowledge, many of those Families he mentions bought
those Houses and Lands, some one Descent, some two Descents,
some three before, which Families came out of other parts of the
Kingdom, or the City, and not to the Antient and Inheritary Families ;
but he leaves those Antient Families unmention'd ... he might take
some pett at those that did not entertain him at their Houses when
he went his Progress about the Kingdome to inform him of the several
parts of the Country before he writ of the same.
One would expect from this to find the Newcastles slighted
in Britannia, but the case proves to be quite otherwise, ^ for
the Ogles are duly mentioned ^ and the Cavendishes receive
their meed of attention.^ Now Camden's book had earlier
been subjected to severe criticism by one Ralphe Brooke, who
in 1 599 brought out A Discoverie of Certaifie Erronrs, pub-
lished in Print in the much commeftded Britannia, 1594-^
1 Is it conceivable that the Duchess could have imagined that the Lucases
deserved a place in this aristocratic work ?
2 Britannia, 1637 ed., p. 812.
8 Britatmia, pp. 555-556. It is true that the Newcastle branch is not specifi-
cally noticed, but it had achieved no eminence by 1623, the year of Camden's
death. In his Annales, 1625 ed., p. 572, Camden mentions Elizabeth Talbot's
ill conduct, and as she really founded the family of Cavendish, this may have
been a possible cause for complaint.
* Title-page.
222 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
The minor facts are of small importance for our purpose,
which is merely to show that the Duchess's strictures were not
the first of their kind. Indeed it almost seems as if Camden
were anticipating The Unnatural Tragedie, when he wrote : ^
There are some peradventure which apprehend it disdainfully and
offensively that I have not remembered this or that family when as it
was not my purpose to mention any but such as were more notable,
nor all of them truely (for their names would fill whole volumes) but
such as hapned in my way according to the method I proposed to
my selfe.
The Piiblick Wooing takes its name from a plan devised by
Lady Prudence as a safeguard in marrying, that everything
may be open and aboveboard. She refuses a soldier, a country
gentleman, a courtier, a bashful suitor, an amorous one, a
divine, a lawyer, a citizen, and a farmer. The man of her
choice is a stranger, "a man that had a wooden Leg, a patch
on his Eye, and crook-back'd, unhandsome, snarled Hair and
plain poor Cloaths on,"^ who, of course, ultimately turns out
to be a prince in disguise. Sir Thomas Letgo, being in finan-
cial straits, wagers his affianced mistress against ;!^ 15,000,
and, when he loses, contents himself with the Lady Liberty, his
amoretta. Other characters in this play are Sir Henry Courtly
and his jealous wife ; the Lady Geosling, a newly married
woman ; and four chattering girls, Mistresses Parle, Trifle,
Vanity, and Fondly. The Matrimonial Tronble contains the
history of several unfortunate marriages. Mistris Forsaken
disguises herself as a man and courts her lover's wife, poison
or cold steel being the end of all three. Monsieur Amorous
gains the favor of Lady Wanton but is refused by Lady
Chastity. Sir Humphrey and Lady Disagree fall out over
trifles. Sir Timothy Spendall drinks his wife out of house and
1 "To the Reader," prefixed to the 1637 Britannia.
2 Scene xxiii.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 223
home. Only imminent personal danger to her husband can
shake the Lady Hypocondria from her fits of melancholy. The
Lady Jealousy feels that her maid Nan is a deadly rival, the
Lord Widower takes Doll Subtilty for his mistress, and Sir
John Dotard marries Briget Greasy. The passages dealing
with these three servants are frankly realistic and more spirited
than much of the Duchess's work ; she was, we shall see, not
altogether inexperienced in housekeeping, and maid-servants'
ways were evidently well known to her. The interview between
Briget and the Steward in Part I, scene ii, is an excellent bit
of life below stairs, while the kitchen wench's subsequent airs
as mistress of the house are vividly described if not specifically
shown. 1 During the second part of this " come-tragedy " a new
character is introduced, one Raillery Jester, the professional
fool. Many of our authoress's fancies are put into his mouth,
but he cannot be said to have the slightest individuality.
The title characters of NaUcres three Datighters, Beauty,
Love, and Wit are given French names in that play : Mada-
moiselle La Belle, Madamoiselle Amour, and Madamoiselle
Grand Esprit. The first weds Monsieur Heroick, after he
has fought a duel with Monsieur Phantasie over their mis-
tresses. Amour confesses her love for Heroick's brother
Nobilissimo, who is a model horseman ^ (shades of New-
castle !) and an exponent of the old Elizabethan spirit. " A
Right bred Gentleman," he says, "is to know the use of the
Sword, and it is more manly to assault, than to defend ; also
to know how to mannage Horses, whereby we know how
to assault our enemy as well as to defend our selves ; for it
is not playing with a Fidle, and dancing a Measure makes
a Gentleman ; for then Princes should dub Knighthood with
a Fidle and give the stick, and a pair of Pumps, instead of a
1 Part I, scenes vii, xiv, and xviii.
2 Part I, scene xi.
224 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Sword and a pair of Spurs," ^ Madamoiselle Grand Esprit
turns out to be another of the loquacious ladies who do not
marry at all. She talks of ignorance,^ self-love,^ vanity, vice,
and wickedness,^ of beauty, ^ and of matrimonial love.^ She
also states quite clearly the Duchess's creed, as it appears in
her philosophical books •?
The Harmony that is made out of discord, shews that there is only
one absolute power and wise disposer, that cannot be opposed, having
no Copartners, produces all things, being not produced by anything,
wherefore must be Eternall and consequently infinite ; this absolute,
wise and Eternal power Man calls God; but this absolute power,
being infinite, he must of necessity be incomprehensible and being
incomprehensible, must of necessity be unknown, yet glimpses of his
power is, or may be seen ; yet not so, but that Man is forced to set
up Candels of Faith, to light them, or direct them to that they cannot
perfectly know, and for want of the clear light of knowledge, Man
calls all Creations of this mighty power Nature.
Among other personages figuring in this play are Monsieur Es-
perance, who exasperates his wife by not noticing her clothes,
and the Talkative Ladies, one more circle of conversationalists.
The Religions relates the story of a child marriage between
Lady Perfection and Lord Melancholy, later broken off by his
father, Dorato. Melancholy is forced to wed another; and
Perfection, wooed by the Arch-Prince, enters a convent.
When Melancholy's wife dies, he seeks out his early love
behind her grate, where they prepare to die on one double-
pointed sword. This design is prevented, but, as the lady will
not break her vow, the only solution is that she " marry this
Lord again, and let him make the same Vow, and enter into
the same Cloyster, and into the same Religious Order of
Chastity, and being Man and Wife you are but as one
1 Part I, scene viii. ^ Part II, scene xiii.
2 Part I, scene vii. ^ Part II, scene xx.
8 Part I, scene xiii. ' Part I, scene vii.
* Part II, scene i.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 225
person, so that if you be constant and true to your selves, you
keep the Vow of Chastity ; for what is more Chast than law-
full Marriage ? " ^ A strange character, Mistriss Odd-Humour,
sporadically enters the action, with her favorite chair which
she cannot bear to leave. Finally her father burns it and
compels his daughter to take a husband. The Comical Hash
is more devoid of plot than any play in the 1662 volume.
Sir William Admirer's marriage with Lady Peaceable being
the only tangible incident in its pages. There is much dis-
cussion, however, especially as to originality in poets. As
usual the Duchess thinks "an Imitator is but an Artificer,
when as the Original Author is a Creator, and ought to be
accounted of, and respected and worship 'd as Divine . . . Art
cannot out do Nature, nor do as Nature hath done and doth
do."^ Again in a personal vein she writes :^ '" Contemplative
persons when they come into Company, or publick Societies,
their tongues do as Boys, that having been kept hard to their
studies, when once they get a play day, they run wildly about
and many times do extravagant actions." And finally, with a
broader application to her own writings than the Duchess ever
imagined : ^ " 't is very unhappy for women that they are not
instructed in the rules of Rhetoric, by reason they talk so
much, that they might talk sensibly, whereas now for want of
that Art, they talk meer nonsense." Some rudimentary knowl-
edge of literary rules would have been inestimably valuable
in assisting the authoress to a more important place in English
literature, dramatic and otherwise.
Bell in Campo, the last two-part play, seems to embody an
ideal of womanhood. Although the Duchess has elsewhere
forcibly expressed her opinion concerning feminine limitations,
at the same time she evidently cherished a vague aspiration
^ Scene xxxv. 8 Scene viii.
2 Scene iv. * Scene xii.
226 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
towards more virile qualities. At least the heroine of "As-
saulted and Pursued Chastity " was a successful general, and
here that situation is repeated,^ Lady Victoria persuades her
husband, the Lord General, to let her go along on his mili-
tary expedition, but later, when engagements threaten, she and
the other women are sent away. In pique they form an army
among themselves and after the men's defeat subdue the hos-
tile Kingdom of Faction, thus restoring peace to their country.
As a result many new laws, favorable to women, are enacted,
while their general, the Lady Victoria, receives particular
rewards and honors. Meantime Madam Jantil and Madam
Passionate, whose husbands have been killed in the wars, pass
very different widowhoods. Jantil builds an elaborate tomb,
prays constantly before it, and at last, playing the swan, dies
in music. Madam Passionate, on the other hand, marries
young Monsieur Compaignon, only to have her money squan-
dered and her person abused by the young husband. Follow-
ing Bell in Campo comes The Apocriphal Ladies, already
discussed in some detail, and then The Female Academy
brings this volume to an end. The Academy is "a House
wherein a company of young Ladies are instructed by old
Matrons ; as to speak wittily and rationally and to behave
themselves handsomly and to live virtuously." ^ Naturally the
men do not like this arrangement and start a rival academy,
but as their discourses always turn on women, the institution
proves a failure. Then in an attempt to break up the female
organization they play trumpets outside its lectures, until one
of the Matrons pacifies them by laying the responsibility on
the ladies' parents. Most of this action is described at second-
hand, and the scenes themselves are mainly occupied with
various abstract orations.
1 See also " To the Two Universities," prefixed to the 1655 edition of Philo-
sophical and Physical Opinions. ^ Scene i.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 227
At the conclusion of this volume, in another letter, " To
the Readers," the Duchess tells about a new work she is pro-
jecting. The Life of William Cavendishe had been already
begun, but as some necessary material was not yet at hand
(presumably the depositions of John Rolleston), " I was forced
to sit idle. . . . After some idle time, at last, I fell upon a vein
of writing Letters and so fast did the vein run at first, as in
one Fortnight I writ above three score Letters, but I find it
begins to flag ... for though I desire to make them up a
hundred, yet I believe I shall not go much further, finding
my spirits of Fancy grow weak, and dull and the vein of Wit
empty, having lately writ 2 1 Playes with 1 2 Epistles and one
Introduction besides Prologues and Epilogues. . . . These
letters I thought to joyn them to this Book of Playes, believ-
ing there would not be so many of them, as to be in Folio,
by themselves, but fearing I should surfeit my Readers with
too great a Volume, I have altered that intention. . . . But it
may be some will say there is enough of my Playes, to surfeit,
as being not delicious and choyce food for the mind." Evi-
dently some did say so,^ as in 1668, when Plays, Never Be-
fore Printed appeared, their author states that, " malice cannot
hinder me from Writing, wherein consists my chiefest delight
and greatest pastime ; nor from Printing what I write, since
I regard not so much the present as future Ages, for which I
intend all my Books. When I call this new one Plays, I do
not believe to have given it a very proper Title : for it would
be too great a fondness to my Works to think such Plays as
these suitable to ancient Rules, in which I pretend no skill ; or
1 Scott makes the young Earl of Derby in Peveril of the Peak exclaim :
" The fellow has brought me nothing but a parcel of tracts about Protestants
and Papists and a folio play-book, one of the conceptions as she calls them,
of that old mad-woman, the Duchess of Newcastle. ... I would not give one
of Waller's songs or Denham's satires for a whole cart-load of her Grace's
trash." — Border Edition, II, 5.
228 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
agreeable to the modern Humor, to which I dare acknowledg
my aversion : But having pleased my Fancy in writing many
Dialogues upon several Subjects, and having afterwards order'd
them into Acts and Scenes, I will venture in spight of the
Criticks, to call them Plays." ^
The first drama in this 1668 volume, TJie Sociable Com-
panions; or, the Female Wits, deals with certain disbanded
soldiers and their efforts to obtain a livelihood. The opening
scene contains a vigorous account of contemporaneous sharpers'
methods culminating in a rousing song, " Let's go to our New
Plantation." Subsequently the Captain's sister. Peg, fathers a
child on Get-all, the usurer, and by help of a mock spiritual
court obtains him as husband. During the supposed midwife's
testimony comes a phrase which might well stand as the plea
of all over-realistic artists. '" But what is all this to the Con-
fession of the Labouring Woman ? " the witness is asked in
the midst of her superfluous details, "It is of concern," she
replies, "for Circumstance is partly a declaring of truth." ^
Jane Fullwit takes service with Lawyer Plead-all as a man
clerk, so that when the disguise is revealed, he has agreed to
marry her. Lady Riches had meanwhile fallen in love with
the fictitious clerk but on learning of the deception takes
Dick Traveller to husband instead. Anne Sensible causes her
brother to find her alone with Doctor Cure-all, and in view of
this compromising situation she receives an offer of marriage.
A rather more unrelated portion of the story concerns Lady
Prudence's final acceptance of an aged suitor. Her insistence
on the vices of young men and on wisdom in the old may
hark back to the wedding of Margaret Lucas, aged twenty-
two, and William Cavendish, thirty years her senior.^
1 "To the Readers," prefixed to Plays, 1668. - Act III, scene i.
3 Compare The World's Olio, p. 136, where she says a woman should marry
at twenty, but a man not until fifty, for by then he will have gained some
knowledge ; and Natures Picture, p. 678, reiterates the former judgment.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 229
The Presence has for its heroine an imaginative Princess,
who finds that a common mariner is her dream-hero. The
Emperor disapproves of this match but himself falls in love
with the sailor, when that gentleman proves to be a woman in
disguise. Later the existence of two persons, twin brother
and sister, is discovered, and, as they are children to the Em-
peror of Persia, a double wedding is easily arranged. Various
courtiers and gentlewomen form the attendant court : Spend-
all and Mode marry old women, after the latter has made sure
that the young ladies will accept any man at all ; Conversant
and Observer join themselves to Quick- wit and Self-conceit ;
Madamoisel Bashful is won by the Lord of Loyalty, though
she incurs criticism for going abroad with him unescorted, —
one cannot but wonder whether this too is a reminiscence of
events at Saint Germains. In and out of The Presence runs
the Princess's Fool, at times vaguely recalling Shakespeare's
Feste. Though how much inferior to Feste's quip, " Take
away the fool, gentleman," ^ is the verbose " No, carry the
Princess to the Emperor's Chamber, and let her there be whipt,
for she is more Fool than I ; for she is in love with a Dream,
and I am in love with a Princess." ^ Typical of the Duchess's
method — or rather lack of it — are certain Scenes, twenty-nine
in number, " designed to be put into the Presence, but by
reason I found they would make that Play too long, I thought
it requisite to Print them by themselves." Some of these
additions develop Loyalty's courtship of Bashful, who, much
like the Duchess, was sent to the court " to learn to discourse,
and to refine her behaviour and to elevate her Spirit."^ The
remaining superfluous scenes are occupied with a new story,
which follows the fortunes of Monsieur Underward. On
his father's death he is sold and then married to an old hag,
1 Tivelfth Night, Act I, scene v. ^ Scene x.
"^ The Presence, Act I, scene vii.
230 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
that the Buyer may gain her portion. This wife later dies,
whereupon Underward marries rich Madam Petitioner and
retires into the country, much to the disgust of his servant,
Tom Diogenes. There are numerous short digressions inter-
woven : against gaming/ on office-buying and on favorites,'*
on funeral rites,^ and on the body politic, which is anatomized
according to Hobbes's Leviathan principles.^ Two scenes near
the end are very fittingly written by Newcastle, to describe
the excellences of country life and no doubt to justify his
withdrawal from London activities.
The Bridals begins with the weddings of Sir William Sage
and Sir John Amorous to Lady Vertue and Lady Coy respec-
tively. Monsieur Courtly, much annoyed by the attentions of
women in general, falls desperately in love with Vertue, all in
vain. Masters Longlife and Aged try to keep their witty son
and daughter apart, on the ground that " great Wits for the
most part have few Children, but what their brain produces,
which are Ideas, Inventions and Opinions . . . and the produc-
tion of these Incorporeal Children hinders the production of
Corporeal Children." ^ Here the Duchess seems again to sound
a personal note, but at any rate the two young people in ques-
tion elope and are soon forgiven by their fathers. Mimick, a
fool, plays considerable share in The Bridals with his arith-
metical calculations ^ and his pretended orations,'^ while in
one scene which is unspeakably low he goes quite beyond the
pale of respectability.^ No commentary on Restoration indeli-
cacy could be more striking than such work from the pen of
the noble and virtuous Margaret Cavendish. The Convent of
Pleastire is written in a more poetic vein than the Duchess's
other dramas. Lady Happy decides to forswear the world and
1 Scene ix. * Scene xvi. "^ Act III, scene ii.
2 Scene xii. ^ Act II, scene iii. * Act IV, scene v.
8 Scene xvii. * Act II, scene i.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 231
shuts herself up in a convent, where men are not allowed.
One gentleman disguises himself as a Princess, gains entrance,
and wins Happy's love before he is discovered. This simple
plot is made the framework for a short entertainment set-
ting forth the evils of matrimony, ^ for a pastoral of shepherds
and shepherdesses, and for a marine scene with the Princess
as Neptune, Lady Happy as a sea-goddess,^ Throughout
the whole play a large amount of verse occurs, none more
satisfactory than a song of Happy's in the last-mentioned
character. The Duchess actually seems stirred by her theme,
when she writes :
My cabinets are oyster-shells,
In which I keep my Orient pearls,
To open them I use the tide,
As keys to locks, which opens wide,
The oyster-shells then out I take ;
Those, orient-pearls and crowns do make.
And modest coral I do wear,
Which blushes when it touches air.
On silver waves I sit and sing,
And then the fish lie listening :
Then sitting on a rocky stone,
I comb my hair with fishes bone ;
The whilst Apollo, with his beams,
Doth dry my hair from wat'ry streams.
His light doth glaze the water's face,
Makes the large sea my looking glass.
So when I swim on waters high,
I see myself as I glide by :
But when the sun begins to burn,
I back into my waters turn,
And dive unto the bottom low :
Then on my head the waters flow.
In curled waves and circles round ;
And thus with waters I am crown'd.
1 Act III, scenes ii-x.
2 Act IV, scene i.
232 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
After The Convent of Pleasure the 1668 volume is brought
to a conclusion with some fragments headed A Piece of a
Play ; the Duchess states it is one " which I did intend for
my Blazing-World and had been printed with it, if I had
finish'd it ; but before I had ended the second Act, finding
that my Genius did not tend that way, I left that design ; and
now putting some other Comedies to the Press, I suffer this
Piece of One to be publish 'd with them." ^ She also intended
a farce to accompany her play but never got any further than
naming the characters. In the two acts of the drama proper
we see Lord Bear-man and Sir Puppy Dog-man trick them-
selves out in the latest fashions to please their mistress, Lady
Monkey. Dog-man is rejected and unceremoniously transfers
his attention to Lady Leviret, already wooed by Sir Politick
Fox, Monsieur Satyr, and Monsieur Ass. A strong propensity
towards satire comes out in such a passage as that where Lord
Bear-man enters, "all Accoutred in the mode, and all in the
mode, careless and with Congies."^
Bear-man : Sir Politick Fox-man, my dear and obliging friend, how
do I love thee ! for thou art the most meritorious person in the
whole World.
This fragment brings to an end the Duchess's dramatic work,
which is of far greater amount than value. Her genius did
not tend towards a form of composition subject to so many
and such strict qualifications as playwriting, nor did she
have any conception of depicting character, which is the
backbone of that art. Judged as drama, her two volumes
of plays are worthless. What they do contain, is here and
there a bit of poetry, a well-put gnomic phrase, or some satir-
ical exposition of contemporary society. Occasionally a per-
sonal reference is discoverable, but, above all, the Duchess's
^ " Advertisement." * Act II, scene i.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 233
mental state, her ideals and her ideas, shine forth from the
disconnected plots and impossible personages of her imagina-
tion. Yet what is gained from perusing these plays hardly
repays the time and labor necessary to extract the wheat from
the chaff. Repetitions and involved discussions weary one's
intellect, orations and " dialogue-discourses " tire the brain, and
twenty-six plays are required to relate that which could have
been told us in as many pages. The most important fact to
be deduced from this whole phantasmagoria is the simplest as
well as the most evident — the Duchess tried her hand at play-
writing and failed. Here for once contemporary judgment
was justified and has been sustained by posterity.
Not unrelated to her dramatic activities was a book this
authoress published in 1662 or 1663,^ under the title of Ora-
tions of Divers Sorts, Accomodated to Divers Places. At first
glance, such a volume seems decidedly original and indeed it
is unusual, but one must remember that in the plays inci-
dental orations on various topics were of common occurrence.
The Duchess evidently took delight in writing them, they
offered her an opportunity to express her " conceptions," and
therefore it was natural she should project a collection of these
speeches. They are all short but number one hundred and
eighty (divided into fifteen sections), so that they form a small
folio. The introductions as usual deserve attention. Newcastle
writes to his wife with half -jocular kindliness :^
Were all the Grecian Orators alive,
And swarms of Latines, that did daily strive
With their perfum'd and only tongues to draw
The deceiv'd people to their Will and Law
^ Some copies are dated one year and some the other. See Diet. Nat.
Biog., Firth, p. xxvi, and Harvard Copy (1663). Mr. Henry E. Huntington
has a copy of each date.
^ " To the Lady Marchioness of Newcastle on her Book of Orations."
234 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
How short would all this be, did 3'ou but look
On this admired Ladies witty Book !
All Europ's Universities, no doubt,
Will study English now, the rest put out.
The Duchess herself describes her detractors : ^
The truth is, they are a sort of Persons that in Playes preferr Plots
before Wit and Scenes before Humours ; in Poems, Rime before
Similizing and Numbers before Distinguishing ; in Theology, Faction
before Faith, and Sophistry before Truth ; in Philosophy, Old Authors
before New Truths, and Opinions before Reason. And in Orations
they preferr Artificial Connexions before Natural Eloquence.
That is to say, the Duchess's lack of restraint in writing was
noticed by her contemporaries, and she was very justly criti-
cized for an exuberant fancy in need of formal repression.
" A Praefatory Oration " states that the orations were written
'" rather to benefit my Auditors, than to delight them," but
further on the authoress hopes that both ends may be achieved,
a combination of the utile and dtdce again. Part I consists of
" Orations to Citizens in a chief City concerning Peace and
War," different speakers counselling different actions in a given
situation. Part II, " Orations in the Field of War," are ad-
dressed to soldiers under all the conceivable conditions favor-
able to speechmaking. Part III, '" Orations to Citizens in the
Market Place," wanders far afield in the three speeches con-
cerning liberty of conscience, which conclude that sects are all
very well if they submit to the State.^ Number 11 is "' An
Oration against those that lay an Aspersion upon the Retire-
ment of Noble men " and concludes that whether it be caused
by affronts or not, no one should criticize. If there is a single
theme of prevailing occurrence in the Duchess's work, surely
it is this pique at the slights which brought about her lord's
1 " To the Readers of my Works."
2 Orations 12-14.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 235
retirement from the court. Part IV, " Several Causes Pleaded
in Several Courts of Judicature," contains pleadings for mur-
der, adultery, theft, and inheritance. Several of the " Speeches
to The King in Council " deal with two brothers condemned
to death, who are finally pardoned because they killed their
sister to wipe out her dishonor.^ Oration 7 emphasizes the
importance of trade as Newcastle did in the " Little Book."
Numbers 9 to 12 give advice how to treat common peti-
tioners, the conclusion being to hold them in hand until the
entire army is ready for action. Part VI is " Orations in Courts
of Majesty, From Subjects to their King and From the King
to his Subjects," when the people are rebellious, discontented,
or submissive. All these political tracts are based on the
Hobbesian conception that a monarch is the sine qua non
of government.
Part VII becomes more individual with its " Speeches of
Dying Persons," of which Number 2, "A Daughters Dying
Speech to her Father," may be quoted to show the Duchess's
general style in this volume :
Father, farewell ! And may that life which issues from my young
and tender years be added to your age ! may all your grief be buried
in my grave, and may the joys, pleasures and delights, that did attend
my life, be servants unto yours ! may comfort dry your eyes, God
cease your sorrows, that though I die, you may Uve happily. Why do
you mourn that death must be your son-in-law 1 since he is a better
husband, than any you could choose me, or I could choose myself ; it
is a match that Nature and the Fates have made ; wherefore be con-
tent, for it is not in your power to alter the decrees of fate for destiny
cannot be opposed, but if you could, you would rob me of the happi-
ness the Gods intend me ; for though my body shall dwell with death,
my soul shall dwell in heaven ; and holy angels that are my marriage
guests, will conduct it to that glory for which you have cause to joy,
and not to grieve ; for all creatures live but to die, but those that are
blessed die to live ; and so do I. Farewell.
1 Orations 2-5.
236 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Twenty-eight " Funeral Orations " compose Part VIII, the
most remarkable of which is "A Post-Riders Funeral Oration,"
for " could his soul ride post on death to heaven, as his body
rid post on a horse to death, he might outstrip many a soul
that is gone before him." ^ In the " Funeral Oration of a
Student," the Duchess says that this man was half dead before
and that now his soul has escaped. Part IX is made up of four
"Marriage Orations," Part X of "Orations to Citizens in the
Market Place." The last of these, " An Oration for the Liberty
of Women," introduces Part XI, "' Femal Orations," in which
the problem to-day called Feminism is debated pro and con.
We have already seen the Duchess rebelling against women's
inabilities, and here she argues from opposite sides the ques-
tion of her sex's emancipation. These speeches are about
evenly divided in number,^ though Mr. Bickley says that vic-
tory lies " with the advocates of passive femininity." ^ They
have the last word certainly, and one may imagine that their
creator sympathized with them, not by inclination but by what
she felt the force of necessity. Margaret Cavendish would
have liked to see women leading armies as they did in her
imagination, yet she did not believe that their natures fitted
them for such tasks. In the Orations, too, her scheme is pro-
fessedly dramatic,* so that no final opinion need be formulated
after different points of view have been expressed.
Part XII, " Orations in Country Market-Towns, where
Country Gentlemen meet," begins with arguments in favor of
country life but degenerates into a drinking bout, concluding
1 Oration 13.
2 Out of seven speeches three are violently for, three are against, and
one is cravenly neutral.
8 The Cavendish Family, p. 125, where he wrongly says there are two books
of orations, one for men and one for women.
* " My Orations for the most part are Declamations, wherein I speak Pro
and Con, and Determine nothing." — " The Preface " to CCXI Sociable Letters.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 237
with the " Speech of a Quarter drunk Gentleman " and the
" Speech of a Half drunken Gentleman," Part XIII contains
" Orations in the Field of Peace," dealing with rural industry,
and Part XIV, " Orations in a Disordered and Unsettled State
or Government." The latter is naturally based on Hobbes's
theory of a commonwealth and makes no original suggestions
in regard to restoring a stable organization. The last speech
in this group, " A Generals Oration to his Chief Command-
ers," states that in the present condition of war ten bullets out
of every eleven miss their mark. Part XV, " Scholastical Ora-
tions," completes the three hundred and nine pages of this
strange volume, which, like many of the Duchess's other works,
is more interesting by reason of its existence than for any in-
trinsic excellence. These orations are well enough in their
way, but it is such an undramatic, monotonous way that they
have practically no claim upon posterity. It was their author's
habit to lay hold upon an idea, to envelop it with her formless
images, and to hammer at it continuously. She followed this
formula, with more or less success, in her poems, her philoso-
phy, and her plays ; the Orations exemplify the same process
on a smaller scale.
IV
CCXI SOCIABLE LETTERS (1664) AND THE BLAZING
WORLD (1666)
In 1664 Margaret Cavendish put forth still another kind of
literature — her epistolary volume, the CCXI Sociable Letters)-
We have already seen how, after her first book of plays was
finished, she began to produce these imaginary letters, com-
posing over sixty at first. One hundred was the number she
^ Fifty-one of these letters are reprinted in Everyman's Library, and twenty-
two of these fifty-one also appeared in pages 235-284 of Mr. Jenkins's selec-
tions, The Cavalier and his Lady.
238 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
hoped to complete, but her muse once started, it could not
stop until the extraordinary number of two hundred and eleven
had been written. Newcastle introduces them with his cus-
tomary eulogy in verse, and an unnamed admirer (possibly the
authoress herself) rhymes as follows : ^
This Lady only to her self she Writes
And all her Letters to her self Indites ;
For in her self, so many Creatures be,
Like many Commonwealths, yet all Agree.
The Duchess explains that she has composed this book be-
cause she could not work,^ " I mean such Works as Ladies use
to pass their Time withall, and if I Could, the Materials of
such Works would cost more than the Work would be worth,
besides all the Time and Pains bestow'd upon it. You may ask
me, what Works I mean ; I answer. Needle-works, Spinning-
works, Preserving-works, as also Baking, and Cooking-works,
as making Cakes, Pyes, Puddings and the like, all of which I
am Ignorant of ; and as I am Ignorant in these Imployments,
so I am Ignorant in Gaming, Dancing and Revelling. But
yet, I must ask you leave to say, that I am not a Dunce in all
Imployments, for I Understand the Keeping of Sheep, and
Ordering of a Grange, indifferently well, although I do not
Busie my self much with it, by reason my Scribling takes
away the most part of my Time. Perchance some may say,
that if my Understanding be most of Sheep, and a Grange, it
is a Beastly Understanding ; My answer is, I wish Men were
as Harmless as most Beasts are, then surely the World would
be more Quiet and Happy." This particular indignation against
humanity is due to criticisms that had been passed upon her
previous books, which she defends one by one with some
1 " Upon her Excellency the Authoress."
^ " To his Excellency the Lord Marquess of Newcastle."
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 239
minuteness. Then fearing adverse comment on the present
volume, our authoress anticipates it by a poem, " To the Cen-
sorious Reader."
The scheme of her work is clearly stated in Letter I :
Madam, — You were pleas'd to desire, that, since we cannot con-
verse personally, we should converse by letters, so as if we were speak-
ing to each other, discoursing our opinions, discovering our designs,
asking and giving each other advice ; also telling the several accidents,
and several imployments of our home-affairs, and what visits we re-
ceive, or entertainments we make, and whom we visit, and how we
are entertain'd ; what discourses we have in our gossiping-meetings,
and what reports we hear of publick affairs, and of particular persons,
and the like ; so that our letters may present our personal meetings and
associatings.
In another place we are told that the reason these effusions
are cast " in the Form of Letters, and not of Playes, is, first,
that I have put forth Twenty Playes already, which number
I thought to be Sufficient, next, I saw that Variety of Forms
did Please the Readers best, and that lastly they would be more
taken with the Brevity of Letters, than the Formality of Scenes,
and whole Playes, whose Parts and Plots cannot be Understood
till the whole Play be Read over, whereas a Short Letter will
give a Full Satisfaction of what they Read." 1 A careful
peruser of the Duchess's books, then, will expect to find little
novelty in these "Sociable Letters" beyond their form, and
such proves to be the case. Their subjects we have already
found to repletion throughout her earlier writings, although
this collection is unique in the diversity of its range. Almost
every side of Margaret Cavendish's literary activity finds some
expression here, with a corresponding confusion as the in-
evitable result. None among her works better synthesizes
her complete accomplishment, none would be more amazing
to the uninitiated.
1 " The Preface."
240 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Perhaps the commonest theme in these epistles is women,
their characteristics and their abihties. As usual, the Duchess
has no very high opinion of her sex's wisdom,^ but she still
is ambitious enough to envy men's greater capacities.^ Women
are too much occupied with gossip ^ and dancing, romances and
courtships,* too completely overruled by the vagaries ^ of tyran-
nic fashion,^ for their minds to be more than " shops of small-
wares, wherein some have pretty toyes, but nothing of any
great value." '^ Feminine influence must come indirectly, for
" not only Wives and Mistresses have prevalent power with
Men, but Mothers, Daughters, Sisters, Aunts, Cousins, nay
Maid-Servants have many times a persuasive power with their
Masters, and a Land-lady with her Lodger, or a she-Hostess
with her he-Guest ; yet men will not believe this, and 't is the
better for us, for by that we govern as it were by an insensible
power, so as men perceive not how they are Led, Guided and
Rul'd by the Feminine Sex." ^ Some instances of this fact
are given in other letters,^ but most marriages discussed by the
Duchess do not turn out so well. In one case divorce is
narrowly averted,^*' there are several matches of convenience,^^
while censorious wives,^^ fickle husbands,^^ and general incom-
patibility ^^ disturb many marital relationships. Sir G. C. (for
the characters in this book are designated by initials) has a
terrific altercation with his wife, because " the Cook knowing
his Master loved not rost Beef, sent in a Chine of rost Beef
to the Table, and when her Guests were all Set, and beginning
to Eat, she was very angry, to have, as she thought her Feast
1 Letter IX. 8 Letter XVI.
2 Letter XXVII. ^ Letters XII, CIV, CX.
8 Letter XCI. 1° Letters CLIII, CLV.
4 Letter XXI. ii Letters LXXIX, CLXXV.
6 Letter C XX VIII. ^^ Letter C 1 1 1 .
6 Letter LXIII. is Letter XXXV.
» Letter X. w Letter LX.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 241
disgraced with an old English fashion, and not only an Old,
but a Countrey fashion, to have Beef serv'd to their Table," ^
Jealousy is the root of most domestic evil, as was exemplified
by a woman 2 who lived next door to the Newcastles during
their exile.^ Her husband flirted with one of the Duchess's
maids, at first stuffing flowers through a hole in the door
between their gardens and afterwards throwing a handkerchief
filled with sweetmeats into the girl's room at night.^ The
maid's confession of ignorance whence these trifles came
finally pacified the irate wife, though not until considerable
time and attention had been expended upon that matter.
Jealousy, indeed, is a common failing among human beings,
not only jealousy in love,^ but of women towards one another,^
and a general envy of the powerful.^ Bragging, too, is fre-
quently found in this world ^ and gaming as well, especially at
tennis, which seems to be played out of covetousness, not for
recreation or exercise : ^
Tennis is too Violent a Motion for Wholsome Exercise, for those that
Play much at Tennis, impair their Health and Strength, by Wasting
their Vital Spirits through much Sweating, and weaken their Nerves
by overstraining them, neither can Tennis be a Pastime, for it is too
Laborious for Pastime, which is onely a Recreation, and there can be
no Recreation in Sweaty Labour.
Bad critics,^'^ busybodies,ii officious will-makers,^^ and courte-
sans ^^ come in for their share of condemnation, but especial op-
probrium gets heaped upon the Puritans. A burlesque of their
1 Letter XXXII. 2 Letter CXXIV.
3 Because of the jealous wife's letter of complaint " being in another Lan-
guage, I could not read it."
* A window was open on account of the heat, and this made the occurrence
possible. ^ Letter CI.
s Letters XXIII, CVIII. 10 Letter CIX.
6 Letters CV, CLXXI. " Letter CX.
7 Letter XXXI. 12 Letter CVII.
« Letters XXII, LXIV. 1* Letters XXXVI, LVII.
242 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
sermons occurs/ and it is remarked that "those ministers
preach more their own words than God's, for they interpret
the Scripture to their own sense, or rather to their factious
humours and designs ; and after their sermons, their female
flocks gossip Scripture, visiting each other to confer notes
and make repetitions of the sermons, as also to explain and
expound them. For, first the minister expounds the Scripture,
and then the women-hearers expound the sermon ; so that
there are expoundings upon expoundings, and preaching upon
preaching, insomuch as they make such a medley or hash of
the Scripture, as certainly the right and truth is so hidden and
obscured that none can find it."^ A religious woman, Mrs. P. I.,
urges long extemporaneous prayers,^ but the Duchess does not
approve of them :
I can hardly believe God can be pleased with so many words, for
what shall we need to speak so many words to God, who knows our
thoughts, minds and souls, better than we do our selves? Christ did
not teach us long prayers, but a short one, nay, if it were lawful for
men to similize God to his creatures (which I think it is not), God
might be tired with long and tedious petitions or often repetitions ;
but, Madam, good deeds are better than good words, in so much as
one good deed is better than a thousand good words.*
These reflections on Puritanism show that the Civil War
was never far from Margaret Cavendish's thoughts, and, more-
over, she often mentions it expressly.^ Her desire that the
commons should be subordinated,*^ her exclamations against
duelling "^ and upon the necessity of exact titles ^ depend more
or less upon that great event. It broke up many friendships,^
confused preachers with soldiers, ^^ and left in its wake a
1 Letter LXXVI. 6 Letter LXV.
2 Letter XVIL ' Letter LXVIIL
8 Letter LL s Letter CLXXVL
* Letter LIX. 9 Letter CXX.
6 Letters IX, XVI, XL, CXIX. lo Letter XL.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 243
contempt for learned men.^ This last evil was of course magni-
fied into incredible proportions by the Duchess, who believed
that poets and philosophers were the happiest as well as the
wisest people on earth .^ She planned to bring up any children
of hers in accordance with that principle,^ meanwhile devot-
ing her talents to its establishment. The most fanciful and
consequently in some ways the most characteristic letter in her
collection describes a banquet of poets, at which she was the
only woman present.^ Their food and appointments were suit-
able to the occasion, and afterwards they all walked up Par-
nassus for exercise and looked at the surrounding landscape
through perspective glasses. Another time our authoress imag-
ined that she was empress of all the world,^ and yet again her
absent-mindedness got her into serious trouble : ^
For I one day sitting a Musing with my own Thoughts, was Con-
sidering and Pondering upon the natures of Mankind, and Wondering
with my Self, why Nature should make all Men some wayes or other
Defective, either in Body, or Mind, or both, for a Proof I Chose out
One whom I thought the freest from Imperfections, either in Mind,
or Body, which was the Lady A. N. and I took Pen and Paper, and
Writ down all the Defects I could Think or had Observed in her, and
upon an other all the Excellencies she was Indued with, by Nature,
Heaven, and Education, which last Pleased me so Well, as I was
resolved to send her a Copy in a Letter ; but when I was to send her
the Letter, both the Papers lying upon my Table, I mistook the right
Paper that was in her Praise and sent that which was in her Dispraise,
never reading it when I sent it.
First and last the Duchess tells us a good deal about herself
in the CCXI Sociable Letters. Her melancholy ,'' her bashful-
ness,^ and her retired life^ are all noticed, together with the
1 Letter CLXIX. « Letter LXVI.
2 Letter XIV. ' Letter VIII.
8 Letter LXXV. 8 Letter CXXXVII.
* Letter XCIX. 9 Letters XXIX, XC, CXLVIL CLVIII.
6 Letter CXCVII.
244 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
ill health that inevitably followed lack of exercise.^ One also
suspects Margaret Cavendish of figuring as the Lady V. R.,
who, when she is sick, " doth like the man that was in a
Storm, who in the time of Danger promised the Blessed
Virgin Mary, to Offer to her Altar a Candle as Big and as
Long as the Mast of the Ship, if ever he came to Shore ; so
the Lady V. R. when she is Sick, promises, if ever she Recover,
she will take the Air, and Use Exercises, but being Restored
to Health, she Forgets her Promise, or only Looks out of a
Window for Once or Twice, and Walks Two or Three turns
in a Day, in her Chamber." ^ Sometimes the Duchess dis-
cusses Plutarch,^ and again she holds forth with her customary
eloquence on servants,^ orators,^ or the educational value of
toys.^ In this last epistle may be detected a lurking regret at
her own childlessness, which is confirmed by a scornful diatribe
against pregnant women's affectations'^ and against excessive
wish for offspring. Feminine nature might well have hidden
the chagrin of disappointing her husband under the assertion
that, " Many times Married Women desire Children as Maids
do Husbands more for Honour than for Comfort or Happi-
ness." ^ More abstractly and also more platitudinously we are
informed that beauty is transitory,^ that happiness lies within
us,^*^ and that wisdom comes with age.^^ As usual the Duchess
emphasizes the necessity of faith, ^ because God, who disposes
all things, ^^ is beyond our understanding. " O Foolish and
Conceited Man ! " ^^ she exclaims, and again, " Man is so Pre-
sumptuous, as to Assimilize God, as also to Pretend to know
1 Letter CXIX. « Letter XCIII.
2 Letter CXXX. » Letter CLXXX.
8 Letters XXV, CLXXXVIL lo Letter CIL
* Letters LXI, CLXXIX. " Letters XX, XXIV.
5 Letters XXVII, XXVIII, CXVII. 12 Letter XXXVII.
6 Letter CLII. is Letter LXXIV.
7 Letter XLVII.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 245
what God sayes, making him to Speak Hke Man ; also to
express him to have Passions ; but if God be Absolute and
Incomprehensible, it is an High Presumption to Assimilize
God to any Creature." ^ The Church of England seems to
her the most uncontaminated creed in spite of too much lay
reading,^ although " one may be my very good Friend, and
yet not of my opinion, everyone's Conscience in Religion is
betwixt God, and themselves, and it belongs to none other. "^
This breadth or weakness of religious belief is not echoed by
Newcastle in discussing the heathen, who "are Govern'd by
Lies and Fables,"* yet he too admits that "every Man hath
his Weak and his Strong Side, and if he do Compare him-
self with another, he doth it not Justly, for he Compares his
Strong Parts with the other mans Weak Parts, and it seems
Truth when so Compared."
A good many of the Duchess's letters deal with those meta-
physical conceptions which lie behind her philosophical books.^
Atoms,^ vacuum,^ the planets,^ are discussed, and diseases
occupy no less than seven epistles,^ The properties of cream
receive some attention,!'^ and it is explained that standing tires
one more than walking, because "when any one Stands still,
the Nerves and Sinews are Stretch'd straight out at Length,
but when one Walks or Moves, they have Liberty, as being
Unbent and Unstretch'd." " Her Philosophical and Physical
Opinions is specifically defended ^^ and her Orations rather
consciously depreciated in a letter that must have been
1 Letter CLXX. 2 Letter LXXXVII. 3 Letter XVL
* Letter CLXXXIV. He also quotes a saying of Sir Philip Sidney's :
" Hath a man any good thing in him ? Love him for that, for there are many
that have none."
5 Letter CLVII. '^ Letter CLXI.
6 Letter CLIX. 8 Letters CXXXV, CXXXVII.
9 Letters CXXXII, CXXXVI, CXXXIX, CXL, CXLIX, CCVIII, CCIX.
10 Letters CLIV, CLX.
11 Letter CLVI. 12 Letter CXLIV.
246 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
written before its publication.^ Prefatory epistles alone ought to
be used for self-praise she thinks,^ although satirical writers
employ such material in the body of their work and thus re-
veal their own complacency.^ Margaret Cavendish is so sure
that a man can be known by his writings'^ that she under-
takes considerable literary criticism in the " Sociable Letters."
Romances are always scorned as demoralizing and vapid ; ^
complimentary poems have "seldom much Wit or Fancy,
onely Flattery, Rime and Number " ; ^ new authors gain little
applause at home, especially among students, who " despise all
New Works, and only delight in Old Worm-eaten Records." "^
The Scriptures are no fit subject for a layman to treat,^ nor
does Scriptural paraphrasing command much respect : ^
I cannot say but it may be pleasing to read, but I doubt whether
it will be well to write it ; for whosoever doth heighten the sacred
scriptures, by poetical expressions, doth translate it to the nature of
a romance, for the ground of a romance is for the most part truth, but
upon those truths are feignings built ; and certainly the Scripture and
feignings ought not to be mixed together, for so holy a truth ought
not to be express'd fabulously ; wherefore in my opinion no subject
is so unfit for poetical fancies as the Scriptures, for though poetry is
divine, yet it ought not to obstruct and obscure the truth of sacred
historical prose.
The use of initials in this work is often very puzzling.
Lord B., for instance, who was learned, eloquent, witty, and
wise, and whose writings have kindled the brains of others,^^
suggests at once Lord Bacon. Sir W. D. may well be Sir
William Davenant ; and his heroic poem, which, unlike
older examples of that genre, is quite probable, coincides
with Gondibert : ^^
1 Letter CLXXV. 6 Letters LXX, LXXVII. » Letter CXXIX.
2 Letter LXXIX. e Letter LXXIL i" Letter LXIX.
8 Letter LXXIIL '^ Letter LXXVIII. " Letter CXXVIL
4 Letter CXXVI. 8 Letter LXXXVI.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 247
Of all the Heroick Poems I have read, I like Sir W. Ds as being
Most and Nearest to the Natures, Humours, Actions, Practice, Designs,
Effects, Faculties, and Natural Powers, and Abilities of Men or Human
Life, containing no Impossibilities or Improbabilities : Indeed such an
Heroick Poem it is, that there cannot be found any Fault therein,
unless he seem'd to have too much Care or Pains taken in the Expres-
sion of his Descriptions. , . . But had the Language been as Easie, as
Fine, and had not those Choice Expressions been so Closely Compact,
but were as Usual, as his Descriptions are Natural, certainly it had
been a President for all Heroick Poems.
S. A.'s contemporary history of Charles I is censured for mud-
dhng the figures in regard to Newcastle's expenditures when
he entertained the King at Welbeck and Bolsover ; ^ the
Duchess guarantees to set that matter straight in her forth-
coming biography, a promise which we know she carried out
to the letter. Meanwhile she compares her husband in valour
to Caesar, in fancy to Ovid (whom she vastly prefers to
Virgil),^ and in dramatic authorship to Shakespeare.^
The latter author comes in for more particular and more
discriminating criticism than is usually meted out by our
authoress : ^
Shakespear did not want wit, to express to the life all sorts of
persons, of what quality, profession, degree, breeding, or birth soever ;
nor did he want wit to express the divers, and different humours, or
natures, or several passions in mankind ; and so well he hath expressed
in his playes all sorts of persons, as one would think he had been
transformed into every one of those persons he hath described ; and
as sometimes one would think he was really himself the clown or
jester he feigns, so one would think, he was also the king, and privy
counsellor; also as one would think he were really the coward he
feigns, so one would think he were the most valiant, and experienced
soldier ; who would not think he had been such a man as his Sh-Johi
Falstaffl and who would not think he had been Harry the Fifth?
& CGTtsanXy Jtilius Caesar, Augustus Caesar, and Antontus did never
1 Letter CLXIV. * Letter CLXII.
2 Letter CXLVI. * Letter CXXIII.
248 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
really act their parts better, if so well, as he hath described them, and
I believe that Antottius and Brutus did not speak better to the people,
than he hath feign'd them : nay, one would think that he had been
metamorphosed from a man to a woman, for who would describe
Cleopatra better than he hath done, and many other females of his
own creating, as Nan Page, Mrs. Page, Mrs. Ford, the doctor's maid,
Bettrice, Mrs. Quickly, Doll Tearsheet, and others, too many to relate?
and in his tragick vein, he presents passions so naturally, and misfor-
tunes so probably, as he peirces the souls of his readers with such a
true sense and feeling thereof, that it forces tears through their eyes,
and almost persuades them they are really actors, or at least present
at those tragedies. Who would not swear he had been a noble lover,
that could woo so well ? and there is not any person he hath described
in his book, but his readers might think they were well acquainted
with them. . . . Shakespear's wit and eloquence was general, for, and
upon all subjects, he rather wanted subjects for his wit and eloquence
to work on, for which he was forced to take some of his plots out of
history, where he only took the bare designs, the wit and language
being all his own ; and so much he had above others, that those, who
writ after him, were forced to borrow of him, or rather to steal from him.
Some of these "Sociable Letters" were written after the
Newcastles' return, as there are felicitations over that event ^
and a note on hearing that '" the ship was drowned wherein the
man was that had charge and care of my playes, to carry them
into E. to be printed, I being then in A."^ Other epistles
reflect experiences upon the Continent : women's enforced
travel,^ trepidation over a return home,^ the courtesy due to
creditors,^ with comments on Holland and the Dutch.^ Certain
Antwerp descriptions are redolent of life there : '^
I am so full of fear, as I write this letter Avith great difficulty, for all
this city hath been in an uproar, and all through a factious division be-
twixt the common council, and those they call the Lords, which are the
higher magistrates. The common people gather together in multitudes,
1 Letter LXXXIV. 5 Letter XLI.
2 Letter CXLIIL 6 Letter CXV.
8 Letter XCIX. 7 Letter CLXXII.
* Letters CXLI, CLXV.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 249
pretending for the right of their privileges, but it is thought the design
is to plunder the merchants' houses, and the churches. ... I am ex-
tremely afraid, insomuch that at every noise I hear, if I be not with my
husband I run to find him out, so that I write this letter but by starts.
The climate of Antwerp seemed very severe to the Duchess,
for she frequently complains about cold weather in her ac-
counts of sleighing and sliding.^ One day her husband's per-
suasion brought her "' out of the city, as without the walls, to
see men slide upon the frozen moat, or river, which runs, or
rather stands about the city walls, as a trench and security
thereof ; and I being warm inclosed in a mantle, and easily
seated in my coach, began to take pleasure to see them slide
upon the ice, insomuch as I wished I could, and might slide,
as they did." ^ However, she did not attempt that feat, but
when she returned home her thoughts quite naturally took to
sliding in her brain. When fine weather came again, the
Duchess ventured out, despite her bad health, to see the pre-
Lenten carnival which was Antwerp's chief diversion.^ At
other times travelling mountebanks and actors visited the city,^
especially a certain quack doctor with his fool, Jaen Potage.
Two women took part in the troupe's performances, which
were so pleasing to the Duchess " as I caused a Room to be
hired in the next House to the Stage, and went every day to
see them." ^ After they were ejected from town, her thoughts
began to act upon the stage of her brain, until the magistrates
of the mind did away with such follies.
In another Antwerp letter, the Duchess explains why she
sings ballads rather than songs written by Newcastle and set
to music by a Mr. Duarti.^ Her modesty asserts that, "the
1 Letters CXC-CXCII. 2 Letter CXCII. ^ Letter CXCIV.
* Letters CXCIII and CXCV. 6 Letter CXCV.
^ This gentleman, who was of Portuguese extraction, is mentioned in the
Life, Firth, p. 67, and a letter from him appears in Letters and Poems in Honouf
of the Duchess, 1676.
250 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Vulgar and Plainer a Voice is, the Better it is for an Old
Ballad ; for a Sweet Voice, with Quavers, and Trilloes and
the like, would be as Improper for an Old Ballad, as Golden
Laces on a Thrum Suit of Cloth, Diamond Buckles on Clouted
or Cobbled Shoes, or a Feather on a Monk's Hood ; neither
should Old Ballads be sung so much in a Tune as in a Tone,
which Tone is betwixt Speaking and Singing," ^ This epistle
is addressed to one of Mr. Duarti's sisters, Eleanora by name,^
and with nine others makes up a series written to " my Near
and Dear Relatives, and Kind and Obliging Friends." They
comprise Letters CC-CCX and include two to Eleanora
Duarti,^ one to Margaret's " Sister Pye," * and one to her un-
married sister Ann, warning against the dangers of ill-advised
matrimony.^ " Sweet Madam C. H." is urged to return to her
parents,^ and another lady receives the customary'^ arguments
in favor of a rural life.^ The Duchess wrote to her brother-
in-law,9 to a clergyman,!^ and to a doctor, ^^ so that these ten
documents were apparently composed for actual correspondence.
Letter CCXI, the last in this volume, is sent to her fictitious
friend, with apologies '" for Mixing some other Letters with
those to your self " and for not including " the answers to
those Letters, wherein you were pleased to Propound several
Philosophical Questions for me to Resolve." They are so
long and so particular that she will make another book out of
them, a book which was given to the world that same year as
Philosophical Letters. As we have seen, it materially differs
from this earlier collection.
1 Letter CCII.
2 The others were called Katherine and Frances.
8 Letters CCII and CCVI.
* Letter CC. Her sister Catherine married Sir Edmund Pye.
6 Letter CCI.
6 Letter CCIV. ^ Letter CCV.
7 Letters III, LV, LXXXII, CXLII. 1° Letter CCVII.
8 Letter CCX. " Letters CCVIII, CCIX.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 251
The Duchess's purpose in her two hundred and eleven
epistles was to make them " rather scenes than letters, for I
have endeavoured under cover of letters to express the humours
of mankind, "1 and, in doing so, she made her work of real
literary importance. Though its content does not radically
vary from that of her other writings, its form and its avowed
intention, dimly, gropingly, but surely, foreshadow the later
letter-novels. Many series of imaginary letters paved the way
for Richardson, from the Epistolcs Ho-Eliance to the Letters
of Eloisa and Abe lard, but that which Margaret Cavendish
contributed did not depend upon tradition or imitation. What-
ever fortuitous impulse she gave to this growing tendency
came entirely out of her own inner consciousness apart from
exterior influences. It has been stated by M. Jusserand that
the CCXI Sociable Letters were especially important in the
development of fictitious narrative and that they are to be
regarded as almost an anticipation of Richardson,^ but that is
a claim which even partiality cannot substantiate. They are
too disconnected, too episodic, too altogether typical of the
Duchess to be of greater value than their mere existence implies.
Yet they are by no means the dullest portion of her work,
and they inspired Charles Lamb to a delightful appreciation
in " The Two Races of Men. "^ " But what moved thee, way-
ward, spiteful K.,"^ he implores an unprincipled borrower of
books, "to be so importunate to carry off with thee, in spite
of tears and adjurations to thee to forbear, the Letters of
that princely woman, the thrice noble Margaret Newcastle } —
knowing at the time, and knowing that I knew also, thou most
assuredly wouldst never turn over one leaf of the illustrious
1 "The Preface."
^ In his discussion of the Duchess in The English Novel in the Time of
Shakespeare, 1895, p. 378.
2 Essays of Elia, p. 50.
* James Kenny, the playwright.
252 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
folio : — what but the mere spirit of contradiction, and childish
love of getting the better of thy friend ? — Then, worst cut of
all ! to transport it with thee to the Gallican land —
Unworthy land to harbor such a sweetness,
A virtue in which all ennobling thoughts dwelt,
Pure thoughts, kind thoughts, high thoughts, her sex's wonder."
The Duchess's most finished production, her Life of William
Cavendishe, was published in 1667, but in the previous year
she had brought out another work, which, if not so impor-
tant, was far more typical. For in The Description of a New
World, called The Blazing World, appended to her Obser-
vations iipon Experiniejttal Philosophy, our authoress at last
set herself her proper task by professedly embarking on an
imaginative enterprise. "' If you wonder that I join a work
of Fancy to my serious Philosophical Contemplations," she
writes, "think not that it is out of disparagement to Phi-
losophy ; or out of an opinion, as if this noble study were
but a Fiction of the Mind ; for though Philosophers may
err in searching and enquiring after the Causes of Natural
Effects and many times embrace falsehoods for Truth ; yet
this doth not prove, that the Ground of Philosophy is merely
Fiction ... for that Reason searches the depth of Nature
and enquires after the true Causes of Natural Effects ; but
Fancy creates of its own accord whatsoever it pleases, and
delights in its own work. The end of Reason is Truth ; the
end of Fancy, is Fiction." Margaret Cavendish refuses to
believe, much less to admit, that her philosophy is not based
upon scientific observation, but she indirectly connects it with
the realms of fantasy when she goes on in this fashion : ^
Lest my Fancy should stray too much, I chose such a Fiction as
would be agreeable to the subject I treated of in the former parts;
it is a Description of a New World, not such as Lucian's, or the
1 " To the Reader," prefixed to The Biasing World.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 253
Frenchman's World in the Moon ; but a World of my own Creating,
which I call the Blazing-World : The first part whereof is Romancical,
the second Philosophical and the third is merely Fancy or (as I may
call it) Fantastical.
The romance begins with a foreigner's falHng in love with
a certain aristocratic young lady and carrying her off from the
seashore in a ship prepared especially for that purpose. They
set sail and reach the pole, whereupon all the sailors freeze
to death ; for this is the juncture of our planet with another
world, whose suns are so far away that we cannot see them
without strong telescopes. Several men shaped like bears
presently come on board, carry oif the lady, and sink her
boat. They treat the prisoner kindly and send her to their
emperor through the territory of Fox-men and Bird-men.
Her journey is minutely described, until she reaches a pal-
ace set on a hill, where even freer rein is given to the
Duchess's imagination. An imperial throne stands in every
apartment, a maze of pillars bewilders the stranger, and the
room of state is paved with green diamonds, " (for in that
World are Diamonds of all colours), the roof of arches blue
ones, a carbuncle representing the sun. Out of this room
there was a passage into the Emperors Bed-chamber, the
walls whereof were of Jet and the floor of black Marble, the
roof was of mother of Pearl, where the Moon and Blazing-
stars were represented by White Diamonds, and his Bed was
made of Diamonds and Carbuncles." The customs of this
country are described at some length, but they are only
those of an ideal Hobbesian commonwealth, for "a Monarchy
is a divine form of Government, and agrees most with our
Religion ; for as there is but one God, whom we all unan-
imously worship and adore with one Faith, so we are re-
solved to have but one Emperor to whom we all submit
with one obedience."
254 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
This Emperor makes our heroine his wife, and her first
proceedings plunge us at once into the philosophical section.
Various groups of subjects are summoned to answer her ques-
tions. The Bird-men are catechized of the air, the Worm-men
of the earth, the Fish-men of the sea, and each answers in
the jargon of pseudo-science. The Ape-men or Chemists dis-
agree as to fundamentals, but the Empress tells them that
self-moving matter is the only cause of Nature, so that it is
useless to quarrel over primary ingredients. She finds that
the people do not all accept her beliefs, and in order to con-
vert them she builds two chapels, one of star-stone, figuring
Heaven, the other of fire-stone to represent Hell ; from these
she preaches respective sermons of comfort and terror. Mean-
while the Flye-men tell her there are Immaterial Spirits in
the air, and she sends after them to learn of affairs in her
own world. They give her what information they can but
say their immaterial vehicles prevent them from taking an
active share in physical life, for these vehicles, although some- ,
times changed in form, always cling to them. The Spirits
agree to make a cabbala for the Empress, and when the
question of a scribe is broached she chooses the soul of the
Duchess of Newcastle, " for the principle of her Writings, is
Sense and Reason." The Duchess persuades the Empress to
write a poetical or romancical cabbala, is taken into high favor
and kept some time in that region, so that " by this means the
Duchess came to know and give this Relation of all that
passed in that rich, populous and happy world."
The Duchess presently comes to desire a world of her own,
which according to the Spirits' advice she herself makes inside
of her, and thereafter this same pattern is copied by the less
imaginative Empress. Some time later the sovereign takes
a fancy to see that world from which the Duchess came and
leaving a spirit in her royal body undertakes an incorporeal
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 255
pilgrimage to earth. First they visit the Grand Signior, but
he seems far inferior to the King of England, who is supreme
not only in politics but in religion as well. At a theatre in
London the Empress thinks that " the Actors make a better
show than the Spectators, and the Scenes a better than the
Actors, and the Musick and Dancing is more pleasant and
acceptable than the Play it self." Just as the Duchess ante-
dated Richardson in her CCXI Sociable Letters, so here she
approaches the idea later to be developed by Montesquieu in
his Lettres Persanes and by Goldsmith in his Citizen of the
World papers. To be sure, the admirable opportunity for
satire in a foreigner's impressions of one's own country goes
for almost nothing in the Duchess's hands, but she does not
let slip her chance for fulsome adulation. The travellers come
to court, where the Empress asserts that, "' in all the Monarchs
she had seen in that World, she had not found so much
Majesty and affability mixt so exactly together, that none did
overshadow or eclipse the other ; and as for the Queen, she
said, that Vertue sate Triumphant in her face and Piety was
dwelling in her heart and that all the Royal family seem'd
to be endued with a Divine splendor : but when she had
heard the King discourse, she believ'd, that Mercury and
Apollo had been his Celestial instructors ; and my dear Lord
and Husband, added the Duchess, has been his Earthly
Governour."
The Duke himself is soon discovered performing at manage
and sword-play in his dismantled castle. " But the Duchess's
soul being troubled, that her dear Lord and Husband used
such a violent exercise before meat, for fear of overheating
himself,^ without any consideration of the Emperess's soul, left
her aereal Vehicle, and entred into her Lord. The Emperess's
soul perceiving this, did the like : And then the Duke had
1 See the Life, Part III, Section 15 (Firth, p. 112), for the same sentiment.
256 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
three Souls in one Body ; and had there been but some such
Souls more, the Duke would have been like the Grand-Signior
in his Seraglio, onely it would have been a Platonick Seraglio."
Soon a Spirit comes to tell the Empress her husband is
melancholy without her, and she prepares to return to the
Blazing World. The Duchess begs her to make an agree-
ment between Newcastle and Fortune, to whom access is
gained by the Spirits after both ladies leave this earth.
Prudence and Honesty uphold the Duke, but Folly and
Rashness are quite as influential with fickle Fortune. The
Duchess, weeping, departs for her home again, after urging
the Empress to continue a monarchical form of government.
At the beginning of Part II the Duchess is summoned, to give
advice concerning a hostile invasion of the Empress's native
world. Such excellent counsel does she offer that the intruders
are completely routed by a complicated mechanism of fishes,
birds, submarine vessels, and the wondrous fire-stone which is set
aflame by water. The Duchess's spirit inhabited the Empress's
soul during this expedition, after which the two friends held
long and confidential dialogues. In reply to a query about
her peculiar costumes, "the Duchess's Soul answered, she
confessed that it was extravagant, and beyond what was usual
and ordinary ; but yet her ambition being such, that she would
not be like others in anything if it were possible ; I endeavour,
said she to be as singular as I can ; for it argues but a mean
Nature to imitate others ; and though I do not love to be imi-
tated if I can possibly avoid it ; yet rather than imitate others,
I should chuse to be imitated by others ; for my nature is
such, that I had rather appear worse in singularity than better
in the Mode."
The Emperor of the Blazing World builds an elaborate
golden stable for a hundred horses, in copy of what Newcastle
would do if he were rich, one side adorned with gems and
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 257
the floor strewn with golden sand. He wants a theatre also,
where the Duchess thinks her plays might be performed :
The Wits of these present times condemned them as uncapable of
being represented or acted, because they were not made up according
to the Rules of Art ... it is the Art and Method of our Wits to de-
spise all Descriptions of Wit, Humour, Actions and Fortunes that are
without such Artificial Rules . . . my Playes may be acted in your
Blazing-World when they cannot be acted in the Blinking-World
of Wit.
Finally the Duchess's soul does tear itself away from her
friends and goes back to dwell in its body. There is nothing
more nafve in this whole ingenuous fancy than the bit of real
life to which we are treated at the conclusion of her spiritual
adventures. Newcastle had patiently to listen to his wife's
endless romancing and to hear how he might possess some of
the Emperor's excellent horses if only a passage to the Blaz-
ing World could be discovered. With a touch of his cele-
brated wit " the Duke smilingly answered her, That he was
sorry there was no Passage between those two Worlds ; but
said he, I have always found an Obstruction to my Good
Fortunes."
In an " Epilogue to the Reader " the Duchess proclaims the
humbleness of her muse, for though she might have written
of heroes and war, her themes are peace and " the figure of
Honest Margaret Newcastle which now I would not change
for all this terrestrial world." A new ruler must henceforth
find a new kingdom, " for concerning the Philosophical World,
I am Emperess of it myself ; and as for the Blazing World,
it having an Emperess already who rules it with great wisdom
and conduct which Emperess is my dear Platonick Friend."
The feminine note in such writing is as unmistakable in the
exaggerated fantasy as in the rambling and disconnected struc-
ture, but it is a note we would not be without in literature any
258 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
more than in every-day life. The Duchess took httle pains
to arrange her fancies, to trim or to proportion them ; The
Blazing World is made up of one episode after another,
strung together in the most casual helter-skelter way, without
beginning, middle, or end. To analyze the confused result
would be well-nigh impossible ; we can only accept it as it
stands and follow its winding course. Yet the exuberant
imagination and absolute naturalness behind this lack of
form produce a charm which many more perfect works of art
are entirely without. The Duchess wrote what she felt and
in this instance attained a high degree of success because the
subject suited her method. Drama and science demand that
ingenuity be curbed and material selected, but pure fancy
knows no limitations. Doubtless The Blazing World would
have been a more finished piece of literature had its author
conformed somewhat to prescribed rules, but then it would in
large measure have wanted that delightful spontaneity which
is the very essence of its particular distinction.
The Duchess had unfriendly critics in her own day, as her
apologies show, but certainly no author ever enjoyed more
extravagant praise while still alive. Her rank must have been
an important factor in this eulogy, for there is no evidence
that any of her books except the Life achieved an extensive
audience. On the contrary, they were apparently printed at
their writer's instigation and distributed among various indi-
viduals or institutions as presentation copies,^ for in the 1676
volume of Letters atid Poems in Honotir of the Lncomparable
Prijicess, Margaret, Dutchess of Nezvcastle"^ are to be found
1 Her books may have been "the nuisance of the time in which she lived,"
but it is not true that " she reaped little but ridicule." See Costello, Memoirs of
Eminent Englishwomen, III, 211.
2 There is also a 1678 publication Collection of Letters and Poems to the
late Duke and Duchess of Newcastle. See Catalogue of the British Museum, and
Wheatley's Evelyn, III, 395, n.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 259
many epistles acknowledging such favors. The Universities of
Leyden, Cambridge, and Oxford, the Colleges of St. John's,
Trinity,! and Magdalen, render thanks to the Duchess for her
gifts of Letters or Poems, the Life or Observations tipon Ex-
perimental Philosophy. There are numerous personal letters,
some of them from Kenelm Digby, Samuel Tuke, and a cer-
tain Thomas Barlow (" a poor impertinent thing in Black,"
he calls himself), from Jasper Mayne, Joseph Glanvill,^ and
Thomas Hobbes. The last named writes on February 9, 1661-
1662, concerning the Playes :
I have already read so much of it (in that Book which my Lord of
Devonshire has) as to give your Excellence, an account of it thus far,
That it is filled throughout with more and truer Idea's of Virtue and
Honour than any Book of morality I have read. And if some Comique
Writers, by conversation with ill People, have been able to present
Vices upon the Stage, more ridiculously and immodestly by which
they take their rabble, I reckon that amongst your Praises.
On May 7, 1667, Walter Charleton mentions the great sums she
has expended on printing and adds a questionable compliment,
which the Duchess probably interpreted in the most favorable
light. Her poetry is so facile, Charleton says, that "you do
not always confine your Sense to Verse ; nor your Verses to
Rhythme ; nor your Rhythme to the quantity and sounds of
Sillables." The Duchess's errors could be pardoned, but it is
plain that they were understood.
These "Letters and Poems" were apparently collected by
Newcastle after his wife's death, and among them he included
any laudatory material that was procurable. Otherwise one could
^ The master of Trinity in 1663, who wrote with such extreme adulation,
was John Pearson, afterwards (1672) Bishop of Chester, the writer on the creed.
See article on the Duchess in Biographia Britanuica, ed. Kippis, Vol. III.
^ Glanvill has a book of Letters and Poems writteti and sent to Margaret,
Duchess of Newcastle in Ashmole's library, according to Wood's Athenae, III,
1252, n. No mention of it occurs in the Ashmolean Catalogue., however.
26o THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
not account for the presence of three letters from Thomas
Shadwell relative to his dedication of The Humourists, with
an elegy on the Duchess's death from the same hand.^ This
elaborate ode is very dull indeed, but the last stanza concerning
Newcastle's grief may be cited to show how Shadwell comports
himself when he deviates into verse :
Oh what Expedient can there be
Found to support his Magnanimity !
The best of Husbands, and the noblest Peer ;
The best of Generals, best of subjects too.
Whose Arts in Peace as well as War appear :
He knows how to advise, and how to do ;
His Prudence and his Courage might uphold
The most decay'd and crippled State,
And rescue it from the J awes of Fate :
His Body, may, but Mind, can ne're be old.
Him she has left, and from our sight is hurl'd
And gloriously shines in the true Blazing World.
Flecknoe's verses on the Duchess's closet find an unsigned place
among these poems, while Sir George Etherege's contribution
is the only link that connects him with the Cavendishes. After
recounting our authoress's literary exploits, Etherege continues :
This made the great New-Castle's Heart your prize ;
Your Charming Soul, and your Victorious Eyes,
Had only pow'r his Martial mind to tame.
And raise in his Heroick Breast a Flame ;
A Flame, which with his Courage still aspires.
As if Immortal Fewel fed those Fires :
This mighty Chief, and your great self made One,
Together the same Race of Glory run ;
Together on the Wings of Fame you move.
Like yours his Virtue, and like his your Love.
1 One panegyric Newcastle did not include was " To the Most Excellent
Princesse The Dutchess of Newcastle. By H. J. of Grays Inne," published 1667,
reprinted in the Bagford Ballads, II, 884-885. Another by Elias Ashmole is
in the Ashmolean Library, according to the Catalogue, Col. 28, No. 185, and
Col. 1270, No. 3; it begins "Here lyes wise, chast, hospitable, humble."
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 261
Quite the best of all these tributes is an address " To the
Glory of her Sex, the Most Illustrious Princess, the Lady
Marchioness of New-Castle, upon her Most Admirable Works."
Lengthy as it is, scarcely a verse lacks some spark of wit ex-
pressed in well-turned phrase ; the single line, " Truth never
was so naked, nor so dress'd," sums up the Duchess's work in
very nearly her own spirit. Its author is not mentioned, but he
seems to have been Francis Fane, for another copy of this poem
is signed with his initials. ^ Whoever he was, his work is not
wanting in keen insight nor in an evident desire to please :
Now let enfranchiz'd Ladies learn to write,
And not Paint white and red, but black, and white,
Their Bodkins turn to Pens, to Lines their Locks,
And let the Inkhorn be their Dressing-box :
Since, Madam, you have Scal'd the walls of Fame,
And made a Breach where never Female came,
Had men no Wit, or had the World no Books,
Yet here 's enough to please the curious looks
Of Every Reader : such a General Strain,
Would reinstruct the School-boy-world again.
Philosophers and Poets were of old
The two great Lights, that humane minds control'd ;
The one t' adorn, the other to explain,
Thus Learnings Empire then was cut in twain.
But Universal Wit and Reason joyn's
To make you Queen : nor can your sacred Lines
Without a Paradox be well express'd,
Truth never was so naked, nor so dress'd.
Majestick Quill ! that keeps our Minds in Awe,
For Reasons Kingdom knows no Salique Law,
Or if that Law was ever fram'd 'twas then
When Woman held the Distaff not the Pen.
The Court, the City, Schools and Camp agree
Welbeck to make an University,
Of Wit and Honour, which has been the Stage,
Since 't was your Lords the Heroe of this Age ;
1 Hist. Mss. Comm., lo Rep., App. IV, p. 20.
262 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Whose Noble Soul is Steward to great Parts,
And do's dispence his Reasons and his Arts,
His Wit and Power, his Greatness, and his Sense,
With as much Freedom and Magnificence,
As when our English Jove became his Guest
And did receive a more than Humane Feast.
With Arts of Wit, he mixes those of Force
And Pegasus is his old Manag'd Horse.
No wonder he excells all other Men ;
They but Nine Muses had, and he has Ten.
A Lady whose Immortal Pen transferrs
To our Sex Shame and Envy, Fame to hers ;
Whose Genius traces Wit through all her wayes
In abstruse Notions, Poems and in Playes.
Then why should we the mouldy Records keep
Of Plautus, or disturb Ben Johnson's Sleep?
The Silent Womati Famous heretofore
Has been, but now the Writing Lady more.
Still, despite this contemporary adulation, a fair-minded
critic can grant Margaret Cavendish's work no very excessive
praise. Yet he would not, with Pope, set it in the Dunce's
library, where,
Here swells the shelf with Ogilby the great.
There stamp'd with arms, Newcastle shines complete.^
The Duchess's purpose was too sincere and too unusual for
her writings to be completely discounted, even if their net
accomplishment seems rather slight. Such an enormous amount
of material as they contain also tends to minimize their value,
but that accidental consideration must be dismissed. If the
Duchess was to write at all, she must needs write without re-
straint. No rules of art, no other authors influenced her muse,
which soared wherever impulse directed it. "She thought with-
out system and set down everything she thought,"^ one com-
mentator says, and another remarks upon her ''cacoetkes
1 Dunciad, I, lines 141-142.
* Jenkins in The Cavalier and his Lady, p. 8.
THE WRITINGS OF THE DUCHESS 263
scribendV ^ Yet it is this incurable desire to write which gives
her a unique position in English literature and at the same
time causes her most palpable defects. The good goes hand
in hand with the bad, so that we cannot differentiate them
but must accept both inextricably entangled. One must read
the Duchess's philosophical books, her plays, orations, and
olios, by the side of her poems, '" feigned stories," " Sociable
Letters," and "Blazing Worlds," in order to understand appre-
ciatively the mental processes that produced one of our first
English authoresses.
The Duchess's sex not only emphasizes her importance in
literary history but strongly affects her actual writings as well.
Women have always been less able than men to confine their
feelings within the narrow limits required by an art form ; they
will not allow sufficient tranquillity in which to recollect their
emotion. Accordingly Margaret Cavendish puts no check upon
her imagination but permits it quite to surpass the bounds of
reason. In this connection it is instructive to contrast her
work with that of John Donne, with whose poetry she was
herself acquainted.^ Dr. Donne's passionate nature twisted and
contorted his medium of expression, but it never let him for-
get our material existence. The Duchess, however, entirely
transcends mere flesh and blood, passing into a terra incognita
of her own. Her fancy was so far removed from things of
this world that when she gave it full swing the result proved
confusing to readers and detrimental to aesthetic excellence.
Moreover the quality of this romancing was not fervent enough
to sweep the average citizen off his feet, although a certain in-
herent and dignified charm can be unmistakably felt through it
^ Retrospective Review, 1853, I, 332.
^ She quotes lines 35-36 of The Storm in The Lady Contemplation, Part II,
Act II, scene ix, and mentions him also in " Of Light and Sight" from Poems
and Fancies.
264 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
all. Indeed, there is nothing more attractive in the Duchess's
books than that absolute ingenuousness which characterizes
them. Their lack of artistic regulation may be criticized ; nay,
it must be condemned ; but in compensation we gain an almost
unparalleled naturalness. Whatever technical faults appear in
these volumes and however far actual life may be absent from
them, their sincerity remains indisputable. Certainly they are
not great literature, but at least they are imaginative and
genuine.
CHAPTER IV
THE DUCHESS HERSELF
I
MARGARET LUCAS (1623-1645)
Apart from a purely historical importance, the Duchess's
writings must depend for their chief interest upon the singular
clarity with which they depict their author. One cannot read
even the Life, most normal of all her works, without realizing
that here is an astonishing and unusual personality, while The
Blazing World convinces us that its creator was, on one occa-
sion at least, dangerously far from sanity. Indeed the Duchess
has been long known as "' Mad Madge of Newcastle," ^ and
there are grounds for approving this epithet. " Great Wits are
sure to Madness near alli'd," in this case means that without
our authoress's peculiarities of character, the world would have
been without her eccentricities of literary production. In the
seventeenth century it required some remarkably strong stimu-
lus for a woman of the upper classes to undertake writing as
a serious occupation, and this impetus was furnished the
Duchess by her overactive, unrestrained imagination. Modern
scientists tell us that insanity is the overdevelopment of one
side in an individual at the expense of his other constituent
parts, and in this sense the Duchess was most certainly in-
sane. Hers was a warped and irregular growth, due largely
no doubt to certain inborn tendencies and in part to her
early surroundings.
1 Lower in 1872 mentions this " nickname which her jealous (female?) con-
temporaries gave her," p. ix, but cites no evidence to prove his assertion.
265
266 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
On neither point could better evidence be procured than
from the lady herself, who has been pleased to give us A
True Relation of my Birth, Breeding and Life. Moreover
she is such a nai've writer that only the most suspicious person
can refuse to grant her a complete suspension of disbelief.
Often, to be sure, her statements are not so significant as the
fact that she does set them down, but in that case her veracity
is only emphasized by her ingenuous sincerity. The True Rela-
tion occurs as Book XI of Nature s Pictures, and is described
on the title-page as " a true story at the latter end, wherein
there is no feignings." Its unique importance was early recog-
nized, so that it has been often reprinted, generally in con-
nection with the Life, but sometimes by itself, as in Edward
Jenkins's garbled selections. The Cavalier and his Lady, and
by Sir Egerton Brydges at his private press at Lee Priory,
Kent.i The date of this latter, the first modern edition, was
1 8 14, but Sir Egerton deserves more credit for resurrecting
the document than for his presentation of it, which was un-
scholarly and slipshod. In 1872 Lower published a careful
transcription, while Firth has furnished the definitive and
most convenient form of this autobiography. Its original ap-
pearance was in 1656, four years before Newcastle returned
to England, and in consequence the Duchess's account of her
life is far from complete. Her style, too, was never more
rambling or disconnected than in this work, so that one need
not expect to find it the historical document which the life of
her husband most certainly is. On the other hand, A True
Relation has not the errors in fact and judgment of her more
elaborate composition, nor is a personal memoir subject to
such strict qualifications as are demanded in authoritative biog-
raphy. This makes the Duchess's account of prime impor-
tance to us, for, having already discussed the dates and figures
1 In 1813 Brydges had published Selected Poems by the Duchess.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 267
of her life, we must now seek further Hght upon what manner
of person she was. But this information is more difficult to
sift than to acquire.
The Duchess's father ^ dying in her early years, his widow
was left to take charge of their large family, which she did
with eminent success. This lady is described by her daughter
in such affectionate terms as to reflect credit alike upon parent
and child. Madam Lucas lived to see the ruin of her fortunes
by war, "and then died, having lived a widow many years;
for she never forgot my father so as to marry again. Indeed,
he remained so lively in her memory, and her grief was so
lasting, as she never mentioned his name, though she spoke
often of him, but love and grief caused tears to flow, and
tender sighs to rise, mourning in sad complaints. She made
her house her cloister, inclosing herself, as it were, therein,
for she seldom went abroad, unless to church. . . . She
was of a grave behaviour, and had such a majestic grandeur,
as it were continually hung about her, that it would strike a
kind of awe to the beholders, and command respect from the
rudest. . . . Also her beauty was beyond the ruin of time,
for she had a well-favoured loveliness in her face, a pleasing
sweetness in her countenance, and a well-tempered com-
plexion, as neither too red nor too pale, even to her dying
day, although in years. And by her dying, one might think
death was enamoured with her, for he embraced her in a sleep,
and so gently, as if he were afraid to hurt her. . . . Like-
wise my mother was a good mistriss to her servants, taking
care of her servants in their sickness, not sparing any cost
she was able to bestow for their recovery : neither did she
exact more from them in their health than what they with ease
or rather like pastime could do. She would freely pardon a
^ He killed a certain Mr. Brooks in a duel, and was exiled until after
James I's accession. See Firth, pp- 155-156.
268 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
fault, and forget an injury, yet sometimes she would be angry ;
but never with her children, the sight of them would pacify
her ; neither would she be angry with others but when she had
cause, as negligent or knavish servants, that would lavishly or
unnecessarily waste, or subtly and thievishly steal. And though
she would often complain that her family was too great for her
weak management, and often pressed my brother to take it upon
him, yet I observed she took a pleasure, and some little pride,
in the governing thereof. She was very skilful in leases, and
setting of lands, and court keeping, ordering of stewards, and
the like affairs. Also I observed that my mother nor brothers,
before these wars, had never any lawsuits, but what an attorney
despatched in a term with small cost, but if they had it was
more than I knew of. But, as I said, my mother lived to see the
ruin of her children, in which was her ruin, and then died." ^
This is the portrait of a quiet, refined housewife (" femme
essentielle " M. Montegut calls it 2), and it is also a portrait of
the Duchess with her genius omitted. Let us not neglect to
notice that Margaret Cavendish was primarily a woman, and
only, after that, an artist :
For had my brains as many fancies in 't
To fill the world, I 'd put them all in print ;
No matter whether they be well or ill exprest,
My will IS done, and that please wofnefi best?
Her feminine characteristics come out unmistakably in the
account of her childhood : ^
As for my breeding, it was according to my birth, and the nature
of my sex ; for my birth was lost in my breeding. For as my sisters
was or had been bred, so was I in plenty, or rather with superfluity.
1 Firth, pp. 163-165. M. Montegut writes, " Le portrait que trace sa fille de
cette prude veuve est celui d'une mistress Peyser aristocratique," p. 202.
- P. 226.
3 At the close of Philosophical Fancies. See Walpole's Catalogue, ed. Park,
111,154. 4 Firth, pp. 156-157.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 269
Likewise we were bred virtuously, modestly, civilly, honourably, and
on honest principles. ... As for our garments, my mother did not
only delight to see us neat and cleanly, fine and gay, but rich and
costly ; maintaining us to the height of her estate, but not beyond it.
For we were so far from being in debt, before these wars, as we were
rather beforehand with the world ; buying all with ready money, not
on the score. For although after my father's death the estate was
divided between my mother and her sons, paying such a sum of money
for portions to her daughters, either at the day of their marriage, or
when they should come to age ; yet by reason she and her children
agreed with a mutual consent, all their affairs were managed so well,
as she lived not in a much lower condition than when my father lived.
'Tis true, my mother might have increased her daughters' portions by
a thrifty sparing, yet she chose to bestow it on our breeding, honest
pleasures, and harmless delights, out of an opinion, that if she bred
us with needy necessity, it might chance to create in us sharking quali-
ties, mean thoughts and base actions, which she knew my father, as
well as herself, did abhor. Likewise we were bred tenderly for my
mother naturally did strive, to please and delight her children, not to
cross or torment them, terrifying them with threats or lashing them
with slavish whips ; but instead of threats, reason was to persuade us,
and instead of lashes, the deformities of vice was discovered, and the
graces and virtues were presented unto us.
One way in which the graces were presented to these chil-
dren was by having servants treat them with the deference
due their position : ^
Also we were bred with respectful attendance, every one being
severally waited upon, and all her servants in general used the same
respect to her children (even those that were very young) as they did
to herself ; for she suffered not her servants, either to be rude before
us, or to domineer over us, which all vulgar servants are apt, and oft-
times which some have leave to do. Likewise she never suffered the
vulgar serving-men to be in the nursery among the nursemaids, lest
their rude love-making might do unseemly actions, or speak unhand-
some words in the presence of her children, knowing that youth is apt
to take infection by ill examples, having not the reason of distinguish-
ing good from bad. Neither were we suffered to have any familiarity
1 Firth, pp. 157-158.
270 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
with the vulgar servants, or conversation : yet caused us to demean
ourselves with an humble civility towards them, as they with a dutiful
respect to us. Not because they were servants were we so reserved ;
for many noble persons are forced to serve through necessity ; but by
reason the vulgar sort of servants are as ill-bred as meanly born, giv-
ing children ill examples and worse counsel. As for tutors, although
we had for all sorts of virtues,^ as singing, dancing, playing or music,
reading, writing,'^ working and the like, yet we were not kept strictly
thereto, they were rather for formality than benefit; for my mother
cared not so much for our dancing and fiddling, singing and prating
of several languages, as that we should be bred virtuously, modestly,
civilly, honourably, and on honest principles.
The result of this upbringing was a model and unusually
homogeneous family. Of the " eight children, three sons and
five daughters, there was not anyone crooked, or any ways
deformed, neither were they dwarfish, or of a giant-like stature,
but every ways proportionable ; likewise well-featured, clear
complexions, brown hairs (but some lighter than others), sound
teeth, sweet breaths, plain speeches, tunable voices (I mean
not so much to sing as in speaking, as not stuttering, nor
wharling in the throat, or speaking through the nose, or
hoarsely, unless they had a cold, or squeakingly, which impedi-
ments many have) : neither were their voices of too low a
strain, or too high, but their notes and words were tunable
and timely." ^ Margaret's own beauty seems to have been an
indisputable fact, for we have it attested by such contemporary
recorders as Pepys^ and Mrs. Katherine Philips.^ This fact
may help to explain Newcastle's choice of a second wife or the
amount of wonder that her bashfulness caused at court, but it
1 Lower reads " virtuosos," according to a written correction in one copy
of the book.
^ Letter CLXXV in CCXI Sociable Letters tells us that she " never went to
school, but only Learn'd to Read and Write at Home, Taught by an Antient
Decayed Gentlewoman, whom my Mother kept for that Purpose."
3 Firth, p. 164.
* Pepys's Diary, entry for April 26, 1667. ^ Poems, 1667, p. 142.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF
271
was not a determining factor in her life and it had no effect
upon her spiritual growth.
Of her brothers, the Duchess writes : ^
Their practice was, when they met together, to exercise themselves
with fencing, wrestling, shooting, and such like exercises, for I observed
they did seldom hawk or hunt, and very seldom or never dance, or
play on music, saying it was too effeminate for masculine spirits.
Neither had they skill, or did use to play, for aught I could hear, at
cards or dice, or the like games, nor given to any vice, as I did know,
unless to love a mistress were a crime, not that I knew any they had,
but what report did say, and usually reports are false, at least exceed
the truth. As for the pastime of my sisters when they were in the
country, it was to read, work, walk and discourse with each other.
For though two of my three brothers were married . . . likewise three
of my four sisters ... yet most of them lived with my mother, espe-
cially when she was at her country-house, living most commonly at
London half the year, which is the metropolitan city of England. But
when they were at London, they were dispersed into several houses
of their own, yet for the most part they met every day, feasting each
other like Job's children.
But to rehearse their recreations. Their customs were in winter
time to go sometimes to plays, or to ride in their coaches about the
streets to see the concourse and recourse of people ; and in the spring
time to visit the Spring Garden, Hyde Park, and the like places ; and
some times they would have music, and sup in barges upon the water.
These harmless recreations they would pass their time away with ; for
I observed they did seldom make visits nor went abroad with strangers
in their company, but only themselves in a flock together, agreeing so
well that there seemed but one mind amongst them. And not only
my own brothers and sisters agreed so, but my brothers and sisters in
law, and their children, although but young, had the like agreeable
natures and affectionate dispositions. For to my best remembrance
I do not know that ever they did fall out, or had any angry or unkind
disputes. Likewise, I did observe that my sisters were so far from
mingling themselves with any other company, that they had no familiar
conversation or intimate acquaintance with the families to which each
other were linked to by marriage, the family of the one being as great
strangers to the rest of my brothers and sisters as the family of the
other.
1 Firth, pp. 1 59-161.
2/2 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
And in another place : ^
My brothers and sisters were for the most part serious and staid in
their actions, not given to sport or play, nor dance about, whose com-
pany I keeping, made me so too. But I observed that although their
actions were staid, yet they would be very merry amongst themselves,
delighting in each other's company : also they would in their discourse
express the general actions of the world, judging, condemning, approv-
ing, commending, as they thought good, and with those that were
innocently harmless, they would make themselves merry therewith.
Truly this was a narrow and circumscribed existence, which
offered few opportunities for a wider experience in diverse
sides of life. Small wonder that Margaret Lucas desired to
become a maid of honour at Henrietta Maria's court, and
small wonder, too, that once there, she was unable to fit into
her new environment.
Concerning her own characteristics the Duchess has this
further to say:^
I am naturally bashful, not that I am ashamed of my mind or body,
my birth or breeding, my actions or fortunes, for my bashfulness is
my nature, not for any crime, and though I have strived and reasoned
with myself, yet that which is inbred I find is difficult to root out.
But I do not find that my bashfulness is concerned ■with the qualities
of the persons, but the number ; for were I to enter amongst a com-
pany of Lazaruses, I should be as much out of countenance as if they
were all Caesars or Alexanders, Cleopatras or Queen Didos. Neither
do I find my bashfulness riseth so often in blushes, as contracts my
spirits to a chill paleness. But the best of it is, most commonly it soon
vanisheth away, and many times before it can be perceived ; and the
more foolish or unworthy I conceive the company to be, the worse I
am, and the best remedy I ever found was, is to persuade myself that
all those persons I meet are wise and virtuous.
That must have been a hard task at court, where other com-
plications made it difficult for the girl. As long as Henrietta
Maria was at Oxford, matters went fairly well, for most of the
1 Firth, pp. 174-175. 2 Ibid., pp. 168-169.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 273
Lucases were there too ; but when the Queen fled to France
Margaret was thrown upon her own resources. She had
always before been supported by family spirit, but now that
prop was gone and the maid of honor had not been trained
to do without it. '" Besides," she says,i " I had heard that
the world was apt to lay aspersions even on the innocent, for
which I durst neither look up with my eyes, nor speak, nor
be anyway sociable, insomuch as I was thought a natural fool."
We have seen that in her plays are certain scenes and descrip-
tions which may specifically mirror incidents during this
period,^ when, instead of improving as time went on, she
continually withdrew farther into her shell. " I never heeded
what was said or practised, but just what belonged to my loyal
duty, and my own honest reputation. And, indeed, I was
so afraid to dishonour my friends and family by my indis-
creet actions, that I rather chose to be accounted a fool
than to be thought rude or wanton. In truth, my bashful-
ness and fears made me repent my going from home to
see the world abroad, and much I did desire to return to
my mother again, or to my sister Pye, with whom I often
lived when she was in London, and loved with a supernat-
ural affection." ^ Her mother would not permit Margaret to
return ; hence she stayed on at court, getting deeper and
deeper into a solitary and contemplative life with every day
which passed over her head.
Within two years this difiicult situation was resolved by the
appearance of Newcastle as a serious lover. Evidently the
1 Firth, p. 161.
2 Compare also the description of a young, inexperienced girl at court in
Natures Picture, p. 339 : "When the Company was called to sit down, that the
Masque might be represented, every one was placed by their Friends or else
they placed themselves. But she, being unaccustomed to those meetings, knew
not how to dispose of herself . . . and therefore she stood still."
8 Firth, pp. 161-162.
274 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
exiled and widowed Marquis had made up his mind to marry
some young girl, not only that he might have further issue,
as we have seen, but also because he " would choose such
a wife as he might bring to his own humours, and not such
a one as was wedded to self-conceit, or one that had been
tempered to the humours of another ; for which he wooed me
for his wife ; and though I did dread marriage, and shunned
men's company as much as I could, yet I could not nor had
not the power to refuse him, by reason my affections were
fixed on him, and he was the only person I ever was in love
with. Neither was I ashamed to own it, but gloried therein.
For it was not amorous love (I never was infected therewith,
it is a disease, or a passion, or both, I only know by relation,
not by experience), neither could title, wealth, power or person
entice me to love. But my love was honest and honourable,
being placed upon merit, which affection joyed at the fame of
his worth, pleased with delight in his wit, proud of the respects
he used to me, and triumphing in the affections he professed
for me, which affections he hath confirmed to me by a deed
of time, sealed by constancy, and assigned by an unalterable
decree of his promise, which makes me happy in despite of
Fortune's frowns." ^ Even here the Duchess is probably
telling the truth, for a girl of twenty does not often feel
" amorous love " towards a man thirty years her senior.^ A
combination of respect for Newcastle's position, flattery at his
proposals, and — what she does not state — the desire to
escape from an uncongenial atmosphere, must have been the
causes for her agreeing to his proposals. If that is the case,
one can very easily understand how in her plays the Duchess
rails against passionate love but was herself a devoted wife.
1 Firth, p. 162.
^ M. Montegut, of course, supposes she was deceiving herself and that the
affection was really " amour," p. 220. See also First Duke mid Duchess, p. 279.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 275
The deep but platonic regard she felt for the Marquis ap-
pears first in the twenty-one letters written to him while their
engagement was yet a secret and now preserved at Welbeck
Abbey. They were privately reprinted in 1909 as pages 5-18
of Letters Written by Charles Lamb's "^^ Princely Womaji, the
Thrice Noble Margaret Newcastle'' to her Husba^id, etc. The
editor, Richard William Goulding, has retained the original
spelling, which, although it presents some difficulties, adds
greatly to the human interest of these documents. They are
most valuable additions to our knowledge of the time and
place, the events and persons concerned. No better account
of petty, underhand bickerings at the exiled Stuart court is to
be desired ; the intrigues of Newcastle's office-seeking are
nobility itself compared with these malevolent attempts to pre-
vent his marriage. The courtiers involved seem to have had
no object beyond sheer love of mischief-making and lack of
more important occupation. In their small detached group the
day's gossip had become of cardinal interest, so that a middle-
aged marquis's evident attentions to the young and bashful
Margaret Lucas perforce raised something of a tempest. People
began to talk and to torment the girl, hinting that her lover
was proverbially inconstant. Henrietta Maria took offense be-
cause she was kept in ignorance of the proceedings, while
Newcastle's friends advised him against such a match as con-
trary to his worldly advantage. Of all this we hear in Margaret's
very first letter :
I. My Lord, there is but on acsident which is death to mak me
onhappy ether to my frindes or fame or your affection/ tho the last
I prefer equall to the firest, but I fear others foresee we shall be
unfortunat, tho we see it not our seleves, or elles ther would not
be such paynes takeing to unty the knot of our affection. I must
confes as you have had good frindes to counsell you, I have had the
^ Goulding reads " affection " here and elsewhere, but that can hardly be
correct.
2/6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
like to counsell me and tell me they heer of your profesions of afection
to me ; which they bed me tak hed of, for you had ashured your selfe
to many and was constant to non. I answred that my lord newcastle
was to wis and to honest to ingag himself to many, and I hard the
qeene should tak it ell that I ded not mak her aquainted befor I
had resolued. I asked of what ; they sayed of my resolution to you.
I asked if I should aquant the qeene with every complement that
was bestod on me, with many other idell descouerses, which would be
to long to wright, but pray doe not think I am inquisitiue after such
friuolus talk, for I auoyd company to auoyd ther discours . . . they
they [sic] that tould you of my mother has beter inteligenc then I, and
shur, my lord, I threw not my self away when I gaue my self to you,
for I neuer did any act worthy of prays before, but tis the natur of
thos that can not be happy to dessir non elles should be so, as I shall
be in haueing you, and will be so, in spit of all malles [malice], in being,
my lord, your most humbell saruant,
Margreat Lucas
pray lay the fait of my wrighting to my pen.
Soon the envious court charged Margaret with pursuing
Newcastle :
n. Me lord, I deed not dessir to deleuer up the intrest I had in you
out of any inconstansee in me, but out of a considdarashoin of you ;
me lord, me lord widdrington in his aduies has don as a nobell and a
true affectshoinit frind would doe, yet I find I am infinnightly obleged
to you whos afectshoins are aboue so powerfull a parswashon; my
lord, if I doe not send to you, pray exques me, for if I doe, thay well
say I parsue you for your affectshoin, for though I love you extremely
well, yet I neuer feard my modesty so smalle as it would give me leue
to court any man ; if you pies to ask the queen, I think it would be
well understod. . . .
The IVIarquis evidently replied to this epistle with strictures
on IVlargaret's caution and coolness, for she next protests :
III. My lord, pardon me if I have wright any thing that is not
agreable but if I be carfull in things that may arise to the
scandall of my repeta[t]ion is for fear of a refleckion, becaus I am
yours, for though it is imposabll to keep out of the rech of a slander-
ing toung from an enues parson, yet it tis in my power to hender
them from the aduantag of a good ground to held ther descour[s]es on,
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 277
for know, me lord, saintiarmanes [Saint Germains] is a place of much
sencour [censure] and thinks I send to often ; me lord, I am sory you
should think your loue so much transends mine, but suer it tis as un-
comble [uncomely] to see a woman to kaind as to see a man to
necklegant, but, me lord, I know you are a man of so much honour
that I may safiy rule my actions by your directions. . . .
Later she defends herself for not having been overcivil to
Mr. Porter :
IV. My lord, I think you haue a plot against my healt in sending
so early, for I was forst to reed your leter be a candell light, for ther
was not day enouf, but I had rather reed your leter then slep, and it
doth me more good ; my lord, I hop you are not angare for my aduise
of St. jermenes. I gaue it semply for the best; as for mr porter
[Endymion ?] he was a stranger to me, for before I cam in to france I
ded neuer see hem, or at least knew hem not to be mr porter, or my
lord of newcastles frind, and, my lord, it is a custtom I obsarue that I
neuer speek to any man before they addres them selues to me, nor to
look so much in ther face as to inuit ther descours, and I hop I neuer
was unseuell to any parson of what degree so euer, but to morrow the
qeene comes to pares, they say, and then I hope to iusttifie my selfe
to be, my lord, the most humbell saruant to you and your saruants
Margreat Lucas
if you cannot reed this leter, blam me not, for it was so early I was
half asleep.
Rumors spread that a secret marriage had already taken
place, but the love-making still went on :
V. My lord, there is non could be more sory to part with any thing
thay loue so well as I doe you, but it was my affection to you, not to
my self, as made that dissir to leue me. I consider non so much as to
be desplesd or deslik any thing in you for any considdar[at]ion of what
others can say, for that you think to be best shall pies me most ; . . .
it was say to me you had declared your marreg to my lord Jermyn. I
ansurred it was mor then I could doe, but heer is so many idell
descor[s]es as it would werre [weary] me to tell them, and you to
heer them. . . .
VI. My lord, your uerses are more like you then your peckter,
though it resembelles you uery much, but heer art has not bene so
2/8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
good a courtiar as it eues [used] to be ; my lord, the only blessing
I wish for heer is I may desarue your afectshion which is onualabell
[invaluable]. . . .
When the Queen prepared to move from Saint Germains to
Paris, Margaret seriously considered remaining behind, in order
to silence gossiping tongues :
VII. My lord, pray beleue I am not factious, espashally with you,
for your commands shall be my law, but supos me now in a uery
mallancolly humer, and that most off my contempaltions are fext on
nothing but dessolutions, for I look apon this world as on a deth's
head for mortefecation, for I see all things sublet to allteration and
chaing, and our hopes as if they had taken opum. . . . my lord, I hear
the qeen comes to parres this next week to the solemetes of prences
mary's marrag, and I am in a dessput wither I should com with her,
if I can get leue to stay ; my reson is becaus I think it will stop the
scors [source ?] of ther descors of us when they see I doe not com, but
I shall not doe any thing without your apprebation, as becomes your
most humbl saruant n, ^ t
Margreat Lucas
My lord lett your eye ^ lemet your poetry.
The case of Newcastle's picture which he had sent to Mar-
garet got broken and subsequently caused serious complications :
VIII. My lord, as grace drawes the sole to Hfe, so natuer, the pen-
cell of god, has drawen your wit to the birth, as may be seene by your
uerses, though the subget is to mene for your mues. ... I should be
sory your afectshion should be as brokin as the case of your pickter ;
it can be no ell oment [ill omen] of my part. I know not what it may
be of yours. I hop it is not rauen like to give wor[n]ing of deth but
I wish life only to be still, my lord, your umbell saruant,
Margraet Lucas
IX. My lord, I thank you for the toaken of loue you sent me, for I
must confes I wanted it, wer it but to returne it on your self againe.
... I am sory you should bed me keepe the ferses you sent, for it
lookes as tho you thought I had flung thos away you sent before ;
shurly I would keep them wer it with deficulty, and not to part with
your muses so easely. . . .
1 Goulding reads " ere," but " eye " in Hist. Mss. Comm. Hep. would be
more natural. See Welbeck Mss., II, 134-137.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 279
Masculine indifference to a woman's sensitive nature must
have occasioned the following outburst :
X. . . . my lord, I can beleue nothing but what is in honour of you,
and I besech you to beleue that I have euer truth of my sid, tho
naked ; therfor I neuer sayed any such thing as you menshioned in
your letter of your peckter, nor neuer so much as shewed it to any
cretur before yesterday that I gaue it to mend, but I find such
enemenys that what soeuer can be for my disaduantag tho it haue but
a resemblance of truth shall be declard. I hop my innocens will gard
me, but suer, my lord, you haue many frindes, tho I haue many
enemenys, or eles this is a counselling age, but if I shall preiudgice
you in the affaires of the world, or in your iudgment of your bad
choyce, consider and leue me, for I shall desir to life no longer then
to see you happy ... it is not ushal to give the queen gloves or any
thing eles, but, my lord, if you plese I will give them her.
The unfeminine petulance in this last epistle did not pass
unnoticed by Newcastle :
XI. My lord, I am sory you haue metamorphosis my later and
made that masculen that was efemenat ; my ambition is to be thought
a modest woman and to leue the title of a gallante man to you . . . my
lord, I am sory you haue such a defluction in your eies. I fear your
wrighting may draw downe the rhum to much, tho I rejoyce at nothing
mor then your letters, but insted of ioy they would bring me sadnes if
I reseued then at such a disaduantag as to hurt them. . . .
Presently peace was restored amid new protestations of affection :
XII. My lord, I may uery well tak all your faltes to me, and yet be
excusable for what is yours though not for my one [own], and tis no
mercie to signe a pardon wher ther has bene no offence. I must con-
fes my discression dede neuer aper so much as by my affection to loue
a parson of so much woreth as your self, and yet, me lord, I must tell
you I am not esly drawen to be in loue, for I ded neuer see any man
but yourself that I could haue marred ... I neuer knew the nice of enuy,
but I must haue a large proporsion of grace to arme me againest it, if
I had a riuall in your affection, espeshially a nemeies [an enemy's ?]
daughter, but wer I suer you should hat me as I hop you loue me, yet
I well be, my lord, your must humbell saruant Margreat Lucas
the queen takes no notes [notice] of any thing to me.
280 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
XIII. My lord, I wounder not at my loue, but at yours, becaus the
obiet of mine is good. I wish the obiet of yours wer so, yet me
thinkes, you should loue nothing that wer ell, therfore if I haue any
part of good tis your loue makes me so, but loued I nothing elles but
you, I loue all that is good, and louing nothing aboue you I haue
loues recompens ; my lord, I haue not had much expereanse of the
world, yet I haue found it such as I could willinly part with it, but
sence I knew you, I fear I shall loue it to well, becaus you are in it,
and yet, me thinkes you are not in it, becaus you are not off it ; so I
am both in it and out off it, a Strang inchantment.
Nor with all this billing and cooing, was Margaret's worldly
wisdom quiescent :
XIV. My lord, it may be the triall, but it tis not true loue that
absence or tim can demenesh, and I shall as sone forget all good as
forget you ; me lord, you are a parson I may uery confeedently one
[own] unless morell meret be a scandall, but, me lord, ther is a cuss-
tumare law that must be sineed [signed] before I may lawfully call
you husban ; if you are so passhonit as you say, and as I dar not
belefe, yet it may be feared it cannot last long, for no extreme is
parmenttary [permanent ? ].
XV. My lord, Wer I much sicker then I was, your kaind car [care]
would cuer me. I am afeard it were an ambeshion to desir much of
your loue, knowing my self of lettell dessart and yet, me thinks, it
should be no sinne when the disir is good ; my lord, I sent a leter by
my mayd ; I should be sory if you thought any line can come from
you could be any others wayes then plesing to me, for that is only
troublesom which is foolesh or emperttenent, with which you will
neuer be taxed, nor your iudgment, unles now in choosing me, but
being as your choyes makes it good, and so I shall ualu my self, which
elles I should not. . . .
Once more Margaret was disturbed by gossip, but Newcastle's
protestations and her brother's influence smoothed the troubled
waters :
XVI. My lord, I haue rescued your leter which seems to satisfi
mee aginest the noies of a cort, but when I rede your lordsp justifi-
cashon under your one hand, I consider tis all the sattisfackshon can
be giuen from a parson of honner, but now, hauing so great a ingong-
shon [injunction] as is laid uppon mee in the nam of a brother, which
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 281
has so great a powr, together with your lordps excues that hauing som
ocashones of my one this week that will drae me to pares, of which I
belefe your lordps may hear of, my lord, your humbell saruant M. L.
XVII. My lord, ther is nothing will pleas me more then to be wher
you are, and I begen to admire parres becaus you are in it ; my lord,
the reson I had to consele [conceal] our affections was becaus I thought
it would be agreabl to your dissir, but for my part I would not car if the
trumppet of fame blue it throwout all the world, if the world wer ten
times biger then it tis, for it would be an aduantag to me and my iudg-
ment, and tho I am gelty of falts I may be ashamed to one, yet sence
they are knowin in heuen I car not what can be knowin on earth. . . .
Later Margaret grew so restive under a temporary illness that
she was about to give up her entire romance. Henrietta
Maria's displeasure and the antagonism of Newcastle's friends
seemed to her almost insuperable obstacles :
XVIII. My lord, I should be sory if your busnes be not acorden
to your dissir, and pray, me lord, consider well wither marring me will
not bring a troubl to your self, for, beleue me, I loue you to well to
wesh you unhapy, and I had rather lose all hapness my selfe then you
should be unforteenat, but if you be resoueled, what day soever you
pies to send for me, I will com ; my lord, I know not what counsell
to give conser[n]ing the quine, but I fear she will tak it ell if she be
not mad aquanted with our intenshoins, and if you pies to right a leter
to her and send it to me I will deleuer it that day you send for me. I
think it no pollese to desples the quine, for though she will doe us no
good, she may doe us harme. I haue sent my mayd about som busness,
and she and my lady broune shall agre about the other things you speak
of. I understand the parswashon of some againest your marreg, suer
thay would not perswad you but for your good ; but if you think you
haue don unaduisedly in promesis your self to me, send me word, and
I will resing [resign] up all the intrist I have in you, though unwil-
lingly. ... I haue bene uery ell this th[r]ee days, but health can not
be so plesing to me as knowing my self to be, my lord, your most
umbell saruant Margraet Lucas
pray, me lord, doe not messtrust me, for telling of any thing that
you haue commanded my silance in ; for though I am a woman, I
can keep counsell, but I hau not power ofer the emmaganacions of
others ; pray consider I haue enemyes.
282 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
XIX. My lord, it can be in no bodyes powr to ues me ell if you ues
me well. I have not ben with the qeen as yet be reson I am not well,
but I heer she would haue me acknowledg my self in a fait and not
she to be in any ... for the hindirance of our marrag, I hop it is not
in ther power, I am sure they can not hinder me from louing, for I
must be and will be and am, my lord, your admiring louing, honour-
ing humbell and obedient saruant Margreat Lucas
However, when the Queen once gave her consent, their
marriage was soon planned :
XX. My lord. My health will be according as I imaign [imagine]
your affection, for I shall neuer be sicke so long as you loue me ; my
lord, I hop the qeene and I am frindes ; she sayeth she will seme so
at lest, but I finde, if it had bene in her power, she would a [have]
crost us. I hard not of the leter, but she sayed to me she had it in
wrightin that I should pray you not to mak her acquainted with our
desines; my lord, sence our affections is poubleshed, it will not be
for our honours to delay our marreg ; the qeene dos intend to com
on mondday ; if not, I will send you word.
XXI. My lord, I dessir nothing so much as the contineuanc[e] of
your affection, for I think my self richer in haueing that then if I wer
a monarch of all the world ; my lord, I hop the qeene and I shall be
uery good frindes againe, and may be the beter for the deffarances
we have had. ... I find to sattesfy the opinion we are not marred
allredy, we must be marred by on of the prestes heer, which I think
cousens,^ to be the fettes [fittest]; we shall not come tell mondday, if
then, but there is no tim can allter my affection.
So their true love (if it may be called so) was strong
enough to weather all difficulties thrown in its way. The
credit for their ultimate union rests largely with Margaret,
because her position was much harder than Newcastle's.
Alone and unaided, she had to endure the gibes of a mock-
ing court, and, all things realized, she carried off a difficult
situation with no small amount of grace.
1 This is Dr. Cosin, the well-known priest, although Goulding reads it
"consens" and annotates it as "consent." See Welbeck Mss., II, 137, for
the correction.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 283
II
THE MARCHIONESS OF NEWCASTLE (1645-1664)
Once wedded, Margaret Cavendish enjoyed a more peaceful,
leisurely, but uninteresting life. This latter consideration, how-
ever, did not cause her a moment's uneasiness. She was in-
tensely relieved to be out of the court circle, and one may
imagine that her delight upon leaving Paris was even greater.
Yet time must have hung heavy upon her hands after the ex-
citement of existence at Saint Germains. Up to this period
she had never lived much alone, for the Lucas family with its
various connections had completely filled her girlhood. Now
the new Marchioness was thrown almost exclusively upon her
noble lord's society, but he, of course, could not always be
with his wife. Moreover, she had undergone such an unfor-
tunate experience as maid of honor that a marked aversion to
strangers characterized all her subsequent history ; this atti-
tude necessarily limited her outlook and occupation, especially
as there were no children to bring up nor any very arduous
household cares to sustain. The management of some few
servants ^ and of Newcastle's precarious finances must have
fallen to his wife, but this task she would easily accomplish.
Her mother, it will be remembered, was adept in such mat-
ters, so that the daughter probably inherited similar ability ;
at least the minute figuring and computing of Cavendish's
losses in his Life show that she fully comprehended the
value of money. The Marquis, on the contrary, was far too
casual ever to take any great interest in mundane details.
1 In the more prosperous times that succeeded the Duchess writes : " I
seldom take any servants, or turn them away, for I have an Under-officer as
my Lieutenant-General, which is the Governess of my House, & she receives
my General Orders, and Executes the Particular Households Affairs." —
CCXI Sociable Letters, Letter CLXXIX.
284 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Spending was a necessity for him, and procuring the where-
withal only an unmitigated nuisance. He had never learned
that economy was possible, while Margaret had been bred in
a frugal, well-ordered establishment, so that the subsequent
improvement in their affairs was no doubt partly due to her
careful management. Still these activities could not have
occupied a large share of her time, and she must have passed
many idle hours during that period.
It was only natural, then, that the Marchioness should
continue to develop her imagination, which had been some-
what awakened by the spiritual solitude she had endured at
court. Also this meditative habit was a decided source of
self-satisfaction for her, as it offered certain opportunities that
were a closed door to the uninitiated. When, in addition,
the joy of written composition was discovered,^ our authoress's
cup of happiness was full, for she had found a way to occupy
herself. The only wonder is that this fanciful vein should
have existed alongside of a marked practicality, although these
two seeming opposites may have been but heightened mani-
festations of that petty materialism and lofty spirituality which
are so often associated in feminine emotionalism. Margaret
Cavendish's genius brought about an excessive development
of this paradox, but the phenomena differ scarcely at all in
fundamentals. As time went on, however, the fantastic side
gained increasing sway over the human, until her normality
was gradually reduced to a subservient position. This desire
to write having once become established, she could not resist
setting down her conceptions and contemplations. Each day
she threw continued emphasis upon the strangeness in her
personality by devoting less and less time to the ordinary
relationships of life.
1 The continental influence of literary ladies and the Duchess's own early
attempts at writing made such a discovery almost inevitable.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 285
A True Relation admits this but does not make clear its
full significance. In a singularly disjointed passage the
authoress writes : ^
For I being of a lazy nature, and not of an active disposition, as some
are that love to journey from town to town, from house to house,
delighting in variety of company, making still one where the greatest
number is — likewise in playing at cards, or any other games, in
which I neither have practised, nor have I any skill therein : — as for
dancing, although it be a graceful art, and becometh unmarried per-
sons well, yet for those that are married, it is too light an action, dis-
agreeing with the gravity thereof — and for revelling, I am of too
dull a nature to make one in a merry society — as for feasting, it
would neither agree with my humour or constitution, for my diet is
for the most part sparing, as a little boiled chicken, or the like, my
drink most commonly water ; for though I have an indifferent good
appetite, yet I do often fast, out of an opinion that if I should eat
much, and exercise little, which I do, only walking a slow pace in my
chamber, whilst my thoughts run apace in my brain, so that the
motions of my mind hinders the active exercises of my body; for
should I dance or run, or walk apace, I should dance my thoughts
out of measure, run my fancies out of breath, and tread out the feet
of my numbers. But because I would not bury myself quite from the
sight of the world, I go sometimes abroad, seldom to visit, but only
in my coach about the town, or about some of the streets, which we
call here a tour, . . . which most cities of note in Europe for all I can
hear, hath such like recreations for the effeminate sex, although for
my part I had rather sit at home and write, or walk, as I said, in my
chamber and contemplate ; but I hold necessary sometimes to appear
abroad, besides I do find, that several objects do bring new materials
for my thoughts and fancies to build upon.
There is something of the primitive artist in this stimulus
from exterior perception, as is emphasized when the Duchess
describes her own methods of composition : ^
When I am writing any sad feigned stories, or serious humours, or
melancholy passions, I am forced many times to express them with
the tongue before I can write them with the pen, by reason those
1 Firth, pp. 172-173. 2 Ibid., p. 172
286 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
thoughts that are sad, serious, and melancholy are apt to contract,
and to draw too much back, which oppression doth as it were over-
power or smother the conception in the brain. But when some of
those thoughts are sent out in words, they give the rest more liberty
to place themselves in a more methodical order, marching more regu-
larly with my pen on the ground of white paper ; but my letters seem
rather a ragged rout than a well-armed body, for the brain being
quicker in creating than the hand in writing or the memory in retain-
ing, many fancies are lost, by reason they oft times outrun the pen,
where I, to keep speed in the race, write so fast as I stay not so long
as to write my letters plain, insomuch as some have taken my hand-
writing for some strange character, and being accustomed so to do, I
cannot now write very plain, when I strive to write my best ; indeed
my ordinary handwriting is so bad as few can read it, so as to write
it fair for the press; but however, that little wit I have, it delights
me to scribble it out, and disperse it about. For I being addicted
from my childhood to contemplation rather than conversation, to soli-
tariness rather than society, to melancholy rather than mirth, to write
with the pen than to work with the needle, passing my time with
harmless fancies, their company being pleasing, their conversation
innocent . . . my only trouble is, lest my brain should grow barren,
or that the root of my fancies should become insipid, withering into
a dull stupidity for want of maturing subjects to write on.
As the Duchess's Hterary labors became greater and as in
time her husband's fortunes mended, she obtained outside
assistance in the mechanics of writing. For instance,^ "' she
was of a generous turn of mind, and kept a great many young
ladies about her person, who occasionally wrote what she
dictated. Some of them slept in a room, contiguous to that
in which her Grace lay, and were ready, at the call of her
bell, to rise any hour of the night, to write down her concep-
tions, lest they should escape her memory. The young ladies,
no doubt often dreaded her Grace's conceptions, which were
1 Gibber's Lives of the Poets, II, 164. " Her restless spirit," writes Jusserand
apropos of this passage, " was in some manner anticipating unawares another
great writer, namely Pope." — The English Novel in the Time of Shakespeare,
1895, p. 381.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 287
frequent." A more pungent anecdote of the same sort rests
on a less secure foundation.^ " So fond," says Dr. Lort, "was
her grace of these conceptions, and so careful lest they should
be still-born, that I have heard or read somewhere, that her
servant John Rolleston, the duke's secretary, (whose name I
think is mentioned by her with much condescension and affec-
tion in her dedication of the duke's life to the duke) was
ordered to lie in a truckle-bed in a closet within her grace's
bed chamber, and whenever at any time she gave the summons
by calling out ' JOHN, I conceive,' poor John was to get up,
and commit to writing the offspring of his mistress's reveries."
This story by itself would certainly lend color to any theory
disputing the Duchess's sanity. It is not, however, well-
authenticated and, if it were, must be considered in its proper
connection with other events. There need not be the slightest
doubt that in later life our authoress had become so peculiar
as to cause the growth of unreliable material concerning her
habits. That was the inevitable result of plunging into realms
of imagination and leaving behind the more solid earth.
We have already seen what an extraordinary amount of work
the Duchess published, besides which she is supposed to have
written three folio manuscripts of poems, two of them being
at one time in Mr. Thomas Richardson's library and the other
in Bishop Willis's.^ Yet not content with so much literary
production, " I did many times not peruse the copies that
were transcribed, lest they should disturb my following con-
ceptions";^ and "my fancy is quicker than the pen with
which I write, insomuch as it is many times lost through the
slowness of my hand, and yet I write so fast, as I stay not so
long as to make perfect letters." * Indeed she set such store
^ Walpole's Catalogue, ed. Park, 1806, III, 190, n.
2 Ballard's Memoirs of British Ladies, p. 213.
3 Firth, p. xxxvii. * Ibid., p. 154.
288 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
by her fancies, " as I neglect my health, for it is as great a
grief to leave their society as a joy to be there in their com-
pany." 1 Medical opinion also felt that the Duchess was likely
to injure her physical well-being, for Sir Theodore Mayerne,
the celebrated doctor,'^ wrote Newcastle that an " occupation in
writing bookes with a sedentary life is absolutely bad for her
health, and if she will be a philosopher, I could wish her to be
a peripatetick."^ As this condition of ill health increased, the
Duchess presumably became more unreasonable and devoted
even a greater share of attention to literature. At any rate, that
part of her life steadily progressed in importance, until it had
usurped dominance over the remaining functions. In the fifteen
years following 1645 Margaret Cavendish changed from a
sweet, attractive, if unusual, girl to a self-absorbed, self-satisfied,
and eccentric woman. All the pliancy, all the spring of youth
had deserted her, and in its stead was left a serene compla-
cency, more annoying than agreeable. She who could create
"Blazing Worlds" was not likely to take excessive heed of this
terrestrial footstool ; she lived unto herself as an escape from
harassing social complications.
Finally things came to such a pass that the Duchess could
do nothing but write, whether she would or no. One of the
CCXI Sociable Letters tells us that neighbors taxed her waiting-
maids with idleness and the girls excused themselves,^ " laying
the blame upon me, that I did not set them to any imployment,
^ Firth, p. 172. Compare, " Your Lordship never bid me to Work, nor leave
Writing, except when you would perswade me to spare so much time from my
study as to take the Air for my Health," in " To his Excellency the Lord Mar-
quess of Newcastle," prefixed to CCXI Sociable Letters.
^ He was born at Geneva in 1573, moved to London in 161 1, and was royal
physician to both Charleses in turn {Diet. Nat. Biog.).
^Letters Written by Charles Lamb's '■^Princely JVoman," etc., p. 4. From a
manuscript at Welbeck Abbey according to R. W. Goulding, the librarian there.
* Letter CL.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 289
but whereas they were ready to obey my commands, I was
so slow in commanding them, as I seldom took any notice of
them, or spoke to them, and that the truth was, they oftener
heard of their lady, than heard, or saw her themselves, I liv-
ing so studious a life, as they did not see me above once a
week, nay, many times, not once in a fortnight ; wherefore,
upon the relation of these complaints, I sent for the governess
of my house, and bid her give order to have flax and wheels
bought, for I, with my maids, would sit and spin. The gov-
erness hearing me say so, smiled, I asked her the reason, she
said, she smiled to think what uneven threads I would spin,
for, said she, though Nature hath made you a spinster in
poetry, yet education hath not made you a spinster in huswifry,
and you will spoil more flax, than get cloth by your spinning,
as being an art that requires practice to learn it. . . . Then I
bid her leave me, to consider of some other work ; and when
I was by myself alone, I call'd into my mind several sorts of
wrought work, most of which, though I had will, yet I had no
skill to work, for which I did inwardly complain of my educa-
tion, that my mother did not force me to learn to work with
a needle, though she found me alwayes unapt thereto ; at last
I pitch'd upon making of silk flowers, for I did remember,
when I was a girl, I saw my sisters make silk flowers, and I
had made some, although ill-favour 'dly ; wherefore I sent for
the governess of my house again, and told her, that I would
have her buy several coloured silks, for I was resolved to im-
ploy my time in making silk-flowers, she told me, she would
obey my commands, but, said she, Madam, neither you, nor
any that serves you, can do them so well, as those who make
it their trade, neither can you make them so cheap, as they
will sell them out of their shops, wherefore you had better buy
those toyes, if you desire them, for it will be an unprofitable
290 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
employment, to wast time, with a double expense of mony.
Then I told her I would preserve, for it was summer time,
and the fruit fresh, and ripe upon the trees ; she ask'd me
for whom I would preserve, for I seldom did eat sweet meats
my self, nor make banquets for strangers, unless I meant to
feed my household servants with them ; besides, said she, you
may keep half a score servants with the mony that is laid out
in sugar and coals, which go to the preserving only of a few
sweet meats, that are good for nothing but to breed obstruc-
tions, and rot the teeth. . . . Besides, said she, none can
. , . employ their time better, than to read, nor your Ladiship
better than to write, for any other course of life would be
as unpleasing and unnatural to you, as writing is delightful
to you ; besides, you are naturally addicted to busie your time
with pen, ink, and paper."
This addiction increased the Duchess's unsociability and, as
previously suggested, may have been a contributory cause of
Newcastle's retirement after the Restoration. His wife was
so palpably unfitted for court life, especially under Charles II,
that he may have felt it the part of wisdom not to strive after
political recognition. At Welbeck or Bolsover the Duchess
would be much happier than in the busy haunts of men, and,
personal ambition set aside, perhaps the Duke himself (now
sixty-eight years old) preferred rural tranquillity. Their manner
of existence in the country we must reconstruct for ourselves.
Certainly it was not that ill-naturedly imagined by Walpole : ^
What a picture of foolish nobility was this stately poetic couple,
retired to their own little domain, and intoxicating one another with
circumstantial flattery, on what was of consequence to no mortal but
themselves !
1 Walpole's Catalogue, ed. Park, III, 190-191. As unfounded is Charles
Whibley's remark in the Cambridge History, VIII, 149, that the Duke and
Duchess might have inspired Lord and Lady Froth in Congreve's The
Double Dealer.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 291
As little can one accept Sir Egerton Brydges's idyllic account : ^
Welbeck opened her gates to her Lord ; and the castles of the North
received with joy their heroic chieftain, whose maternal ancestors, the
baronial house of OGLE, had ruled over them for centuries in
Northumberland. But Age had now made the Duke desirous only
of repose ; and her Grace, the faithful companion of his fallen for-
tunes, was little disposed to quit the luxurious quiet of rural grandeur,
which was as soothing to her disposition, as it was concordant with
her duty. To such a pair the noisy and intoxicated joy of a profligate
court would probably have been a thousand times more painful than
all the wants of their late chilling, but calm, poverty. They came not,
therefore, to palaces and levees ; but amused themselves in the coun-
try with literature and the arts.
As a matter of fact, the Duke and Duchess must have led a
much more prosaic existence. Newcastle seems to have been
chiefly occupied with restoring parks ^ or racing horses,^ while
his wife still plied those literary pursuits which had fastened
so tightly upon her.
What is more, she began to show a decided interest in
Cavendish's family. Although her maternal instinct had never
been allowed to gratify itself, she now undertook the role of
grandmother. Henry, Earl of Ogle, had one boy, Henry, Lord
Mansfield, and four daughters, who sometimes came to visit
at Welbeck. On January 20, 1669- 1670, Newcastle wrote
his son, " All your children are well, but Henry loves my
wife better than any body and she him."^ On another occa-
sion, the Duchess addresses a letter to Ogle, showing regard
for him and affection for young Henry. This missive, by the
way, is quite indecorous and furnishes another instance of how
plain-spoken was an age in which a respectable noblewoman
^ Preface to Sir Egerton Brydges's reprint of the True Relation, pp. 6-7.
2 Firth, p. 71.
3 See his rules for horse racing promulgated by John Rolleston, May 26, 1662
(Bod. Lib., Wood 2^6 A, 149), reprinted in Firth, pp. 218-219.
* Welbeck Afss., II, 149.
292 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
would send such a message to her grandson. The ingenuous-
ness of this epistle adds still further to its interest : ^
My lord, I am glad you have reseud such sattesfaction [as] you
desir[ed] when your lordship was heer at welbick, and I wish with all
my sould your lordship may haue the fruesion of all your good desirs.
I am allso glad my lord mansfield did kindly actseept of my letter, but
sorry he hath got a knock opon his forhead; pray tell his lordship
from me if he wer a marred man it would be a dangrous bumpe ; but
praying for his happenes as allso your lordship, I am, my lord, your
lordships humbell seruant
M. Newcastle
Certainly this is as friendly a letter as a stepson could wish
to receive, and if there was any trouble between Ogle and
the Duchess, she was not to blame for it.
Yet Newcastle's son seems to have been dissatisfied with
existing conditions. In a letter of August lo, 1671, he is
" very mallencholly, finding my Father more perswaded by
his Wife then I could thinke it possible," ^ and this statement
forms a damning coincidence with an occurrence of the pre-
ceding July 14; for on that day there was made a "con-
fession by John Booth before James Chadwick, a justice of
the peace for Nottinghamshire, that he had written a libel
against the Duchess of Newcastle for the purpose of making
dissensions between the Duke and Duchess."^ An ugly but
almost an inevitable suspicion points to Ogle as inciting the libel,
although his motives are not plain. They could hardly have
been personal dislike of the Duchess, for no milder or more
unobjectionable lady could be found. Possibly he had wished
a worldly, ambitious wife for his father, but Newcastle's
retirement from political activity left the son additional oppor-
tunities for advancement. After all, " stepmother " is an
1 Letters Written by Charles Lamb's " Princely Woman" etc., p. 19.
^ S. A. Strong's Catalogue of the Lette7-s and other Doctiments exhibited at
Welbeck, p. 63. 3 Welbeck Mss., II, 149.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 293
ill-fated word, and it may have been merely that relationship
which prompted Ogle's ill will. The Duke and Duchess were
so wrapped up in one another that jealousy would be an easy
growth on the part of children by a former marriage, but
nothing could justify the employment of these underhand
means, which were defeated, as they richly deserved. The
exposure precluded any further mischief from that quarter,
while it probably served to unite husband and wife even more
closely. So they lived on in a quiet way, busied with their pos-
sessions, their household, or their literary talents. Surely they
had small cause to envy Charles's court for all its bustling
intrigues and vain pursuit of pleasure.
HI
THE DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE (1664-1673)
Occasionally, however, they went up to London, and on one
of these trips the Duchess must have come into contact with.
Mrs. Katherine Philips. Our sole proof of their friendship is
contained in a poem by Orinda, To my Lady M. Cavendish^
chusing the name of Policnte. It runs : ^
That Nature in your frame has taken care,
As well your Birth as Beauty do declare,
Since we at once discover in your Face,
The lustre of your Eyes and of your Race :
And that your shape and fashion does attest,
So bright a form has yet a brighter guest,
To future times authentick fame shall bring,
Historians shall relate, and Poets sing.
But since your boundless mind upon my head,
Some rays of splendour is content to shed ;
And least I suffer by the great surprize,
Since you submit to meet me in disguise,
1 Poems, 1667, P- 142-
294 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Can lay aside what dazles vulgar sight,
And to Orinda can be Policrite.
You must endure my vows and find the way
To entertain such Rites, as I can pay :
For so the pow'r divine new praise acquires,
By scorning nothing that it once inspires :
I have no merits that your smile can win,
Nor offering to appease you when I sin ;
Nor can my useless homage hope to raise.
When what I cannot serve, I strive to praise :
But I can love, and love at such a pitch.
As I dare boast it will ev'n you enrich ;
For kindness is a Mine, when great and true,
Of nobler Ore than ever Indians knew,
'T is all that mortals can on Heav'n bestow
And all that Heav'n can value here below.
This poem must have been written between 1660 and 1664,
the dates of " M. Cavendish's" return and Orinda's death, at
a period when it was almost inevitable that these two literary
ladies should meet. " The Society of Friendship " ^ had been
organized some time before the Duchess could have assumed
her name of Policrite — "a critic of the town" no doubt —
and when she did so, it must have been merely to gain a for-
mal identification with this literary group. By her very nature
Margaret Cavendish was incapable of taking an active part in
any approximation of the salon ; ^ she possessed such a shy,
bashful, solitary disposition as to make even the idea of con-
versation for conversation's sake unbearable to her. When
M. Montegut writes that, " La duchesse de Newcastle fut, en
date, la premiere de ces has bleus" ^ he completely miscon-
ceives the situation. " Blue-stocking " is the last name which
1 For some account of this organization see Edmund Gosse's Seventeenth
Century Studies.
2 " There is no suggestion of the salon about such a figure as the Duchess
of Newcastle." — C. B. Tinker, Salon and English Letters, p. 90, n.
* La Duchesse et le Due de Newcastle, p. 206.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 295
should be applied to this reserved and unsociable authoress.
In books she might pour forth her inmost feelings, but among
people her tongue was so tied by self-consciousness that she
could not have been an influential addition to Orinda's circle.
From the tenor of Mrs. Philips's poem, the Duchess would
seem condescendingly to have lent her name to the group
as an honorary member. This would indeed be conferring a
dignity, for Newcastle was such a prominent person that his
wife possessed no small degree of importance. So it is that
Orinda asks her to " lay aside what dazles vulgar sight " in re-
turn for a love which is "all that mortals can on Heav'n be-
stow." The attitude is that of an inferior who returns thanks
for favors received, in this case the Duchess's deigning to
enter the " Society of Friendship." Her character and the
lack of any further evidence go to prove that she was only
a silent partner in its workings.
The Newcastles' most famous visit to town was made, as
already noted, in April and May, 1667. Regarding it, Samuel
Pepys has several entries which furnish a specific tinge to
our ideas of the Duchess's peculiarities. For one thing she
seems to have felt the elevation of her position and was deter-
mined to impress London with the fact that, although living
in the country, she was a peeress of no mean rank. On
April 1 1 Pepys went to Whitehall " thinking there to have
seen the Duchess of Newcastle's coming this night to Court,
to make a visit to the Queene, the King having been with her
yesterday, to make her a visit since her coming to town. The
whole story of this lady is a romance, and all she does is
romantick. Her footmen in velvet coats, and herself in an
antique dress, as they say ; and was the other day at her own
play, The Humorous Lovers ; ^ the most ridiculous thing that
1 Here Pepys errs again, as we have seen him doing once before, in
ascribing the Duke's play to the Duchess.
296 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
ever was wrote, but yet she and her Lord mightily pleased with
it ; and she, at the end, made her respects to the players from
her box, and did give them thanks. There is as much expec-
tation of her coming to Court, that so people may come to see
her, as if it were the Queen of Sheba ; ^ but I lost my labour,
for she did not come this night." Ten days later the expected
visit took place, although Pepys leaves no record of it. A news-
letter dated April 22 mentions that, " last night is memorable
for the Duchess of Newcastle's first appearance at Court. She
came in the evening attended with three coaches, the first of
her gentlemen, of two horses, the second her own of six, and
the third that of her women, of four. Her train was carried
by a young lady in white satin. Her first visit was to the
King, who sent the Lord Chamberlain to conduct her to the
Queen, where his Majesty came to her. This visit is thought
extraordinary." 2
On the 25 th it is recorded i^ "Last night the Duchess of
Newcastle visited the Duchess of York in the same equipage
in which she visited the Queen." Nor was this the first time
that these two peeresses had met. Sir Charles Lyttelton had
journeyed to York with its titular Duke and Duchess and had
written thence on August 7, 1665, to Christopher Hatton:^
Last night wee gott hither, having bine mightily feasted and wel-
comed by the appearance of the nobillity and gentlemen of the contrys
with the volunteer troopes as wee passed ; but more especially at
S' George Saville's, whose entertainment was indeed very splendid.
Hard by his house mett us on the way my L'* of Newcastle and my
Lady, whose behavior was very pleasant, but rather to be scene then
told. She was dressd in a vest, and, insteed of courtesies, made leggs
and bows to the ground with her hand and head.
^ The word is "Sweden" in the original. See Wheatley's 1895 edition,
VI, 254, n.
2 Hist. Mss. Comm., 12 Rep. App., Part VII, p. 47. » Ibid.
* Hatton Correspondence ("Camden Society"), I, 47. Sir John Reresby also
alludes to this visit in his Memoirs, p. 65.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 297
The Duchess's reserve evidently had no connection with matters
of public display. Despite her natural timidity among strangers,
she seems to have enjoyed being stared at by a crowd, when
she thought of it as a unit, not as individuals. This delight
in attracting notice resembles the tendency towards blatant
self-revelation apparent throughout her books, both of which
characteristics may be laid to the same shyness that denied her
more common means of self-expression. She could not talk
familiarly with casual acquaintances, and to make up for that
defect, she asked recognition from a larger public, the world
en masse.
Something of the Duchess's strange manner in doing so
may be laid to the ancient stately tradition, still more to her
personal oddities. " I never took delight in closets, or cabinets
of toys," she tells \xs>} "but in the variety of fine clothes, and
such toys as only were to adorn my person." And again : ^ " I
took great delight in attiring, fine dressing, and fashions, es-
pecially such fashions as I did invent myself, not taking that
pleasure in such fashions as was invented by others. Also I
did dislike any should follow my fashions, for I always took
delight in a singularity, even in accoutrements of habits."
This whim of 1656 had ten years later become an obsession,
which subjected its author to severe ridicule in modish London.
Pepys's second notice voices the common opinion, when on
April 26 he "met my Lady Newcastle going with her coaches
and footmen all in velvet : herself, whom I never saw before,
as I have heard her often described, for all the town-talk is
now a-days of her extravagancies, with her velvet-cap, her hair
about her ears ; many black patches, because of pimples about
her mouth ; naked-necked, without anything about it, and a
black just-au-corps. She seemed to me a very comely woman :
but I hope to see more of her on May-day."
1 Firth, p. 174. 2 Ibid., p. 175.
298 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
On May-day Pepys was not very fortunate, although he
made every effort to carry out his purpose : " Sir W, Pen and
I in his coach, Tiburne-way, into the Park, where a horrid
dust, and a number of coaches, without pleasure or order.
That which we, and almost all went for, was to see my Lady
Newcastle ; which we could not, she being followed and
crowded upon by coaches all the way she went, that nobody
could come near her ; only I could see she was in a large
black coach, adorned with silver instead of gold, and so white
curtains, and everything black and white, and herself in her
cap. . . . When we had spent half an hour in the Park, we
went out again, weary of the dust, and despairing of seeing my
Lady Newcastle ; and so back the same way, and to St. James's
thinking to have met my Lady Newcastle before she got home,
but we staying by the way to drink, she got home a little
before us: so we lost our labours." On the loth this tireless
novelty-seeker " drove hard towards Clerkenwell, thinking to
have overtaken my Lady Newcastle, whom I saw before us in
her coach, with 100 boys and girls running looking upon her :
but I could not : and so she got home before I could come
up to her. But I will get time to see her." That time finally
arrived, but the circumstances were somewhat particular and
demand special consideration.
Meanwhile we may notice what impression the Duchess
made upon another diarist, John Evelyn. He, it will be re-
membered, was the son-in-law of Sir Richard Browne, at whose
chapel in Paris Newcastle had married Margaret Lucas, and
to him therefore they felt under obligations. On April 18,
Evelyn "went to make court to the Duke and Duchess of
Newcastle at their house in Clerkenwell,^ being newly come
1 There was a dispute over whether this house was Newcastle's by virtue
of the Act restoring his property lost during the Rebellion {Hist. Mss.
Comm., 7 Rep., Parti, p. 135 a).
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 299
out of the north. They received me with great kindnesse, and
I was much pleas'd with the extraordinary fanciful habit, garb,
and discourse of the Dutchess." A week later he " visited
again y^ Duke of Newcastle, with whom I had ben acquainted
long before in France, where the Dutchess had obligation to my
Wife's mother, for her marriage there ; . . . My Wife being
with me, the Duke and Dutchess both would needs bring her
to the very Court." ^ By way of acknowledgment, on the
27th, " I went againe with my Wife to the Dutchess of New-
castle, who receiv'd her in a kind of transport, suitable to her
extravagant humour and dresse, which was very singular." So
the returned Royalists vied in showing one another courtesies,
for there is no more mighty breeder of camaraderie than com-
mon adversity. Mistress Evelyn was not blind to the Duchess's
feminine foibles, however, as appears in a letter from her of
about this time : ^
I was surprised to find so much extravagance and vanity in any
person not confined within four walls. Her habit particular, fantastical,
not unbecoming a good shape, which she may truly boast of. Her face
discovers the facility of the sex, in being yet persuaded it deserves the
esteem years forbid, by the infinite care she takes to place her curls
and patches. Her mien surpasses the imagination of poets, or the
descriptions of a romance heroine's greatness ; her gracious bows,
seasonable nods, courteous stretching out of her hands, twinkling of
her eyes, and various gestures of approbation, show what may be
expected from her discourse, which is as airy, empty, whimsical, and
rambling as her books, aiming at science, difficulties, high notions,
terminating commonly in nonsense, oaths and obscenity.
In the same interview " she swore if the schools did not banish
Aristotle," in favor of her writings, " they did her wrong." ^
The Evelyns and Cavendishes seem to have continued their
acquaintance, to judge from an extant letter, which is dated
1 Entry for April 25, 1667.
2 Introduction to Ever)rman edition of the Life, p. xvi.
8 Ibid., p. xvii.
300 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
June 15, 1674. It is written by Evelyn to the Duchess, who
died in the preceding December, so that some confusion of
times and seasons has occurred, although the letter appears to
be genuine in its thanks for her inevitable present of books
and in its suggestion that he has reciprocated with some
plans for landscape gardening : ^
I go not into my study without reproach to my prodigious ingrati-
tude, whilst I behold such a pile of favours & monuments of y incom-
parable spirit, without having yet had the good fortune, or the good
manners indeede, to make any recognitions as becomes a person so
immensely oblig'd. That I presume to make this small present to y
Grace (who were pleas'd to accept my collection of Architects, to whom
timber and planting are subsidiaries) is not for the dignitie of the sub-
ject (tho' Princes have not disdain'd to cultivate trees & gardens with
the same hands they manag'd sceptres) but because it is the best
expression of my gratitude that I can returne.
Thereupon he launches forth into a comparison of the Duchess
with all the women who have ever written and concludes in a
burst of eloquence,^ " What of sublime & worthy in the nature
of things, dos not y"" Grace comprehend and explaine ! "
Another human touch brings this epistle to a close : ^
My Avife (whom you have ben pleas'd to dignifie by the name of
y daughter, & to tell her that you looke upon her as your owne, for
a mother's sake of hers, who had so greate a veneration of y"" Grace)
presents her most humble duty to you by, Madame,
Yr Grace's &c
In this letter there seems to be something more than mere
lip service, although the conventional compliments must of
course be heavily discounted. Evelyn was apparently able
to penetrate beneath Margaret Cavendish's superficial eccen-
tricities to the warmly affectionate heart beating under her
strange exterior.
1 Wheatley's Evely)t, III, 395.
2 Ibid., Ill, 397. '
3 Ibid, III, 397-398.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 301
Not so could the court at large overlook this cause for
merriment, as an episode in the Memoirs of Cozmt Grammont
indirectly shows. It is, of course, far from reliable, but sympto-
matic none the less. De Grammont arrived late for a certain
ball and, in excusing himself, concludes : ^
I had forgot to tell you, that to increase my ill humour, I was
stopped, as I was getting out of my chair, by the devil of a phantom
in masquerade, who would by all means persuade me, that the queen
had commanded me to dance with her ; and, as I excused myself with
the least rudeness possible, she charged me to find out who was to be
her partner, and desired me to send him to her immediately : so that
your Majesty will do well to give orders about it ; for she has placed
herself in ambush in a coach, to seize upon all those who pass through
Whitehall. However, I must tell you, that it is worth while to see her
dress ; for she must have at least sixty ells of gauze and silver tissue
about her, not to mention a sort of a pyramid upon her head, adorned
with a hundred thousand baubles. This last account surprised all the
assembly, except those who had a share in the plot. The queen
assured them that all she had appointed for the ball were present;
and the king, having paused some minutes : " I bet," said he, " that
it is the Duchess of Newcastle." "And I," said Lord Muskerry, com-
ing up to Miss Hamilton, " will bet it is another fool ; for I am very
much mistaken if it is not my wife."
Muskerry was right, but to judge from Pepys's realistic descrip-
tion, this costume might well have been the Duchess's, although
she was never known to display such confident forwardness
in action.
A more frankly fictitious anecdote is contained in Sir Walter
Scott's Peveril of the Peak. Scott had edited Anthony Hamil-
ton's book and from the passage just cited probably gained his
idea of the Duchess's personality. In justice to the lady, it
must be admitted that no historical basis underlies any such
conception as is expressed in his novel : ^
1 Memoirs of Count Grammont, London, 1846, pp. 134-135.
2 Peveril of the Peak, Border Edition, III, 228-230.
302 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
An attendant on the Court announced suddenly to their Majesties
that a lady, who would only announce herself as a Peeress of England,
desired to be admitted into the presence.
The Queen said, hastily, it was impossible. No peeress, without
announcing her title, was entitled to the privilege of her rank.
" I could be sworn," said a nobleman in attendance, " that it is some
whim of the Duchess of Newcastle."
The attendant who brought the message said that he did indeed
believe it to be the Duchess, both from the singularity of the message,
and that the lady spoke with somewhat a foreign accent.
" In the name of madness, then," said the King, " let us admit her.
Her Grace is an entire raree-show in her own person — a universal
masquerade — indeed a sort of private Bedlam-hospital, her whole
ideas being like so many patients crazed upon the subjects of love and
literature, who act nothing in their vagaries, save Minerva, Venus,
and the nine Muses."
" Your Majesty's pleasure must always supersede mine," said the
Queen. " I only hope I shall not be expected to entertain so fantastic
a personage — The last time she came to Court, Isabella" — (she
spoke to one of her Portuguese ladies of honour) — " you had not
returned from our lovely Lisbon, — her Grace had the assurance to
assume a right to bring a train-bearer into my apartment ; and when
this was not allowed, what then, think you, she did? — even caused
her train to be made so long, that three mortal yards of satin and
silver remained in the antechamber, supported by four wenches,
while the other end was attached to her Grace's person, as she paid
her duty at the upper end of the presence-room. Full thirty yards
of the most beautiful silk did her Grace's madness employ in this
manner."
" And most beautiful damsels they were who bore this portentous
train," said the King — "a train never equalled save by that of the
great comet in sixty-six. Sedley and Etherege told us wonders of
them ; for it is one advantage of this new fashion brought up by the
Duchess, that a matron may be totally unconscious of the coquetry
of her train and its attendants."
" Am I to understand, then. Your Majesty's pleasure is, that the
lady is to be admitted 1 " said the usher.
"Certainly," said the King; "that is, if the incognita be really
entitled to the honour — It may be as well to enquire her tide — there
are more madwomen abroad than the Duchess of Newcastle. I will
walk into the anteroom myself, and receive your answer."
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 303
Impressionistically this story is successful in establishing
the color after which Scott was striving. It does reflect com-
mon court opinion concerning the Duchess's eccentric foibles,
but it entirely leaves out of account the lady herself. She
might have demanded unconditional admittance, like the
Countess of Derby in Sir Walter's novel, but one does not
imagine that the episode about her train could contain a grain
of truth. How little Scott knew of the historical Duchess may
be seen by his crediting her with a foreign accent, while,
despite many years abroad, she never learned a word of any
alien speech. " I had a natural stupidity towards the learning
of any other language than my native tongue," is her admis-
sion,i "for I could sooner and with more facility understand
the sense, than remember the words, and for want of such
memory makes me so unlearned in foreign languages as I am."
Unfortunately the Duchess is now best known by these highly
colored inventions of Scott and Hamilton, together with
Pepys's literal but prejudiced descriptions. So it is that
people to-day think of Margaret Cavendish — if they think of
her at all — as "the mad Duchess," ^ an antique curiosity
wandering through the Restoration court to furnish amusement
for its sophisticated members. As a matter of fact, all these
apparent inanities and absurdities, if reduced to their proper
proportions, may be explained in the light of her natural
qualities and unusual career. Moreover, these visits to London
played such a small part, even in her later years, that it is
neither fairness nor wisdom exclusively to accept the testimony
concerning them.
Apart from the literary and social aspects of the Duchess's
life in town is her interest in scientific investigations. The pub-
lication of her " philosophical " books showed a certain tendency
in this direction, so that it was natural enough she should
1 Firth, p. 174. 2 Jenkins, p. 23.
304 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
wish to affiliate herself with prominent men of science. The
meeting place for such persons was " the Royal Society of
London," which had been revivified with remarkable success
after the Restoration ; and accordingly at a meeting of the
Council on May 23, 1667,^ "it was resolved, that the duchess
of Newcastle, having intimated her desire to be present at one
of the meetings of the society, be entertained with some ex-
periments at the next meeting; and that the lord BERKELEY
and Dr. CHARLETON be desired to give notice of it to her
Grace, and to attend her to the meeting on the Thursday fol-
lowing. It was ordered, that for the said entertainment there
be made ready the experiments of colours formerly mentioned
by Mr. BOYLE ; the weighing of an air in an exhausted
receiver ; the dissolving of flesh with a certain liquor of
Mr. BOYLE'S suggesting." On the next page we find that,^
"the lord BERKELEY mentioned, that the duchess of New-
castle had expressed a great desire to come to the society, and
to see some of their experiments ; but that she desired to be
invited. This was seconded by the earl of CARLISLE and
Dr. CHARLETON, who pressing, that it might be put to
the vote accordingly, whether the duchess of Newcastle should
at her desire be invited to be present at the meeting on the
Thursday following ; it was carried in the affirmative. The
ceremonies and the subjects for her entertainment were
referred to the council." The Duchess evidently stood on
her dignity at first but finally achieved the respect which
she felt was due her.
On May 30, "the duchess of Newcastle was at the meeting
of the Royal Society, seated at the right hand of the Presi-
dent." 3 The society's records state that she,^ " coming in, the
1 Birch's History of the Royal Society, II, 175. ^ Ibid., II, 176.
8 News-letter in Hist. Mss. Comm., 12 Rep. App., Part VII, p. 48.
* Birch, 11, 177-178.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 305
experiments appointed for her entertainment were made ; First,
that of weighing the air, which was done with a glass receiver
of the capacity of nine gallons and three pints ; which being
exhausted, and put into a scale, and then opened, and the air
let in, weighed thereupon one ounce and seventy-one carats
more than it did when exhausted. Mr. BOYLE suggested
afterwards, that a gage might be employed to know how
much air was left, which was ordered to be done. Next were
made several experiments of mixing colour. Then two cold
liquors by mixture made hot. Then the experiment of making
water bubble up in the rarefying engine, by drawing out the
air; and that of making an empty bladder swell in the same
engine. Then the experiment of making a body swim in the
middle of the water : And that of two well-wrought marbles,
which were not separated but by the weight of forty-seven
pounds. After the duchess was withdrawn, Mr. HOOKE
was put in mind of the experiment of measuring the earth
in St. James's park, to be tried there on the Monday morning
following." So much for facts. John Evelyn has this men-
tion of the occurrence : ^
To London to wait on the Dutchess of Newcastle (who was a
mighty pretender to learning, poetrie and philosophic, and had in both
published divers bookes) to the Royal Society, whether she came in
great pomp, and being received by our Lord President at the dore of
our meeting roome, the mace &c carried before him, had several ex-
periments shewed to her. I conducted her Grace to her coach and
return'd home.
Pepys as usual has the fullest and most lively account : ^
After dinner I walked to Arundell House, the way very nasty, the
day of meeting of the Society being changed from Wednesday to
Thursday, which I knew not before, because the Wednesday is a
Council-day, and several of the Council are of the Society, and would
1 Entry for May 30, 1667. ^ Entry for May 30, 1667.
306 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
come but for their attending the King at Council ; where I find much
company, indeed very much company, in expectation of the Duchesse
of Newcastle, who had desired to be invited to the Society ; and was,
after much debate, pro and con^ it seems many being against it ; and
we do beUeve the town will be full of ballads of it. Anon comes the
Duchesse with her women attending her ; among others, the Fera-
bosco, of whom so much talk is that her lady would bid her show her
face and kill the gallants. She is indeed black and hath good black
little eyes, but otherwise but a very ordinary woman I do think, but
they say sings well. The Duchesse hath been a good, comely woman;
but her dress so antick, and her deportment so ordinary, that I do not
like her at all, nor did I hear her say any thing that was worth hear-
ing, but that she was full of admiration, all admiration. Several fine
experiments were shown her of colours, loadstones, microscopes, and
of liquers : among others, of one that did, while she was there, turn a
piece of roasted mutton into pure blood, which was very rare. Here
was Mrs. Moore of Cambridge, whom I had not seen before, and I
was glad to see her ; as also a very pretty black boy that run up and
down the room, somebody's child in Arundell House. After they had
shown her many experiments, and she cried still she was full of ad-
miration, she departed, being led out and in by several Lords, that
were there ; among others Lord George Berkeley and Earl of Carlisle,
and a very pretty young man, the Duke of Somerset.
At this meeting there may very well have taken place a
reported dialogue between the Duchess and Dr. Wilkins, later
made Bishop of Chester. Wilkins was a prominent member
of the Royal Society and a man of some wit, to judge by
his repartee in this instance. The episode has come down
to us in several forms, but its origin is not clear. As a
note to his 1806 edition of Walpole's Catalogue, Thomas
Park writes : ^
In a book of anecdotes this is related. The duchess of Newcastle
once asked bishop Wilkins, how she should get up to the world in the
moon, which he had discovered ? " Oh, Madam, (said the prelate) your
Grace has built so many castles in the air, that you cannot want a
place to bait at."
1 III, iS4,n.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 307
In 1844 Louisa Stuart Costello records the dialogue as follows i^
" Doctor, where am I to find a place for bating at in the way up to
that planet? " " Madam," he replied, " of all the people in the world,
I never expected that question from you, who have built so many
castles in the air, that you may lie every night in one of your own."
The misspelling of " bating " leads one to imagine that this
story's vitality may have been oral, a conjecture which is more
firmly established by the change of "bating" to "waiting" in
still a third version. Stanley in his Memorials of Westminster
Abbey makes the Duchess ask,^ " ' Doctor, where am I to find
a place for waiting in the way up to that Planet?' 'Madam,'
Wilkins replied, ' of all people in the world, I never expected
that question from you, who have built so many castles in the
air, that you may be every night at one of your own.' " The
three forms of this anecdote, given in historical sequence, go to
show the instability of any traditional narration, but that some
repartee of the kind took place seems sufficiently well attested.
The Duchess closes the Tnie Relation with an analysis of
her own character, which affords us certain minor sidelights
upon its composite whole. These remarks are pervaded by the
naivetd, verbosity, and disorder which run throughout her en-
tire autobiography, and which make it rather a natural confes-
sion than a work of art. Its value, like that of her other
works, lies in what we learn concerning the Duchess, not in
her manner of telling us the facts : ^
As for my disposition, it is more inclining to be melancholy than
merry, but not crabbed or peevishly melancholy, but soft, melting, soli-
tary and contemplating melancholy. And I am apt to weep rather than
laugh, not that I do often either of them. Also I am tender-natured,
for it troubles my conscience to kill a fly, and the groans of a dying
beast strike my soul. Also where I place a particular affection, I love
1 MeTnoirs of Eminent Englishzvomen, III, 219.
2 Edition of 1868, p. 233.
8 Firth, pp. 175-178.
3o8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
extraordinarily and constantly, yet not fondly, but soberly and observ-
ingly, not to hang about them as a trouble, but to wait upon them as
a servant; but this affection will take no root, but where I think or
find merit, and have leave both from divine and moral laws. Yet I find
this passion so troublesome, as it is the only torment of my life, for
fear any evil misfortune or accident, or sickness, or death, should come
unto them, insomuch as I am never freely at rest. Likewise I am grate-
ful, for I never received a courtesy — but I am impatient and troubled
until I can return it. Also I am chaste, both by nature, and education,
insomuch as I do abhor an unchaste thought. Likewise, I am seldom
angry, as my servants may witness for me, for I rather choose to suffer
some inconveniences than disturb my thoughts, which makes me wink
many times at their faults; but when I am angry, I am very angry,
but yet it is soon over, and I am easily pacified, if it be not such an
injury as may create a hate. Neither am I apt to be exceptious or
jealous, but if I have the least symptom of this passion, I declare it
to those it concerns, for I never let it lie smothering in my breast to
breed a malignant disease in the mind, which might break out into
extravagant passions, or railing speeches, or indiscreet actions ; but I
examine moderately, reason soberly, and plead gently in my own be-
half, through a desire to keep those affections I had, or at least
thought to have. And truly I am so vain, as to be so self-conceited,
or so naturally partial, to think my friends have as much reason to
love me as another, since none can love more sincerely than I, and it
were an injustice to prefer a fainter affection, or to esteem the body
more than the mind. Likewise I am neither spiteful, envious, nor
malicious. I repine not at the gifts that Nature or Fortune bestows
upon others, yet I am a great emulator ; for, though I wish none worse
than they are, yet it is lawful for me to wish myself the best, and to
do my honest endeavour thereunto. For I think it no crime to wish
myself the exactest of Nature's works, my thread of life the longest,
my chain of destiny the strongest, my mind the peaceablest, my life
the pleasantest, my death the easiest, and the greatest saint in heaven;
also to do my endeavour, so far as honour and honesty doth allow of,
to be the highest on Fortune's wheel and to hold the wheel from turn-
ing, if I can. And if it be commendable to wish another's good, it
were a sin not to wish my own ; for as envy is a vice, so emulation
is a virtue, but emulation is in the way to ambition, or indeed it is a
noble ambition. But I fear my ambition inclines to vain-glory, for I
am very ambitious; yet 'tis neither for beauty, wit, titles, wealth or
power, but as they are steps to raise me to Fame's tower, which is to
THE DUCHESS HERSELF
309
live by remembrance in after-ages. Likewise I am that the vulgar call
proud, not out of self-conceit, or to slight or condemn any, but scorn-
ing to do a base or mean act, and disdaining rude or unworthy per-
sons ; insomuch, that if I should find any that were rude or too bold,
I should be apt to be so passionate, as to affront them, if I can, unless
discretion should get betwixt my passion and their boldness, which
sometimes perchance it might if discretion should crowd hard for
place.^ For though I am naturally bashful, yet in such a case my spirits
would be all on fire. Otherwise I am so well bred, as to be civil to all
persons, of all degrees, or qualities. Likewise I am so proud, or rather
just to my Lord, as to abate nothing of the quality of his wife, for if
honour be the mark of merit, and his master's royal favour, who will
favour none but those that have merit to deserve, it were a baseness
for me to neglect the ceremony thereof. Also in some cases I am
naturally a coward, and in other cases very valiant. As for example,
if any of my nearest friends were in danger I should never consider
my life in striving to help them, though I were sure to do them no
good, and would willingly, nay cheerfully, resign my life for their
sakes: hkewise I should not spare my life, if honour bids me die.
But in a danger where my friends, or my honour is not concerned, or
engaged, but only my Ufe to be unprofitably lost, I am the veriest
coward in nature, as upon the sea, or any dangerous places, or of
thieves, or fire, or the like. Nay the shooting of a gun, although but
a pot-gun,^ will make me start, and stop my hearing, much less have
I courage to discharge one ; or if a sword should be held against
me, although but in jest, I am afraid. Also as I am not covetous, so
I am not prodigal, but of the two I am inclining to be prodigal, yet
I cannot say to a vain prodigality, because I imagine it is to a profit-
able end ; for perceiving the world is given, or apt to honour the out-
side more than the inside, worshipping show more than substance;
and I am so vain (if it be a vanity) as to endeavour to be worshipped,
rather than not to be regarded. Yet I shall never be so prodigal as
to impoverish my friends, or go beyond the limits or facility of our
estate. And though 1 desire to appear to the best advantage, whilst
I live in the view of the public world,^ yet I could most willingly ex-
clude myself, so as never to see the face of any creature but my Lord
as long as I live, inclosing myself like an anchorite, wearing a frieze
^ It is interesting to notice how the Duchess's " philosophical " theories
pervade all her mental processes. ^ Pop-gun.
* " Elle aimait la vie somptueuse, elle savait calculer." — M. Montegut, p. 206.
3IO THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
gown, tied with a cord about my waist. ^ But I hope my readers will
not think me vain for writing my life, since there have been many
that have done the like, as Caesar, Ovid, and many more, both men
and women, and I know no reason I may not do it as well as they :
but I verily believe some censuring readers will scornfully say, why
hath this Lady writ her own life? since none cares to know whose
daughter she was or whose wife she is, or how she was bred, or what
fortunes she had, or how she lived, or what humour or disposition she
was of. I answer that it is true, that 't is to no purpose to the readers,
but it is to the authoress, because I write it for my own sake, not
theirs. Neither did I intend this piece for to delight, but to divulge ;
not to please the fancy, but to tell the truth, lest after-ages should
mistake, in not knowing I was daughter to one Master Lucas of
St. Johns, near Colchester, in Essex, second wife to the Lord Marquis
of Newcastle ; for my Lord having had two wives, I might easily have
been mistaken, especially if I should die and my Lord marry again.
Such was Margaret Cavendish, first Duchess of Newcastle,
as interesting and as strange a figure as is to be found in the
range of Enghsh Hterature. She is sufficiently striking to chal-
lenge one's instant attention, and she holds it by sheer force
of her humanity. Given bashfulness combined with feminine
genius, their product seems almost a foregone conclusion ; the
incidents of her early life only heightened and accentuated an
inevitable process. Reserve was the keynote of Margaret Lucas's
nature, reserve cultivated at home, developed in court, domi-
nating her subsequent career. She finally could not conquer
it, nor did she wish to. Contemplation was to her so much
more satisfactory than action that a state of quiet repose
seemed Elysium enough. This was the surface, but under-
neath lay a woman's instinct for emotion, that now and again
unmistakably breaks out. An intense love for her husband led
towards worldly ambitions, in which she, as his wife, must have
a part. These thoughts, no doubt, impelled her to join Orinda's
1 A True Relation immediately follows " The She Anchoret," in Nature's
Pictures.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 31 1
circle, to visit the Royal Society, even to deck herself out
(the woman still) in costumes more striking than appropriate.
Above all, this was the impulse that stimulated and made pub-
lic her multifarious compositions, that not only printed them
but circulated the precious copies among deserving, i.e. notable,
personages. Thus the Duchess manifested her sex in writing,
although, except for inherent bashfulness, her genius would not
have taken that exact form. There is nothing really inexpli-
cable about what appears at first to be a unique personality,
when it is considered as the natural exaggeration of the female
temperament. Timidity brought out the Duchess's latent lit-
erary talent, which expressed itself not in artistry but in a
simple revelation of her mind. From every point of view, then,
— cause, effect, and substance all being considered, — Ward
is right when he states that,^ " if literature, arduously as she
pursued it, was to her only a noble diversion, it was never-
theless an organic part of a noble life."
To gauge the moral value of Margaret Cavendish's charac-
ter would be as futile as impossible, for, like all human beings,
the better one comes to know her, the more difficult it is to
generalize concerning her qualities. True, she was vain, pedan-
tic, self-sufficient ; but, on the other hand, her honesty, loyalty,
and warmth of heart cannot be gainsaid. Although she proved
the laughing stock of two courts, the Duchess had the qualifica-
tions, by no means common during Charles II's reign, for making
an astute manager and a loving wife. Her surprising absurdi-
ties may be largely laid to a deficiency in any sense of humor
by which she might have comprehended the normal world and
her own relation to it. But high seriousness generally goes
hand in hand with a powerful imagination, the conspicuous
feature of Margaret Cavendish's books, the basic principle in
her genius. Her excellences and defects alike depend on this
1 Cambridge History of English Literature, VII, 229.
312 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
preoccupation with unseen things at the expense of more tran-
sitory matters. She did not think it vastly important to curb
her natural instincts and therefore is quite frank to admit her
own failings. Indeed she glories in them, while her plays
paradoxically ring with denunciations of mankind's consuming
follies. This contradictory attitude is essentially a woman's,
wherein perhaps lies its clear distinction, its mixture of incon-
sistency and noble charm. "In her personality as it stands
forth from her autobiography," writes Ward again,i "there is
something which if less than heroic is more than merely attrac-
tive." And Charles Lamb, who better than any modern has
entered into the Duchess's spirit, characterizes her with finality
as "a dear friend of mine, of the last century but one — the
thrice noble, chaste and virtuous — but again, somewhat fan-
tastical and original-brained, generous Margaret Newcastle." ^
Perhaps the fairest way of all to survey the Duchess is through
the eyes of him who knew and loved her best — the Duke
himself. Being no fool, he must have soon perceived what
manner of person his wife was and must have watched her
eccentricities develop with the years. He could not but have
noted that her childlessness offered no opportunity for affec-
tionate expression and that her consequent need of utterance
found outlet in literary production. Newcastle was the only
person on whom she could lavish real feeling, as appeared in
her crowning act of devotion, the Life of William Cavendishe.
No doubt he, like Pepys, saw the absurdities in this panegyric,
but innate chivalry would not admit of his spuming the Duchess's
good intentions. It is hard to believe that the Duke did not
realize her weaknesses here as well as in Poems and Fancies,
Orations, or the "philosophical" books, where he laughs slyly
in one sleeve, while the other hand extends to their authoress
1 Cambridge History of English Literature, VII, 229.
^ See " Mackery End in Hertfordshire " in Essays of Elia, p. 131.
THE DUCHESS HERSELF 313
incredible compliments. Certainly his opinion that salt is the
primal cause and his epigram concerning a wise woman show
that Cavendish's sense of humor did not fall short in regard
to his wife's idiosyncracies. Yet, at the same time, and this
is the important point, he never wavered in his complete attach-
ment to her. A woman who could inspire such permanent
affection, despite her peculiar shortcomings, deserves some-
thing more than consummate scorn or supercilious ridicule.
By reason of this very complexity, the first Duchess of New-
castle is not to be lightly dismissed from one's attention. On
the contrary she demands an unusual share of consideration,
sympathy, and respect.
CONCLUSION
Margaret and William Cavendish have up to the present
time been considered as of historical rather than of literary
importance, and this book can only confirm that verdict. Never-
theless, it is true that both the Duke and the Duchess of New-
castle have a place in the history of literature, a place which
cannot be ignored. The Duke was a classic writer on horses,
he had a share in plays by Shirley and Shadwell, and he may
have given Dryden considerable aid in the composition of
Sir Martin Mar-all] his "Little Book," addressed to King
Charles, will be more appreciated as it becomes better known.
On the other hand, the art of manage is an outworn subject,
Newcastle's dramatic work is not of great compass or value,
and the " Little Book " is comparatively inaccessible. It is
therefore on his patronage of more gifted men that the larger
share of the Duke's literary reputation must depend. Jonson
and Hobbes, Shirley and Shadwell, Settle and Dryden are
no mean names to have upon one's list of proteges, and they
inevitably shed lustre upon their less talented patron. Per-
haps now that the facts regarding his relations with these men
are better understood. Cavendish will occupy a surer place in
the world of letters. Not even then, however, would one wish
to put his rank as author or patron so high as his position in
history. Charles I's intimate friend, Charles 11 's tutor, the
Commander-in-chief of the Royalist army in the north of
England, he needs no doubtful glamor borrowed from the
realm of literature to adorn his name ; Newcastle has an
assured immortality as general, cavalier, and gentleman.
314
CONCLUSION 315
So, too, the Duchess is least successful where she is most
purely literary, which with her means most purely imaginative.
The more vague and romantic her books are, the less form
and substance they seem to have, until their value becomes
directly proportional to their tangibility. The pseudo-science
must give place to the plays, the plays to the poems, the
poems to the narrative prose, just as all her work looks in-
significant beside the Life of Newcastle. There for once
only Margaret Cavendish treated a subject which kept her
continuously occupied with affairs of this world and as a
result created one lasting work of art. Yet even her acknow-
ledged masterpiece seems unimportant compared with the all-
important fact that she, a woman, in the years between 1649
and 1668, wrote thirteen books and had them published — at
that period almost an unheard-of feat. The magnitude of the
Duchess's achievement as a pioneer among literary women
was never equalled by the excellence of any individual work
which she accomplished or by the specific influence which it
exerted. It makes no difference that her fantastic stories had
few imitators or that the CCXI Sociable Letters scarcely affected
the development of the letter-novel ; these and the other folio
volumes bear witness to her industry and initiative. Her main
distinction is to have been one of the first English authoresses
and, more than that, a woman of unusual characteristics and
marked individuality.
Nor is all this to be taken in a derogatory way. If the New-
castles are not of supreme moment as producers of literature,
yet they themselves are individual and attractive personages.
And, as often happens, it is the written word which gives
expression to its author's personality and reveals his inner con-
sciousness. Indeed, the Duchess of Newcastle's writings prove
themselves a new method of approach to an unexplored coun-
try of the soul, for in them the reader comes face to face
3l6 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
with a living, breathing woman and learns to know her as she
is, without reserve and without artificiality. When, in addition,
they bring us to a knowledge of her lord and master, no
further justification is needed for the literary productions of
Margaret Cavendish. Whatever may be their technical limita-
tions, they have an indisputable place among those books
which help us better to understand and to appreciate the
puzzling intricacies of human nature.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
I. Works in which William Cavendish had a Share (except
Proclamations, Dispatches, and the Like)
I and 2. The Country Captaine, And the Varietie, Two Comedies,
Written by a Person of Honor. Lately presented by His Majes-
ties Servants, at the Black-Fryers. London, Printed for Hum :
Robinson at the Three-Pidgeons, and Hum : Moseley at the
Princes Armes in St. Pauls Churchyard 1649. ^2°.
This volume has separate title-pages, viz. :
1 . The Country Captaine. A Comoedye Lately Presented By his Majes-
ties Servants at the Blackfryers. In s'Grave van Haghe. Printed by
Samuell Broun English Bookseller at the Signe of the English
Printing house in the Achter-ome. Anno 1 649.
2. The Varietie, A Comoedy, Lately presented by his Majesties Servants
at the Black-Friers. London, Printed for Humphrey Moseley, and
are to be sold at his Shop at the Princes Armes in St. Pauls
Churchyard 1649.
3. La M^thode Nouvelle et Invention extraordinaire de dresser les
Chevaux les travailler selon la Nature et parfaire la nature par la
subtilte de Fart ; la quelle n'a jamais ete treuvee que Par Le tres-
noble haut et tres-puissant Prince Guillaume, Marquis et Comte
de Newcastle, Viconte de Mansfield, Baron de Bolsover et Ogle,
Seigneur de Cavendish, Bothal et Hepwel etc. etc. Traduit de
I'Anglois de I'Auteur en Francois par son Commandement A
Anvers. Chez Jacques van Meurs I'an MDCLVIII. Folio.
Seconde edition. Londres, 1737. Folio.
An English translation comprises Volume I of "A General Sys-
tem of Horsemanship in all it's Branches : containing A Faithful
Translation of that most noble and useful Work of his Grace,
William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, Entitled The Manner
317
31 8 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
of Feeding, Dressing and Training of Horses for the Great
Saddle, and Fitting them for the Service of the Field in Time
of War, or for the Exercise and Improvement of Gentlemen
in the Academy at home : A Science peculiarly necessary
throughout aU Europe and which has hitherto been so much
neglected or discouraged in England, that young Gentlemen
have been obliged to have recourse to foreign Nations for
this Part of their Education. With all the original Copper-
Plates, in Number forty-three which were engrav'd by the best
Foreign Masters under his Grace's immediate Care and Inspec-
tion, and which are explained in the different Lessons. And to
give all the Improvements that may be. This Work is orna-
mented with Head-Pieces and Initial Letters, properly adapted
to the subsequent Chapters and enlarged with an Index.
London : Printed for J. Brindley Bookseller to his Royal High-
ness the Prince of Wales in New Bond St. MDCCXLHI."
Folio. (This book was also printed in 1748.)
A manuscript translation into Portuguese by Manoel Zelles da
Sylva is entitled, " Arte de Cavallaria composto pelo Duque
de Neucastel."
4. A New Method and Extraordinary Invention to dress Horses and
Work them according to Nature ; as also To Perfect Nature by
the Subtilty of Art ; which was never found out, but by The
Thrice Noble, High and Puissant Prince William Cavendishe,
Duke, Marquess and Earl of Newcastle ; Earl of Ogle ; Viscount
Mansfield ; and Baron of Bolsover, of Ogle, of Bertram, Bothal
and Hepple [etc. etc.]. London, Printed by Tho. Milbourn in
the Year 1667. Folio.
A French translation. London, 1667. (No record of this is to be
found except the statement of its existence by M. de SoUeysel
in the 167 1 translation.)
A second French translation " avec des Annotations ou Supple-
ments pour rendre plus intelligibles les endroits difficiles. Par
Monsieur De Solleysel, ^ficuyer Sieur du Clapier, & I'un des
Chefs de I'Acade'mie Royale, pres I'Hotel de Condd." 1671.
Second English edition. London, 1677. Folio.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 319
Des Welt-beriihmten Herzog Wilhelms von Newcastle Neueroffnete
Reit-Bahn Welche erstlich durch Ihme selbsten erfunden und
in Englischer Sprache ans Licht gebracht ; Hernach Durch
Herrn von Solleisel Konigl. Franssosischen Bereiter aus dem
Englischen ins Franssosische versetzt mit schonen Anmerckungen
und die schwereste Puncten erlauterenden Zusatzen vermehrt
und mit nothwendigen Kupfern versehen ; Anjestzo aber Dem
Hoch-Lobl. Deutschen Adel zu Ehren, Nutz und Vergniigen
auf ersuchen eines der Edien Pferd- und Reist-Kunst grossen
Liebhabers. Ins reine Deutsche gebracht von Dem Wolgebohrnen
Herrn Johann Philipp Ferdinand Pernauer Herrn von Pemay,
Freyherrn, Niirnberg. In Verlegung Johann Ziegers und Georg
Lehmanns Gedruckt bey Johann Michael Sporlen. Im Jahr
Christi 1700. Folio.
The original English version. Dublin, 1740. 12°.
5. Sir Martin Mar-all or the Feigned Innocence : A Comedy as it
was Acted at his Highnesse the Duke of York's Theatre.
London, Printed for H. Herringman at the Sign of the Blew
Anchor in the Lower Walk of the New Exchange, 1668. 4°.
Second edition, 1669. 4°.
Third edition, 1678. 4°.
Sir Martin Marr-all ; or The Feign'd Innocence. A Comedy As it
is Acted By Their Majesties Servants, By Mr. Dryden. London,
Printed for Henry Herringman, and are to be sold by Francis
Saunders, at the Blue Anchor in the Lower Walk of the New
Exchange, 1691. 4°. In "The First Volume of the Works of
Mr. John Dryden. London, Printed for Jacob Tonson, at the
Sign of the Judge's Head, near the Inner-Temple-Gate, in Fleet
Street 1695."
(From this time on " Sir Martin " has been included in all editions of
Dryden's works.)
6. The Humorous Lovers. A Comedy, Acted by His Royal Highness's
Servants. Written by His Grace the Duke of Newcastle. London,
Printed by J. M. for H. Herringman, at the Sign of the Blew
Anchor in the Lower-Walk of the New-Exchang, 1677. 4°.
320 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
7. The Triumphant Widow, or the Medley of Humours. A Comedy,
acted by His Royal Highness's Servants. Written by His
Grace the Duke of Newcastle. London, Printed by J. M.
for H. Herringman, at the Sign of the Blew Anchor in the
Lower-Walk of the New-Exchang, 1677. 4°.
[8. The " Little Book," which exists in two manuscript copies, one in the
Bodleian Library and one in the possession of the Duke of Portland,
has been reprinted in "A Catalogue of Letters and Other Historical
Documents preserved in the Library at Welbeck. London, 1903,"
edited by Sanford Arthur Strong, pp. 173-236. In that volume are
also some unprinted poems and songs by the Duke, pp. 57-60.]
[9. " The Earl of Newcastle's letter of instructions to Prince Charles for
his studies, conduct and behaviour " is preserved with the Royal
Letters in the Harleian Ms. 6988, Art. 62. It has been reprinted in
Sir Henry Ellis's " Original Letters, Illustrative of English History,"
Series I, Vol. Ill, p. 288, and in Professor C. H. Firth's edition of
the " Life of William Cavendish," 1906, pp. 184-187.]
II. Works by Margaret Cavendish
Poems and Fancies : Written By the Right Honourable, the Lady
Margaret, Countesse of Newcastle. London, Printed by T, R.
for J. Martin and J. Allestrye at the Bell in Saint Pauls Church
Yard 1653. Folio.
Poems, and Phancies Written By the Thrice Noble, Illustrious,
and Excellent Princess The Lady Marchioness of Newcastle.
The Second Impression much Altered and Corrected. London,
Printed by WUliam Wilson, Anno Dom. MDCLXIV. Folio.
Poems, or Several Fancies in Verse : with the Animal Parliament,
in Prose. Written by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious, and Excellent
Princess, The Duchess of Newcastle. The Third Edition.
London, Printed by A. Maxwell, in the Year 1668. Folio.
(" Select Poems of the Duchess of Newcastle, edited by Sir Egerton
Brydges, Bart., Kent, 181 3. 8°." Twenty-five copies printed as a
specimen of the Lee Priory Press, and the first work printed there.)
(Selected poems by the Duchess also occur in " Poems by Eminent
Ladies, London, R. Baldwin, 1755," Vol. II, pp. 197-212; in
BIBLIOGRAPHY 321
Alexander Dyce's " Specimens of British Poetesses. London, 1 825,"
pp. 88-98; and in George W. Bethune's "The British Female
Poets: with biographical and critical notices, Philadelphia, Lindsay
& Blakiston, 1848," pp. 35-38.)
Philosophicall fancies. Written by Rt. Hon. the Lady Newcastle.
London, Printed by Tho. Rycroft for J. Martin & J. Allestrye.
21 May, 1653. 8°.
The World's Olio. London, 1655. Folio.
The World's Olio. Written by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious, and
most Excellent Princess, the Duchess of Newcastle. The Second
Edition. London, Printed by A. Maxwell, in the Year 167 1. Folio.
The Philosophical and Physical Opinions, Written by her Excel-
lency, the Lady Marchionesse of Newcastle. London, Printed
for J. Martin and J. Allestrye at the Bell in St. Pauls Church-
Yard 1655. Folio.
Second edition. London, Printed by William Wilson, Anno Dom.
MDCLXIII. Folio.
Nature's Pictures drawn by Fancie's Pencil to the Life. Written
by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious, and Excellent Princess, the Lady
Marchioness of Newcastle. In this Volume there are several
feigned Stories of Natural Descriptions, as Comical, Tragical,
and Tragi-comical, Poetical, Romancical, Philosophical, and
Historical, both in Prose and Verse, some all Verse, some all
Prose, some mixt, partly Prose and partly Verse. Also there
are some Morals and some Dialogues ; but they are as the
advantage Loaves of Bread to Baker's Dozen ; and a true
Story at the latter End, wherein there is no feignings. London,
Printed by J. Martin and J. Allestrye, at the Bell, in Saint Pauls
Church Yard, 1656 (some copies 1655). Folio.
Natures Picture Drawn by Fancies Pencil to the Life, Being
several Feigned Stories, Comical, Tragical, Tragi-comical, Poeti-
cal, Romancical, Philosophical, Historical, and Moral : Some in
Verse, some in Prose; some mixt, and some by Dialogues.
Written by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious, and most Excellent
Princess, the Duchess of Newcastle. The Second Edition.
London, Printed by A. Maxwell in the Year 1671. Folio.
322 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
(" The Experienced Traveller " and " The She Anchoret " appeared in
" Poems on Several Subjects, both Comical and Serious. In Two
Parts, By Alexander Nicol, Schoolmaster. To which are added
The Experienced Gentleman, and The She Anchoret ; Written in
Cromwell's Time by the then Duchess of Newcastle. Edinburgh.
Printed for the Author and James Stark Bookseller in Dundee;
and sold by him and the other Booksellers in town and country
MDCCLXVI." 12°. The separate title-page reads :" A Treasure
of Knowledge ; or The Female Oracle. Wherein is delineated The
Experienced Traveller ; likewise the She Anchoret ; in which many
curious Questions are resolved, put by Natural Philosophers, Phy-
sicians, Moral Philosophers, Theological Students, Preachers, Judges,
Tradesmen, Masters of Families, Married Men and their Wives,
Nurses, Widowers and Widows, Virgins, Lovers, Poets and Aged
Persons. By the late Duchess of Newcastle.")
(" A True Relation of my Birth, Breeding and Life," which constituted
Book XI of the first edition of " Nature's Pictures," but which did
not appear in the second edition, was published again as " A True
Relation of the Birth, Breeding, and Life, of Margaret Cavendish,
Duchess of Newcastle. Written by herself. With a Critical Preface
etc. by Sir Egerton Brydges, M. P. Kent : Printed at the private-
Press of Lee Priory: By Johnson and Warwick. 1814." This is
the third publication in octavo printed at the private press of Lee
Priory, Kent. The impression is limited as usual to one hundred
copies. " A True Relation " is also the most important reprint in
" The Cavalier and His Lady. Selections from the Works of the
First Duke and Duchess of Newcastle. Edited with an introduc-
tory essay by Edward Jenkins. London, Macmillan and Co., 1872."
Golden Treasury Series.)
6. Playes. Written by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious and Excellent
Princess, the Lady Marchioness of Newcastle. London, Printed
by A. Warren for John Martyn, James AUestry and Tho. Dicas
at the Bell in Saint Pauls Church Yard, 1662. Folio.
7. Orations of Divers Sorts, Accomodated to Divers Places. Written
by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious and Excellent Princess, the Lady
Marchioness of Newcastle. London, Printed Anno Dom. 1662
(some copies 1663). Folio.
Second edition. London, Printed by A. Maxwell, in the Year
1668. Folio.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 323
CCXI Sociable Letters, Written by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious,
and Excellent Princess, the Lady Marchioness of Newcastle.
London, Printed by William Wilson, Anno Dom. MDCLXIV.
Folio.
Philosophical Letters : or Modest Reflections Upon some Opinions
in Natural Philosophy, maintained by several Famous and
Learned Authors of this Age, Expressed by way of Letters :
By the Thrice Noble, Illustrious and Excellent Princess, the
Lady Marchioness of Newcastle. London, Printed in the Year
1664. Folio.
Observations upon Experimental Philosophy, to which is added
The Description of a New Blazing World. Written by the Thrice
Noble, Illustrious and Excellent Princesse, the Duchess of
Newcastle. London, Printed by A. Maxwell in the Year 1666.
Folio. A separate title page announces " The Description of a
New World, caUed The Blazing World."
Second edition. London, 1668. FoUo.
The Life of the Thrice Noble, High and Puissant Prince William
Cavendishe, Duke, Marquess, and Earl of Newcastle, Earl of
Ogle ; Viscount Mansfield ; and Baron of Bolsover, of Ogle,
Bothal and Hepple: Gentleman of His Majesties Bed-chamber ;
one of His Majesties most Honourable Privy-Councel ; Knight
of the most Noble Order of the Garter; His Majesties Lieu-
tenant of the County and Tovrai of Nottingham ; and Justice
in Ayre Trent- North : who had the honour to be Governour
to our most Glorious King, and Gracious Sovereign, in his
Youth, when He was Prince of Wales ; and soon after was
made Captain General of all the Provinces beyond the River
of Trent, and other Parts of the Kingdom of England, with
Power, by a special Commission, to make Knights. Written
by the Thrice Noble, Illustrious and Excellent Princess, Mar-
garet, Duchess of Newcastle, His Wife. London, Printed by
A. Maxwell, in the Year 1667. Folio.
De Vita et Rebus Gestis Nobilissimi Illustrissimique Principis
Guilielmi Duels Novo-Castrensis Ab Excellentissima Prin-
cipe, Margareta Ipsius Uxore Sanctissima Conscript! Et Ex
324 THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Anglico in Latinum Conversi. Londini, Excudebat T. M.,
MDCLXVin. Folio.
Second English edition. London, 1675. 4°.
The Lives of William Cavendishe, Duke of Newcastle and of his
wife Margaret Duchess of Newcastle. Written by the Thrice
Noble and Illustrious Princess, Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle.
Edited with a preface and occasional notes by Mark Antony
Lower, M. A., etc. London: John Russell Smith, 36, Soho Square.
1872. (Library of Old Authors.)
The Life of William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle to which is
added The True Relation of My Birth Breeding and Life by
Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle. Edited by C. H. Firth, M. A.
(Editor of " Memoirs of the Life of Colonel Hutchinson ").
With four etched Portraits. London, John C. Nimmo, 14,
King William Street, Strand, W. C. 1886. (300 copies printed
for England, 200 for America.)
The Cavalier in Exile. Being the Lives of the First Duke and/
Dutchess of Newcastle. Written by Margaret dutchess of Nev/-
castle. London, George Newnes, Ltd. Southampton. Street,
Strand, 1903. (Newnes' Pocket Classics.)
The Life of William Cavendish Duke of Newcastle to whicb is
added The True Relation of My Birth Breeding and Life by
Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle. Edited by C. H. Firth, M, A.,^
Regius Professor of Modem History in the University of Ox-
ford. Second Edition, Revised, with Additional Notes. With
Twelve Appendices and an Index. London, George Routledge
& Sons, Limited. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co. [1906.]
(The London Library.)
Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle : Life of the Duke, Memoirs of
her own Life & Certain [i.e. 51] Sociable Letters. Everyman's
Library. Edited by Ernest Rhys. No. 722, Biography. London
& Toronto : J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd. New York : E. P. Dut-
ton & Co. [November, 1915.]
12. Plays, Never before Printed. Written By the Thrice Noble,
Illustrious, and Excellent Princesse, the Duchess of Newcastle.
London, Printed by A. Maxwell in the Year MDCLXVIII. Folio.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 325
13. Grounds of Natural Philosophy: Divided into Thirteen Parts:
with an Appendix containing Five Parts. The Second Edition,
much altered from the First, which went under the Name of
Philosophical and Physical Opinions. Written by the Thrice
Noble, Illustrious, and Excellent Princess, the Duchess of
Newcastle. London, Printed by A. Maxwell in the Year
1668. Folio.
INDEX
Addison, Joseph, 71 note. Spectator,
The, 71 note
Airy, Osmund, Charles II, 19 note, 134
note
Albrecht, L., Drydeti's ^^ Sir Martin
Mar-all" 151 note
Anglia, 84 note
Argyle, Earl of, 53, 54
Aristophanes, 113. Clouds, The, 113
Ascham, Roger, 170
Ash, Mr., 62, 63
Ashmole, Elias, 259 note, 260 note
Ashmolean Catalogue, 259 note, 260
note
Aubrey, John, 120, 124, 127. Brief
Lives, 120 note, 124 note, 127 note
Aylesbury, William, 51
Bacon, Francis, Lord, 188 note, 246.
Novum Organum, 188 note. Works,
188 note
BagfoTd Ballads, The, 160, 260 note
Baillie Letters, 36 note
Baillon, Conte de, Lettres inidites de
Henriette- Marie, 28 note
Ballard, George, Memoirs of British
Ladies, 46 note, 70 note, 287 note
Banks, Sir Thomas, Dormant and
Extinct Barottage of England, 12
note, 13 note
Barlow, Thomas, 259
Basset, William, 11
Behn, Mrs. Aphra, 172
Bellasis, Colonel John, 33, 34, 82
Bethune, George W., British Female
Poets, The, 321
Beynham, Mrs., 50
Bickley, Francis, 236. Cavendish Fam-
ily, The, 236 note
Birch, Thomas, History of the Royal
Society, The, 304 notes
Birkenhead, John, 126, 127. Editor
oi Mercurius Aulicus, 126-127
Blackbume, Richard, 123. Vitce Hob-
biance auctarium, 123 note
Blundeville, Mr., 138
Boccaccio, Giovanni, Decameron, 204
Bohemia, Queen of, 45
Boswell, James, 80
Boucheret, Matthew, 98 note
Brackley, Elizabeth (nee Cavendish),
Countess of Bridgwater, 77, 121
Brackley, John, Earl of Bridgwater,
77. 121
Bramhall, John, Bishop of London-
derry, 122, 123. Castigations of
Air. Hobbes, 123. Catching of Levi-
athan, The, 123. Defence of True
Liberty, A, 123. Works, 122 notes,
123 notes
Brandenburg, Elector of, 54
Brindley, John, 136, 318
Bristol, Earl of, 64
Bristow, James, 198
Brome, Richard, 104, 116-119, 165,
167. Court Beggar, The, 104. Cov-
ent Garden Weeded, The, 116. North-
ern Lass, The, 117. Sparagus Gar-
den, The, 117, 165. Works, 104
note, 117 note
Brooke, Ralph, 221. Discoverie of Cer-
tai>ie Errours, A, 221
Brooks, Mr., 267 note
Broun, Samuell, 112 note, 317
Brown, F. C, Elkanah Settle, His Life
and Works, 162 notes
Browne, Sir Richard, 48, 50 note,
298
Brydges, Sir Egerton, 266, 266 note,
291, 291 note. Editor of Selected
Poems of the Duchess of Newcastle,
266 note, 320. Editor of True Re-
lation, A, 291 note, 322
Bullen, A. H., 102-105, 108. Collec-
tion of Old English Plays, A, 102,
102 note, 104-107 notes, 109 notes
Burghclere, Lady, George Villiers, 76
note
Butler, Samuel, 78. Hudibras, 78
note
327
328
THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Caesar, Julius, 79, 153, 247, 310
Calendar of Claretidon State Papers, 5 1
note, 53-55 notes, 57 note, 136 note,
184 note
Calendar of the Proceedings of the Com-
mittee for Compounding, 56 note
Calendar of State Papers, 15 note, 41
note, 57 note, 60 note
Cambridge History of English Litera-
ture, The, 135 note, 181 note, 182
note, 290 note, 311 note, 312 note
Camby, Captain, 39
Camden, William, 220-222, 221 note.
Britannia, 220, 221, 221 notes, 222
note
Caracena, Marquis of, 59
Carlyle, Thomas, Letters and Speeches
of Oliver Crojnwell, 33 note
Carte, Thomas, Collection of Original
Letters, A, 53 note
Cartwright, William, 112
Castle Rodrigo, Marquis of, 45
Catalogue of the British Museum, 186
note, 258 note
Catalogue of the TTiomasoti Tracts, 26
note
Cavalier in Exile, The, 5 note, 324
Cavendish, Catharine (nee Ogle),
(Newcastle's mother), 7, 11, 68, 77,
88
Cavendish, Charles, Lord Mansfield
(Newcastle's elder son), 45, 52, 66,
77, 79, 88, 100
Cavendish, Sir Charles (Newcastle's
father), 7-1 1, 77
Cavendish, Sir Charles (Newcastle's
brother), 8, 54-58, 66, 77, 86, 124,
174, 182, 199, 199 note
Cavendish, Christian, Countess of
Devon, 100
Cavendish, Elizabeth (nee Basset),
Countess of Newcastle (Newcastle's
first wife), 11, 68, 77
Cavendish, Elizabeth (n^e Hardwick),
afterwards Elizabeth Talbot (New-
castle's grandmother), 68, 77, 100,
221 note
Cavendish, Grace (nee Talbot) (New-
castle's aunt), 8 note, 77
Cavendish, Henry (Newcastle'suncle),
8 note, 77
Cavendish, Henry, Earl of Ogle (New-
castle's younger son), 45, 52, 62, 66,
70, 77, 291-293
Cavendish, Henry, Lord Mansfield
(Newcastle's grandson), 291, 292
Cavendish, Margaret (nee Lucas),
Duchess of Newcastle (Newcastle's
second wife), 1-7, 11, 12 note, 13,
14, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22 note, 23-25,
27-30, 32-34, 36, 37, 39, 46-49, 52
note, 53-55, 57, 58, 61-63, 65, 67,
68, 70-85, 92, 100, 114, 124-127,
134. 137. 141, 142, 144. 145' 154.
155, 158, 159, 168, 171, 172, i73note,
174-184, 181-182 notes, 186-200,
187-189 notes, 198-199 notes, 202,
204, 203-204 notes, 206-220, 220-
221 notes, 222-225, 227-268, 227
note, 251 note, 259 note, 266 note,
270-288, 283-284 notes, 290-307,
290 note, 294-295 notes, 309 note,
310-316, 320-325. Blazing World,
The, 209 note, 237, 252, 252 note,
258, 265, 323. Grounds of Natural
Philosophy, 193, 325. Life of Wil-
liam Cavendishe, The, 1-3, 5, 7 note,
28, 32, 44, 56, 65, 71, 80-82, 84, 99
note, 125, 169, 171, 184, 227, 249
note, 252, 255 note, 258, 259, 265,
266, 283, 312, 315, 323. Nature's
Pictures, 81 note, 198, 203, 206, 209,
211, 213, 228 note, 266, 273 note,
310 note, 321, 322. Observations
upon EJxperimental Philosophy, 127
note, 196, 252, 259, 323. Orations
of Divers Sorts, 233, 236, 237, 245,
312, 322. Philosophical and Physi-
cal Opinions, 98 note, 125 note, 179
note, 185 note, 186, 187, 188-189
notes, 189, 191, 193, 195, 196, 199
note, 202 note, 226 note, 245, 321.
Philosophical Fancies, 172, 186, 268
note, 321. Philosophical Letters, 127
note, 195-197. 197 note, 250, 323.
Playes (158- 1 59 notes, 214, 213-
214 notes, 259, 322): Apocryphal
Ladies, The, 215, 216, 226; Bell in
Campo, 225, 226; Comedy of the
Several Wits, The, 218; Comical
Hash, The, 225; Female Academy,
The, 226; Lady Contemplation, The,
158, 218, 263 note; Love's Adven-
tures, 217; Matrimonial Trouble,
The, 222 ; Nature's Three Daugh-
ters, 223 ; Publick Wooing, The, 159
note, 222 ; Religious, The, 224 ; Un-
natural Tragedy, The, 220, 222 ;
INDEX
329
H^ts Cabal, The, 219; Youths Glory
and Deaths Banquet, 218. Flays,
Never Be/ore Printed (227, 228 note,
324): Bridals, The, 230; Convent 0/
Pleasure, The, 230, 232 ; Piece of a
Play, A, 232 ; Presence, The, 229,
229 note ; Scenes, 229 ; Sociable Com-
panions, The, 228. Poems and Fancies^
47, 173, 173 note, 179, 184 note,
185-187, 188 note, 197 note, 263
note, 312, 320. True Relation of my
Birth, Breeding and Life, A, 3, 47
note, 51 note, 55 note, 57 note, 172
note, 186 note, 203, 266, 285, 307,
310 note, 322. CCXI Sociable Let-
ters, 92, 173 note, 184-185 notes,
236 note, 237, 243, 251, 255, 270
note, 283 note, 288, 288 note, 315,
323. World''s Olio, The, 172, 185,
195, 198, 199
Cavendish, Sir William (Newcastle's
grandfather), 7, 8, 77
Cavendish, William, Earl of Devon-
shire, 95, 100, 259
Cavendish, Wilham, Duke of New-
castle, 2, 4-42, 44, 45, 48-92, 54 note,
94-103, 105-108, 110-113, 1 16-146,
122 note, 134-136 notes, 149-171,
182-184, 184-185 notes, 188, 189
note, 192, 199 note, 204 note, 205,
212, 213, 217-219, 223, 228, 230,
233» 235, 238, 241, 245, 248, 249,
255-257, 259, 260, 266, 270, 273-283,
288, 288 note, 290, 290 note, 291-
293, 295, 295 note, 296, 298, 298 note,
299.310.312-315,317-320,323,324.
Country Captain, The, 102-108, 103
notes, 106 notes, 107 note, 110-114,
317. Exile, The, 145. LTeyresse, The,
145. Humorous Lovers, The, 145,
150, 156 note, 295, 319. "Little
Book," The, 128, 134, 134 note, 169,
235, 314, 320. Methode Nouvelle,
La, 136, 139,317. New Method and
Extraordinary Lnvention, A, 52 note,
53 note, 59 note, 318. Triumphant
Widow, The, 156-160, 157 notes, 162,
163, 165, 167, 320. tfpon Giving
Mee The Late Kinges Picture, 134.
Variety, The, 112-117, 114 notes,
149, 168, 317
Charles I, King, 8, 11, 13-19, 21-24,
27, 28, 31, 33, 35, 37-44, 47, 51, 53,
64, 73, 76 note, 86, 87, 92, 93, 109,
119, 121, 149, 177, 247, 288 note,
314
Charles II, King, 14, 18, 20-22, 49,
50, 53. 55. 58, 60-65, 69, 70, ^^„
78, 83, 84, 98, 115, 118, 119, 122
note, 127, 129-132, 134, 134 note,
137, 142, 169, 255, 288 note, 290,
293, 296, 302, 306, 311, 314, 320,
323
Charleton, Walter, 5, 7 note, 259,
304
Chaucer, Geoffrey, 93 note, 129, 220.
Canterbury Tales, T7ie, 204
Chesterfield, Lord, 170
Cholmley, Sir Hugh, 27, 42, 45 note,
81. Memoirs, 42 note. Memorials
of the Battle of York, 37 note
Cibber, Theophilus, Lives of the Poets,
T7ie, 48 note, 286 note
Cock Laurel, 168
Cokayne, G. E., 46, 46 note. Complete
Peerage, 7, 14 note
Coke, Sir John, 17 note
Colbert, Jean, 129
Collection of Letters and Poems to the
late Duke and Duchess of Newcastle,
258 note
Collections and Notes. Wither to Prior
(Groher Club), 173 note
Collins, Arthur, 7. Historical Collec-
tions, 7, 12 note, 53 note
Con, George, 43 note
Congreve, William, 146. Double
Dealer, The, 290 note. L^ve for
Love, 146
Connoisseur, The, 177
Constable, John, 41
Constable, Sir Henry, Viscount Dun-
bar, 41
Cosin, Dr., Dean of Peterborough, 23,
282, 282 note
Costello, Louisa, S., 258 note, 307.
Memoirs of Eminent Englishwomen,
258 note, 307 note
Cottington, Francis, Lord, 14
Cottrell, Sir Charles, 60
Cox, Nicholas, Gentleman's Recreation,
The, 140, 140 note
Cox, Robert, 116 note
Crofts, Lord, 49
Cromwell, Oliver, 38, 39, 142
Crowne, John, 162
Cru\\,]oducus, Antiquities of St.Peter's,
The, 71 note
330
THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Davenant, Sir William, 23, 120, 120
note, 121, 167, 246. Gondibert, 24,6.
Upon ike Marriage of the Lady Jane
Cavendish, 121. JVorks, 121 note
Davenport, Robert, 119, 119 note
Defoe, Daniel, Memoirs 0/ a Cavalier,
31 note, 37 note
Descartes, Rene, 124, 125, 127, 136,
167, 195
De Solleysel, 139, 140, 318. Le Par-
fait Mareschal, 140
Dictionary of National Biography, The,
7, 46 note, 54 note, 99 note, 100
note, 116 note, 119 note, 120 note,
140 note, 141 note, 172 note, 203
note, 233 note, 288 note
Diepenbeck, Abraham, 99, 137, 173
note
Digby, Kenelm, 259
D'Israeli, Isaac, 178 note. Curiosities
of Literature, 178 note
Donne, John, 182, 263. Storm, The,
263 note
Downes, John, 150, 151. Roscitis An-
glicanus, 150, 151 note
Doyle, J. E., Official Baronage of Eng-
land, The, 53 note
Drake, Francis, Eborauitn, 25, 26 note,
36 note
Drayton, Michael, 181 note. A^yrn-
phidia, 18 1 note
Drunken Lover, The, 160
Dryden, John, 85, 144, 150-152, 150
note, 152 note, 154, 162, 167, 220
note, 314, 319. Absalom and Achito-
phel, 163 note. Assignation, The,
162. Evening's Love, An, 152. Fables,
220 note. Mac-Flecknoe, 154 note.
Notes and Observations on the Em-
press of Morocco, 162. Sir Martin
Mar-all, 150-152, 314, 319. Vindi-
cation of the Duke of Guise, A, 154
note
Duarti, Eleanora, 250
Duarti, Frances, 250 note
Duarti, Katherine, 250 note
Duarti, Mr., 249, 250
Du Verger, S., 199 note. LIumble Re-
flections, 199 note
Dyce, Alexander, 102. Specimens of
the British Poetesses, 173 note, 321
East Friesland, Prince of, 58
Egglesfield, Francis, 108, 109, 11 1
Elizabeth, Queen, 132, 201
Ellis, Clement, 65 note
Ellis, Sir Henry, Original Letters, 17
note, 20 note, 24-25 notes, 40 note,
n8 note, 320
English Historical Review, 32 note, 37
note
Etherege, Sir George, 260, 302
Evelyn, John, 70, 298-300, 305. Diary,
ed. Wheatley, 48 note, 50 note, 206
note, 258 note, 300 notes
Evelyn, Mistress, 299
Fairfax, Lady Anne, 29
Fairfax, Fernando, I,.ord, 24, 25, 28,
34. 35. 81
Fairfax, Sir Thomas, 26, 28, 29, 34
Fane, Francis, 261
Firth, C. H., i, 2, 5, 32, 54, 57 note,
78, 82, 108, 126, 158, 266. Editor
oi Life of William Cavendishe, The,
7 notes, 10 note, 21-22 notes, 24-
26 notes, 28 note, 32-33 notes, 37
note, 41 note, 45 note, 51 note, 58
note, 60 note, 64-65 notes, 82 note,
99 note, 1 14 note, 118 note, 120 note,
126-127 notes, 136 note, 158 note,
174 note, 184 note, 233 note, 249
note, 255 note, 267-274 notes, 285
notes, 287-288 notes, 291 notes, 297
notes, 303 note, 307 note, 320,
324
Fleay, F. G., 107. Chrotticle of the
English Di-ama, A, 107 note
Flecknoe, Richard, 141-144, 142 note,
154, 260. Birthday, The, 142. Col-
lection of Choicest Epigrams, A, 144.
Damoiselles h la Mode, 143. Dis-
course of the English Stage, A, 142.
Enigmaticall Characters, 141. Epi-
g7-amsof all Sorts, i43,i42-i43notes.
Euterpe Revived, 144. Farrago of
Several Pieces, A, 142, 143. Heroick
Portraits, 142. Love's Dominion,
142 note. Love's A'ingdom, 142. Of
We I beck, 142. On the Death of the
Lady Jean Cheney, 144. On the
Dutchess of Newcastles Closset, 142.
Relation of Ten Years' Travels, A,
141. To James, 142
Fletcher, John, 164, 184
Ford, John, 94, 95, 100, 167. Chronicle
Lfistorie of Perkin Warbeck, The, 94.
Works, 94 note
INDEX
331
Forsythe, R. S., 104, 105, 107-109,
III, 112, 114 note, delations of
Shirley's Plays, The, 104, 104-105
notes, 1 09- 1 1 o notes, 1 1 4 note
Fortnightly Review, The, 107 note
French Dancing Master, The, 115
Gardiner, S. R., 32, 36. History of
England, 1603-1642, 22 note, 43
note. History of the Great Civil War,
27 note, 32 note
Gassendi, Pierre, 124, 167
General System of Horsemanship, A,
136- 317-318
Geoffrey of Monmouth, 215
Gifford, William, 87
Glanvill, Joseph, 259, 259 note. Letters
and Poems to Margaret, Dtichess of
Newcastle, 259 note
Gloucester, Duke of, 60
Goldsmith, Oliver, 255. Citizen of the
World, The, 255
Goring, General George, 26-28, 36,
82
Gosse, Edmund, 107, 113 note. Editor
of Shirley's Selected Plays (Mermaid
Series), 107 note, 113 note. Seven-
teenth-Century Studies, 294 note
Goulding, R. W., 8 note, 275, 275 note,
278 note, 288 note. Editor of Let-
ters Writte7t by Charles Lamb's
^^Princely Woman,'' 275, 288 note,
292 note
Green, Mrs. Mary Anne, Editor of
Letters of Henrietta Maria, 23 note,
26-28 notes, 30-31 notes, 40 note,
120 note
Grison, Frederic, 138
Guise, Duke of, 52
Halliwell-Phillipps, J. O., 102. Collec-
tion of Letters, A, 1 24 note. Diction-
ary of Old English Plays, A, 102
Hamilton, Anthony, 301, 303. Mem-
oirs of Count Gram-mont, 301, 301
note
Hamilton, Duke of, 33, 53, 54
Harington, Sir John, 182 note
Harmar, John, 198 note
Hatton, Christopher, 296. Hatton
Correspondence (Camden Society),
296 note
Hazlitt, W. C, Collections and Notes,
199 note. Handbook to Popular,
Poetical and Dramatic Literature, 5
note
Heath, James, Brief Chronicle, A, 38
note, 40 note
Henrietta Maria, Queen, 3, 18, 20-23,
26 note, 27, 28, 31, 40 note, 43, 45-
50,81,92,93, 119, 120, 172, 192, 272,
2731 275, 276, 278, 279, 281, 282
Henry VIII, King, 133 note
Herbert, Lord, of Cherbury, 97 note
Herbert, William, Earl of Pembroke,
170. De Veritate, 97 note
Herrick, Robert, 174, 181. Hesperides,
The, 174, 181 notes
Hesse, Landgrave of, 58
Historical Manuscripts' Commission
Reports, 13-14 notes, 17 note, 21-
22 notes, 55 notes, 64 note, 68-70
notes, 173 note, 261 note, 278 note,
296 notes, 298 note, 304 note. Wel-
beck Manuscripts, Snote, i i-i 2 notes,
14 note, 18 note, 22 note, 27 note,
30 note, 33 note, 48 note, 54-55
notes, 66 note, 69 note, 7 1 note, 95-
99 notes, 119 note, 278 note, 282
note, 291-292 notes
Hobbes, Thomas, 73, 85, 95, 96, 98,
99, 122-126, 122 note, 128-132,128
note, 134, 166, 187 note, 192, 195,
23O) 237,259, 314. Decameron Physi-
ologicum, 187 note. De Corpore, 187
note. De Homi7te, 124. Elements
of Law, Natural and Politique, 99.
Elements of Philosophy, 195. Eng-
lish Works, 122-124 notes, 126 note.
Latin Works, 123 note, 187 note.
Leviathan, 126, 195. Minute or First
Draught of the Optiques, A, 124. On
Illumination, 124. On Vision, 124.
Questions Concerning Liberty, Neces-
sity and Chance, The, 123
Holland, Earl of, 16, 21
Horace, 168. Ars Poetica, 168 note
Hotham, Captain, John, 22, 27, 30, 81
Hotham, Sir John, 27, 81
Howard, Henry, 11, 68
Howell, James, Epistolce Ho-Eliance,
251
Humours of Monsieur Gatllard, The,
116
Hunt, Leigh, 178 note. Men, Women,
and Books, 178 note
Huntington, Henry E., 173 note, 179
note, 233 note
332
THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Hutchinson, Colonel, 33, 64, 70, 81,
84
Hutchinson, Mrs. Lucy, 83. Memoirs
of Colonel Hutchinson, 21 note, 23
note, 33 notes, 55 note, 65 note, 70
note, 83, 318
Huth, F. N., Works on Horses and
Equitation, 135 note
Hyde, Edward, Earl of Clarendon,
20, 24,37,42, 54, 58,81,92, 127 note,
135, 184 note. History of the Rebel-
lioft, 20 note, 22 note, 25-26 notes,
32 note, 36 note, 42 note, 50 note,
58 note, 92 note. Life of Clarendon
by himself, 58 note. State Papers, 18
note, 27 note
Irving, Washington, 7 1 . Sketch Book,
The, 7 1 . Works, 7 1 note
James I, King, 10, 11, 44, 46, 87, 267
note
Jenkins, Edward, 237 note, 262 note.
Editor of The Cavalier and his Lady,
191 note, 237 note, 262 note, 266,
303 note, 322
Jermyn, Henry, Lord, 22, 277
John, Don, of Austria, 53 note, 59
Johnson, Samuel, 152 note, 170. Lives
of the Poets, 152 note, 179 note
Jones, Inigo, 90, 93
Jonson, Ben, 14, 18, 85-88,90-94, 103,
105, 1 13, 1 14, 149, 164, 166-168, 184,
220, 262, 314. Cynthia's Revels, 1 13.
Devil is an Ass, The, 104, 1 13.
Every Man in his Humour, 104.
Love's Welcome at Bolsover, 18.
Love''s Welcome at Welbeck, 92. Mag-
netic Lady, The, 93 note. A^ezv Inn,
The, 90, 93 note. Silent Woman,
77ie, iiT,, 262. Staple of A^ews, The,
113. Triumph of Charis, The, 1 14
note. Underwoods, Z^. Volpone,iiT,.
Works, 86-94 notes
Jusserand, J. J., 251, 286 note. English
Novel in the Time of Shakespeare,
The, 251 note, 286 note
Kenny, James, 251 note
Kerr, Mina, Influence of Ben fonsott
on English Comedy, The, 104 note,
113 note
Killigrew, Thomas, 115
King, General James, Lord Ethyn,
25, 26, 29, 30, 34 note, 35, 37, 43, 45,
82
Kingston, Earl of, 29, 82
Kipling, Rudyard, 2 10 note. Man Who
Would Be King, The, 210 note
Kippis, Andrew, 178 note. Editor of
Biographia Britannica, 12 note,
178 note, 259 note
Kirkman, Francis, 116 note. Wits,
The, 116
Koeppel, Emil, 104, 107. Benfonson's
Wirkung, 104 note, 107 note. Shake-
speare^ s Wirkung, 107 note
Lamb, Charles ("Elia"), 1, 3, 6, 203
note, 251,312. Essays of Elia,y note,
203 note, 251 note, 312 note
Laney, Benjamin, Bishop of Ely, 123
Langbaine, Gerard, 6, 85, 140, 142,
150, 156, 169, 214 note. English
Dramatick Poets, The, 6, 85 note,
ii6note, 140 note, 2i4note. Hunter,
The, 140
Lawes, Henry, 57
Legg, Colonel William, 22, 69
Leicester, Earl of, 113, 170
Leigh, Joseph, 112
Lely, Sir Peter, 166
Letters and Poems in Honour of the
Dutchess ofA^eu'castle, 6 note, 8 note,
198 note, 249 note, 258
Letters of Eloisa and Abelard, 25 1
Lichfield, Leonard, 140
Lilly, William, History' of his Life and
Times, 39 note
Locke, John, 166
Tacrine, 216
Lodge, Edmund, Portraits of Illustri-
otts Personages, 13 note
Lohr, Anton, 142 notes
Long, Robert, 54
Longueville, Thomas, 12 note. First
Duke and Duchess of A^ewcastle, The,
12-13 notes, 26-27 notes, 32 note,
35 note, 69 notes, 74 note, 274 note
Lort, Dr., 287
Lower, M. A., 5 note, 265 note, 266,
270 note. Editor of Life of William
Cavendishe, The, 265 note, 324
Lucas, Ann, 250
Lucas, Sir Charles, 36, 206 note
Lucas, Madam Elizabeth, 48, 267
Lucas, John, Lord, 48, 56, 71
Lyttleton, Sir Charles, 296
INDEX
333
Mackworth, Sir Francis, 28
Madan, Falconer, Summary Catalogue
of the Western Mss., A, 127 note
Maecenas, 2, 85, 155, 167, 169, 170
Malone, Edmund, Editor of Shake-
speare's Works, 1 1 5 note
Malone Society Collections, 1 10 note,
116
Markham, Sir C. R., Life of Lord Fair-
fax, 36 note
Markham, Gervase, 135 note. Cavel-
arice, 135 note. Discourse of Horse-
manshJppe, A, 135 note
Marvell, Andrew, 185 note. Last In-
structions to a Painter, 185 note.
Satires, 185 note
Masson, David, Life of fohn Milton,
TTie, 90 note
Mayerne, Sir Theodore, 288
Mayne, Jasper, 198, 198 note, 259
Mazarin, Captain, 137
Milton, John, 177, 178, 178 note, 215.
Comtis, 121, 215. II Penseroso, 178.
U Allegro, 178
Moliere, 150. Le Bourgeois Gentil-
homme, 116 note. VEtourdi, 151.
CEuvres, 116 note
Montegut, fimile, 92, 93 note, 128,
182 note, 268, 268 note, 274 note,
294. Marickal Davout, Le, 92 note.
Duchesse et le Due de Newcastle, La,
43 note, 92 note, 182 note, 191 note,
268 note, 274 note, 294 note, 309
note
Montesquieu, Charles, 255. Lettres
Persanes, 255
Montrose, Earl of, 34, 40, 81
More, Dr., 195. Antidote, 195. Of the
Immortality of the Soul, 195
Moseley, Humphrey, 112, 112 note,
317
Moundeford, Sir Edmond, 14 note
Nason, A. Yi.., fames Shirley, loi note,
107 note, no note
Nethersole, Sir Francis, 12
Neuberg, Duke of, 54
Newport, Earl of, 25, 26, 82
Nicholas, Sir Edward, 7, 40, 41 note,
60, 136
Nichols, John, 171 note. Progresses of
fames the First, The, 1 1 note. Select
Collection of Poems, A, 171 note
Nicol, Alexander, Poems on Several
Subjects, 211, 322. Treasure of
Knowledge, A, 211, 322
Ogle, Cuthbert, Lord, 7, 68
Oldenburg, Duke of, 58
Orange, Prince of, 45
Ovid, 247, 310
Pearson, John, Bishop of Chester, 259
note
Pepys, Samuel, 6, 70, 108, 112, 115,
145, 150, 151, 270, 295-298, 295
note, 301, 303, 305, 312. Diary, ed.
Wheatley, 270 note, 296 note
Pernauer, J. P. F., 140, 319
Petty, Sir William, 122 note
Philips, Mrs. Katherine ("Orinda"),
172, 172 note, 270, 293-295, 310.
Poems, 270 note, 293 note. 21? my
Lady M. Cavendish, 293
Piccolomini, Count, 46
Plutarch, 244
Poems by Eminent Ladies, 320
Poems on Affairs of State, 168 note
Pope, Alexander, 262, 286 note. Dun-
ciad, The, 262 note
Porter, Endymion, 51, 277
Portland, Duke of, 127, 320
Potage, Jaen, 249
Pranks of Puck, TTie, 90 note
Pugliano, J. P., 90 note
Pye, Lady Catherine (nee Lucas),
250, 250 note, 273
Pye, Sir Edmund, 250 note
Quinault, Philippe, L'Amant Indiscret,
Raleigh, Sir Walter, 139
Reresby, Sir John, 70, 296 note. Mem-
oirs, 58 note, 70 note, 296 note
Retrospective Reviro), The, 47 note,
263 note
Rhys, Ernest, 178 note, 204 note, 206
note. Editor of Life of William
Cavendishe, The (Everyman's Li-
brary), 178 note, 187 note, 204 note,
206 note, 299 notes, 324
Richardson, Jonathan, 74
Richardson, Samuel, 251, 255
Richardson, Thomas, 287
Robertson, G. C, Ilobbes, 124 note
Rochester, Earl of, 156 note, 168. An
Allusion to the Tenth Satire of the
First Book of Horace, 1 56 note
334
THE FIRST DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE
Rolfe, W. J., i8i note
RoUeston, John, 6f 8i, 227, 287, 291
note
Rupert, Prince, 30, 36-40, 42, 44
Rushworth, John, 20, 82. Historical
Collections, 20 note, 24 note, 26 note,
28 note, 32 note, 34-36 notes, 121
note
St. Loo, Sir William, 68, 77
Sampson, William, 99, 100, 99-100
notes. Love's Metamorphosis, 100.
Virtus post Funera vivit, 99
Sanford, J. L., Studies and Illustra-
tions, 37 note
Saville, Sir William, 26
Scott, Sir Walter, 3, 227 note, 301,
303. Peveril of the Peak, 227 note,
301, 301 note
Scott, Sir Walter, and Saintsbury,
George, 1 50 note. Editors of Dry-
den's Works, 152 note, 154 notes
Selden, John, 128-129 notes. Table-
Talk, 128-129 notes, 132, 132 note
Session of the Poets, The, 168
Settle, Elkanah, 162, 163, 165-167,
314. Empress of RIorocco, The, 162-
163. Ibrahim, 162 notes, 166, 166
note. Love and Revenge, 162, 165
Shadwell, Thomas, 85, 1 52, 1 54, 1 56-
158, 162, 163, 165-167, 260, 314.
Bury Fair, 157-159, 157 notes, 163.
Epsom. Wells, 155,162. Humourists,
The, 155, 260. Libertine, 77ie, 156,
162, 166. Sullen Lovers, The, or
Impertinents, The, 154, 155. Vir-
tuoso, The, 1 54 note, 155
Shakespeare, William, 164, 170, 177,
181, 184, 229, 247, 248. Henry IV,
Part I, 131, 131 note. Henry VIII,
79. Midsummer Night's Dream, A,
181, 181 note. Romeo and fuliet,
18 1 note. &««^jfj, 85 note. Twelfth
Night, 229 note
Shaw, Mr., 63
Sheavyn, PhcEbe, 170 note. Literary
Professio7i in the Elizabethan Age,
The, 170 note
Shirley, James, 85, 100-105, 107-113,
119, 152, 167, 314. Arcadia, The,
III. Ball, The, 113. Bird in a Cage,
The, 106. Brothers, The, no. Cap-
tain Underwit, 102, 103, 103 notes,
106 note, 108. Constant Maid, The,
105. Duke's Mistress, The, "105.
Gejitleman of Venice, The, no.
Humorous Courtier, The, 105. Hyde
Park, 104. Imposture, The, no note.
Lady of Pleasure, The, 104, 105.
Look to the Lady, 108, i lo-i 12. Love
ift a Maze, 104. Love Tricks, 1 13.
Politician, The, no. To Odelia,\o\.
Tragedy of St. Alb atis. The, 109 note.
Traitor, The, 100. Witty Fair One,
The, 104, 105. Works, loi notes,
102 note
Sidney, Sir Philip, 90 note, 170, 245
note. Apologie for Poetrie, An, 90
note
Slingsby, Sir Henry, Diary, 26 note,
30 note, 36 note
Smith, L. P., Life and Letters of Sir
Henry Wotton, The, 10 notes
Southampton, Earl of, 170
Southey, Robert, 175 note. Common-
place Book, 175 note
Spenser, Edmund, 170, 184
Stanley, A. P., 307. Memorials of
Westminster Abbey, yyj
Stationers^ Register, 108, 108 note,
in
Stephen, Sir Leslie, Hobbes, 122 note
Strickland, Agnes, Lives of the Queens
of England, 19 note
Strong, S. A., 127, 134, 168. Cata-
logue of Letters etc. in Welbeck Abbey,
96 note, 127-128, 127 note, 134
note, 292 note, 320
Suckling, Sir John, 22, 119, 120, 167
Suffolk, Earl of, 11, 68
Swift, Jonathan, 170. Tale of a Tub,
The, 170
Swinburne, A. C, 93 note, 107. Study
of Ben fonson. A, 93 note
Talbot, Edward, Earl of Shrewsbury,
88
Talbot, George, Earl of Shrewsbury,
8, 68, 77
Talbot, Gilbert, Earl of Shrewsbury,
8, II, 12, 77
Talbot, Jane (nee Ogle), Countess of
Shrewsbury, 11, 22, 88
Talbot, Mary (nee Cavendish), Count-
ess of Shrewsbury, 8, 12
Thorpe, Benjamin, Catalogue of Mss.,
1 19 note
Throckmorton, Sir William, 50
INDEX
335
Tinker, C. B., 294 note. Salon and
English Letters, The, 294 note
Toppe, Lady, 174, 174 note
Tuke, Samuel, 259
Upham, A. IT., 84 note
Van Dyck, Sir Anthony, 66, 99, 166,
184
Van Helmont, Jean, 195
Vaughan, Robert, Protectorate of Crom-
well^ The, 122 note, 124 note
Verney, Frances, Memoirs of the Ver-
ney Family, 21 note
Villiers, George, first Duke of Buck-
ingham, 13
Villiers, George, second Duke of Buck-
ingham, 13 note, 51, 55, 64, 76, 76
note
Virgil, 247
Waller, Edmund, 124, 167, 179, 179
note, 227 note
Walpole, Horace, Earl of Oxford, 3, 6,
135, 290, 306. Catalogue of Royal
and Noble Authors, A, ed. Park, 6
note, 135 note, 144-145 notes,
172 notes, 268 note, 287 note, 290
note
Warburton, Bishop, 135
Warburton, Eliot, Memoirs of Prince
Rupert, 35 note, 39-40 notes
Ward, Sir A. W., 311, 312. History of
English Dramatic Literature, A, 90
note, 107 note
Warner, Mr., 96, 97
Warwick, Sir Philip, 30, 32, 74 note,
120. Memoirs, 30 note, 32-34 notes,
120 note
Wentworth, Thomas, Earl of Straf-
ford, 14, 15, 17, 19. Letters, 15 note,
17 note, 19 note
Westmoreland, Earl of, 173 note
Whibley, Charles, 290 note
Whincop, Thomas, 145. Theatrical
Records, 145 note
Whitelock, Sir Bulstrode, 82
Widdrington, Lord, 50, 62, 276
Widmerpoole, Major, 55 note
Wilkins, Dr., Bishop of Chester, 306,
307
Willcock, John, Life of Sir Henry
Vane the Younger, 34 note
William the Conqueror, 76
Williams, John, 108, 109, 11 1
Willis, Bishop, 287
Windebank, Sir Francis, 18
Wishart, George, 34. De Rebus Aus-
piciis Caroli, 34 note
Wit Restored, 160
Wood, Anthony a, 7, 46, 100, 102, 113.
Athena Oxonietises, 7 note, 46 note,
100, 198 note, 259 note
Woodford, John, 12
Wotton, Sir Henry, 10, 45, 86 ^
York, Duchess of, 296
York, Duke of, 60, 62, 296
Yorkshire Diaries (Surtees Society),
28 note
C 49 89
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