previously in 1776 created Baron Cardiff of Cardiff Castle. In 1796 his lordship was further advanced to the Viscounty of Mountjoy in the Isle of Wight, the barony of Windsor, and the Marquisate of Bute.

In the reign of Queen Anne Lord Windsor bore also the title of Baron Newport, and as John the fourth Earl of Bute and son of George the Third's well-known Prime Minister married the eldest daughter of Herbert Windsor Hickman, second and last Viscount Windsor of the kingdom of Ireland, it may be inferred that in this way the Viscount of Mountjoy in the Isle of Wight came into the family of the Marquis of Bute, and has remained there ever since.

The late Mr. Thackeray used to pour forth the vials of his wrath upon the inevitable, abominable, maniacal, absurd, disgusting peerage,' but a good peerage, the older perhaps the better, provides the student with suggestive material in history and biography. Through the kindness of a parishioner I have been enabled to consult a curious old book called A Help to English History, by Peter Heylin, D.D., and since his death continued with great additions to the first day of November 1773, which, as the preface states, may be looked upon as a supplement or rather an addition to Milles's Catalogue of Honour.' It is called a 'Peerage of the Dukes, Marquises, Earls, Viscounts, and Barons, with a description of the places from which they have their titles.' Among these will be found Newport, with the pedigree of the Earls of Newport and their arms-Barry nebulé of six or and sa.-now borne by the family of the Blounts, Baronets.

April 20, 1889.

RICHARD WESTON, EARL OF PORTLAND, GOVERNOR OF THE ISLE OF WIGHT,

A.D. 1631-1634.

I.

In those days when our forefathers never approached a patron empty handed it appears to have been the custom to welcome the arrival of a new Governor to the Isle of Wight by sending him a present. Sir John Oglander, in his MS. Memoirs, has the following entry with regard to Richard, Lord Weston, who succeeded Lord Conway in the Captainship of Carisbrooke Castle :

'A note of ye gwyftes yt wase sent to my Lord Treasurer, ower Captayne, on his ffirst cominge to ower Iland, August ye 3rd, 1631, Sir Robert Dillington—1 phesant, I heathcoke, 2 partrydges, 2 gulles, half a boucke, 12 rabbottes, 24 pigions, 6 salmon peales, 6 mullettes, I troute, 9 carpes, 6 soules, 16 place, 1 baskett of plumbes.

My lord comanded mee, in his name, to thanke them all for theyre presentes, because they weare most of them unknowne to miselve, and by yt manner, I had a truer note from his stuard.'

If the other gentlemen in the Isle of Wight sent as liberal a contribution of flesh, fowl, fish, and fruit as Sir Robert Dillington, the larder at Carisbrooke Castle must have been very well stocked. Some of the entries in the Corporation records of Newport, I. W., prove that the burghers of that borough were equally well-disposed towards furnishing the Governor's kitchen. In the charges laid out by the bailiffs from 1580 to 1582 there occurs-Itm given to Sir Edward Horsey, xxviij lbs. of ffyne suger at xixd.-xliiijs. iiijd.' Mr. Hillier, from whose History of Newport this extract is taken, says, This sugar was grown in Sicily and Madeira, the cane not having been then introduced into England.' But it must be remembered that in Hispaniola or St. Domingo there were as early as 1518 twenty-eight sugar-works

established by the Spaniards. Peter Martyr, who gives this information, remarks on the extraordinary growth of the cane in that island, which for a long period offered the principal supply of sugar to Europe. Antwerp about 1560 received sugar from Spain, which had it from the Canaries and also from Portugal, the latter country deriving it from St. Thomé and other islands on the African coast and from Madeira. Sugar was also an article of import from Barbary. We learnt the art of manufacturing sugar, so Humboldt supposes, from the Arabs, to whom we are indebted for so many inventions, as also to the increased communication with the East occasioned by the Crusades.

The authorities at Carisbrooke Castle had what children call a sweet tooth, for there is another item of marmalade also given the Governor, vijs. and vid. 1583. Paid Mr. Jefferie, for certayne spises, which was given for Sir George Carey, xliiijs. and xd. 1588. Payde for spises being a pr'sent given unto Sir George Carey, our Captayne, xxxvs. 1594. Item payde for suger and other spises, being a pr'ent to our Captayne, Sir George Carey, £iij vs. vid. 1596. Item payde for cinnamon, suger, and other spises, being a present to My Lord Hunsdon (Sir George Carey), £iiij is. vid.'

We have an admirable portrait of Richard Weston, Earl of Portland, in the first book of Clarendon's History. Clarendon is remarkable for his keenness of observation and his skill in delineating character, with a certain sober majesty of style. His description of this Governor of the Isle of Wight stands out like a picture by Vandyke. It is too lengthy to be given in full, and it cannot be shortened without being entirely taken to pieces, to the sacrifice of its peculiar merits. Richard Weston was of an ancient family on both his father's and mother's side. He had a good education both among books and men. After some years' study of the law in the Middle Temple, he travelled into foreign parts, and then he took himself to the Court in London. At Court he spent the best part of the fair fortune which he had inherited from his father, but as a compensation made his way with people in authority. He was in consequence sent as an ambassador to the German Diet, to treat about the restitution of the Palatinate, where, according to Clarendon, he behaved

himself with great prudence, and with the concurrent testimony of his being a wise man from all those princes and ambassadors with whom he treated.'

The mission of Weston belongs to one of the most interesting chapters in history-the great struggle of the Thirty Years' War, which beginning in 1618 came to a close in 1648. That memorable war has been called the great duel of the seventeenth century, in which Romanism and Protestantism were pitted against each other. It may be more truly described as a conflict in which the contending forces were Jesuitism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism. A century had passed since the first teaching of Luther. The Society of Jesus, founded by Ignatius Loyola, was overshadowing that Church of Rome which it was created to protect. Certain of the Popes felt this painfully, and made their dislike of the new order evident by using the old orders against the intruder. The Jesuits with their watchword of 'Obedience' became mightier and mightier. They could gather the most enterprising and devout spirits about them, and could reach the highest and lowest in all lands. Jesuitism, working from its great seminary at Ingoldstadt, and backed by Austria, was, with its three instruments, the pulpit, the school, and the confessional, reclaiming men, women, and children from the Protestant sects. The Protestants, though they had formed. an Evangelical Union, were divided among themselves. There were fatal divisions among the Lutherans and the Calvinists, Luther himself having said in his haste that he hated a Calvinist more than a Papist. The Evangelical Union wanted the compactness of the Catholic League, of which Maximilian of Bavaria, a pupil of the Jesuits, was chief. The watchword of the Lutherans was 'Faith,' that of the Calvinists 'The Religion.' That religion was the belief in an unchangeable personal will, which not only governs the course of events but first of all chooses out individual men-the elect to fulfil its purposes. Faith and religion are both grand names. But when they are worked up into a belief in a system of doctrine, instead of a faith in a living God and in Christ as King of the nations upon earth, they are little more than mere names. They did not stir the hearts of the people. The smouldering fire burst

into a flame in Bohemia, a kingdom of the House of Austria, and a member of the Empire, but peopled by hot, impulsive Sclavs, jealous of their nationality as well as of their faith, which had been endeared to them by their struggles in the Hussite War and their victories under Zisca and Procopius. The spark which Wyclif had kindled in England had passed along the electric chain of those universities and schools of learning by which mediaeval Christendom communicated its religious ideas from one country to another. The Sclavonian Reformation under John Huss and Jerome of Prague was different from that which Luther afterwards started in Germany, and still more different from that of Calvin and the French Huguenots. John Huss was burnt at the stake as a heretic, but his heresy has never been accurately defined. On transubstantiation (notwithstanding the subtleties of his adversaries), even on the communion in one kind and the worship of the saints and of the Virgin Mary, Huss followed the received opinions of the time. After the fierce conflagration of the Hussite War the Bohemians had become Utraquists, so called because they claimed to partake of the Lord's Supper sub utraque formâ of bread and wine. They insisted upon having the eucharist in both kinds-the cup for the laity was their battle-shout, and they won it. With certain limitations the Council of Basle conceded to the Bohemians the communion in both kinds. By this concession the Council averted the severance of Bohemia from Latin unity. The symbols of Utraquism, the great chalice and the sword, were put up in the Thein church at Prague, and were only taken down with the rigorous enforcement of Roman dogmas and usages under the Emperor Ferdinand II. Such was the state of Bohemia a century before Luther. A century after Luther, in that romantic city by the Moldau-Prague-with its strange, half-Oriental beauty, the strife was renewed. The Utraquists had obtained from the Emperor Rudolph II a charter of religious liberty. The timid Rudolph, buried in his astrological reveries, his gems, antiques, and laboratory, was succeeded by his brother Matthias, and he again by his first cousin, Ferdinand II. Ferdinand was the Philip II of Bohemia in bigotry though not in cruelty. In his youth,