fifth duke, was the occasion of a few days' gossip and much scandal. During his travels in Italy he visited the convent of the Augustinians at Lerice, where he was foolish enough to offer an impertinence to some ladies of the family of Botti, and was shot by an angry Signor Botti a few hours later. His brother Charles, who succeeded him, is the hero of a less tragic story. His second wife, Lady Charlotte Finch, once tapped him with her fan, when he is said to have rebuked her in these terms: "Madam, my first wife was a Percy, and she never ventured to take such a liberty." He was known among his contemporaries as "the proud Duke of Somerset."

The next of the ducal houses in order of precedence traces its descent from Charles II. and Louisa de Querouaille, "whom our rude ancestors called Madam Carwell." The Dukes of Richmond have always been known as honorable gentlemen, but they have left no mark on the political history of England. The present Duke is perhaps the most distinguished man of his family, being leader of the Conservative party in the House of Lords, and, as is generally thought, Mr. Disraeli's destined successor in the Premiership. The third Duke held high office in the early part of the reign of George III.; while his nephew, Colonel Lennox, who afterward succeeded him in the title, had the honor of fighting a duel with a son of George III. Neither of the combatants suffered any hurt, and Colonel Lennox was reserved for the most melancholy of deaths; falling, thirty years after, a victim to hydrophobia, caused by the bite of a dog. His royal antagonist was Frederic, Duke of York, who subsequently became Commander-in-Chief of the British army in the most inglorious period of its annals. Indeed, so disgraceful was his Royal Highness's conduct of the campaign of 1794, that Pitt demanded one of two things from the King; viz., either that the Prince should be brought before a court-martial, or that the Prime Minister should in future have the right of appointing to great military commands. It must have cost George III. a bitter pang to accept the latter alternative.

The Duke of Grafton, who holds the fourth place on Garter's Roll, is equally descended from his Majesty, King Charles II., of happy memory. Henry Fitzroy, son of Barbara Villiers (created Duchess of Cleveland), was raised to the highest rank in the peerage, as Duke of Grafton, in 1675. He was one of the first to desert his uncle's cause in 1688, and two years later he died a soldier's death under the walls of Cork, fighting for William III. and the liberties of England. His great grandson was Augustus Henry, third Duke of Grafton, who may still be seen gibbeted in the pages of Junius. His Grace was a member of Chatham's second ministry, and succeeded his chief in the Premiership. Of other Dukes of Grafton history makes no special mention.

The fifth of the dukes in order of precedence quarters the royal arms of France and England, but without the bâton sinister. Henry Charles Fitzroy Somerset, Duke of Beaufort, is lineally descended from "old John of Gaunt, time-honored Lancaster" (third son of Edward III.) and Catherine Swinford. John of Gaunt's children by this union were afterward legitimatized by act of Parliament. Henry, the second son, took holy orders, and became Bishop of Lincoln, and afterward of Winchester, as well as Cardinal and Lord Chancellor. He is the Cardinal Beaufort who figures in the stately Gallery of Shakespeare. He and his brothers took the name they bore from the Castle of Beaufort, in Anjou, the place of their nativity. The Cardinal's elder brother was created Earl and afterward Marquis of Somerset. His descendant, Henry Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, fell into the hands of the Yorkists, at the battle of Hexham, and was succeeded in the family honors by his brother Edmund, who was soon to share the same fate. With him the legitimate male line of John of Gaunt became extinct. Duke Henry, however, had left a natural son, who was called Charles Somerset, and who, to use the appropriate language of chronological dictionaries, "flourished" in the reigns of Henry VII. and Henry VIII. He was a brave soldier and a skilful diplomatist; having been chosen a Knight of the Garter; he was also appointed captain of the King's Guards for his services. Sir Charles Somerset obtained in marriage Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of William Herbert, Earl of Huntingdon, and Lord Herbert of Rayland, Chepston, and Gower; and, in his wife's right, was summoned to Parliament as Lord Herbert, in the first year of Henry VIII. In 1514 he was advanced to the Earldom of Worcester, having previously been constituted Lord Chamberlain for life, as a reward for the distinguished part he had in the taking of Terouenne and Tournay. He died in 1526, and was succeeded by his son. Little is heard of the Somersets—Earls of Worcester—during the sixteenth century, though the marriage of two ladies of that house called forth the well-known Epithalamium of Spenser. Henry, the fifth earl, created Marquis of Worcester by Charles I., is celebrated in English history for his defence of Rayland castle against the forces of the Parliament, under Sir Thomas Fairfax. On this subject, Mr. George MacDonald's last novel of "St. George and St. Michael" may be consulted with advantage.

The brave old cavalier did not long survive the surrender and destruction of his ancestral home. The same year he died, and was succeeded in his title by his son Edward, the famous author of the "Century of Inventions." It is scarcely too much to say that had this man been divested of rank and fortune, and had he been furnished with the requisite motive for exertion, he might have anticipated the work of Watt and Stephenson. As it was, the discoveries he made served but to amuse his leisure hours. The Marquis of Worcester was well-nigh the last of his race about whose doings his countrymen would much care to be informed. His son was created Duke of Beaufort in 1682, and with the attainment of the highest rank in the peerage came a cessation of mental activity in the family. One more Somerset, however, deserves honorable mention—Fitzroy, who was aide-de-camp to Wellington, and lost an arm at Waterloo. Raised to the peerage in 1852 as Lord Raglan, he was named two years later to the command of the English army in the Crimea. What he did, and what he did not, in that post, is still remembered. In truth he was a gallant soldier, distracted by contradictory instructions, feeling keenly the criticisms of newspaper writers, who complained that one of the strongest fortresses in the world was not taken in a few weeks. The siege had lasted eight months, when Lord Raglan resolved to make one desperate effort to carry the place by assault on the 18th of June, the fortieth anniversary of Waterloo. The attack failed, and the allies were repulsed with severe loss. Ten days later the English general succumbed to sickness and chagrin.

The Dukes of St. Albans enjoy precedence after the Dukes of Beaufort. William Amelius Aubrey De Vere Beauclerk, present and tenth duke, is lineally descended from the Merry Monarch and Nell Gwynn, and through the marriage of the first duke, from the De Veres, Earls of Oxford. His Grace is Hereditary Grand Falconer, a pleasant little sinecure of some $6,000 a year. Of the Dukes of Saint Albans history has nothing to say. The ninth duke married the widow of Mr. Thomas Coutts, of banking renown.

Next on Garter's roll comes the Duke of Leeds, lineally descended from Thomas Osborne, Earl of Danby and Lord High Treasurer under Charles II., whom Dutch William afterward made Duke of Leeds. Danby (for he is better known by this title than by the one which he dishonored) must be considered to have been an average statesman, and even a patriot, as public spirit then went. He steadily opposed French influence under Charles II., and afterward contributed to the success of the Revolution. He was subsequently impeached by the Commons for taking bribes, but the principal witness on whom the House relied to substantiate the charge mysteriously disappeared when most