120 Some Notice of William Herbert, 



time, place, and company of tlieir marriage, but cannot bring either 

 witness or minister. They must either find out the minister, or 

 determine what the law will say, if it be a marriage or no. The 

 matter lies chiefly, notwithstanding all determination, in the Queen^s 

 mercy." ^ Some persons of high rank were suspected to have been 

 concerned in the disposal of the hand of the Lady Katharine ; for 

 if the queen married Lord Robert Dudley, as was feared, a revolu- 

 tion was expected to follow, and she would then form the nucleus of 

 a new party. A single glance below the surface when the explosion 

 came satisfied Elizabeth that it was dangerous to look further. The 

 queen wreaked her anger on the unlucky pair who had ofiended her; 

 they were kept for many years in the Tower, but their treatment 

 there was not so harsh as has been generally supposed, as we learu 

 from the interesting account of their lives in Canon Jackson^s paper 

 on Wulfhall and the Seymours, already mentioned. 



It seems incredible that Pembroke should have contemplated 

 renewing the marriage of his son with the Lady Katharine Grey j 

 it is just possible that the passage in the letter might refer to some 

 proposal of a projected marriage which actually took place some 

 eighteen months after, between his son. Lord. Herbert, and Lady 

 Katharine Talbot, as appears from a letter, dated February, 1563, 

 from Sir John Mason to Sir Thomas Chaloner, " The Earle of 

 Shrewsbui'ie's sonne and heyre hath marryed with the Earle of 

 Pembrook-'s daughter, and the Earle of Pembrook's sonne and heyre 

 hath married with the Eiu'le of Shrewsburie's daughter." This 

 double marriage took place at Baynard's Castle. Machin, in his 

 diary, says that there was afterwards as great a dinner as had ever 

 been seen, and this was continued for four days, and every night 

 there were great mummeries and masques. This was Francis Talbot, 

 son and heir of George, sixth Earl of Shrewsbury, who married 

 Anne, the only daughter of Lord Pembroke, and died in his father's 

 lifetime. Lord Herbert's married life with the Lady Katharine 

 Talbot^ was of short duration ; he afterwards espoused Mary Sidney. 



1 Foreign Series, Eliz., 15G1, 1562, No. 540. 

 * On the occasion of Lady Katharine Talbot's marriage, her father enforced the 

 ancient feudal right of receiving a benevolence from his tenants as ay de four 



