THE EIGHTH DUKE OF BEAUFORT 



thing is clear — he saved his family. His life, which 

 began under the deepest shadow, closed full of 

 years, riches, and honour. Amid all the changes of 

 the troublous times through which he lived, he 

 continued to prosper. What manner of man could 

 he have been ? In the first place at a very early 

 age he seems to have resolved to rebuild the 

 family fortunes, and to have pursued this object 

 steadily and resolutely, at whatever sacrifice of 

 opinions, principles, or persons. Apart from this 

 leading motive of his life, he seems to have 

 been a reserved, cold man, of strict morals. The 

 one touch of nature that marked his rigidly self- 

 contained character was a love of state and 

 splendour, of which in his early days he had had 

 but little. 



His return to England was sad enough. His 

 grandfather, the first Marquis, was dead ; his father 

 a penniless wanderer ; Raglan Castle in ruins, and 

 the family estates confiscated. As we have seen, 

 the last had passed into the possession of the Lord 

 Protector. But Cromwell and the English Parlia- 

 ment, though they thought it right to punish what 

 seemed to them treason, by the confiscation of 

 lands, had a most English and conservative respect 

 for the legal rights of property. No doubt there 

 were some fanatics who viewed such matters 

 differently, but the Protector and his councillors 

 were not of these. Henry, Lord Herbert, had 

 undoubted reversionary rights under the legal 



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