74 THE HISTORY OF THE ROYAL BUCKHOUNDS. 



The Earl of Leicester was married three times : firstly, to 

 Amy, daughter of Sir John E-obsart, June 4, 1550, when the 

 nuptials were honoured with the presence of King Edward VI., 

 who has recorded that after the ceremony certain gentlemen 

 strove who should first transfix with a sword on horseback the 

 head of a goose hung alive across two posts. It is said that 

 the Earl married, secondly, Lady Douglas Howard, widow of 

 John, Lord Sheffield. The fact of this marriage is not free 

 from doubt, and occasioned great controversy. By this lady 

 he had a son (who was titular Earl of Warwick and Duke of 

 Northumberland, a notable sportsman, and said to be the first 

 person " that taught a dog to sit in order to catch partridges ") 

 and a daughter. He married, thirdly, Lettice, daughter of Sir 

 Francis Knollys, K.G., and widow of Walter Devereux, Earl of 

 Essex. By her he had a son, Robert, called Lord Denbigh, 

 who died July 19, 1584. By his will, made at Middleburgh, 

 August 1, 1587, he appointed his widow sole executrix; and 

 expressed in strong terms his fidelity and duty to the Queen, 

 to whom he bequeathed three great emeralds, several diamonds, 

 and a rope of fair white pearls to the number of six hundred. 



This Master of the Buckhounds enjoyed extraordinary power 

 for nearly thirty years. There was no part of the kingdom in 

 which he had not extraordinary influence, and in the counties 

 around Kenilworth almost everything was dependent upon him 

 either through hope or fear. It is almost impossible to enumerate 

 all the local and subordinate offices which he held. They must 

 have greatly strengthened his parliamentary influence, and he 

 seems to have been a perfect master of those arts to which 

 a subsequent age gave the appellation of boroughmongering. 

 He had the sagacity to perceive the growing importance of 

 the House of Commons, and took care to fill it with his 

 dependants, and persons devoted to his interest. He was a 

 patron of literature, the drama, and the arts, and, being well 

 aware of the advantages of trade and commerce, warml)^ 

 encouraged those voyages of discovery which redounded so 

 greatly, if not to the honour, to the advantage of the kingdom. 

 Of his mining operations, cloth and woollen manufactures, and 



