CARDINAL RAPHAEL MERRY DEL VAL 



FOR the first time in the history of the CathoUc Church 

 the Holy See has a Secretary of State whose mother- 

 tongue is English, and who is acquainted with English 

 manners, literature and modes of thought. It is this fact 

 which annoys certain writers against the Holy See, for the 

 comparatively young adviser of the Pope is able to take them 

 at first-hand — not as his predecessors did, by means of trans- 

 lation — and to judge them from an intimate personal and prac- 

 tical knowledge of Anglo-Saxon affairs. He is a man to 

 whom the equipment of the modern world is familiar; the 

 telegraph, telephone, stenographer and typewriter are as freely 

 used by him as by the modern business man. 



Raphael Merry del Val was born at No. 33 Gloucester Place, 

 Portman Square, London, on October 10, 1865, and was the 

 third son of Marquis Raphael Merry del Val, then Secretary 

 to the Spanish Embassy at the Court of St. James. His 

 father is descended from a branch of the Merry family of 

 Waterford, Ireland, which in time of persecution in the sev- 

 enteenth century had to seek a home in Spain. His mother, 

 the Condesa Zulueta, only daughter of Don Pedro Jose de 

 Zulueta, Count de Torre Diaz, was educated in England and 

 lived there until her marriage. Her mother (and his grand- 

 mother) was a Miss Sophie Willcocks, eldest daughter of 

 Brodie McGhie Willcocks, formerly member of Parliament 

 for Southampton. Thus the future cardinal came of a strong 

 mixture of Irish and English blood, in addition to having 

 been born in England. His brother. Count Merry del Val, is 

 even now in the Spanish diplomatic service, and has been of 

 great assistance in settling the intricate Morocco question. 



It is needless to say that the young Merry del Val was al- 

 most wholly English in his mother-tongue and upbringing. 

 His first schooling was at Baylis House, near Slough, an excel- 

 lent school, kept by the well-known Butt family. He was a 

 jolly, good-natured lad, and earned the schoolboy nickname 



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