Introduction xiii 



Wrights in this lively scene; but it is the evidence it 

 brings of the Duke's taste for humours, in both senses, 

 that counts first. In fact he was too mercurial in 

 temperament to be a perfect general much less a com- 

 mander of the King's forces. Of his personal charm, his 

 spirit, wit, physical strength and prowess, we know by 

 the tributes paid to him. As a young man, he was like 

 another Dion for his combined grace and promise. 



Sir Henry Wotton in a letter (May 9, 1612) ^ speaks 

 of the ItaUan journey when young Cavendish was in his 

 train: " . . . at Troyes I rested a day and a half upon 

 a little indispisition William Cavendish had contracted, 

 . . . being loath to leave so sweet an ornament of my 

 journey, and a gentleman himself of so excellent nature 

 and institution." Add Ben Jonson's epigram in which 

 he describes the earl's fencing: 



"... Give me mettled fire 

 That trembles in the blaze, but then mounts higher! 

 A quick and dazzling motion; when a pair 

 Of bodies meet Uke rarefied air; 

 Their weapons darted with that flame and force 

 As they outdid the lightning in the course." 



This were a sight " to draw wonder to valour," he 

 says. But the higher courage still is the earl's, the law 

 of daring not to do a wrong, and that of not minding 

 the wrongs done to him by others, 



" AH this, my lord, is valour: this is yours, 

 And was yoiu: father's, all your ancestors, 

 Who durst live great 'mongst all the colds and heats 

 Of human life; as all the frosts and sweats 

 Of fortune, when or death appear' d, or bands; 

 And valiant were, with or without their hands." 



This was a noble compliment, in the grand style ; but 

 we ought to remember that the poet had reason to let 

 his imagination go on this occasion. For the young earl 

 had, with an eye to royal preferment, speculated ;^20,ooo 

 in two masques of Ben Jonson — Love's Welcome at 

 Welbeck and Love's Welcome at Bolsover, in 1633 and 

 1634. "I have hurt my estate," he confessed after- 



^ Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton, by Logan PearsaU Smith, 

 vol. ii. p. 4. 



