Derby saw her second daughter, as well as her youngest, take rank as a Countess. A far larger family of children had been born to this daughter than to either of her sisters. Out of fifteen children, born in all, at least ten were alive in 1630, in order of age as follows: the Lady Frances Egerton, married to Sir John Hobart, of Blickling, Norfolk; the Lady Arabella, married to Lord St. John of Bletso, son and heir of the Earl of Bolingbroke; the Ladies Elizabeth, Mary, Penelope, Catharine, Magdalen, and Alice, yet unmarried—the last, Lady Alice, being in her tenth or eleventh year; John, Viscount Brackley, the son and heir, in his ninth year; and his brother, Mr. Thomas Egerton, about a year younger. The head-quarters of this numerous family, or of such of them as were unmarried, were-in London, the Earl of Bridgewater's town-house in the Barbican, Aldersgate Street; in the country, the Earl's mansion of Ashridge, Hertfordshire, about sixteen miles from Harefield. Visits of the Bridgewater family to their aged relative at Harefield might be frequent either from London or from Ashridge.

We are now prepared to understand the exact circumstances of the Arcades. Sometime in 1630 or 1631, we are to suppose, some of the younger members of the different groups of the relatives of the Dowager-Countess of Derby determined to get up an entertainment in her honour, at her house at Harefield. The occasion may have been the aged lady's birthday, or it may have been some incidental gathering at Harefield for a family purpose. Whatever it was, the young people had resolved to amuse themselves by some kind of festivity in compliment to the venerable lady of whom they were all so proud. What should the form of the thing be? What could it be but a masque? Harefield, with its avenue of elms called "the Queen's Walk" in memory of Queen Elizabeth's visit, and with its fine park of grassy slopes and well-wooded knolls, was exactly the place for a masque ; besides which, was not the Countess accustomed to this kind of entertainment? Would it not be in good taste to remind her of the masques and similar poetical and musical entertainments that had pleased her in her youth, when she had been the theme of Spenser's muse, and had sat by the side of her first husband, Lord

Strange, beholding plays brought out under his patronage? Would it not be pleasant to remind her, also, of such incidents of her subsequent life as the royal visit to her and the Lord Keeper at Harefield in 1602, when the mansion and the grounds were for four days a scene of dramatic pageantry, and her own motherly visit to Ashby-de-la-Zouch, five years later, when that masque of Marston's, the MS. of which was still kept in the family, was performed in her honour? Masques, indeed, were

even more in fashion now, in the reign of Charles I., than they had been in the reigns of Elizabeth and James, and a masque in a noble family on any occasion of family-rejoicing was the most natural thing in the world.

There was, then, to be a masque, or at least a bit of a masque, at Harefield; and the actors were already provided. But for a good masque, or even a good bit of a masque, more is required than willing actors. Who was to write the words for the little masque, and who was to set the songs in it to music?

The latter question may be answered first. There can be little doubt, I think, that the person to whom the young people of the family of the Countess-Dowager of Derby trusted for all the musical requisites of the masque, if not the person who suggested it originally and entirely superintended it, was Henry Lawes, gentleman of the Chapel Royal, and one of his Majesty's private musicians. Farther particulars respecting this interesting man, one of the most celebrated musical composers of his day, will be given in the Introduction to that one of Milton's Sonnets which is addressed to him (Sonnet XIII.). What we have to attend to here is that, though Lawes was well-known and very popular through English society on account of his musical eminence, and had professional connexions as a composer and teacher of music with not a few aristocratic families, there is proof that by far the most lasting and intimate of his connexions of this latter kind was with the Bridgewater branch of the Countess-Dowager of Derby's family. As late as 1653, when Lawes published the first part of perhaps his chief musical work, called Ayres and Dialogues for one, two, and three voices, he dedicated the volume "to the Right Honourable the two most excellent sisters, Alice, Countess of Carbery, and Mary, Lady Herbert of Cherbury and Castle

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island, daughters to the Right Honourable John, Earl of Bridgewater." The dedication runs thus: "No sooner had I thought "of making these public than of inscribing them to your Ladyships, "most of them being composed when I was employed by your "ever-honoured parents to attend your Ladyships' education in "music; who (as in other accomplishments fit for persons of your quality) excelled most ladies, especially in vocal music, wherein you were so absolute that you gave life and honour to all I set “and taught you, and that with more understanding than a new 66 generation, pretending to skill, (I dare say) are capable of." Now the two ladies thus addressed are no other than two of those enumerated above as constituting the third group of the CountessDowager of Derby's relatives and descendants, surrounding her, or occasionally visiting her, at Harefield, about 1630-31. They were (Mary) the fourth and (Alice) the eighth of her granddaughters of the Bridgewater branch, young and unmarried in 163031, but, when Lawes wrote the dedication, married and matronly. The dedication certifies that Lawes was a teacher of music in the Bridgewater family when these two ladies were unmarried girls. How far back does that carry the connexion of Lawes with the Bridgewater family? Not to mention documentary evidence showing that in 1642 the relationship of the musician to the family was already peculiarly intimate and of old standing, we have positive proof in Comus that it was fully established in 1634. The songs in that masque were set to music by Lawes ; he was one of the actors in it, and the manager of the affair generally; and, besides the above-mentioned Lady Alice Egerton, he had for his fellow-performers in the masque two other pupils of his in the Bridgewater family: viz., her brothers and juniors, young Lord Brackley and young Mr. Thomas Egerton. (For farther particulars, see Introduction to Comus.) As early as 1634, therefore, Lawes was on the friendliest professional footing with the Bridgewater family, much in their society, and superintending not only their musical studies, but their more tasteful relaxations. All that is farther necessary for our present purpose is the supposition that the connexion had then lasted three or four years. And this is sufficiently likely. Not only in Lawes's dedication of Comus by itself to Lord Brackley in 1637 do we hear of the "many favours"

with which he had been "ong obliged" by Lord Brackley's parents, the Earl and Countess of Bridgewater (see the Dedication, prefixed to Comus); but it seems fair to assume that he who in 1634 was the successful and respected musical teacher of the three youngest of the family (Lady Alice, Lord Brackley, and Mr. Thomas Egerton), and who is known to have been the teacher of at least one of the family who was considerably older (Lady Mary), had been already for several years before 1634 connected with the family, and may have taught other members of it besides the four mentioned. In short, if we throw all the known facts into the strictest likelihood, it takes this form :-About 1630-31, Henry Lawes, then about thirty years of age, and already of distinction in the English musical world, though with much of his reputation still to make, reckoned among his chief patrons and employers the Earl and Countess of Bridgewater, who were the step-son and own daughter of the Countess-Dowager of Derby ; and among his most hopeful pupils were several of the children of the Earl and Countess, grandchildren of the Countess-Dowager. Others of the Countess-Dowager's grandchildren may have been pupils of Lawes; but those of the Bridgewater branch were the most musical in their tastes, and it was to them, in their town-house in the Barbican, or in their country-seat at Ashridge, that Lawes's visits were most frequent. Quite possibly, it was they, who were at all events the most numerous group of the Countess-Dowager of Derby's grandchildren, that originated the notion of a masque in her honour. But, even if some of her relatives of the other groups were concerned in the plan, or admitted into it, the singing parts would fall to the Bridgewaters, and the arrangement of the music, and the general management, to their instructor, Lawes. Business of this kind was part of the profession of musical composers in those days, and Lawes, as we shall find (Introd. to Comus), was an expert in it.

An additional argument in favour of the idea that Lawes was the manager of the entertainment and arranged its music is found in the fact that the poetry for it was furnished by Milton. It has been imagined, indeed, that there may have been some bond of acquaintanceship between Milton and the Bridgewater family, or others of the Countess-Dowager of Derby's numerous progeny,

independently of Lawes. Might not such a bond have arisen from business-relations of Milton's father, the scrivener, with the noble house? All that we can say is that such may have been the case, for every life has minute ramifications not recoverable by biography. But it is mere conjecture, whereas Milton's intimacy with Lawes is a known fact. The friendship between the two, of which many interesting proofs remain, may have begun even in Milton's boyhood. Noted as a musician as was Milton's own father, there can have been few musical artists in London that were not occasional visitors in his house in Bread Street; and there were many things in Lawes, when once he and the younger Milton were brought together, to rivet an attachment to him. Often, when in London from Cambridge in vacation-time, Milton would see Lawes, to talk with him on musical and poetical matters (for Lawes could write verse as well as compose airs), and to learn what songs of Herrick, Carew, or other living or dead English poets he had been last setting to music. Possibly already he had done that honour to some little pieces of Milton's own; and, at all events, Milton's poetical powers were known to him. Accordingly, when the notion of the Entertainment at Harefield had been started, and Lawes and his Bridgewater pupils, if our idea is correct, were busy over the project, it was to Milton that Lawes applied for the necessary words or libretto. If, as has been argued, the date was 1630 or 1631, Milton may have been up in London on one of his vacation visits. Perhaps, however, his father was already in possession of his country-place at Horton, and in that case Milton may have been there, and so actually within about ten miles, crosscountry, from Harefield. Wherever it was that the two met to consult, Lawes about thirty years of age and Milton eight years younger, we can see what happened. Lawes explains to Milton the circumstances of the proposed entertainment and the kind of thing that is wanted-namely, a speech and a song or two, to form the poetical gem of some larger pageant or show; and Milton meditating the affair for a few days, produces Arcades or The Arcadians.

Let the reader now go back in imagination to Harefield, on a spring or summer evening two hundred and forty years ago. Certain revels or pageants in the grounds have perhaps preceded,