The sweet, attractive kind of grace,
A full assurance given by looks,
Continual comfort in a face,
The lineaments of Gospel books.
Before Mary Sidney was twenty years of age her hand was sought in marriage by Henry Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, to whom she was married in the year 1576. This match afforded considerable satisfaction to her father, as we see from a letter by him to his kinsman, the Earl of Leicester, whose good offices he was obliged to ask for the purpose of raising a dowry for his daughter. This letter rather painfully reminds us that it is not always the most deserving who, even in high places, receive their deserts. A servant less conscientious and faithful than Sir Henry would have found means of making his claims known, and would not have been allowed to endure the privations of poverty. After referring to the pleasure which the alliance would afford him, he says: "I have so joyfully at heart this happy advancement of my child that I would lie a year in prison rather than it should break. But, alas! my dearest lord, mine ability answereth not my hearty desire. I am poor; mine estate, as well in livelod and movable, is not unknown to your lordship, which wanteth much to make me able to equal that which I know my Lord of Pembroke may have. Two thousand pounds, I confess, I have bequeathed her, which your lordship knoweth I might better spare her when I were dead than one thousand living; and, in troth, my Lord, I have it not; but borrow it I must, and I will: and if your Lordship will get me leave, that I may feed my eyes with that joyful sight of their coupling, I will give her a cup worth five hundred pounds. Good, my Lord, bear with my poverty; for, if I had it, little would I regret any sum of my own, but would willingly give it, protesting before Almighty God, that if He and all the powers on earth would give me my choice for a husband for her, I would choose the Earl of Pembroke."
The Earl of Leicester very generously provided his young kinswoman with a handsome dowry, and, the desired marriage taking place, Wilton House, the seat of the Pembrokes, thenceforth became the principal home of the young Countess.
The life of Mary Sidney had hitherto been one of influence rather than event. Her marriage did not tend to alter its character, so much as to widen its circle and extend its sphere. Exemplary and dutiful as a daughter, loving and helpful as a sister, she could hardly fail to be a devoted and faithful wife. Although her rank entitled her to a prominent place at Court, where she was ever a favourite, her inclination and tastes led her to prefer the retirement of the study, and the society of the learned rather than the great. If history is silent as to a large portion of her life, we may be sure it is a silence which speaks of "duties well performed and days well spent."
On the return of Mr. Philip Sidney from the Continent, in 1577, he made it one of his first duties to pay a visit to his sister in her new home, before entering more fully into public life, which his station and family interests demanded. It is, however, in his character as a scholar and patron of letters that he will be the most lovingly remembered. The friend of Raleigh, Spenser, Dyer, and others of not much less renown, it has been also said of him that "there was not a cunning painter, a skilful engineer, an excellent musician or any other artificer of extraordinary fame, that did not make himself known to this famous spirit, and found in him his true friend without hire."
A temporary retirement of Mr. Philip Sidney from Court in the year 1580, has been assigned to different causes. During the previous year the Duke of Anjou had so far pressed his suit for the hand of Elizabeth that she had shown an inclination to accept it. Opinions at Court were divided on the subject. Mr. Sidney, amongst others, was decidedly opposed to the alliance, as being likely to endanger the religious and civil liberty of the country. He had even the boldness to address to the Queen a strong, though courteous and elegant, remonstrance. To this some have attributed the fact that the negotiations for the match were broken off. It has been said that this action of Sidney did not give the smallest offence to the Queen; and that the reason for his subsequent early retirement is to be found in his quarrel with the Earl of Oxford. Others have fixed an earlier date for the last-named event, and trace the removal from Court to the resentment of the Queen at Sidney's interference with her proposed marriage. Whether Elizabeth openly resented the conduct of Sidney or not, she was hardly likely to forget it. The probability seems to be that the letter would arouse the secret indignation of the Queen, which only waited a suitable opportunity for showing itself. The opportunity arose for the Royal favour to be for a time withdrawn on the occasion of a misunderstanding between Sidney and the Earl of Oxford. In the early part of the last-mentioned year, however, Sidney retired from the Court, going to reside at the seat of his brother-in-law, the Earl of Pembroke. Here he regained the society of his beloved and like-minded sister; their happy intercourse was renewed, and mutual help afforded. In the solitudes of the Wilton Woods, at this time, their joint literary work was planned, and in great part performed. The extent of their mutual aid, and the exact part performed by each, will never be known. Although the whole of the beautiful romance, The Arcadia, is attributed to Philip, it is certain that his sister had no insignificant part in advising and directing it, so much so that he gave to it the name of "The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia." The introduction is a pleasing record of their loving devotion and a testimony of fraternal gratitude:—
"To my dear Lady and Sister, The Countess of Pembroke. Here have you now, most dear, and most worthy to be most dear, Lady, this idle work of mine, which I fear, like a spider's web, will be thought fitter to be swept away than worn to any other purpose. For my part, in very truth, as the cruel fathers among the Greeks were wont to do to the babes they would not foster, I could well find in my heart to cast out in some desert of forgetfulness this child, which I am loath to father. But you desire me to do so; and your desire to my heart is an absolute commandment. Now it is done only for you, only to you. If you keep it to yourself, or to some friends who will weigh errors in the balance of goodwill, I hope for the father's sake it will be pardoned, perchance made much of, though in itself it have deformities; however, indeed for severer eyes it is not, being but a trifle, and that triflingly handled. Your dear self can best witness the manner, being done in loose sheets of paper, most of it in your presence, the rest by sheets sent to you as fast as they were done…. Read it, then, at your idle times, and the follies your good judgment will find in it blame not, but laugh at; and so, looking for no better stuff than, as in a haberdasher's shop, glasses or feathers, you will continue to love the writer, who doth exceedingly love you, and most, most heartily prays you may long live to be a principal ornament to the family of the Sidneys.