“The gentlest shepherdess that liv’d that day,
And most resembling, both in shape and spirit,
Her brother dear,”
survived her husband some time, and at her death, which took place in 1621, that beautiful epitaph so often quoted, and as often erroneously ascribed to Ben Jonson, was penned by William Browne, and will bear again quoting here:—
“Underneath this sable hearse
Lies the subject of all verse;
Sidney’s sister! Pembroke’s mother!
Death, ere thou hast slain another
Fair, and learn’d, and good as she,
Time shall throw a dart at thee!
Marble piles let no man raise
To her name for after days;
Some kind woman, born as she,
Reading this, like Niobe
Shall turn marble, and become
Both her mourner and her tomb.”
William, third Earl of Pembroke under the new creation, eldest son of the Earl and of “Sidney’s sister,” succeeded to the title and estates on the death of his father in 1600-1. Of him Aubrey says, “He was of a most noble person, and the glory of the court in the reigne of King James and King Charles. He was handsome and of an admirable presence.
‘Gratior et pulchro veniens a corpore virtus.’
He was the greatest Mecænas to learned men of any peer of his time—or since. He was very generous and open-handed. He gave a noble collection of choice bookes and manuscripts to the Bodleian Library at Oxford, which remain there as an honourable monument of his munificence. ‘Twas thought, had he not been suddenly snatcht away by death, to the grief of all learned and good men, that he would have been a great benefactor to Pembroke College, in Oxford; whereas, there remains only from him a great piece of plate that he gave there. He was a good scholar, and delighted in poetrie; and did sometimes, for his diversion, write some sonnets and epigrammes which deserve commendation. Some of them are in print in a little book in 8vo., intituled ‘Poems writt by William, Earle of Pembroke, and Sir Benjamin Ruddyer, Knight, 1660.’”
His lordship married Mary, eldest daughter and co-heiress of Gilbert, seventh Earl of Shrewsbury, by his countess, Mary, daughter of Sir William Cavendish, of Chatsworth, and his wife, Elizabeth Hardwick—“Bess of Hardwick”—afterwards Countess of Shrewsbury. By this marriage the Earl of Pembroke had two sons, who died in their infancy. Dying without surviving issue, he was succeeded in the title and estates by his brother, Philip Herbert, who thus became fourth Earl of Pembroke, and was shortly afterwards created Earl of Montgomery, and appointed Lord Chamberlain, Gentleman of the King’s Bed-chamber, and Lord Warden of the Stannaries. He was twice married: first, to Lady Susan Vere, daughter to the Earl of Oxford, by whom he had a numerous family; and, secondly, to Anne, daughter and heiress of George, Earl of Cumberland, and widow of Richard, Earl of Dorset.
Dying in 1649-51, the Earl was succeeded by his fourth but eldest surviving son, Philip, as Earl of Pembroke and Montgomery. This nobleman married, first, Penelope, daughter and heiress of Sir Robert Naunton; and, secondly, Catherine, daughter of Sir William Villiers, and, dying in 1669-70, was in his turn succeeded by the eldest son of his first marriage, William, who, dying unmarried, was succeeded by his half-brother, Philip (the son of his father by his second wife), who thus became seventh Earl of Pembroke, and fourth Earl of Montgomery. This nobleman married Henrietta de Querouaille, sister to the Duchess of Portsmouth, but dying without male issue, the title and estates devolved on his younger brother, Thomas, eighth Earl of Pembroke, who held distinguished offices under William III., Queen Anne, and George I., and was the founder of the noble collection of sculptures, &c., at Wilton. His lordship married three times, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Henry, as ninth earl, of whose taste Lord Orford says, “Besides his works at Wilton, the new lodge in Windsor Park, the Countess of Suffolk’s house at Marble Hill, Twickenham, the water house in Lord Orford’s park at Houghton, are incontestable proofs of his taste: it was more than taste, it was passion for the utility and honour of his country, that engaged his lordship to promote and assiduously overlook the construction of Westminster Bridge by the ingenious Monsieur Labeyle.”
He was succeeded in the title and estates by his son, Henry, as tenth Earl of Pembroke and Earl of Montgomery, who, marrying Elizabeth, second daughter of Charles Spencer, Duke of Marlborough, had issue one son and one daughter, and, dying in 1794, was succeeded by his son, George Augustus Herbert, as eleventh Earl of Pembroke, &c.
That nobleman married, first, in 1784, Elizabeth, daughter of Topham Beauclerk, Esq., son of Lord Sidney Beauclerk, and by her, who died in 1793, had issue the Lady Diana, married to the Earl of Normanton, and one son, Robert Henry, who succeeded him; and, secondly, in 1808, Catherine, daughter of Count Woronzow, the Russian ambassador, by whom he had issue one son, the Hon. Sidney Herbert, M.P., and Secretary for War, created, in 1861, Lord Herbert of Lea (which title has now merged into the earldom of Pembroke), and five daughters—viz. the Lady Elizabeth, married to the Earl of Clanwilliam; the Lady Mary Caroline; the Lady Catherine; the Lady Georgiana; and the Lady Emma. His lordship, dying in 1827, was succeeded by the son of his first marriage, Robert Henry Herbert, as twelfth Earl of Pembroke, &c. This nobleman was born in 1791, and married, in 1814, the Princess Octavia Spinelli, daughter of the Duke of Lorraine, and widow of the Sicilian Prince Buttera de Rubari, by whom he had no issue. He died in 1862, and (his half-brother, Sidney Herbert, Baron Herbert of Lea, the heir to the title, having died a few months before him) was succeeded by his nephew (the son of that honoured statesman), George Robert Charles Herbert, the present peer—the thirteenth earl—then a minor.