Such was the extinction of all the magnificence and intellectual ascendency that at one time centred in the great and gifted family of Villiers.
[1] Dryden.
[2] The day after the battle at Kingston, the Duke's estates were confiscated. (8th July, 1648.)—Nichols's History of Leicestershire, iii. 213; who also says that the Duke offered marriage to one of the daughters of Cromwell, but was refused. He went abroad in 1648, but returned with Charles II. to Scotland in 1650, and again escaped to France after the battle of Worcester, 1651. The sale of the pictures would seem to have commenced during his first exile.
[3] Sir George Villiers's second wife was Mary, daughter of Antony Beaumont, Esq., of Glenfield, (Nichols's Leicestershire, iii. 193,) who was son of Wm. Beaumont, Esq., of Cole Orton. She afterwards was married successively to Sir Wm. Rayner and Sir Thomas Compton, and was created Countess of Buckingham in 1618.
[4] This incident is taken from Madame Dunois' Memoirs, part i. p. 86.
[5] The duke became Master of the Horse in 1688; he paid £20,000 to the Duke of Albemarle for the post.
[6] The duel with the Earl of Shrewsbury took place 17th January, 1667-8.
[7] Brian Fairfax states, that at his death (the Duke of Buckingham's) he charged his debts on his estate, leaving much more than enough to cover them. By the register of Westminster Abbey it appears that he was buried in Henry VII.'s Chapel, 7th June, 1687.