wn, and, so far as I can ascertain, there is no historical
warrant for supposing her to have been the mistress of Herbert, or the
beguiler of Southampton into such a lapse of duty to his beloved
Elizabeth Vernon as should inspire the expressions of Sonnets 134, 133,
144, which Mr. Massey says are written in the person of this lady to
Lady Rich. Lady Penelope Devereux, sister of Essex, was born in 1563,
and her father, who died when she was but thirteen, expressed a desire
that she should be married to Sir Philip Sidney. For some unknown reason
the intended match was broken off, and the fair Penelope, who is
described as "a lady in whom lodged all attractive graces of beauty, wit
and sweetness of behavior which might render her the absolute mistress
of all eyes and hearts," was married in 1580 to Lord Rich, a man whom
she detested. Sidney's _Astrophel and Stella_, a series of one hundred
and eight sonnets and poems addressed to Lady Rich, and celebrating the
strength and the purity of their love for each other, was first printed
in 1591. Sidney had died five years before, and so long as he lived, at
least, no whisper had been breathed against Lady Rich. In 1600 we have
the first notice of her losing the queen's favor from a suspicion of her
infidelity to her husband, and in 1605, having been divorced, her lover,
the earl of Devonshire, formerly Lord Mountjoy, immediately married her.
He defended her in an eloquent _Discourse_ and an _Epistle to the King_,
in which he says: "A lady of great birth and virtue, being in the power
of her friends, was by them married against her will unto one against
whom she did protest at the very solemnity and ever after." Lord Rich
treated her with great brutality, and having ceased to live with her for
twelve years, "did by persuasions and threatenings move her to
consent unto a divorce, and to confess a fault with a nameless
stranger." In spite of Mountjoy's noble pleadings for his wife, the
whole court rose up against his marriage. The earl's sensitive heart was
broken by the disgrace he had brought upon one whom he had loved so
dearly and so long (for he was Sidney's rival in his early youth, and
had been rejected by Lady Penelope's family before her marriage with
Lord Rich), and he died of grief four months after their marriage, April
3, 1606. His countess, "worn out with lamentation," did not long survive
him.

Does that look like the conduct of a light and fickle heart? or was it
li