writ--Lady
Purbeck at a convent--Sir Kenelm Digby--His letter about
Lady Purbeck--Lady Purbeck returns to England 125

CHAPTER XIII.

Lord Purbeck takes Lady Purbeck back again as his wife--He
acknowledges Robert Wright as his own son--Death of Lady
Purbeck--Retrospect of her life and character--Her
descendants--Claims to the title of Viscount Purbeck 137

CHAPTER I.

"After this alliance,
Let tigers match with hinds, and wolves with sheep,
And every creature couple with its foe."
DRYDEN.

The political air of England was highly charged with electricity.
Queen Elizabeth, after quarrelling with her lover, the Earl of Essex,
had boxed his ears severely and told him to "go to the devil;"
whereupon he had left the room in a rage, loudly exclaiming that he
would not have brooked such an insult from her father, and that much
less would he tolerate it from a king in petticoats.

This well-known incident is only mentioned to give an idea of the
period of English history at which the following story makes its
start. It is not, however, with public, but with private life that we
are to be here concerned; nor is it in the Court of the Queen, but in
the humbler home of her Attorney-General, that we must begin. In a
humbler, it is true, yet not in a very humble home; for Mr. Attorney
Coke had inherited a good estate from his father, had married an
heiress, in Bridget Paston, who brought him the house and estate of
Huntingfield Hall, in Suffolk, together with a large fortune in hard
cash; and he had a practice at the Bar which had never previously been
equalled. Coke was in great sorrow, for his wife had died on the 27th
of June, 1598, and such was the pomp with which he determined to bury
her, that her funeral did not take place until the 24th of July. In
his memorandum-book he wrote on the day of her death: "Most beloved
and most excellent wife, she well and happily lived, and, as a true
handmaid of the Lord, fell asleep in the Lord and now reigns in
Heaven." Bridget had made good use of her time, for, although she died
at the age of thirty-three, she had, according to Burke, seven
children; but, according to Lord Campbell, ten.

As Bridget was reigning in Heaven, Coke immediately began to look
about for a substitute to fill the throne which she had left vacant
upon earth. Youth, great per