ears. A merchant's child, whose face was her fortune--Judith,
the daughter of Sir Robert Booth, is extolled by biographers for
reclaiming her young husband from a life of levity and culpable
pleasure. That he loved her sincerely from the date of their imprudent
marriage till the date of her death, which occurred just about six
months before his elevation to the woolsack, there is abundant evidence.

Judith died April 2, 1705, and in the September of the following year
the Lord Keeper married Mary Clavering, the beautiful and virtuous lady
of the bedchamber to Caroline Wilhelmina Dorothea, Princess of Wales.
This lady was the Countess Cowper whose diary was published by Mr.
Murray in the spring of 1864; and in every relation of life she was as
good and noble a creature as her predecessor in William Cowper's
affection. Of the loving terms on which she lived with her lord,
conclusive testimony is found in their published letters and her diary.
Frequently separated by his professional avocations and her duties of
attendance upon the Princess of Wales, they maintained, during the
periods of personal severance, a close and tender intercourse by written
words; and at all other times, in sickness not less than in health, they
were a fondly united couple. One pathetic entry in the countess's diary
speaks eloquently of their nuptial tenderness and devotion:--"April 7th,
1716. After dinner we went to Sir Godfrey Kneller's to see a picture of
my lord, which he is drawing, and is the best that was ever done for
him; it is for my drawing-room, and in the same posture that he watched
me so many weeks in my great illness."

Lord Cowper's second marriage was solemnized with a secrecy for which
his biographers are unable to account. The event took place September,
1706, about two months before his father's death, but it was not
announced till the end of February, 1707, at which time Luttrell entered
in his diary, "The Lord Keeper, who not long since was privately married
to Mrs. Clavering of the bishoprick of Durham, brought her home this
day." Mr. Foss, in his 'Judges of England,' suggests that the
concealment of the union "may not improbably be explained by the Lord
Keeper's desire not to disturb the last days of his father, who might
perhaps have been disappointed that the selection had not fallen on some
other lady to whom he had wished his son to be united." But this
conjecture, notwithstanding its probability, is only a conjecture.