explains much
that is striking and peculiar in his own character; and it will be
found that General Lee inherited many of the traits of his ancestors,
especially of some eminent personages of his name in Virginia.

The family pedigree is traced back by Lee, in the life of his father,
to Launcelot Lee, of London, in France, who accompanied William the
Conqueror to England. After the battle of Hastings, which subjected
England to the sway of the Normans, Launcelot Lee, like others, was
rewarded by lands wrested from the subdued Saxons. His estate lay in
Essex, and this is all that is known concerning him. Lionel Lee is the
next member of the family of whom mention is made. He lived during the
reign of Richard Coeur de Lion, and, when the king went on his third
crusade, in the year 1192, Lionel Lee raised a company of gentlemen,
and marched with him to the Holy Land. His career there was
distinguished; he displayed special gallantry at the siege of Acre,
and for this he received a solid proof of King Richard's approbation.
On his return he was made first Earl of Litchfield; the king presented
him with the estate of "Ditchley," which became the name afterward of
an estate of the Lees in Virginia; and, when he died, the armor which
he had worn in the Holy Land was placed in the department of "Horse
Armory" in the great Tower of London.

The name of Richard Lee is next mentioned as one of the followers of
the Earl of Surrey in his expedition across the Scottish border in
1542. Two of the family about this period were "Knights Companions
of the Garter," and their banners, with the Lee arms above, were
suspended in St. George's Chapel in Windsor Castle. The coat-of-arms
was a shield "band sinister battled and embattled," the crest a closed
visor surmounted by a squirrel holding a nut. The motto, which may be
thought characteristic of one of General Lee's traits as a soldier,
was, "_Non incautus futuri_"

Such are the brief notices given of the family in England. They seem
to have been persons of high character, and often of distinction. When
Richard Lee came to Virginia, and founded the family anew there, as
Launcelot, the first Lee, had founded it in England, he brought over
in his veins some of the best and most valiant blood of the great
Norman race.

This Richard Lee, the _princeps_ of the family in Virginia, was,
it seems, like the rest of his kindred, strongly Cavalier in his
sentiments; indeed, the Lees seem always