Introduction-The family of Cecil-William Cecil, First Lord BurghleyThomas Cecil, Second Lord Burghley and First Earl of Exeter-The travels of his eldest son, Will Cecil-Letter to Lord Burghley from his grandson Will Cecil-Marriage of Will Cecil to the Baroness de Ros-Her deathThe Hon. Edward Cecil-Announcement of his birth to William, Lord Burghley-Westminster School-License for Richard and Edward Cecil to travel abroad for three years-The civility they received when abroad— Letter from Florence-The Duke of Bracciano-His visit to LondonReception by the Queen-Edward Cecil's determination to follow the wars in the Low Countries- His letter to his uncle, Sir Robert Cecil, from the Hague.

THE memoirs of a man whose career was one of uninterrupted success are not generally so interesting, or instructive to the reader, as a biography which recounts the struggles and trials, successes and reverses, of an eventful life. In the former case you know what to expect, but in the latter you never know what is going to happen, and so your interest is kept alive to the end.

Horace Walpole, in his Royal and Noble Authors, remarks that there are few memoirs of Edward Cecil, Viscount Wimbledon. Walpole, in common with some other writers, mentions that Lord Wimbledon followed the wars in the Netherlands for many years, and was a general

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of great reputation until his miscarriage in the expedition to Cadiz.1 Most of our historians devote a few lines to the unfortunate expedition to Cadiz in 1625, and mention Lord Wimbledon's name with either sarcasm or opprobrium, not knowing, or not caring to mention, that this same Lord Wimbledon had served for nearly thirty years in the Netherlands, and had won renown in some of the campaigns of those stirring times. It is because historians and biographers have said so little about a man who, whatever his faults may have been, was deservedly reckoned a brave and experienced soldier, and who had raised himself step by step up the military ladder, to the highest military rank, that I have laboured to rescue his name from the oblivion that has so long surrounded it.

Many a face escapes beauty by the possession of one bad feature. Many a character would be considered noble but for one unredeeming trait. Many a general would be reckoned a great commander had he not suffered one signal defeat. A bad feature may improve and soften with age. A character can be improved with care. But a defeat in war is never really forgotten or forgiven, and the defeated commander can seldom retrieve his fame. I say seldom, because it does sometimes happen that the unfortunate commander has the chance of retrieving his reputation and does retrieve it, but if, as is generally the case, he has not the chance, his reputation is never repaired, and what is still worse, his past services and former brave deeds are often forgotten.

'Walpole's Royal and Noble Authors, ii. p. 300. A. Collins, in his Peerage, art. Cecil, Earl of Exeter, says, Sir Edward Cecil was one of the most famous generals of his time." Granger says the same, and gives General Cecil a place in his Biographical Dictionary of England, i. p. 396. See also honourable mention of Sir E. Cecil in Robert Codrington's Life and Death of the Illustrious Robert, Earl of Essex, &c., printed in 1646, and republished in Harleian Miscellany, i. pp. 216–239.

Few families can boast of having produced two such illustrious statesmen as William Cecil, the great Lord Burghley, and his illustrious son, Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury. If (as I take it to be) the real founder of a family is the one who first brings honour and renown to the name, and raises his family to a high estate, then can we dispense with the genealogists' conflicting statements as to the origin of the Cecils, and merely state that William Cecil, Lord Burghley, was the founder of this noble family. To those, however, who wish for more information, I may state that the Cecils are said to derive their descent from Robert Sitsilt, an assistant to Robert Fitz Hamon in the conquest of Glamorganshire, in the 4th year of King William Rufus. Aubrey, in his History of Surrey, says he was in Monmouth Church in 1656, and there was in the window of the church a very old escutcheon, as old as the church, belonging to the family of Sitsilt of Monmouthshire, of which family, he says, was the great Lord Burghley.2

The name of this family has been spelt at various times, Sitsilt, Sicelt, Seycil, Seisel, Cicil, &c.3

Whatever uncertainty there may be about the descent of Lord Burghley from the Sitsilts of Monmouthshire, it is proved beyond doubt that his grandfather, David Cissil, or Cecil, was the first of his family to settle in Lincolnshire. This David Cecil, of the parish of St. George, Stamford, had a son, Richard Cissel of Burghley, in the parish of St.

1 See an article on "The origin of the noble family of Cecil" in Notes and Queries, 6th series, vii. p. 384.

2 i. p. 15.

Camden's Remains, p. 140.

4 Lord Burghley, who was a great genealogist, drew up several pedigrees of his family with his own hand, and he deduced his descent from the ancient family of Sitsilt. See facsimile of a pedigree in Lord Burghley's handwriting (from the Hatfield MSS.) in Dr. Nares' Life of Lord Burghley, i. p. 8.

Martin, Stanford Baron, Northamptonshire, who in the 22nd year of Henry VIII. was Groom of the Robes to that Monarch, and Constable of Warwick Castle. He left issue by Jane his wife, daughter and heir to William Heckington, of Bourn, in Lincolnshire, a son William, "a person," says Dugdale," of great learning, singular judgment, admirable moderation, and comely gravity, who came to be the chiefest statesman of the age, wherein he lived, unto whose prudence in council, much is attributed for the blessing then enjoyed by that prosperous and happy government throughout the long reign of Queen Elizabeth of famous memory."1

Edward Cecil, the subject of this narrative, had the honour to be a grandson of this illustrious statesman, his father being Sir Thomas Cecil, only son of Lord Burghley by his first marriage with Mary Cheeke, sister to the learned Sir John Cheeke. Sir Thomas Cecil served, in the 16th of Elizabeth, as a volunteer in that expedition into Scotland, in aid of the Regent of that Kingdom, when the Castle of Edinburgh was besieged and taken. He afterwards distinguished himself in the Netherlands, and was made Governor of the Brill, one of the cautionary towns which the States of Holland pledged to Queen Elizabeth.2

In the memorable year of the Spanish Invasion, 1588, he, with his half-brother, Sir Robert Cecil, served as volunteers on board the English fleet. In 1601, Sir Thomas Cecil, then Lord Burghley, was installed a Knight of the Garter

3

Arthur Collins' Life of William, Lord Burghley, &c.

2 Rymer's Fadera, xvi. p. 4.

3 Brit. Biog., iii., art. "Cecil Lord Burghley ;" Biog. Brit., art. Cecil;" Chalmers' Biog. Dict., same life.

"Robert