of 1805 was painted by G. Garrard, A.R.A., and afterwards engraved. It presents to our view about 150 portraits, some on foot and others on horseback, amongst them the Duke of Clarence, Mr. Coke of Holkham, the Duke of Bedford, and Lord John Russell, then quite a boy.

Woburn has been visited, in more or less of state, by several of our sovereigns. Queen Elizabeth made a journey thither in one of her progresses in 1572. It appears from a letter addressed by the Earl of Bedford to Lord Burghley, that he did not at all relish the task of entertaining Her Majesty, whose tastes were very expensive, not to say ruinous to her subjects; and so he expresses a hope that she will not stay beyond two days. Charles I., we are told, slept at the abbey in June, 1644, and again when he visited Woburn on his way to Oxford, on January 26th, 1645, notwithstanding the fact that its owner, the Earl of Bedford, was in the service of the Parliamentarian army. He spent a night there on a third occasion, in July, 1647, on his way from Holdenby, after the fatal battle of Naseby. A memorial of his visit, namely his walking-stick, is to be seen in the abbey, kept under a glass case. Woburn was one of the first of the seats of her nobility visited by Her Most Gracious Majesty, in company with her Royal Consort, in the summer of 1841, soon after her marriage.

The town of Woburn is strikingly deficient in picturesque objects. It is neat, clean, and regular; and having suffered from fire in the reign of Elizabeth, and again in that of George II., it has been almost entirely rebuilt in a modern style, red brick of a plain and unornamental type largely predominating. The most striking feature which it contains is St. Mary's Church, built by Richard Hobbes, the last Abbot of Woburn, and originally designed as a chapelry to Birchmore, the ancient parish out of which Woburn Abbey and Manor were carved. Its tower, which is short and embattled, stands detached from the main building, at the north-west. It is now used as a mortuary chapel. The church contains a fine monument to several members of the Stanton family, who once owned the Manor of Birchmore, in Woburn, but none to that of the Russells, all of whom, from generation to generation, are buried at Chenies, a village some miles off, across the Buckinghamshire border.

A new church was built at the expense of the duke in 1868 by Mr. Henry Clutton, at the cost of about £40,000. It is in the Early English style, with some semi-Norman details, and has a lofty stone spire. It stands between the town and the western entrance to the park. The old church being a donative in the gift of the Duke of Bedford, as impropriator and lord of the manor, was exempt from episcopal jurisdiction. The great tithes, which originally belonged to the Rectory of Birchmore, were appropriated to the monastery in 1308, as Tanner tells us in his "Notitia Monastica," and they still belong to the duke, as "Abbot" of Woburn.

The old town-hall of Woburn, which stands on the south side of the market-place, owed its erection to the Duke of Bedford, soon after the fire of 1724. It was again pulled down and rebuilt by another duke, in 1830, from the designs of Mr. E. Blore.

In the High Street are twelve almshouses, founded and endowed by John, Duke of Bedford, in 1672, for the maintenance of twenty-four poor widows, who have each a weekly pension and rooms; but the building is singularly uninteresting. There is also a school adjoining the west side of the churchyard, founded as a free-school for boys by Francis, Earl of Bedford.

PEDIGREE OF THE RUSSELLS.

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It has been lately converted into an infant-school; and the old rectory-house, on the other side of the church, is now devoted to parochial purposes.

Several stone coffins have been found at different times in the neighbourhood of the abbey; and in 1744, when a part of the old foundations was being removed, a corpse was discovered, with its flesh so sound and firm as to bear being cut with a knife. It had probably been embalmed by some process or other, and apparently must have lain there since the reign of Henry VIII.

Camden tells us, in his "Magna Britannia," that a fine fuller's-earth called "Woburn earth" was dug up here in his day, and that it was so valuable to the clothing trade that its export was strictly forbidden.

The noble house of Russell, of which the Duke of Bedford is the head, although it may not vie in historic interest with those of Howard, Talbot, and Stanley, can point back to an existence of upwards of 600 years in England; and at a still earlier date its members were seated in Normandy, where they bore the name of "Du Rozel." The first of the family who figures in the records of English annals is John Russell, Constable of Corfe Castle, Dorsetshire, in 1221; and from him was descended, in a direct line of seven generations, one Sir John Russell, Speaker of the House of Commons in the reign of Henry VI. His grandson, another John Russell, "one of the most accomplished gentlemen of his time," exchanged the lot of a plain country squire for that of a courtier and a peer of the realm by one of those lucky chances which may almost be termed freaks of fortune. Residing on the coast of his native county, Dorsetshire, in 1506, he joined in showing the hospitality of an English gentleman to the Archduke Philip of Austria, only son of the Emperor Maximilian of Germany, who on his voyage between Flanders and Spain was driven by a terrible storm into Weymouth. The prince, desiring to utilise his compulsory stay in England by visiting Henry VII., at Windsor, offered to take Mr. Russell as his companion. The offer being accepted, the latter was presented at Court, the prince strongly recommending him to the notice of the king. Arrived at Windsor he seems to have "played his cards" to perfection, for he was appointed by the king one of his gentlemen of the privy chamber, and he continued to hold the same post at Court under Henry VIII., whom he accompanied to the wars in France, attending him at the Field of the Cloth of Gold. Having discharged the duties of one or two high posts at home, in the spring of 1539 he was raised to the peerage as Lord Russell, of Chenies, in the county of Bucks, and in the following year received from the Crown a gift of the broad acres of the Abbey of Tavistock. Soon after the accession of the boy-king Edward he obtained a grant of the Abbey of Woburn, whose history is recorded above, and aiso that of the garden belonging to the Abbot of Westminster, now known as Covent (i.e., Convent) Garden. In 1550 he was raised to the Earldom of Bedford, a title which had previously been in the possession of several noble houses of De Bellomonte, De Coucy, Plantagenet, Neville, and Tudor-and had twice been conferred on near relations of the reigning sovereign.

His lordship was fortunate enough, in spite of having enjoyed the favour of Henry and Edward, to stand well also in the good graces of Queen Mary, who nominated him Lord Privy Seal, sent him as ambassador to Spain, to conduct her intended husband, Philip, to England, and presented him with the blue riband of the Order of the Garter. His son

and successor also was a Knight of the Garter, and was privileged to bask in the sunshine of Queen Elizabeth's favour.

This earl's youngest son, Sir William Russell, having been employed by Elizabeth in her military service in Flanders and in Ireland, was appointed Lord Deputy of the latter country, and was raised to the peerage by James I. as Lord Russell, of Thornhaugh, Co. Northampton. His son Francis, by the decease of his uncles and cousin without leaving issue male, became fourth Earl of Bedford, and, marrying one of the daughters and coheiresses of Brydges, Lord Chandos, had by her a family of four sons, the eldest of whom, William, the fifth earl, having taken an active part in the Revolution of 1688, was six years afterwards raised to the Marquisate of Tavistock and the Dukedom of Bedford.

By his

marriage with the daughter and heiress of Carr, Earl of Somerset, he had a large family, the eldest of whom was the patriot, William, Lord Russell, whose execution is recorded above. His only son, Wriothesley, married the heiress of the Howlands, of Streatham, Surrey, in consequence of which he was created Lord Howland. He became second duke on his grandfather's death, and is known as "The Good Duke"-the worthy son of a worthy father. He was the father of two sons, the younger of whom, John, fourth duke, was our ambassador at Versailles, and in that capacity signed the treaty of peace with France and Spain at Fontainebleau. He was the father of Francis, the fifth duke (a most popular nobleman, and eminent also as an agriculturist, and whose name is commemorated by a statue in Russell Square), and also of John, the sixth duke, who, through the forty years during which he was the head of the house of Russell, showed himself the friend and patron alike of agriculture and horticulture, and also of painting and sculpture.

EARL RUSSELL.

John was the father of Francis, seventh duke, and also of Lord John Russell, who, as a member of the House of Commons, carried the first Reform Bill, and afterwards twice held the Premiership, and was created Earl Russell. He was also the grandfather of the late and the present duke.

It has been the boast, and the legitimate boast, of the Russells that they have disputed for two centuries with the Cavendishes the leadership of the great Whig or Liberal party in the Constitution. It is not our part or duty in these pages to discuss such a question, but simply to state facts; and it certainly will not be denied, even by those who espouse the opposite cause in politics, that the Russells have, without an exception, stood forward as the champions of the popular cause, in spite of the fact that they have owed their rise to royal favour. They have helped on scientific agriculture in the central districts not only by supporting with their purses the improvement of farms and homesteads, and the breeds of

horses and sheep, but by aiding in the great work of draining the Fen Country; for the important and fertile district extending over parts of Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, Cambridgeshire, and Northamptonshire, now known as the Bedford Level, was drained mainly by their help, and certainly under their auspices, towards the close of the last century. The result has been that a boggy and fenny waste, fifty miles in length, which a century ago was scarcely worth cultivating, and which during a large part of the year was almost inaccessible on account of its meres and lakes, is now one of the finest corn-growing districts in England; so that it is scarcely an exaggeration to say that, like the Cistercians (their forerunners at the abbey), they have "made the desert smile."

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DUBLIN CITY.

The Beginning of Dublin-The Danes-Invasion of Henry II.-Gradual Growth of the Place-Dublin in the time of James II. -Dublin Castle-The First Fortress-Changes in the Building-St. Patrick's Hall-The Chapel Royal-Cork Hill-Bullies and Bravoes in Dublin-Dame's Gate-College Green-The Statue of William III.-Henry Grattan-St. Patrick's-The Earl of Ormonde-Restoration of St. Patrick's-Dean Swift-Francis Street-Meath Street-Thomas Street-The "United Irishmen "-Christ Church, its Early History, Decay, and Restoration-The Monuments.

N times more remote than the birth of Christ, there stood upon the summit of a hill covered with a wood of hazel-trees, a little town or fishing-village. The houses were as rude as primeval huts, being constructed of wattles woven together and daubed with mud. The hamlet extended from the spot where the present Castle of Dublin stands westward along the ridge to Kilmainham. The Irish aborigines called it "Drom Col Coille," or "The Hill of the Hazel-wood." Along the northern base of this hill, through a boggy marsh, ran the river Liffey eastward to the sea. To gain access to the river and to ford its dark water the fishermen made hurdles of wickerwork, and thence the little town acquired a new name, "Bally Ath Cliath" ("The Town of the Ford of the Hurdles "). Then it got a further descriptive addition, and became "Bally Ath Cliath Dubh Linne" ("The Town of the Ford of the Hurdles on the Black River"). In process of time the latter portion of this long-winded appellative was alone retained, and that eventually was modified to the name by which it is now known. Within two centuries the village had grown of sufficient importance to be noted by the geographer Ptolemy as "Eblana Civitas' --"Eblana" being supposed a corruption or Latinising of "Dublin." When St. Patrick came over to convert the Irish-towards the middle of the fifth century-Dublin, if we can trust the testimony of his biographer Jocelin, commanded the admiration of the apostle, and was the subject of a vaticination. "St. Patrick," he says, "departing from the borders of Meath, directed his steps towards Leinster, and having passed the river Finglass, he came to a certain hill about a mile distant from Ath Cliath, now called Dublin, and casting his eyes round the place and the circumjacent country, he is reported to have broken out into this prophecy: That small village shall hereafter be an eminent city; it shall increase in eminence and dignity, until at length it shall be lifted up unto the throne of the kingdom.""

In the ninth century, those adventurous sea-kings the Danes or Ostmen, following the tide of emigration westward, sailed up the Liffey and occupied the northern side, bestowing on it the name of "Fingal," or "The Land of the White Stranger;" while another party not long after took possession of the south side, which they called "Dubgal," or "The Land of the Black Stranger." They soon commenced to fortify the little town and enclose it with walls. But they were very speedily driven out by the Irish-to return, however, the next year and re-establish themselves in the city; and so with various