family died young one in the field and the other on the scaffold; and that each had a sister celebrated for their charms by the poets, and one herself a poet-the Countess of Pembroke, "Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother;" and Waller's Saccharissa.

In thus noticing the exalted principles and splendid characters of these Sidneys, it is a very natural and important question, what were the influences under which such men and women sprung up from one stock? Ben Jonson, in his visit to Robert Sidney, Sir Philip's brother, when Earl of Leicester, can partly let us into the secret:

They are and have been taught religion. Thence
Their gentle spirits have sucked innocence.
Each morne and even they are taught to pray
With the whole household, and may every day
Reade in their virtuous parents' noble parts,
The mysteries of manners, arms, and arts.
The Forrest, ii.

Sir Philip Sidney grew under the most favourable auspices. His mother was Mary Dudley, the daughter of the Duke of Northumberland, and sister of Lord Guildford Dudley, the husband of Lady Jane Grey. The tragedies which the enthronement of Lady Jane brought into her family, made her retire from the world, and devote herself to the careful education of her children. His father, Sir Henry Sidney, was, as I have already observed, one of the noblest and best of men, and one who, had he not been eclipsed by the glory of his descendants, must have occupied more of the attention of the

English historian than he has done. In his arms expired the pious young prince, Edward VI., who entertained the warmest friendship for him; and his conduct in the government of Ireland, of which he was thrice Lord Deputy, and all his recorded sentiments, exhibit him a rare example of integrity and wisdom.

Such were some of the Sidneys of other days; and, as if poetry were destined to break forth with periodical lustre in this family, it has now to add Percy Bysshe Shelley to its enduring names; for Shelley was a lineal Sidney. The present Sir John Shelley Sidney being his paternal uncle, and his cousin Philip Sidney, Lord de L'Isle, being the present possessor of Penshurst.

In these preliminary pages I have traced some of the causes which must throw a lasting and peculiar interest around Penshurst, let us now hasten thither at once.

Having received from Lord de L'Isle an order to see everything of public interest at Penshurst, accompanied by an expectation that he would himself be there, and ready to give me all the information in his power, I went there on Tuesday September 25th, 1838.

I took coach to Tunbridge on Monday, and after breakfast on Tuesday morning walked on to Penshurst, through a delightful country; now winding along quiet green lanes, and

now looking out on the great beautiful dale in which Tun

bridge stands, and over other valleys to my left. Green fields and rustic cottages interspersed amongst woods; and the picturesque hop-grounds on the steep slopes and in the hollows of the hills, now in their full glory; and all the rural population out and busy in gathering the hops, completed just such scenery as I expected to find in the lovely county of Kent.

The whole road as I came from town was thronged with huge wagons of pockets of new hops, piled nearly as high as the houses they passed, a great quantity of these going up out of Sussex; and here, at almost every farm-house and group of cottages, you perceived the rich aromatic odour of hops, and saw the smoke issuing from the cowls of the drying kilns. The whole county was odoriferous of hop.

*

The first view which I got of the old house of Penshurst, called formerly both Penshurst Place and Penshurst Castle,* was as I descended the hill opposite to it. Its grey walls and turrets, and high-peaked and red roofs rising in the midst of them; and the new buildings of fresh stone, mingled with the ancient fabric, presented a very striking and venerable aspect.

It stands in the midst of a wide valley, on a pleasant elevation; its woods and park stretching away beyond, northwards; and the picturesque church, parsonage, and other houses of the village, grouping in front.

From whichever side you view the house, it strikes you as a fitting abode of the noble Sidneys. Valleys run out on every

* Originally Pencester.

side from the main one in which it stands; and the hills, which are everywhere at some distance, wind about in a very pleasant and picturesque manner, covered with mingled woods and fields, and hop-grounds. The park ranges northward from the house in a gently-ascending slope, and presents you with many objects of interest, not merely in trees of enormous growth, but in trees to which past events and characters have given an everlasting attraction; especially Sir Philip Sidney's Oak, Saccharissa's Walk, and Gamage's Bower. Southey and Waller have both celebrated the Sidney oak. Southey says,—

That stately oak,

Itself hath mouldered now:

Zouch, in his life of Sir Philip, on the contrary, says it was cut down in 1768. It is probable that both statements are erroneous; for the oak which tradition has called "the Sidney Oak," and "the Bear's Oak," no doubt in allusion to the

Bear-and-ragged-staff in the Leicester arms, is still standing. Probably the one cut down, was what Ben Jonson calls "the Ladies' Oak."

Amongst the many tributes of respect to Penshurst, none are so graphic and complete as that of Ben Jonson. This is to the life. You see in every line that the stout old dramatist had walked over the ground, and beheld the house and the people which he describes. We shall have speedy reason to recur to this description to shew how true to the fact it is.

Thou art not, Penshurst, built to envious show
Of touch, or marble; nor canst boast a row
Of polished pillars, or a roofe of gold:
Thou hast no lantherne whereof tales are told;
Or stayre, or courts; but standst an ancient pile,
And these grudged at, art reverenced the while.
Thou joyst in better markes, of soyle, of ayre,
Of wood, of water: therein thou are faire.
Thou hast thy walkes for health as well as sport;
Thy Mount to which the Dryads do resort,

Where Pan and Bacchus their high feasts have made,
Beneath the broad beech and the chestnut shade.

That taller tree, which of a nut was set

At his great birth where all the Muses met.
There, in the writhed bark are cut the names
Of many a sylvane token with his flames.
And thence the ruddy Satyres oft provoke

The lighter Fawnes to reach thy Ladies' Oake.

Thy copps, too, named of Gamage, thou hast there,

That never fails to serve thee seasoned deere,
When thou wouldst feast, or exercise thy friends.
The lower land, that to the river bends,
Thy sheepe, thy bullocks, kine and calves do feed ;
The middle ground thy mares and horses breed.
Each banke doth yield thee coneys; and the topps,
Fertile of wood, Ashore and Sidney's copps,