HENRY DANVERS,

EARL OF DANBY,

THE first and last of his family who held that dignity, seems to have owed his elevation as much to its great wealth, and to the splendour of his descent, both on the side of his father and mother, as to any distinguished personal merits. He was the second son of Sir John Danvers, of Dantsey, in Wilts, maternally of very noble blood, by Elizabeth, daughter and coheir of John, ninth and last Lord Latimer of the Nevilles, and was born on the twenty-eighth of June, 1573.

Our notices of the story of his life are few and desultory. We are told that he was early engaged in military service in the Netherlands as a volunteer under Prince Maurice, who appointed him, at the age of eighteen, to the command of a company of infantry; and that he was, three years after, with higher rank, in the armies of France, in which he served with such gallantry that he was honoured with knighthood in the field by the hand of Henry the fourth. How long he remained abroad is uncertain, but we find him in 1597 commanding "a large ship" in the expedition of that year to the coast of Spain, under the Admiral Earl of Nottingham, who is said to have reputed him "one of the best captains in his fleet." In this voyage he acquired, probably through a medium of interest which will presently be mentioned, the patronage of Essex, who commanded the troops, and who, soon after his return, was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, where Danvers was immediately placed by him in the stations of