hospitals, and repaired or built seven churches. But the singular act of her life is the letter she wrote to the secretary of state, after the restoration of Charles the Second, who had recommended a candidate for one of her boroughs. The Countess replied, "I have been bullied by an usurper, I have been neglected by a court, but I will not be dictated to by a subject; your man shan't stand. Anne, Dorset, Pembroke, and Montgomery." This letter excited great admiration.
The Countess of Pembroke was considered one of the most eminent women of her time for intellectual accomplishments, spirit, magnificence, and benevolence. She died in her castle at Brougham, March 23rd., 1675, at the age of eighty-six. She was buried at Appleby, in Westmoreland, under the monument she had erected. Her funeral sermon was preached by the Bishop of Carlisle, from a verse in the proverbs of Solomon—"Every wise woman buildeth her house." In her ended the Clifford family.
Although the Countess expended more than forty thousand pounds in building, and was truly royal in her acts of generosity and benevolence, yet she was prudent, economical, and exact to the last degree in her accounts. Bishop Rainbow calls her "a perfect mistress of forecast and aftercast." Her information was so extensive, that it was said of her "that she knew how to converse on ail subjects, from predestination to slea-silk." Her manner of living was simple, abstemious, and even parsimonious; and she was accustomed to boast that she had hardly ever tasted wine or physic.
CLIVE, CATHERINE,
Daughter of William Rafton, of Ireland, an actress of great merit, was born in 1711. She was quite young when she made her first appearance before the public, and for more than thirty years was considered the best performer, in high or low comedy, on the stage. In 1732, she married George Clive, a lawyer, and brother to Baron Clive; but this union was not a happy one, and they soon agreed to separate, and for the rest of their lives had no intercourse whatever.
Mrs. Clive left the stage in 1768, and retired to a small but elegant house near Strawberry-hill, in Twickenham, where she resided in ease and independence, respected by the world, and surrounded by friends. She died December 6th., 1785.
CLOTILDE,
Wife of Clovis, King of France, was the daughter of Chilperic, third son of Gandive, King of Burgundy. Gandive, dying in 470, left his kingdom to his four sons, who were for three years engaged in a constant contest to obtain the entire control of the country. At length the two elder princes succeeded. Chilperic and Godemar were murdered, Chilperic's first wife was drowned, his two sons killed, and Cotilde, still very young, confined in a castle. Clovis, hearing of her beauty, virtues, and misfortunes, and besides wishing to have an excuse for extending his dominions, sent to demand her in marriage of her uncle, who was afraid to refuse the alliance, though he foresaw the disasters it might bring on his country. Clotilde was married to Clovis in 493, at Soissons. She then devoted her whole life to the fulfilment of two great designs; one was to
