136 THE CECILS
was engaged at Burghley for a space of twelve years, at an annual salary, it is said, of 1,500.* The portraits of himself, his wife and his children by Lely and Kneller 2 bear further witness to his love of art, and among the other artists he patronised was William Wissing, who painted portraits of several members of the family. Wissing died while at Burghley in 1687, and the Earl erected a monument to his memory in St. Martin's, Stamford.
Another still more illustrious inmate of Burghley was Matthew Prior, who, about the year 1689, on the recommendation of the Master of St. John's College, Cambridge, was appointed tutor to the Earl's sons. Several of his poems are dated from Burghley, 3 notably the lines " To the Countess of Exeter," beginning :
" What charms you have, from what high race you
sprung,
Have been the pleasing subjects of my song : UnskilTd and young, yet something still I writ, Of Ca'ndish beauty join'd to Cecil's wit."
Lord Exeter, with the Countess and three children, " in all thirty-six in family," set out in September, 1699, to go to the jubilee at Rome, intending to " continue in those parts " for three years. He was, however, taken very ill at Turin,
1 Charlton, p. 216.
2 The Earl formed a weird society at Burghley, called " The Honble. Order of Little Bedlam," of which Kneller was a member. See Hist. MSS. Com., 5th Report, 399.
8 See Introduction to Prior's Poetical Works, by R. B. Johnson (Aldine edition.Jji 892, I. xxii).
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