Of this illustrious stock was one of whom we know just enough to make us wish to know more--the brave Sir Hugh Willoughby, who defended Lauder Castle in Berwickshire against both the French and Scots; and, though suffering the severest privations, with a mere handful of men, held it until peace was proclaimed; and who, as we are told, "by reason of his goodly personage, as also for his singular skill in war," was in 1553 chosen by "The Mystery, Company, and Fellowship of Merchant Adventurers," to command the first Arctic expedition that ever left the English shores--an expedition that was fated never to return, for before a year had passed Sir Hugh, with the crews of two of his ships, in all about 70 men, were frozen to death in the North Sea, about the very time that his grand-niece, the Lady Jane Grey, and her husband, Lord Guildford Dudley, perished upon the scaffold. Such was the Briton's fate, As with first prow (what have not Britons dared!) He for the passage sought attempted since So much in vain, and seeming to be shut By jealous Nature with eternal bar, In these fell regions in Arzina caught, And to the stony deep his idle ship Immediate seal'd; he with his hapless crew Each full exerted at his several task, Froze into statues; to the cordage glued The sailor, and the pilot to the helm. Scarcely had the solemn sound heard from the bell-towers of England, announcing the decease of King Henry the Eighth, died away, when Sir William Willoughby--descended through a younger line from William, fifth Lord Willoughby de Eresby--was raised to the dignity of Baron Willoughby of Parham, in Suffolk, the patent of his nobility bearing date February 16, 1547, the very day on which the remains of the defunct king were committed to the dust at Windsor. This Lord William, from whom the future owners of Shaw Place derived their descent, lived to a ripe old age, and died in 1574, leaving a son Charles, who succeeded to the barony, and who was then married to the Lady Margaret Clinton, a daughter of Queen Elizabeth's Lord High Admiral, Edward Clinton, first Earl of Lincoln. By her he had several sons, among them William, the eldest, who died in the lifetime of his father; Sir Ambrose; and Thomas, whose descendants we shall have occasion to refer to hereafter. Charles Lord Willoughby died in 1603, and was succeeded in the honours of his house by his grandson William, who had espoused the Lady Francis Manners, daughter of John, fourth Earl of Rutland, by whom he had three sons, Henry, Francis, and William, who successively became fourth, fifth, and sixth Lords Willoughby. Henry enjoyed the title only for a short time, and died before attaining his majority. Francis, who succeeded, married Elizabeth Cecil, a great granddaughter of the famous Lord Treasurer, William Cecil, Lord Burghley. On the breaking out of the great Civil War, he took sides against the King,