But she was mildness itself compared with that ‘she-devil,’ Bess of Hardwicke, who was wedded and a widow before her sixteenth year, and saw four husbands into the grave. She was the daughter of a rich Derbyshire gentleman, who died and left her his sole heiress at an early age. She fascinated and married a neighbour, the young and invalid Mr. Barley, whose property ranged with her own. He lived but a short while, and left her a charming widow with a great access of wealth. Her second venture was Sir William Cavendish, a Suffolk gentleman of good family and great property, whom she married and constrained to sell his Suffolk lands and settle with her in Derbyshire. She ruled him thoroughly, and he seems to have been little better than her chief director of works in the building operations that were a passion with this singular woman through the whole of her long life. Her home was at Hardwicke Hall; but she now began to build a very much more magnificent house at Chatsworth. She had not proceeded very far with this work before Sir William Cavendish, probably wearied out with being ruled in all things, followed her first husband to the grave. Lady Cavendish mourned him for a decent period, keeping her eye open the while for another eligible, whom she presently found in the person of the widower, Sir William Saint Lo, a captain in Queen Elizabeth’s guard and a gentleman of considerable property in the neighbourhood of Bath. But Sir William had a family, and she could not think of wedding him until he had made a settlement upon her of all his lands. He did so readily, this bluff soldier; for he was absurdly fond of her, as his letters show. He was, however, detained much in the service of the Queen, in London and at Windsor, and died very soon. [Illustration: ELIZABETH, COUNTESS OF SHREWSBURY. ]