Dangan afterwards (but at what time we are uncertain) became the property of the De Wellesleys or Westleys, alias Posleys, a family of the greatest antiquity and of Saxon origin, who had settled in the county of Sussex in England, one of whom was standard-bearer to King Henry II., in which capacity he accompanied that monarch into Ireland, and was rewarded for his services with large grants of lands in the counties of Meath and Kildare. From this illustrious ancestor sprang a numerous and respectable family, who received several distinguished marks of royal favour: and we find that in the year 1303 “Wulfrane de Wellesley and Sir Robert Percival were slain the second day before the calends of November” fighting against the Irish; and that John de Wellesley, who received from King Edward II. a grant of the custody of the Castle of Arden, was the first of the family created a Baron of Parliament, these honours being conferred on him as a reward for having in the year 1327 overthrown the Irish of Wicklow in a battle in which their leader David O’Toole was taken prisoner. But it is the modern, not the ancient history of Dangan Castle, which gives to it a more than ordinary degree of interest. Within those now silent chambers and tottering walls, on the 1st of May 1769, the great Duke of Wellington, the illustrious hero of Waterloo, commenced that auspicious life which was afterwards so replete with honour and renown. The grandfather of this truly great man, Richard Colley, succeeded to the possession of this castle and estate by bequest from his cousin Garrett Wesley or Wellesley, in the year 1728. He was descended from the Colleys of the county of Rutland, of whom the first who came to Ireland was Walter Colley, who migrated hither in the reign of King Henry VIII., and he settling at Kilkenny, was in the year 1537 appointed Solicitor-General, which office he resigned in 1546, but was soon after created Surveyor-General of Ireland. Richard Colley with the estate also took the name of Wesley or Wellesley, and was created Baron of Mornington in the year 1746. His son and successor Garret Colley Wellesley was on the 20th of October 1760 created Viscount Wellesley of Dangan, and Earl of Mornington. This nobleman died on the 22d of May 1781, leaving seven sons, the eldest of whom, Richard, second Earl of Mornington, was created Marquis Wellesley on the 2d day of December 1799; and the fifth was no less a person than the present Arthur Duke of Wellington, who was born (an extraordinary coincidence) in the same year which gave birth to Napoleon Bonaparte. In the year 1788 he received his first commission as ensign in the 73d regiment, and after going through the regular gradation he was presented with the lieutenant-colonelcy of the 33d regiment in 1793. Step by step he advanced, till, raised to the high pinnacle of rank on which he now stands, he commanded the British army in twenty-eight