Lady Palmerston died at Brockett Hall, Herta, this day week,
in the eighty-third year of her age. She was, when Countess Cowper, one of the first six patronesses of Almack's, and a great leader in the fashionable world, in the political circles of which indeed, as sister of one Prime Minister (Lord Mel- bourne) and the wife of another, she was destined to rule till within four years of her death. She patronized Lord Byron in 1814, who seemed to recognize in her something of the caprice of fashionable divinities, for he speaks of "My lady" on one occa- sion as being " very gracious,—which she can be more than any one, when she likes." The Times, however, in a biography evidently written by an out-and-out admirer, speaks of her friendships as -very constant, and her resentments as very placable, —" She never forsook a friend, and always forgave a foe." The same writer eulogizes greatly her "grace, refinement, sweetness of dis- position," &c. ; but it was hardly by these qualities alone, or what they suggest, that she so long ruled in the political drawing-rooms of England. Like almost all leaders of this kind, Lady Palmerston had a vast deal of fibre in her physique. Grace and refinement without bodily strength are of little account in a life of wear and tear such as hers. We are told that she ;managed personally all the accounts at Cambridge House, Brockett Hall, and Broadlands. She herself filled up all her visiting-cards till within a very short period of the end of her reign. She could "receive" for hours without her strength flagging. In a word, she could bear the awful fag, mental and physical, of her position, and find in it nothing but pleasant excitement. Perhaps the most charac- teristic and most pleasant trait told of her is her remark after Lord _Palmerston's death, that it had probably prolonged her own life, for she had been haunted by the fear that his strength and facul- ties would break down without his being conscious of the decline. In a word, to a great masculine and stout-hearted, but somewhat -worldly, politician of the pagan type, Lady Palmerston proved herself a thoroughly loyal and devoted helpmate.
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