born, a.d. 1625. died, a.d. 1678.

MARY BOYLE, Countess of Warwick, was the thirteenth child of the first Earl of Cork. Born in 1625, in 1641 she was married to the Earl of Warwick, whom she survived about five years. Her husband was only Mr. Rich at the time of the marriage, as the following copy of the register of marriages solemnised in the parish church of St. Nicholas, Shepperton, Middlesex, will show:—

“Mr. Charles Rich, second son to the Right Hon. Robert Earle of Warwick, and the Lady Mary Boyle, daughter to the Right Hon. the Earle of Cork in Ireland, were married the 21st of July, 1641.” Mr. Rich did not succeed to the Earldom until after the death of his eldest brother, in 1659. Two children were the issue of this marriage—a girl, named Elizabeth, who died whilst yet an infant; and a son, who died in his twenty-first year, a few months after his marriage with the daughter of Lord Devonshire. “I confess I loved him at a rate,” says the Countess in her Diary, “that if my heart do not deceive me, I could, with all the willingness in the world, have died either for him or with him, if God had only seen it fit; yet I was dumb and held my peace, because God did it, and was constantly fixed in the belief that this affliction came from a merciful Father, and therefore would do me good.”