'A man so various, that he seemed to be
Not one, but all mankind's epitome:
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,
Was everything by starts, and nothing long;
But, in the course of one revolving moon,
Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon.'[1]

Such was George Villiers: the Alcibiades of that age. Let us trace one
of the most romantic, and brilliant, and unsatisfactory lives that has
ever been written.

George Villiers was born at Wallingford House, in the parish of St.
Martin-in-the-Fields, on the 30th January, 1627. The Admiralty now
stands on the site of the mansion in which he first saw the light. His
father was George Villiers, the favourite of James I. and of Charles I.;
his mother, the Lady Katherine Manners, daughter and heiress of Francis,
Earl of Rutland. Scarcely was he a year old, when the assassination of
his father, by Felton, threw the affairs of his family into confusion.
His mother, after the Duke of Buckingham's death, gave birth to a son,
Francis; who was subsequently, savagely killed by the Roundheads, near
Kingston. Then the Duchess of Buckingham very shortly married again, and
uniting herself to Randolph Macdonald, Earl of Antrim, became a rigid
Catholic. She was therefore lost to her children, or rather, they were
lost to her; for King Charles I., who had promised to be a 'husband to
her, and a father to her children,' removed them from her charge, and
educated them with the royal princes.

The youthful peer soon gave indications of genius; and all that a
careful education could do, was directed to improve his natural capacity