was created Viscount Doncaster, and in
February 1619 was despatched on a mission to Germany, where he
identified himself with the cause of the elector palatine and urged
James to make war in his support. In 1621 and 1622 he was sent to France
to obtain peace for the Huguenots from Louis XIII., in which he was
unsuccessful, and in September 1622 was created earl of Carlisle. Next
year he went to Paris on the occasion of Prince Charles's journey to
Madrid, and again in 1624 to join Henry Rich, afterwards Lord Holland,
in negotiating the prince's marriage with Henrietta Maria, when he
advised James without success to resist Richelieu's demands on the
subject of religious toleration. On the 2nd of July 1627 Lord Carlisle
obtained from the king a grant of all the Caribbean Islands, including
Barbados, this being a confirmation of a former concession given by
James I. He was also a patentee and councillor of the plantation of New
England, and showed great zeal and interest in the colonies. He became
gentleman of the bedchamber to King Charles I. after his accession. In
1628, after the failure of the expedition to Rhe, he was sent to make a
diversion against Richelieu in Lorraine and Piedmont; he counselled
peace with Spain and the vigorous prosecution of the war with France,
but on his return home found his advice neglected. He took no further
part in public life, and died in March 1636. Carlisle was a man of good
sense and of accommodating temper, with some diplomatic ability. His
extravagance and lavish expenditure, his "double suppers" and costly
entertainments, were the theme of satirists and wonder of society, and
his debts were said at his death to amount to more than L80,000. "He
left behind him," says Clarendon, "a reputation of a very fine gentleman
and a most accomplished courtier, and after having spent, in a very
jovial life, above L400,000, which upon a strict computation he received
from the crown, he left not a house or acre of land to be remembered
by."

The charms and wit of his second wife, Lucy, countess of Carlisle, which
were celebrated in verse by all the poets of the day, including Carew,
Cartwright, Herrick and Suckling, and by Sir Toby Matthew in prose, made
her a conspicuous figure at the court of Charles I. There appears no
foundation for the scandal which made her the mistress successively of
Strafford and of Pym. Strafford valued highly her sincerity and
services, but after his death, possibly in