PAGET, FAMTLY op. This noble family, though said to be of Norman extraction, do not trace their descent further back than the reign of Henry VII., in whose time one William Paget held the office of one of the sergeants-at-mace of the city of London. His son William, who was educated at St. Paul's schoOl. and at Cambridge, was introduced into public life by Stephen Gardiner, bishop of Winchester, early in the reign of Henry VIII., who sent him abroad to obtain the opinions of foreign doctors as to his contem plated divorce from Catharine of .Aragon. From this time forth his rise was rapid, and lie was constantly employed in diplomatic missions until the death of the king, who appointed him one of his executors. He now adhered to the party of the protector Somerset, and was raised to the peerage in 1552, as lord Paget of Beaudesert. He shared in the power, and also in the fall, of the protector, and was heavily fined by the star chamber; who also deprived him of the insignia of the order of the garter. His disgrace, however, was not of long continuance, and a change taking place in the councils of his opponents, he soon obtained his pardon. On the accession of queen Mary, he was sworn a member of the privy council, and obtained several large grants of lands. Ile retired
from public life on the accession of Elizabeth, who regarded him with much favor, though he was a strict Roman Catholic. The representative of the family adhered to the cause of Mary queen of Scots, and suffered, in consequence, the confiscation of his prop erty. The fifth lord Paget so far departed from the traditionary policy of the family as to accept from the parliament the lord-lieutenancy of but he returned to his allegiance shortly afterward, and held the command of a regiment under the royal standard at the battle of Edgehill. llis grandson wars advanced to the earldom of Ux bridge, but this title becoming extinct, the representation of the family devolved on a. female, who carried the barony of Paget by marriage into the house of Bayly. The son of this marriage, however, haviug assumed the name of Paget, obtained a renewal of the earldom of Uxbridge, and the second earl, for his gallantry at Waterloo, was advanced to the marquisate of Anglesey.- Of late years. the Paget family have usually held three or four seats in every parliament, and they have constantly supported the liberal party.