Mrs. Gunning's exchequer ; whence it came it is impossible to discover.
Glowing reports of the success of the " beautiful Misses Gunning " soon reached London, Bath, Paris, and other resorts of the great and wealthy. Their success as " beauties " undoubtedly was unprecedented in the annals of the Viceregal court, but to the reports were added vague rumours about dowries, which had no substantial basis whatever.
Mrs. Dewes consulted her sister, Mrs. Delany, on the subject, and that prolific writer, whose letters have been selected and published, replied from Delville, close to Dublin, on June 8, 1750:
"I have stole away to finish my letter, with a promise (this being a jubilee day) of playing to them [her guests] on the harpsichord as soon as I have done. All you have heard of the Misses Gunning is true except their having a fortune, but I am afraid they have a greater want than that, which is dis- cretion!"
An image should appear at this position in the text.Miss Gunning, afterwards Lady Coventry
London at Their Feet
Indeed, the financial strain soon became so severe that Mrs. Gun- ning arrived at the reasonable conclusion that a crowd of admirers was all very well, but that it was now time to make sure of a husband. At any rate, she determined to change the scene of action and proceed to London, if she could but get hold of a little ready money.
This the Irish Government helped her to obtain (it had a pleasant way of doing that sort of thing in those days), for she was accommodated with the annual increase of £150 to her very meagre income by having her name added to the Irish Establishment hst as a beneficiary to that amount. This providential assistance came at the right moment, and away Mrs. Gunning and her family went to England.
The Misses Gunning were "presented" in December, 1750, and immediately their beauty took England by storm.
Walpole writes to Sir Horace Mann in 1751 :
"You who knew England in other times will find It difficult to conceive what in- difference reigns with regard to Ministers and their squabbles. The two Misses Gunning are twenty times more the subject of conversation than the two brothers and Lord Granville. These are two Irish girls, of no fortune, who are declared the handsomest women alive."
The future Earl of Orford qualifies the value of the public declaration by adding:
"Their being two, so handsome and both such perfect figures, is their chief excellence, for, singly, I have seen much handsomer women than either."
In saying this Walpole, of course, only expresses his own opinion, with which the fashionable world and the people in the street evidently did not agree.
Wherever they went, the Misses Gunning were mobbed and followed; in the Park, at Vauxhall, and at every other social function. Grand dames at Court mounted chairs and tables to catch a glimpse of them, and people at the Opera paid more attention to their box than to the stage. A special guard of soldiers was suggested to keep the crowds back and maintain a passage for the "beauties" whenever they took their promenade abroad.
Elizabeth Becomes Duchess of Hamilton
A little before Christmas, 1751, the young and dissipated Duke of Hamilton, whose reckless ex- travagance and ill mode of living had sadly crippled his property and health, fell violently in love with Elizabeth, the younger of the two.
In due course he proposed to her and was accepted, and in February, 1752, when Mrs. Gunning and Maria were away at Bedford, mindful of the way in which Miss Chudleigh had jilted him, he urged Eliza- beth to marry him at once.
The lady was nothing loth, but the parson on being summoned to the house declined to tie the knot in the absence of a ring and a licence. This difficulty, however, was sur- mounted soon after midnight by means of a bed-curtain ring and the use of the Chapel in Mayfair.
The Duke of Hamilton was a Duke of three countries, England, Scotland, and France, and after the death of the Duke of Somerset, became the haughtiest peer in the realm. Indeed, he thought so much of himself and his position that he and the Duchess always walked in to dinner before their guests, and declined to drink to any- body beneath the rank of an Earl.
Her Second Marriage
Elizabeth's life with the Duke of Hamilton, however, was not a happy one, and when
