This is his mother's best eulogy. She died in 1831, shortly after her
son had become Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which office he earned
his greatest repute as a statesman.




[Illustration: ELIZABETH, DUCHESS OF HAMILTON by READ]


ELIZABETH GUNNING


The story of the Gunnings is as romantic as any ever wrought into
imaginative narrative or incorporated in epic poem. The notorious
damsels were daughters of John Gunning of Castle Coote, County
Roscommon, Ireland, by the Hon. Bridget Bourke, daughter of Theobald,
sixth Viscount Bourke of Mayo, whom he married in 1731. The family was
wofully impecunious; so when the daughters, Maria and Elizabeth, grew
into marvellously comely maidens, their mother urged their going on
the stage to augment the faulty fortune. They went to Dublin, and
there were kindly received by Peg Woffington, then in her glory as
_Sir Harry Wildair_, and by Tom Sheridan, manager of Dublin Theatre.
The stage had not then become the stepping-stone to the ranks of the
nobility, so the girls were advised to adventure socially, with their
faces for their fortunes. They had not the dresses to be presented in
at Dublin Castle, but Sheridan supplied these from the resources of
the green-room wardrobe. Attired as _Lady Macbeth_ and as _Juliet_
they made their curtsies to the Earl of Harrington, the then
Lord-Lieutenant.