Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I - With his Letters and Journals. by Thomas Moore
page 13 of 357 (03%)

The shooten' o' guns, an' rattlin' o' drums,
The bugle in woods, the pipes i' the ha',
The beagles a howlin', the hounds a growlin';
These soundings will soon gar Gight gang awa'.
O whare are ye gaen, &c.

Soon after the marriage, which took place, I believe, at Bath, Mr.
Byron and his lady removed to their estate in Scotland; and it was
not long before the prognostics of this ballad-maker began to be
realised. The extent of that chasm of debt, in which her fortune was
to be swallowed up, now opened upon the eyes of the ill-fated heiress.
The creditors of Mr. Byron lost no time in pressing their demands; and
not only was the whole of her ready money, bank shares, fisheries,
&c., sacrificed to satisfy them, but a large sum raised by mortgage on
the estate for the same purpose. In the summer of 1786, she and her
husband left Scotland, to proceed to France; and in the following year
the estate of Gight itself was sold, and the whole of the purchase
money applied to the further payment of debts,--with the exception of
a small sum vested in trustees for the use of Mrs. Byron, who thus
found herself, within the short space of two years, reduced from
competence to a pittance of 150_l._ per annum.[10]

From France Mrs. Byron returned to England at the close of the year
1787; and on the 22d of January, 1788, gave birth, in Holles Street,
London, to her first and only child, George Gordon Byron. The name of
Gordon was added in compliance with a condition imposed by will on
whoever should become husband of the heiress of Gight; and at the
baptism of the child, the Duke of Gordon, and Colonel Duff of
Fetteresso, stood godfathers.
DigitalOcean Referral Badge