The year 1818 was chiefly passed by Francis Hare in Bavaria, where he became very intimate with the King and Prince Eugene. The latter gave him the miniature of himself which I still have at Holmhurst. For the next seven years he was almost entirely in Italy—chiefly at Florence or Pisa. Sometimes Lord Dudley was with him, often he lived for months in the constant society of Count d'Orsay and Lady Blessington. He was fêted and invited everywhere. "On disait de M. Hare," said one who knew him intimately, "non seulement qu'il était original, mais qu'il était original sans copie." "In these years at Florence," said the same person, "there were many ladies who were aspirants for his hand, he was si aimable, pas dans le sens vulgaire, mais il avait tant d'empressement pour tout le sexe feminin." His aunts Lady Jones and her sister Louisa Shipley constantly implored him to return to England and settle there, but in vain: he was too much accustomed to a roving life. Occasionally he wrote for Reviews, but I have never been able to trace the articles. He had an immense correspondence, and his letters were very amusing, when their recipients could read his almost impossible hand. We find Count d'Orsay writing, apropos of a debt which he was paying—"Employez cette somme à prendre un maître d'écriture: si vous saviez quel service vous renderiez à vos amis!"
The English family of which Francis Hare saw most at Florence was that of Lady Paul, who had brought her four daughters to spend several years in Italy, partly for the sake of completing their education, partly to escape with dignity from the discords of a most uncongenial home. To the close of her life Frances Eleanor, first wife of Sir John Dean Paul of Rodborough, was one of those rare individuals who are never seen without being loved, and who never fail to have a good influence over those with whom they are thrown in contact. That she was as attractive as she was good is still shown in a lovely portrait by Sir Thomas Lawrence. Landor adored her, and rejoiced to bring his friend Francis Hare into her society. The daughters were clever, lively and animated; but the mother was the great attraction to the house.
Defoe says that "people who boast of their ancestors are like potatoes, in that their best part is in underground." Still I will explain that Lady Paul was the daughter of John Simpson of Bradley in the county of Durham, and his wife Lady Anne Lyon, second daughter of the 8th Earl of Strathmore, who quartered the royal arms and claimed royal descent from Robert II. king of Scotland, grandson of the famous Robert Bruce: the king's youngest daughter Lady Jane Stuart having married Sir John Lyon, first Baron Kinghorn, and the king's grand-daughter Elizabeth Graham (through Euphemia Stuart, Countess of Strathern) having married his son Sir John Lyon of Glamis. Eight barons and eight earls of Kinghorn and Strathmore (which title was added 1677) lived in Glamis Castle before Lady Anne was born. The family history had been of the most eventful kind. The widow of John, 6th Lord Glamis, was burnt as a witch on the Castle Hill at Edinburgh, for attempting to poison King James V., and her second husband, Archibald Campbell, was dashed to pieces while trying to escape down the rocks which form the foundation of the castle. Her son, the 7th Lord Glamis, was spared, and restored to his honours upon the confession of the accusers of the family that the whole story was a forgery, after it had already cost the lives of two innocent persons. John, 8th Lord Glamis, was killed in a Border fray with the followers of the Earl of Crawford: John, 5th Earl, fell in rebellion at the battle of Sheriffmuir: Charles, 6th Earl, was killed in a quarrel. The haunted castle of Glamis itself, the most picturesque building in Scotland, girdled with quaint pepper-box turrets, is full of the most romantic interest. A winding stair in the thickness of the wall leads to the principal apartments. The weird chamber is still shown in which, as Shakspeare narrates, Duncan, king of Scotland, was murdered by Macbeth, the "thane of Glamis." In the depth of the walls is another chamber more ghastly still, with a secret, transmitted from the fourteenth century, which is always known to three persons. When one of the triumvirate dies, the survivors are compelled by a terrible oath to elect a successor. Every succeeding Lady Strathmore, Fatima-like, has spent her time in tapping at the walls, taking up the boards, and otherwise attempting to discover the secret chamber, but all have failed. One tradition of the place says that "Old Beardie"[5] sits for ever in that chamber playing with dice and drinking punch at a stone table, and that at midnight a second and terrible person joins him.
More fearful than these traditions were the scenes through which Lady Anne had lived and in which she herself bore a share. Nothing is more extraordinary than the history of her eldest brother's widow, Mary-Eleanor Bowes, 9th Countess of Strathmore, who, in her second marriage with Mr. Stoney, underwent sufferings which have scarcely ever been surpassed, and whose marvellous escapes and adventures are still the subject of a hundred story-books.
The vicissitudes of her eventful life, and her own charm and cleverness, combined to make Lady Anne Simpson one of the most interesting women of her age, and her society was eagerly sought and appreciated. Both her daughters had married young, and in her solitude, she took the eldest daughter of Lady Paul to live with her and brought her up as her own child. In her house, Anne Paul saw all the most remarkable Englishmen of the time. She was provided with the best masters, and in her home life she had generally the companionship of the daughters of her mother's sister Lady Liddell, afterwards Lady Ravensworth, infinitely preferring their companionship to that of her own brothers and sisters. Lady Anne Simpson resided chiefly at a house belonging to Colonel Jolliffe at Merstham in Surrey, where the persons she wished to see could frequently come down to her from London. The royal dukes, sons of George III., constantly visited her in this way, and delighted in the society of the pretty old lady, who had so much to tell, and who always told it in the most interesting way.
It was a severe trial for Anne Paul, when, in her twentieth year (1821), she lost her grandmother, and had to return to her father's house. Not only did the blank left by the affection she had received cause her constant suffering, but the change from being mistress of a considerable house and establishment to becoming an insignificant unit in a large party of brothers and sisters was most disagreeable, and she felt it bitterly.
Very welcome therefore was the change when Lady Paul determined to go abroad with her daughters, and the society of Florence, in which Anne Paul's great musical talents made her a general favourite, was the more delightful from being contrasted with the confinement of Sir John Paul's house over his bank in the Strand. During her Italian travels also, Anne Paul made three friends whose intimacy influenced all her after life. These were our cousin, the clever widowed Anna Maria Dashwood, daughter of Dean Shipley; Walter Savage Landor; and Francis Hare; and the two first united in desiring the same thing—her marriage with the last.
Meantime, two other marriages occupied the attention of the Paul family. One of Lady Paul's objects in coming abroad had been the hope of breaking through an attachment which her third daughter Maria had formed for Charles Bankhead, an exceedingly handsome and fascinating, but penniless young attaché, with whom she had fallen in love at first sight, declaring that nothing should ever induce her to marry any one else. Unfortunately, the first place to which Lady Paul took her daughters was Geneva, and Mr. Bankhead, finding out where they were, came thither (from Frankfort, where he was attaché) dressed in a long cloak and with false hair and beard. In this disguise, he climbed up and looked into a room where Maria Paul was writing, with her face towards the window. She recognised him at once, but thought it was his double, and fainted away. On her recovery, finding her family still inexorable, she one day, when her mother and sisters were out, tried to make away with herself. Her room faced the stairs, and as Prince Lardoria, an old friend of the family, was coming up, she threw open the door and exclaimed—"Je meurs, Prince, je meurs, je me suis empoisonné."—"Oh Miladi, Miladi," screamed the Prince, but Miladi was not there, so he rushed into the kitchen, and seizing a large bottle of oil, dashed