Catherine, were left early without a parent's guidance, and yet they succeeded in attaining to glittering honours. The life of the eldest was short, but brilliant; when only sixteen, she became the wife of James, fifth Duke of Hamilton, but died before she had completed her eighteenth year. She left an only son, the sixth Duke of Hamilton, who, by the lovely Miss Gunning, was father of two Dukes of Hamilton and of the Countess of Derby, the grandmother of the present Earl of Derby, who is heir-of-line of the house of Hamilton, and entitled to the crown of Scotland, failing the numerous progeny of King. James the First of Great Britain.

Lady Catherine, the third daughter, married in 1729, Alexander, sixth Earl of Galloway, and died at a good old age in 1786, universally loved and lamented, and was the ancestress of a numerous and distinguished progeny; among whom we may mention the Earls of Galloway, the Dukes of Marlborough, the Grahams, of Netherby, Stewart-Mackenzie of Seaforth, the Dukes of Sutherland, the Marquesses of Huntley, and the Dukes of Hamilton, of the present line.

We now come, after these necessary preliminaries, to the real object of our story. No union could promise fairer and better than that of Lord Strathmore and his beautiful Countess. But it

was cut short too soon by sudden and violent death. On Thursday the 9th of May, 1728, the Earl came to Forfar, in order to be present at the funeral of a young lady, the daughter of a friend. And as the custom was in those days, the principal persons who attended the funeral were entertained at a feast, in the house of mourning. Among the guests, were two Forfarshire gentlemen of family and consideration, the one a namesake of the Earl, Mr. Lyon, of Brigton, the other James Carnegie, of Finhaven. According to the barbarous practice of the times, they sat drinking after dinner, in the house of death, until they were rather intoxicated, when they adjourned to a tavern in Forfar, and continued their debauch. They were now completely drunk, and in this state they went from the tavern to visit a lady of station and character, who was then living in Forfar the Lady Aucherhouse, a sister of Carnegie of Finhaven.

Here Lyon of Brigton became very rude and violent, using insulting language to Finhaven, and presuming to dictate to him as to the disposal of his daughters in marriage, he having no sons. He tauntingly advised him to let one of them marry Lord Rosehill, son of the Earl of Northesk, which Finhaven declined. Lyon next began to pinch Lady Aucherhouse's arms, on which the Earl had

sense enough to see that their visit had better be curtailed, and had sufficient influence with his more turbulent companion to make him quit the house. But no sooner were they in the street than Brigton continued his persecution of Finhaven, tumbling him overhead into the dirty kennel, two feet deep, out of which he scrambled, covered with mud from head to foot. Resolved to bear this treatment no longer, he rushed, with his sword drawn, upon Brigton, who was in the act of pulling out Lord Strathmore's sword in order to defend himself, when the Earl, coming forward, as it would appear, to avert the blow of Finhaven, and possibly to separate the antagonists, received the weapon in his own body. It entered the abdomen, passed through his bowels, and came out at his back. The unfortunate nobleman died in two days, and Finhaven was tried for murder. The wish of the court evidently was to condemn him, if possible-witnesses being admitted who had expressed the most deadly enmity towards him. The jury, brow-beaten by the judges, were on the point of returning a verdict of proven as to the facts, which would have been fatal to the prisoner, as, in that case, he would have been condemned to death, but his counsel, Robert Dundas, of Arniston, sprung from a family that seemed to give its descendant an hereditary title to talent,

took his measures no less boldly than wisely; he assured the jury that they were judges of law as well as of fact; and, by this decisive step, had the double merit of saving his client and rescuing the rights of jurymen in Scotland from the grasp of tyranny. The jury, by a plurality of voices, found Carnegie of Finhaven not guilty.

Thus, at an early age, the beautiful Susanna was left a widow, with an ample dower. The earldom went to the next brother of the murdered lord, their union having been childless. From the year 1728 until the 2nd of April, 1745, the fair Countess continued a widow. During these eighteen years she had frequent suitors, but still remained faithful to the memory of her departed husband, though some of these were of high rank and distinguished station. The same propriety of conduct distinguished her now in the widowed as before in the married state, and she continued for many years respected and admired.

At length, when she was about thirty-six years of age, and still in the height of her charms, and with everything which rank, wealth, and popularity could give her; what think you, reader? did she marry wealth and rank? or did she, wearying of the world-as so many others have done-retire to a nunnery? Nothing of the kind,—she married her groom, George Forbes. To be sure, he was a

remarkably handsome young fellow, and was, besides, many years younger than herself, having been admitted, when a little boy, into the service of her late lord. He was also considered a clever young man, and had always behaved with modesty and propriety.

The progress of this ill-fated passion is easily traced. Forbes being an excellent horseman, the Countess placed him over her stud, and always had him with her when she rode out. Hence, in time, arose a familiarity; this, we may suppose, ripened into affection, till, at length, one day, she summoned George into her presence, and plainly told him that she was, and long had been desperately in love with him; that her fortune was very large, her charms not yet quite faded, and that if he only liked her she would immediately marry him! The man at first was frightened and thought she was gone crazy, and seems to have argued the point with his mistress more like a philosopher than a groom. He allowed that beauty, rank and wealth were temptations which he could not merit, but begged to remind her that unequal marriages were seldom happy, that he could not rise to nobility, and that it would be painful for her to sink down to his condition. However, she persisted, telling him that she looked to the beauty of his face and form, and the warmth