Gilly writes from Crome, Lord Coventry's seat in Worcestershire--
"Our life here for a while would not displease you, for we eat and drink
well, and the Earl (Coventry) holds a faro-bank every night to us, which
we have as yet plundered considerably.
"I want to know where to find you, and how long you stay at your
mansion-house; for it would not be pleasant to ride so far only to see
squinting Jenny and the gardener at the end of my journey. I suppose we
shall see you here, where you will find the Countess of Coventry in high
spirits and in great beauty."
We now come to a brief mention of two women, the most remarkable of their
day for popular admiration, if not for finish and fashion--the Gunnings,
afterwards Lady Coventry and the Duchess of Hamilton. They were the
daughters of an Irish country gentleman, John Gunning, of Castle Coote in
Ireland. On their first appearance at court in England, the elder was in
her nineteenth, and the second in her eighteenth year. They appear to have
excited a most unprecedented sensation in London. Walpole thus writes to
Sir Horace Mann--
"You, who knew England in other times, will find it difficult to conceive
what indifference reigns with regard to ministers and their squabbles. The
two Miss Gunnings are twenty times more the subject of conversation than
the two brothers (the Pelhams) and Lord Granville. They are two Irish
girls of no fortune, who are declared the handsomest women alive. I think
there being two so handsome, and both such perfect figures, is their chief
excellence, for, singly, I have seen much handsomer women than either.
However, they can't walk in the Park, or go to Vauxhall, but such crowds
follow them, that they are generally driven away." And this effect lasted;
for, two months after, Walpole writes--"I shall tell you a new story of
the Gunnings, who make more noise than any of their predecessors since the
days of Helen. They went the other day to see Hampton Court. As they were
going into the Beauty room, another company arrived, and the housekeeper
said--'This way, ladies, here are the beauties,' the Gunnings flew into a
passion, and asked her what she meant; they came to see the palace, not to
be shown as sights themselves."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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