Spanish fiction -- Translations into English; Spanish poetry -- Translations into English
According to George Lipscomb's _History and Antiquities of the County
of Buckingham_ (London, 1847, vol. iv., p. 605, _n._ 1.), it was on
December 17, 1844, that "Her Majesty was pleased ... to permit the
family of Gyll of Wyrardisbury, to resume the ancient orthography
of their name." The enthusiastic Gyll (as we must now call him)
interpreted the privilege in a generous fashion. It galled the
patrician to think that his grandfather had been a lowly alderman,
and to know that this lamentable fact was on record at Wraysbury.
There were epitaphs in Wraysbury Church describing his grandfather as
"Alderman of the City of London"; describing his father as "only son
of Alderman Gill"; describing his aunt, Mrs. Paxton, as "daughter of
William Gill, Esq., Alderman of the City of London." Our Gyll had all
these odious references to the aldermanship removed; in their stead he
introduced more high-sounding phrases; he interpolated the statement
that his grandfather was "of the family of Gyll of Wyddial, Herts";
and on all three monuments he took it upon himself to change Gill into
Gyll. The changes were made clumsily and unintelligently, but one
cannot have everything. Gordon Gyll was indefatigable in his pious
work, and, within three years, he somehow induced Lipscomb (_op. cit._,
vol. iv., p. 604) to insert a pedigree connecting the family of "Gyll
of Buckland and Wyddial Hall, co. Herts, Yeoveny Hall, co. Middlesex,
and Wyrardisbury Hall, co. Bucks," with certain Gylls established in
Cambridgeshire during the reign of Edward I. It is impossible not to
admire the calm courage with which the still, strong man swept facts,
tombstones, epitaphs, and obstacle's of all kinds from the path of his
nobility.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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