Dean Gregory married Lady Mary Grey, the youngest daughter of Henry Grey, Duke of Kent (whose title died with him). She had much sorrow in her married life, as all her sons turned out badly, and if the people of her own day were as frank in their views about the dean and his wife, as one writer was in the beginning of this century, she must have felt her responsibility. ‘He had three sons,’ says this nameless chronicler, ‘who being by their mother connected with the English aristocracy, took to horses and dogs, and soon died out.’ Probably it was in his very gentleness that the kind old dean failed towards his sons, for he had such a horror of distress, that he could not bring it upon his children, however much they deserved it. They were a great scandal, and were, too, if one comes to think of it, the only failure in their father’s life. As a parent he is highly extolled by an anonymous writer, and, this in itself is touching enough, showing that his love was of the sort that disappointment cannot kill, and that in their very weakness he did not give them up. Possibly life did teach him to mistrust his sons, for he left his valuable library, in the event of none of his children following a learned calling, to his nephew, Dr James Gregory of Edinburgh. The will was badly worded, so that Professor James Gregory’s claim had to be disregarded, but the books were at all events not seized by his sons’ creditors, and they remained in the custody of Christ Church, and may now be found in the uppermost chamber of the closely locked Wake archives. David Gregory’s character was one which was much considered and criticised. Some of his contemporaries would allow him no good point, while others pronounced eulogies on his every action. One such eulogy, written with no great literary skill, was perhaps the work of an intimate acquaintance, stung into reply by the many attacks upon the memory of his friend. Of his social character this unknown biographer writes, ‘That cheerful, easy affability for which he was so remarkably distinguished, gained him the love and affection of all around him, which contributed very considerably to his institutions taking root so readily, and in so short a time flourishing so successfully: abroad he conducted himself with that dignity which his situation as governor of a great college necessarily required; though, under his own roof, he stripped himself of it all, and became, to everyone indiscriminately, the easy and familiar companion: he conducted himself in short, throughout, in such an admirable manner, that he was not only loved and esteemed, but honoured and respected; and as he was in his life most sincerely valued, so was he in his death truly and universally lamented.’