I sent you word of the truly deplorable situation of the two poor Kinnairds; within one month deprived of both parents, and all their brothers in Yeomanry. When the last accounts were received, the present Lord Kinnaird was at Vienna. Lady K. did not, as I sent you word, die in her carriage, tho' in it when she was seized. Lord K. was dining at the Ordinary at Perth races and was seized at dinner, the Uvula descending into the Windpipe. He recovered sufficiently to return into the room, but did not survive many days. Lord Primrose [19] from whom the whole detail came, sent us also an account of his gaieties, he and his father had been a tour in Scotland and had not neglected to visit at Drummond Castle with which he was enchanted, which he could not well fail being, as the lady of the Castle [20] is a passionate admirer of it, and takes great pleasure in it and manages much about the Estate. We have at last concluded Roscoe's elaborate work, the Life of Leo X, and I do not think I shall ever go through the whole again. The Italian wars are tiresome and to me always most uninteresting. I neither like Leo's principles nor those of his biographer. Parts I shall certainly read again. The style is elegant, and he is an able apologist. I certainly should recommend parts of the work to you; it will be an amusement to you at Christmas. The comment of Mrs Stanhope, as a staunch Tory, upon the famous _Life of Leo X._, which was then attracting much attention, affords an amusing contrast to the extravagant praise bestowed upon the work by the Whigs of the day. Shortly after she had finished its perusal she must have returned with her family to Yorkshire, where a fresh excitement awaited her. "The Gallery at Bretton," she writes, "is to be painted, as well as the staircase. The Architect says, he has worked there six months already. We are going over to see the result of his labours." Bretton Park, which was then undergoing such complete renovation, is situated about a couple of miles from Cannon Hall, and its owner at this date afforded endless food for discussion both in Yorkshire and London. In a previous volume, [21] reference has been made to the celebrated Mrs Beaumont, or, as she was universally called by her generation, Madame Beaumont. The natural daughter of Sir Thomas Blackett of Bretton, she had been made his heiress, and had married Colonel Beaumont, M.P. for York. Although Mrs Stanhope and many others then living could remember her as a village girl riding to Penistone every market day to sell butter and eggs, Mrs Beaumont successfully ignored any such unpleasant reminiscences on the part of those acquainted with her early life, and continued to dominate a situation to which, thus heavily handicapped, she might well have succumbed.