Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/344

 “T 282 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9"‘S.VI.Oo'r.13,1900. which is rhaps less due to literary skill than to th; devoted affection of a riend. Those three chapters, as the writer truly says, contain ample matter for a modern novel. There actually was, he remarks, a female so various, so eccentric, and so lovely, that the only objection to relating her adven- tures in the guise of fiction is that truth and not imagination would form the basis of the work. Refinement, sensitiveness, a pride of family, combined with gentleness of manner, a passionate love o poetry, and an eager and ardent temperament, which endowed with a romantic halo every ob]ect on which she set her mutable aHections- these were the characteristics which gained for Ella Trefusis the love and admiration of her friends, but made for much unhappiness in life. One unfortunate adventure which she met with in her gouth long embittered her after ears. mong the numerous characters who at the close of the eighteenth century amused and scandalized by turns the more sober citizens of the Irish capital the most conslpicuous was Theophilus Swift a distant re ative of the great Dean of St. Patrick’s. While still a young' man he had distinguished himself bg rus ing into the controversial arena an Eublishlng( a pamphlet in defence of the Du e of Yor - who, it will be remembered, in 1789 fought a duel with Col. Lenox, who subsequently suc- ceeded to the dukedom of Richmond-upon a matter with which Swift had not the most distant concern. As this pamphlet contained some reflections upon the du e’s adversary, a second duel ensued, in which the unlucky champion of royalty received a shot throug his body. This was his only reward, and, probably in a fit of disagpointment, in the ollowing year he turn his talents for advocacy in a different direction, and endeavoured by every means in his power, though fortunately with an unsuccessful result, to shelter from punishment the notorious Renwick Williams, who by his cowardl and unprovoked assaults u n women had earned the designation of “ 'lllie Monster." Notwithstanding his wayward- ness, Swift was not destitute of some fine qualities, and his romantic disposition, com- bined with a genuine love of poetry, promoted him for a time to the position of a hero in the imagination of the young enthusiast. It may be interesting to note that Swift, who died in 1815, was the father of the late Edmund Lenthall Swifte,* whose varied ’ Mr. Lenthall Swifte Elled for many gears the omce of Keeper of the Crown Jewels in t e Tower stores of knowledge were for several years at the service of ‘ N. & QI] A further entangle- ment into which our eroine fell had also its element of romance. At a boardin -house in which her circumstances compelled her to lodge she became acquainted with an oflicer who was several years older than herself, and whose constitution was im ired by a wound that he had received in th: American war. The name of th1s officer is not recorded by Beloe, but I have good authority for identi- ymg him with the well-known Col. Barré. his elderly Whig seems to have exerted over Ella Trefusis an induence which both in kind and degree, may be compared with that recorded in a recent American novel, where a sexagenarian Senator inspires a Washington belle, who in most respects seems the ast expression of modernity with a feeling which was quite prepared to laugh at locksmiths, had not the author, in her capacity of  ea: machind, thought fit to intervene with a more conventional dénozl- mmt. In the case of Ella Trefusis, however her relations stepkped in, and in the words of the b1ographer,‘ orbade the banns.” Shortl afterwards the state of his health compelled the veteran to have recourse to the waters of Bath, and Ella, fearing that she would never see him again, not only released him from his engagement, but generously besought him to make no will in her favour, but to bestow his property upon a nephew whom he had always befriended. Thus ended a connexion which, in the opinion of those who were best disposed towards the heroine, afforded at no period any favourable prospect of a harmonious union. It is sad to reflect that the last days of this gifted creature should have been passed in poverty and neglect. Her mother, who was a daughter of the tenth Lord St. John, died when she was only thirteen years old, and her father two years afterwards. She was the eldest child, and was left to fight the world while still in the schoolroom. Her relatives seem to have been unsym thetic, and ‘probably found a difficult in undleli°stand- ing er complex character. <0/ith a fortune which might have secured by prudent man- agement an honourable, if not a splendid of London. He was born 20 Jime, 1777, and died % December, 1875 (5“ S. v. 31, 60, 79,160). His last contribution to ‘N. & Q.’ appeared in the number for 25 December, 1875, three days before his death. Maniy correspondents of ‘ N. & Q.’ have reached a goo old age, but there is no other instance of one stead1ly_ writin till his ninety- eiihth  _Some notices ofll1`heophi1us Swift. w be ound m5"* S. v. 153, IW, 434.