Page:Wives of the prime ministers, 1844-1906.djvu/89

LADY PEEL Russia, and the Grand Duke of Saxony. Guizot, writing to Lord Aberdeen, said in referring to Lady Peel, "J'ai vu leur intérieur. Le bonheur le plus pur n'en est pas moins fragile."

The house in town with all its contents was left to Lady Peel, as well as a large sum of money under the deed of settlement. The remainder of her life was spent quietly in the society of her children and grandchildren and her intimate friends.

Lady Peel died suddenly of heart failure at her house in London on 28th October 1859. She spent the evening with her daughter, Lady Jersey, whose husband had died on the 24th. She returned home, went to bed seemingly in her usual health, but when her maid went to call her the next morning she found her dead. Many griefs had told on her. The deaths of her husband, of her sailor son, Captain William Peel, who, severely wounded at the second relief of Lucknow and while still weak, succumbed to an attack of small-pox at Cawnpore in 1858, and of her son-in-law, Lord Jersey, had been too much for her naturally delicate constitution. She was buried at Drayton beside her husband.

Lady Peel's individuality scarcely stands out apart from her husband. She was ever the 61