Gift Of the Gods

Author’s NoteThe Gunning sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, arrived in London from Ireland in 1751. They were immediately pronounced the most beautiful women alive’, but they were so poor that for some time they used to share one gown between them. In 1752, Elizabeth, the younger, married the sixth Duke of Hamilton at half-past-twelve at night at the Mayfair Chapel, with ‘a ring from the bed-curtain.’ She had two sons who both became Dukes of Hamilton and, when her husband died in 1758, she married the Marquis of Lorne, who became the Duke of Argyll. The elder sister, Maria, married the sixth Earl of Coventry. Because OF her beauty she was mobbed in Hyde Park and the King insisted that she should have a guard of fourteen soldiers to protect her. She had five children, but she was only twenty-seven when she died of consumption after her health was upset by using cosmetics containing white lead. The fascinating little Madame Vestris, the pet of the Regency bucks and beaux, was notorious for her amorous interests as well as for her professional accomplishments. She blazed a trail of new attitudes and practises on the stage and her exquisite legs and her laughter were like a gleam of sunshine.