The Mason County journal. [volume] (Shelton, W.T.) 1886-1927, 1890-05-30

High-Born English Dukes Extraordi
nary Wedding Ring.

The Russians make some very roman.
tic marriages. Peter the Great took
unto himself a servant maid, and in our
own days two Imperial Grand Dukes
Zone of them was the Grand Duke Con-
stantine) renounced all right of success
sion to the throne to marry a French
governess.
But the despotic will of the Car
makes it rather difficult for subjects
to indulge in such vagaries, and En-
gland is, after all, par excellence, the
country Of runaway matches Think
how for hundreds of years the Infamous
marriages at the prison of the Fleet,
the Kings Bench prison, the mint, the
Savoy and the chapel in Mayfair flour
ished, and how hard it was to abolish
them, such men as Charles James Fox
opposing their suppression. He had
kindly feeling for them, and well he
might, for his own father had been mar
ried there. And the high-boru Duke of
Hamilton, whose proud house looks with
disdain on Guelphs. regarding them as
lowly interlcpers, marrying one of tho
beautiful Miss Cummings, those famous
Irish sisters that took the town by
storm, in the Mayfair Chapel at mid
night with ring of bed-curtain!
Besant and Rice's charming novel,
''The Chaplain of the Fleet" has
described 80 wildly the peculiarities of
those strange weddings that we refrain
from dwelling any longer on Fleet mar
riages, lest we might be repeating a
twice-told tale; but it will be news to
many of our readers to learn that
Gretna Green was in full force till 1857,
when the new marriage law-reluctant-
ly enough granted, came into effect, re-
quiring English men and women to
reside six weeks in Scotland before be-
ing able to contract legal marriage in
that country-bereft 1t of its ancient
Slories.
Hither, in October, 1918, came rafting
up the great North Country roads that
brilliant legal luminary, Lord Erskine,
Lord Chancellor of England. Did he
ever, when seated in great dignity on
the ''woolsack," recall that wild gallon
and wilder escapade? His signature
scratched with a diamond is still to he
seen on a window of the old Queens
Head Inn," at Gretna, and copy of the
certificate is hung up in the room in
which he was married.
Lord Eldon, in his twenty-first year,
a penniless barrister, with brains a
plenty and briefs but few, eloped with
Miss Surtrees, of Newcastle. He, as
we'll as Lord Brougham, his successor in
the CHARACTERISTIC of England-truly,
risky trio of Lord Chancelors-patron-
lied Coldstream on the eastern border.
But great names of far more recent date
are to be found on these curious border
registers. Foreign Princes, English
Earls, innumerable Baronets, etc., etc.
In 1915 Lady Adela Villiers, youngest
daughter of the Earl of Jersey, whose
sister was married to "Prince Nicholas
Esterhazy, the Hungarian magnate."
eloped with Captain Ibbetson, following
the example of her grandmother, the
only daughter of rich Mr.. Childs, the
banker, who, in 1882, went off with Lord
Burghersh, afterward tenth Earl of
Westmoreland.
There may be seen the signature of
Lady Florence Paget, daughter of the
VI @AhS iOoOt3 ehO AhHoSOIucSU
woman in England, and the last Mar
quis of Hastings, uncle of Lady Flora
Hastings, the late Duchess of Norfolk.
The lady was betrothed TO Mr. Chaplin,
the present Minister of Agriculture,
the richest commoner in England. She
and her fiance went into great Lon
don jewelry house to have her finger
measured for the wedding ring. The
''shop" had another entrance at the
back, on adifferent street; this entrance
was shut off from the main part of the
store by kind of parlor.
Excusing herself on some pretext or
other, and asking Mr.. Chaplin to
await her return, the fair fance
went into the parlor and out
through the other door where a
carriage and four and the Mar
quis of Hastings were waiting for her,
and they were we'll on their way to the
border before the trick was discovered.
N. Y. Mercury and Journal.
RELIGIOUS AND EDUCATIONAL.