LADY HAMILTON A NURSERY-MAID.

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bestowed. Her life reads like a fable. She was the daughter of Henry Lyon, or Lyons, a labouring man, living at Preston, in Lancashire. He dying whilst she was still a child, the mother removed to Hawarden, in Flintshire, and there supported herself as best she could. As to bestowing education upon her offspring, to talk of it is absurd. The family belonged to the dragged-up class of the community, and when, by dint of instruction, perseverance, and uncommon tact in later years, Lady Hamilton contrived to correspond with the most notable people of her day, the difficulty with which she managed to spell correctly testified to the meagreness of her earliest acquisitions. It is presumed she was born in the year 1764, and the first years of her life after quitting home were spent in ordinary servitude. Her first engagement was as nursery-maid in the family of Mr. Thomas, of Hawarden, the brother-inlaw of Mr. Alderman Boydell; but she afterwards went to London and held the same situation in the house of Dr. Budd, who then resided in Chathamplace, Blackfriars, and was one of the physicians of St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Her fellow-servant here -the housemaid-singularly enough, became Mrs. Powell, the celebrated actress of Drury-lane Theatre. Years afterwards, when Lady Hamilton was in the meridian of her glory, and had won renown by her achievements and beauty, she visited Drury-lane Theatre with her husband, and Mrs. Powell performed upon the occasion. The admiration of the house was divided between the accomplished actress and the still more famous visitor. You may search the history of domestic servitude in vain for a parallel coincidence.

Leaving the service of Dr. Budd, Emma Lyon descended a step or two, and became the servant of a dealer in St. James's-market. Here her appearance and manners attracted the attention of a lady of quality, and she was invited to what, for want of a better expression, we may call a "higher sphere." With much leisure in the house of a fashionable lady, with an ardent temperament, an extraordinary capacity, and a strong will, she took up such books as fell in her way, and grew into a desperate novel reader. It is but fair to the memory of Lady Hamilton, who will have but little of the reader's sympathy after the next dozen lines are read, to state her difficulties and temptations at the outset of her career, and to show how far circumstances and society itself were guilty of her many offences. The trash of a circulating library was not the only poison that crept into her soul. She was already a lovely woman, full of energy and animation, endowed with great powers of mimicry, an exquisite ear, and an incomparable voice. Without education, and surrounded by flattery and vice, we must not wonder if the servant yielded to solicitations against which the well-born and the well-informed are not always proof.

We are told that she first became the mistress of Captain, afterwards Rear-Admiral John Willett Payne, but that she soon deserted this gentleman for the protection of Sir Harry Featherstonhaugh, Bart., of Up Park, Sussex. The baronet was fond of fieldsports; Emma Lyon, who excelled in whatever she attempted, took to riding in consequence, and rendered herself one of the most remarkable horse-women of the period. Up Park, Sussex, however, under the

SITS AS A MODEL TO ARTISTS.

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influence of its new mistress, became a scene of headlong dissipation; the protector was soon ruined, and the "protected" thrown upon the world, into which she went dishonoured. Friendless and without a home, it was perhaps creditable to the discarded woman to earn her livelihood by any honest means that offered. One Dr. Graham was delivering lectures at the time in the Adelphi, upon health and beauty, and Emma Lyon engaged herself to the quack as an illustration. Whatever may have been the merit of the lectures, there could be no doubt respecting the form that threw life and light upon them. Romney the Royal Academician, pronounced it perfect, and took it for the subject of his most celebrated pictures. Hayley, the friend of Cowper, in his Life of Romney tells us that the talents which nature bestowed upon this person, led her to delight "in the two kindred arts of music and painting; in the first she acquired great practical ability; for the second she had exquisite taste, and such expressive powers as could furnish to an historical painter an inspiring model for the various characters, either delicate or sublime, that he might have occasion to represent;" from which statement we may conclude that the intellectual ability, as well as physical beauty of the model, was appreciated and admired by Romney. The poet was as bewitched as the painter: both drew inspiration from the subject, and we have sonnets as well as portraits extant to perpetuate the loveliness that drove both mad.

We have said above that the existence of Lady Hamilton reads like a fable. Every step we take leads us further from what we are accustomed to

regard as real life, and deeper into the realms of fiction. We have seen the labourer's daughter, a poor servant girl, a rich man's mistress, the painter's hired model. We pursue her history. Whilst acting in the last-named capacity she became acquainted with Mr. Charles Francis Greville. Mr. Greville was the nephew of Sir William Hamilton, and famous in his generation "for his taste in objects of art and vertu." He offered a home to Emma Lyon, and the girl accepted it. But he did more! He attempted to cultivate the wild luxuriance of an undoubted genius, and to a certain extent with signal success. Could he have sharpened her moral perceptions as happily as he improved her mental endowments, he might have lost a mistress, but he would have spared the world much shame, and the woman he professed to love infinite degradation, and long and unavailing sorrow. She had masters for everything. Her knowledge of music was intuitive. Receiving instruction in the art, she soon sang to perfection. An anecdote told of the lady at this period is too characteristic to be omitted. Mr. Greville took her one night to Ranelagh, the Vauxhall of our fathers. Excited by the scene, and carried away by the admiration of those who surrounded her, she insisted upon a public exhibition of her vocal powers. She sang and met with rapturous applause. Upon returning home Mr. Greville, alarmed, remonstrated with the performer upon the impropriety of her act. He knew not the consummate powers of the actress with whom he had to deal. The rebuked penitent retired to her room, discarded the finery in which she was dressed, reappeared in a humble garment, and begged to be

IS THE MISTRESS OF MR. GREVILLE.

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dismissed. Reader, imagine the tableau, and form your own conclusion. Be sure the sorceress was not dismissed; she remained with her protector, and became the mother of three children, who called her aunt. Her own name had been changed from Lyon to Harte; for what reason we are not informed.

We are anxious as we proceed to let what glimmering of light we can upon this dark and melancholy picture. We need all the relief the subject affords, and cannot spare one sunny ray; the shadows fall deep and thick enough anon. In the midst of her renewed splendour the unfortunate woman remembered her mother and her home. Through life she continued attentive and affectionate in her conduct towards that mother, and so far vindicated humanity from the all but unredeemed disgrace her conduct otherwise threatened to inflict upon it. Mrs. Lyon, converted into Mrs. Cadogan in order to fit the poor woman for her equivocal elevation, came to her daughter whilst the latter enjoyed the protection of Mr. Greville, and partook of her child's good fortune.

Such good fortune, however, seldom abides. The affairs of Mr. Greville, like those of Sir Harry Featherstonhaugh, fell into disorder; though, in the case of the former, the French Revolution, and not the mistress, is chargeable with the disaster. In 1789 Mr. Greville reduced his establishment, called his creditors together, and parted with his mistress. We are loth to go on.

We have stated that Mr. Greville was famous "for his taste in objects of art and vertu." He had an uncle, already named, Sir William Hamilton, who