nk Bouverie's son resolved, therefore, to take the bull by the
horns, and save all future trouble by obtaining a decree of court.
The family very unwisely resolved to oppose his claim. It seemed that
stories prejudicial to the character of the claimant's mother had been
in circulation, and the Bouveries grounded their opposition on the
allegation that the claimant [5] was not in truth a Bouverie at all.

On the other hand, ample testimony was adduced to show that Frank
Bouverie, notwithstanding his wife's irregularity of conduct, had
always regarded the boy as his son and heir; and one witness told how
the father had held the little fellow up to look at the picture of
his ancestral home, and said, "All that will one day be yours." So
the Bouveries' case broke down entirely, and the ex-private soldier,
ex-policeman, stepped into the fine old mansion of Delapre with sixty
thousand dollars a year. It is satisfactory to be able to add that he
has always borne an excellent character, and seems likely to duly
take his place as a country gentleman. Of course nothing but the bare
fabric and land came to him: the personalty was all left to his aunt,
the general's widow, an old lady near ninety, who yet survives; and it
was by her direction that the famous Linley picture once more changed
hands.

[Footnote 3: This lady's granddaughters, her son's daughters--the
duchess of Somerset, Queen of Beauty in the celebrated Eglinton
Tournament; the countess Gifford, mother, by her first husband, of
Lord Dufferin, viceroy of Canada; and the Honorable Mrs. Norton,
the well-known authoress--were famous in their day for beauty.
Gainsborough passed many years at Bath, where his intimacy with the
Linley family, then resident there, commenced. The following is from
Fulcher's _Life of Gainsborough_: "After returning from a concert at
Bath, where we had been charmed with Miss Linley's voice, I went home
to supper with my friend (Gainsborough), who sent his servant for a
bit of clay, with which he modeled, and then colored, her head--and
that too in a quarter of an hour--in such a manner that I protest it
appeared to me even superior to his paintings. The next day I took a
friend or two to his house to see it, but it was not to be seen:
the servant had thrown it down from the mantelpiece and broken it."
Gainsborough would now and then mould the faces of his friends in
miniature, finding the material in the wax candles burning before him:
the mode