He had met her in the best class of company which he frequented, for, although bearing no rank herself, she was of the best blood and race, being indeed a niece to the Duke of Walton. Later on you shall see this girl, grown into a woman, full of sorrows and vexations and despite, and judge of her for yourself by that which I narrate. Suffice it, therefore, if I write down the fact that she repaid his love with hers in return and that, although she knew this handsome gallant, Gerald, Lord St. Amande to be no better than a wastrel, a tosspot and a gamer, she was willing to become his wife and to endow him with a small but comfortable fortune that she possessed. Alas! that she should ever have done so, for from that marriage arose all the calamities, the sufferings and the heartaches that are to be chronicled in this narrative.
From the commencement all went awry. George, Marquis of Amesbury, to whom this giddy, unthinking Lord St. Amande was kinsman and heir, did hate with a most fervent hatred John, Duke of Walton, they having quarrelled at the succession of the Queen, when the Marquis espoused the cause of her Majesty, while the Duke was all for proclaiming the Pretender; and thus the whole of Lord St. Amande's family was against the match. The ladies, especially his mother and sister, threw their most bitter rancour into the scales against the bride, they endeavoured to poison his mind against her by insinuating evil conduct on her part previous to her marriage, and they persuaded the Marquis to threaten my lord with a total withdrawal of his favour, as well as a handsome allowance that he made annually to his heir, if he did not part from her.
At first he would not listen to one word against her--he had not owned his bride long enough to tire of her; also some of her fortune was not yet wasted. Yet gradually, as he continued in his evil courses, becoming still fonder of his glass and rioting, and as her fortune declined at the same time that he felt bitterly the pinch occasioned by the withdrawal of the Marquis's allowance, he did begin to hearken to the reports spread broadcast against his young wife.
She had borne him a child, dead, during his absence in Ireland, and it was after this period that he began to give credence to the hints against her; and thus it was that while he was still in that country he sent to his mother a power of attorney, authorising her to sue to the Lords for a divorce, as his representative. This petition, however, their Lordships refused, dismissing the plea with costs against him, saying that there was no truth in his allegations, and stigmatising them as scandalous.