306 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 104. 



lect, which stated that the Countess actually out- 

 lived the "trust term for securing lier jointure" 

 (a period generally of ninety-nine years from the 

 date of marriage), "and was obliged in her old age 

 to appear in a court of justice to establish her 

 rights ; and that it was there and then she delivered 

 Walpole's anecdote to the judge and audience." 

 All these different yet concurring testimonies seem 

 satisfactorily to establish the fact that there was a 

 Countess of Desmond " passing old." 



Then, as to her celebrated picture, of which I 

 have frequently seen the original on wood, in pos- 

 session of the " Right Hon. Maurice Fitzgerald, 

 Knight of Kerry," and have now a print before 

 me, there are some particulars and questions 

 which may interest your readers. 



The print (same size as the original) is a mezzo- 

 tint, ten inches by seven inches and a half, and has 

 under it the following inscri[)tion : 



"Catherine Fitzgerald (the long-lived) Countess 

 OF Desmond, from an original Family Picture of the 

 same size, painted on Board, in tlie possession of the 

 llight HonoraMe Maurice Fitzgerald, Knight of 

 Kerry, &e. &c. &c., to whom this plate is most respect- 

 fully dedicated by her very obedient and much obliged 

 humble servant, Henry Pelham. 



" This illustrious lady was born about the year 1464, 

 and was married in the reign of Edward IV., lived 

 during the reigns of Edward V., Richard III., 

 Henry VII., Henry VIII., Edward VI., Mary, and 

 Elizabeth, and died in the latter end of James I., or 

 beginning of Charles I.'s reign, at the great age (as is 

 generally supposed) of 162 years. Published as the 

 Act directs, at Bear Island, June 4, 1806. By Henry 

 Pelham, Esq " 



In this print the features are large and strongly 

 marked ; the forehead and upper part of the nose 

 deeply wrinkled ; the head covered with a large 

 full black hood, showing no hair whatever about 

 the face ; the person wrapped in a dark ctloak, held 

 by a single button over the breast. As some of 

 your correspondents speak of jiortraits of this lady 

 at Knowle (Vol. iii., p. 341.), Bedgebury, and 

 Penshurst, it may be useful to compare them with 

 this description, ibr the following reason. 



Horace \Valpole, whose " mission " seems to 

 Lave been to raise "Historic Doubts," in a letter 

 to Rev. Mr. Cole, dated May 28, 1774, has the 

 following sentence : 



" Mr. Pennant has given a new edition of his former 

 Tour, with more cuts : among others is the vulgar 

 liead called the Countess of Desmond. I told him 1 

 had discovered, and proved past contradiction, that it is 

 RemhrandCa mother. He owned it, and said he would 

 correct it by a note : but be has not. This is a bruve 

 way of being an an'iquary ; as if there could be any 

 merit in giving for genuine what one knows to be 

 spurious." 



Tins is a very teasing passage. I have no copy 

 of Pennant's Tour by me; nor do I recollect ever 



to have seen one with the print here referred to. 

 Probably some of your numerous correspondents 

 will find one, and inform us, whether the print in 

 it resembles the description I have given. It is 

 not at all probable that Pennant's " cut" was 

 copied from the Knight of Kerry's picture : but 

 if it was copied from any of tliose mentioned by 

 your correspondents; and (/"tliese be duplicates of 

 the Knight of Kerry's " family portrait;" and if 

 Horace AValpole's cruel criticism on Mr. Pennant 

 be correct — then have we all been shamed with a 

 sham. These are a considei'able number of ifs, 

 upon which this conclusion depends; but in one 

 thing Walpole is correct : " there is no merit in 

 giving for genuine what one knows to be 

 spurious." 



Of the Mr. Pelham who published the print 1 

 have described, there are some particulars which 

 may interest your readers. He will be found 

 among the correspondents of the late General 

 Vallancey, whose interest in Irish antiquities is 

 well known. Mr. Pelham was an ingenious gen- 

 tleman, who came to Kerry in the end of the last 

 century, in the character of agent to the Marquis 

 of Lansdowne ; which engagement, after a few 

 years, he resigned, but continued in the county, a 

 zealous studier of its anti(iuities, and intending, as 

 I have heard, either a new County History, or a 

 reprint of Smitli's work. He was a good civil 

 engineer, and executed a great part of a large 

 county and baronial map, afterwards finished by 

 another hand. Mr. Pelham, who perished pre- 

 maturely by sudden death, in his boat, while 

 superintending the building of a Martello tower 

 on Bear Island, in the River Kenmare, in the 

 very year he published this print, is said to have 

 been an uncle by half-blood to the present Lord 

 Lyndhurst, whose grandmother, Sarah Singleton, 

 is said to have married to her second husband, 



Pelham, an American — Henry Pelham being 



the only issue of her second marriage, as John 

 Singleton Copley, father to the ex-chancellor, was 

 o( her tii'st. In my ne.xt I propose to consider the 

 question, Who Avas the old Countess of Desmond ? 



A. B. R. 



PANSL.WIC SKETCHES. 



The idea and ctmception of Panslavism .ire the 

 jiroduce of the latent political events on the Con- 

 tinent, viz. the idea of a re-crystallisation of a race 

 of people comprising even now sixty millions, and 

 which in former epochs extended from Arch- 

 angelsk to Tissalonichi, where it bordered on the 

 abodes of the Hellenic race. Having lost their 

 primeval (Indian) civilisation by migrations which 

 extend to times historical, the only monuments 

 testiiying to their most ancient origin are the 

 languages of these various tribes, — the Russians, 

 Czechs, Poles, &c. But these languages have all 



