Zbc Barls cf Xonsbale 42s 



abuse which his enemies hurled at him. Here is a speci- 

 men of the lampoons which galled him : — 



' Rich in words as he is poor in sense, 

 An empty piece of misplaced eloquence, 

 With a soft voice and a moss-trooper's smile, 

 The widgeon fain the Commons would beguile." 



It must have been an enormous relief to him to escape 

 at last from the distasteful and degrading surroundings 

 of office to the congenial pleasures of his Westmoreland 

 home. For, he was a better landscape gardener than 

 statesman and found far more interest in art than in 

 politics. He pulled down the old Lowther Hall, and 

 built an elaborate mansion, the ceilings of which were 

 painted by Verrio, whilst he himself designed the gardens, 

 and planted the woods which made the place the wonder 

 and pride of the North. To salve the sore left by his fail- 

 ure as the First Lord of the Treasury, he was created in 

 1696 Baron Lowther and Viscount Lonsdale, and thus 

 raised the ancient line of Lowther to the peerage. 



It is not given to many noble families to boast of 

 ancestors who have earned the sobriquets of both 'the good 

 lord ' and ' the bad lord.' One of the two, many houses 

 can proudly point to, but I think the Lowthers alone can 

 claim both. The ' good lord ' was Henry, the son of 

 the first Viscount. Robert, Earl Nugent, the big, hearty, 

 jovial Irish poet and politician, in whose praise as Lord 

 Clare, Goldsmith wrote, ' The Haunch of Venison,' 

 considered Henry, the second Viscount, ' the most per- 

 fect man he ever had the happiness and honour of being 

 acquainted with,' and wrote a most eulogistic, and, if 

 the truth must be told, somewhat fulsome epitaph as ' a 



