128 KEW GARDENS 



Again, in a fit of disgust or adventurousness, he 

 started off to India, where he must have had 

 a wide field much to himself as a portrait 

 painter, and thence brought back gorgeous 

 pictures of A Tiger Hunt and A Cock 

 Fight, to revive his vogue in England. The 

 latter picture had the curious history of costing 

 an estate to a young Irishman who figures in it, 

 his father, Robert Gregory, having threatened 

 to disinherit him if ever he took part in cock- 

 fighting. 



Mrs. Papendiek grew up intimate with Mrs. 

 Zoffany, though this lady was looked on askance 

 in the genteel society of Kew, having been a 

 girl of humble birth, seduced by the painter at 

 fourteen and married afterwards on the death of 

 a deserted wife. She so far lived down the 

 rather squalidly romantic story of her youth 

 that her daughter's hand was sought by a rich 

 suitor, Colonel Martin of Leeds Castle, who shut 

 himself up here in single cursedness when the 

 obstinate young lady insisted on marrying a 

 plain and awkward young man named Horn, 

 whose father kept a prosperous school at 

 Chiswick, a match that turned out ill for the 

 couple and for the school. Zoffany, his wander- 



