40 



Tlie Eminent Ladies of Wiltshire History. 



Family , published a few years ago ; partieularly her letters, in which 

 she gives an interesting" description of the domestic ways of Windsor 

 Castle in the time of George III. She died in 1788, at a great age 

 and blind. There is a portrait of her in the collection at Hampton 

 Court. 



I come now to our own times in naming a scientific lady of this 

 neighbourhood, who did good service in — a cause which ladies do 

 not often undertake — the Science of Geology. I mean the late Mjss 

 Etheleed Benet, of Norton Bavent, near Warminster. She studied 

 Geology in its very early days, before it had been taken up and 

 had reached the very important position which it occupies now. She 

 formed a very large and fine collection of the fossil organic remains 

 of that neighbourhood, especially of what is called the Green Sand 

 formation, a complete list of which is printed in Sir R. C. Hoare's 

 M History of the Hundred of Warminster.'''' I believe her collection 

 has been disposed of since her death. I used, when a student at 

 Oxford, to attend the lectures of the well-known Dr. Buckland, 

 who brought that science so prominently into notice, and I recollect 

 very well his speaking most highly of this geological lady, and how 

 her merits met with rather a curious reward. She had sent a set of 

 Wiltshire fossils as a present to the Museum at St. Petersburg. 

 The Emperor of Russia, wishing to acknowledge the gift by an 

 Imperial compliment, supposing from the Anglo-Saxon name of 

 Ethelred that the donor must be a gentleman, caused to be sent to 

 her a very grand diploma, conferring on Miss Ethelred the Honorary 

 Degree of Doctor of Civil Law in the University of St. Petersburg. 



There are a few other notices of ladies belonging to this county 

 in modern times, who have indulged in the luxury of writing books; 

 but I must quit these peaceful associations and pass to that other 

 mode of obtaining eminence which is open to ladies — the Art of 

 War. 



What Heroines have we in Wiltshire history ? If under this head 

 we may include a case not precisely of military valour, but of 

 courageous spirit in very horrible and tragic circumstances, it will 

 enable me to mention a noble old lady, who lived some centuries ago 

 indeed, but was born within three miles of Bradford, at Farley 



