Wales: A tale of two ladies ahead of their time
Telegraph, 4 May 2002.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/d...A-tale-of-two-ladies-ahead-of-their-time.html
' . . . together to Wales in 1778 . . . '
' . . . Their names were Lady Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby, but they were better known as the Ladies of Llangollen, "the two most celebrated virgins in Europe".
'Although the Ladies wished to live in "delightful retirement" - reading, writing, drawing and gardening - the fashionable world soon beat a path to their cottage door. Their visitors included the Duke of Wellington, Lady Caroline Lamb, Josiah Wedgwood, William Wordsworth, Thomas de Quincey, Prince Paul Esterhazy and the Duke of Gloucester; their pen-friends included Queen Charlotte, Lord Byron and Louis XVI's aunt. There were many days when the Ladies had up to 20 visitors in relays, entertaining literally morning, noon and night. . . . '
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' . . . (elope did not have the same marital connotation that it does today, it just meant run away). . . '
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