There was a blend of simplicity, dignity, and kindliness in Mrs. Gladstone’s character that made her very attractive.  My family were exceedingly fond of her, and though two of my brothers were always attacking Mr. Gladstone in the most violent terms, this never strained their friendly relations with Mrs. Gladstone herself.  I always conjure up visions of Mrs. Gladstone in her sapphire-blue velvet, her invariable dress of ceremony.  Though a little careless as to her appearance, she always looked a “great lady,” and her tall figure, and the kindly old face with its crown of silvery hair, were always welcomed in the houses of those privileged to know her.

The Lyon family could do other things besides singing and acting.  The sons were all excellent shots, and were very good at games.  One brother was lawn-tennis champion of Scotland, whilst another, with his partner, won the Doubles Championship of England.

Glamis is the oldest inhabited house in Great Britain.  As Shakespeare tells us in Macbeth,

“This castle hath a pleasant seat; the air Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself Unto our gentle senses.”

The vaulted crypt was built before 1016, and another ancient stone-flagged, stone-vaulted hall leading out of it is the traditional scene of the murder of Duncan by Macbeth, the “Thane of Glamis.”  In a room above it King Malcolm II. of Scotland was murdered in 1034.  The castle positively teems with these agreeable traditions.  The staircases and their passages are stone-walled, stone-roofed, and stone-floored, and their flags are worn into hollows by the feet which have trodden them for so many centuries.  Unusual features are the secret winding staircases debouching in the most unexpected places, and a well in the front hall, which doubtless played a very useful part during the many sieges the castle sustained in the old days.  The private chapel is a beautiful little place of worship, with eighty painted panels of Scriptural subjects by De Witt, the seventeenth-century Dutch artist, and admirable stained glass.  The Castle, too, is full of interesting historical relics.  It boasts the only remaining Fool’s dress of motley in the kingdom; Prince Charlie’s watch and clothes are still preserved there, for the Prince, surprised by the Hanoverian troops at Glamis, had only time to jump on a horse and escape, leaving all his belongings behind him.  There is a wonderful collection of old family dresses of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and above all there is the very ancient silver-gilt cup, “The Lion of Glamis,” which holds an entire bottle of wine, and on great family occasions is still produced and used as a loving-cup, circulating from hand to hand round the table.  Walter Scott in a note to Waverly states that it was the “Lion of Glamis” cup which gave him the idea of the “Blessed Bear of Bradwardine.”  In fact, there is no end to the objects of interest this wonderful old castle contains, and the Lyon family have inhabited it for six hundred years in direct line from father to son.