"Each was," to quote another description, "divinely tall, with a figure of perfect symmetry, and a grace of dignity enhanced by the proud poise of the small Grecian head. Faultless also were the rounded arms and the hands, with their long, slender tapering fingers."
All the portraits of Elizabeth reveal the same dainty disdainful lips in the shape of a Cupid's bow, the long, slender nose, the half-drooping lids and lashes. In colouring there was the same delicacy. A soft, ivory pallor shone in her face, a flush of pink warmed her cheeks, there was a gleam of gold as the sunbeams touched her light brown hair.
Such, in the cold medium of type, were the two Irish sisters who took London by storm, and who "made more noise than any of their predecessors since the days of Helen," in the summer of 1751. Their conquest was immediate, electrifying. London raved about the new beauties; they were the theme of every tongue, from the Court to the meanest coffee-house. Even Grub Street rubbed its eyes in amazement at the wonderful vision, and ransacked its dictionaries for superlatives; and the poets, with one accord, struck their lyres to a new inspiration.
Whenever the sisters took their walks abroad "they were beset by a curious multitude, the press being once so great that one of the sisters fainted away and had to be carried home in her chair; while on another occasion their beaux were compelled to draw swords to rescue them from the mob." When, too, they once went to Vauxhall Gardens, they found themselves the centre of a mob of eight thousand spectators, struggling to catch a glimpse of their lovely faces or to touch the "hem of their garments."
When, in alarm, they sought refuge in a neighbouring box, the door was at once besieged by jostling, clamorous thousands, who were only kept at bay by the sword-points of their escort. And when, one day, they visited Hampton Court, the housekeeper showed the company who were "lionising" the place into the room where they were sitting, instead of into the apartment known as the "Beauty Room," with the significant remark, "These are the beauties, gentlemen."
With such universal and embarrassing homage, it is no wonder that all the gallants in town, from the rakish Duke of Cumberland downwards, were at the feet of the fair sisters, or that they had the refusal of many a coronet before they had been many weeks in London. Each sister counted her noble lovers by the score, and each soon capitulated to a favoured wooer.
Among Maria's most ardent suitors was the Earl of Coventry, "a grave young lord" of handsome person and courtly graces, who had singled himself out from them all by the ardour of his wooing; and to him Maria gave her hand. One March day in 1752, the world of fashion was thrown into a high state of excitement by reading the following announcement:—
"On Thursday evening the Earl of Coventry was married to Miss Maria Gunning, a lady possessed of that exquisite beauty and of those accomplishments which will add Grace and Dignity to the highest station. As soon as the ceremony was over they set out for Lord Ashburnham's seat at Charlton, in Kent, to consummate their nuptials."
Of Lady Coventry, who seems to have been as vain and foolish as she was beautiful, many amusing stories are told. So annoyed was her ladyship by the crowds that still followed her when she took the air in St James's Park that she appealed to the King for an escort of soldiers, a favour which was readily granted to "the most beautiful woman in England," Thus, on one occasion, we are told,
"from eight to ten o'clock in the evening, a strange procession paraded the crowded avenues, obliging everyone to make way and exciting universal laughter. In front marched two sergeants with their halberds, then tripped the self-conscious Lady Coventry, attended by her husband and an ardent admirer, the amorous Earl of Pembroke, while twelve soldiers of the guard followed in the rear!"