Once a Mistress

Codicil to the Last Will and Testament of

  George Ramsey, fifteenth Marquess of Templeston

  My fondest wish is that I shall die a very old man beloved of my family and surrounded by children and grandchildren, but because one cannot always choose the time of one’s Departure from the Living, I charge my legitimate son and heir, Andrew Ramsey, twenty-eighth Earl of Ramsey, Viscount Birmingham, and Baron Selby, on this the third day of August in the year of Our Lord 1818, with the support and responsibility for my beloved mistresses and any living children born of their bodies in the nine months immediately following my death.

  As discretion is the mark of a true gentleman, I shall not give name to the extraordinary ladies who have provided me with abiding care and comfort since the death of my beloved wife, but shall charge my legitimate son and heir with the duty of awarding to any lady who should present to him, his legitimate heir, or his representative a gold and diamond locket engraved with my seal, containing my likeness, stamped by my jeweler, and matching in every way the locket enclosed with this document, an annual sum not to exceed twenty thousand pounds to ensure the bed and board of the lady and any living children born of her body in the nine months immediately following my Departure from the living.

  The ladies who present such a locket have received it as a promise from me that they shall not suffer ill for having offered me abiding care and comfort. Any offspring who presents such a locket shall have done so at their mother’s bequest and shall be recognized as a child of the fifteenth Marquess of Templeston and shall he entitled to his or her mother’s portion of my estate for themselves and their legitimate heirs in perpetuity according to my wishes as set forth in this, my last will and testament.

  George Ramsey

  Fifteenth Marquess of Templeston

  Prologue

  Though the night was made for loving,

  And the day returns too soon,

  Yet we’ll go no more a roving

  By the light of the moon.

  George Gordon,

  6th Lord Byron, 1788—1824