Intrigue between the two was the result, for it seems that Miss Blandy’s affection for this profligate man—­almost double her age—­was violent.  As might be expected, Captain Cranstoun not only worked upon her feelings, but imposed on her credulity.  He sent her from Scotland a pretended love powder, which he enjoined her to administer to her father, in order to gain his affection and procure his consent.  This injunction she did not carry out, on account of a frightful dream, in which she saw her father fall from a precipice into the ocean.  Thereupon the Captain wrote a second time, and told her in words somewhat enigmatical, but easily understood by her, his design.

Horrible to relate, the wicked girl was so elated with the idea of removing her father, that she was heard to exclaim before the servants, “who would not send an old fellow to hell for thirty thousand pounds?”

The fatal die was cast.  The deadly powder was mixed and given to him in a cup of tea, after drinking which he soon began to swell enormously.

“What have you given me, Mary?” asked the unhappy dying man.  “You have murdered me; of this I was warned, but, alas!  I thought it was a false alarm.  O, fly; take care of the Captain!”

Thus Mr. Blandy died of poison, but his daughter was captured whilst attempting to escape, and was conveyed to Oxford Castle, where she was imprisoned till the assizes, when she was tried for parricide, was found guilty, and executed.  Captain Cranstoun managed to effect his escape, and went abroad, where he died soon afterwards in a deplorable state of mind, brought about by remorse for the evil and misery he had caused.

Almost equally tragic was the fatal passion of Sir William Kyte, forming another strange domestic drama in real life.  Possessed of considerable fortune, and of ancient family, Sir William was deemed a very desirable match, and when he offered his hand to a young lady of noble rank, and of great beauty, he was at once accepted.  The marriage for the first few years turned out happily, but the crisis came when Sir William was nominated, at a contested election, to represent the borough of Warwick, in which county lay the bulk of his estate.  After the election was over, Lady Kyte, by way of recompensing a zealous partisan of her husband, took an innkeeper’s daughter, Molly Jones, for her maid; “a tall, genteel girl, with a fine complexion, and seemingly very modest and innocent.”  But before many months had elapsed, Sir William was attracted by the girl, and, eventually, became so infatuated by her charms, that, casting aside all restraints of shame or fear, he agreed to a separation between his wife and himself.  Accordingly, Sir William left Lady Kyte, with the two younger children, in possession of the mansion-house in Warwickshire, and retired with his mistress and his two eldest sons to a farmhouse on the Cotswold hills.  Charmed with the situation, he was soon tempted to build a handsome house here, to which were added two large side-fronts, for no better reason than that Molly Jones, one day, happened to say, “What is a Kite without wings.”  But the expense of completing this establishment, amounting to at least L10,000, soon involved Sir William in financial difficulties, which caused him to drown his worries in drink.