"I will give you as good an account as I can remember of our wise
& good Grandmother Hopton, who I think was one Hall's daughter of
Devonshire without title, & had an elder brother, without child,
who said to his younger brother's wife, who was then with child,
if she would come to his house, & lie in, he would give his estate
to it if a daughter, & if a son it should fare never the worse: so
she had my grandmother, & he bred her up & married her to Sir
Arthur Hopton of Somerset: who had 4000 a year, & she as much.
"By him she had 18 children; 10 daughters married; whose names
were: Lady Bacon, Lady Smith, Lady Morton, Lady Bannister, & Lady
Fettiplace; Bingham, Baskett, Cole, Thomas, & my Grandmother
Ernle; these daughters & their children have made a numerous
company of relations. The duke of Richmond & Lord Maynard married
our Aunt Bannister's daughters & heirs (one to Rogers, the other
to Bannister).[1] Fettiplace, which was also Lord Jones, his
daughter & heiress married Lord Lumley, now Scarbro.
[Footnote 1: ("The Lady Bannister's first husband was Mr. Rogers,
of Brenson (_hodie_ Bryanston) near Blandford, in Dorsetshire: by
him she had the Dutchess of Richmond, who was heiress to him: she
had another daughter of Sir Robt. Bannister, who married Lord
Mainard."--_Added in another Version._)]
"Cole's heir to Popham of Wilts: & Hungerford, & Warnford married
Jones, & some Mackworth, & Wyndham in Wales; some Morgan, &
Cammish, & Kern, with many others that I have forgot. The sons
were Mr Robt Hopton, Sir Thomas, Sir Arthur. Robt had one son,
w'ch was the Lord Hopton of great worth, who married the Lord
Lewen's widow, and had no child: so the estate went to the
daughters. But our Grandfather Hopton, having so good an estate,
thought he might live as high as he pleased, & not run out: but
one day he was going from home but c'd not, but told his Lady she
w'd be left in great trouble, for the great debts he had made on
his estate; & that he knew he should live but few days, & c'd not
die in peace, to think what affliction he should leave her in: so
she desired him to be no way concerned for his debts, for he owed
not a penny to any one. So he died of a gangrene in his toe in a
few days. Now she had set up an Iron-work, & paid all he owed,
unknown to him. And she married all her daughters to great
estates, & great families: her eldest, I think, to one Smith, who
was a younger son, & went factor to a merchant into Spain; he had
a very severe master & was very melancholy & walked one morning in
Spain intending to go & sell himself a galley-slave to the Turks:
but an old man met him, & asked him why he was so melancholy; bid
him cheer up himself, & not go about what he intended, for his
elder brother was dead, letters were coming to him to return home
to his estate; bid him consider & believe what he said, & that
when he went for England, the first house he entered, after this
landing, he would marry the gentleman's eldest daughter: which he
did. The Lady Hopton's way of living was very great: she had 100
in her family; all sorts of trades; and when good servants married
she kept the families, & bred them up to several trades. She rose
at six of the Clock herself: went to the Iron-work, & came in
about 9; went with all her family to prayers, & after dinner she &
her children & grand-children went to their several works with her
in the dining-room, where she spun the finest sheets that are.
Every year she had all her children & grandchildren met together
at her house; & before they went away, would know if any little or
great animosities were between any of them; if so, she would never
let them go, till they were reconciled."