A Group of Noble Dames

The pedigrees of our county families, arranged in diagrams on the pages of county histories,
mostly appear at first sight to be as barren of any touch of nature as a table of logarithms. But
given a clue--the faintest tradition of what went on behind the scenes, and this dryness as of dust
may be transformed into a palpitating drama. More, the careful comparison of dates alone--that
of birth with marriage, of marriage with death, of one marriage, birth, or death with a kindred
marriage, birth, or death--will often effect the same transformation, and anybody practised in
raising images from such genealogies finds himself unconsciously filling into the framework the
motives, passions, and personal qualities which would appear to be the single explanation possible
of some extraordinary conjunction in times, events, and personages that occasionally marks these
reticent family records.