Note 3 — Chapter I

[Miss Mary Berry was born at Kirkbridge, in Yorkshire, on March 16, 1763; her sister Agnes, who was her inseparable companion for eighty-eight years, fourteen months later. Her father, Robert Berry, was the nephew of a Scotch merchant named Ferguson, who purchased the estate of Raith, in Fifeshire. William Berry, the brother of Robert, and uncle of these ladies, succeeded to this property, and took the name of Ferguson. The Miss Berrys first made the acquaintance of Horace Walpole in 1788, when he was seventy years of age, and they became the objects of his devoted attachment and regard. See 'National Biography,' vol. iv. p. 397.]