Note 48 — STORY OF THE COUNTESS OF STAIR.
Reading edition
‘Grace, Countess of Aboyne and Moray, in her early youth, had the weakness to consult a celebrated fortune-teller, inhabiting an obscure close in Edinburgh. The sibyl predicted that she would become the wife of two earls, and how many children she was to bear; but withal assured her that when she should see a new coach of a certain colour driven up to her door as belonging to herself, her hearse must speedily follow. Many years afterwards, Lord Moray, who was not aware of this prediction, resolved to surprise his wife with the present of a new equipage; but when Lady Moray beheld from a window a carriage of the ominous colour arrive at the door of Darnaway, and heard that it was to be her own property, she sank down, exclaiming that she was a dead woman, and actually expired in a short time after, November 17, 1738.’—Notes to Law’s Memorials, p. xcii.