COTTINGTON 463 a house there. He ;«., in 1 622, Anne, widow of Sir Robert Bertt, da. of Sir William Meredith, of London, Treasurer of Flushing, by Jane, da. of Sir Thomas Palmer, ist Bart., of Wingham. She d. at Charing Cross, 22, and was bur. 23 Feb. 1633/4, in Westm. Abbey. Fun. cert. "He d. 19 June 1652, in his 74th year, at Valladolid, and, having become a Rom. Cath., was bur. in the Jesuits' Church there, whence his bones were removed and reinterred, 24 June 1678, in Westm. Abbey. M.I. Will dat. 16 June 1652, pr. 15 Aug. 1666, by his great-nephew, there having been previously, 3 Dec. 1 660, an admon. to a creditor. On his death, s.p.s., his honours became extinct.(^) Francis Cottington, ist s. and h. of Charles C, of Fonthill GifFord (d. 22 Dec. 1697), by Alethea, his wife, was b. before 14 Oct. 1687 (when his mother d.); was a minor at his father's death. In Apr. 1716 he was cr., by the titular King James III, BARON COTTINGTON, of Fonthill Gifford, CO. W^ilts, with rem., failing heirs male of his body, to his br., John C. and the heirs male of his body.C") He m. ( — ), da. of ( — ). She d. 2 Sep. 1728. He d. 8 Sep. 1728, at West W^ycombe, Bucks. Admon. 9 Dec. 1728. [Francis Cottington, s. and h., a minor at his father's death, is be- lieved to have d. Mar. 1758.] COUPAR BARONY [S.] I. James Elphinstone (godson of King James VI [S.]), 2nd and yst. s. of James (Elphinstone), ist Lord I. 1607. Balmerinoch [S.], and his only s. by his 2nd wife, Mar- jory, da. of Hugh Maxwell, of Tealing, was cr. a Lord if) "Always looked like a Merchant, and had the least mien of a Gentleman." (Weldon's Mcmo'in). G.E.C. Clarendon, in his History of the Rebellion, calls him " a master of temper and of the most profound dissimulation "; and later on in the same work says, " He had a very fine and extraordinar}' understanding in the nature of beasts and birds, and above all in all kinds of plantations and arts of husbandry. He was born a gentleman both by his father and mother . . . His mother was a Stafford [sic], nearly allied to Sir Edward Stafford . . . He was of an excellent humour and very easy to live with, and under a grave countenance covered the most mirth and caused more than any man . . . though he loved money very well and did not warily enough consider the circumstances of getting it, he spent it well all ways but in giving which he did not affect . . . He left behind him a greater esteem of his parts than love of his person . . . His greatest fault was that he could dissemble and make men believe that he loved them very well when he cared not for them." Browning, in his Straf- ford, Act I, Sc. i, describes him, by the mouth of Rudyard, as "the muck worm Cot- tington." V.G. C") For the Jacobite Peerage see vol. i, Appendix F.
