Lady Victoria Campbell

CHAPTER I
CHILDHOOD AND HOME
" Oh, the garden I remember
In the gay and sunny spring."
Victoria Campbell, the third daughter and eighth
child of the Duke and Duchess of Argyll, was born
in London on May 22nd, 1854. The house where her
parents were living at that time was in Carlton House
Terrace. Argyll Lodge, the London home of the
family, had only just been purchased and was not yet
ready for occupation ; but very soon after this further
addition to the already large family, the new home-
stead was entered and became a centre of life and
interest to a wide circle of friends and relatives. It
was a year of deep anxiety at home and abroad.
The Crimean War had begun, and the Duke records
" how the final order to launch our comparatively
small army of some 30,000 men on the shores of the
greatest military country in the world was a trans-
action in which the closing formalities make a deep
impression. The final reading of the draft despatch
directing Lord Raglan to employ the Army in an
attack on the Russians in the Crimea came after a
Cabinet dinner held at Lord John Russell's house in
Richmond Park." It was near midnight when the