The Lady Grisell Kar, wife of Patrick Earle of Marchmont &ct Lord High Chancellour of Scotland &c.

A rare, half length portrait, enclosed in an oval, of Grizel Ker (1643-1703), wife of Partick Hume, 1st Earl of Marchmont (1641-1724). Plump and with a strong face and curled hair, she wears a plain dress with clasps up the front. Renowned for her piety and courage, she supported her husband throughout his adventurous life. An ardent presbyterian, Hume had opposed the Duke of Lauderdale and been implicated in the Rye House Plot to murder Charles II and his brother the Duke of York. After the execution of Lord Russell and Sidney in 1684, he escaped posing as a surgeon to Holland, where he was joined in poverty and exile by his wife and children. After supporting Monmouth in his doomed bid for the throne, Hume finally returned to Britain after the Glorious Revolution of 1688, where he was rewarded by William III with the restoration of his confiscated estates and the titles of Viscount Polwarth and later Earl of Marchmont.