Soon after the dissolution of Furness Abbey, Richerde Ruskyn and his family were land-owners at Dalton-in-Furness.

One branch, and that with which we are especially concerned, settled in Edinburgh.
John Ruskin--our subject's grandfather--when he ran away with Catherine Tweddale in 1781, was a handsome lad of twenty.

His portrait as a child proves his looks, and he evidently had some charm of character or promise of power, for the escapade did not lose him the friendship of the lady's family.

Major Ross, her uncle and guardian, remained a good friend to the young couple.

She herself was only sixteen at her marriage--a bright and animated brunette, as her miniature shows, in later years ripening to a woman of uncommon strength, with old-fashioned piety of a robust, practical type, and a spirit which the trials of her after-life--and they were many--could not subdue.