History Headscratchers / DowntonAbbey

* From the [[Film/DowntonAbbeyANewEra second movie]]: Was that vase a prop? Was it shown anytime in the series prior to its stellar appearance in the film?

*** On the contrary, the will did have a legal effect. In Season 3, Robert had sold a 50% share in the Downton estate to Matthew for the duration of his (i.e. Robert’s) life (a life estate ''pur autre vie''). Holders of entailed property could sell life estates in that property for the terms of their own lives for much the same reason they could rent parts of it out—it does not alienate the property from the next in line to hold the title. And such a life tenancy could be inherited by the life tenant's heirs, since the measuring life was that of the grantor rather than the grantee. As an investment vehicle for Matthew to put the Reggie Swire bequest into Downton without just giving the cash to Robert, this arrangement made perfect sense (since he expected that at the end of Robert’s life, he’d inherit the whole thing). This, not familial courtesy, is why Matthew was brought into the management of the estate, and it’s also why Matthew spoke of "investing" his inheritance, not "giving" it: He ''had'' to be included in the decisions if he wanted to be, and he very much wanted to be after seeing how terrible his father-in-law was at business. This 50% life estate (measured, again, by Robert’s life, not Matthew’s), is what Matthew left to Mary by his will.

*** On the contrary, the will did have a legal effect. In Season 3, Robert had sold a 50% share in the Downton estate to Matthew for the duration of his (i.e. Robert’s) life (a life estate ''pur autre vie''). Holders of entailed property could sell life estates in that property for the terms of their own lives for much the same reason they could rent parts of it out—it does not alienate the property from the next heir male of the body. And such a life tenancy could be inherited by the life tenant's heirs, since the measuring life was that of the grantor rather than the grantee. As an investment vehicle for Matthew to put the Reggie Swire bequest into Downton without just giving the cash to Robert, this arrangement made perfect sense (since he expected that at the end of Robert’s life, he’d inherit the whole thing). This 50% life estate (measured, again, by Robert’s life, not Matthew’s), is what Matthew left to Mary by his will.

** Why did Matthew [[TookALevelInDumbass take such a level in dumbass?]] I get that he's still mourning Lavina's death, but he isn't stupid. Why would he have so much of a moral dilemma in accepting her father's money to save Downton--the home of his in-laws and his future children--and then let go of all of that angst with one letter?

** To add, Carlisle's motivation for most of his behaviour/threats was desperately trying to keep Mary one way or another - he admits that he did really love her and wants her to be happy. Once he knew she was gone, it almost seemed to be a weight off his shoulders.

* Why was there any doubt whether Mary and George would inherit Matthew's share of the estate etc? She was his legal wife and he was his legal, recognized heir, even if Matthew hadn't made a will, they'd still be first in line to receive any inheritance. No, Mary doesn't inherit Downton Abbey itself, the money tied up with the estate from Cora's wealth or get the title, but all his personal wealth and worldly goods (eg, if he still owned any property back in Manchester, or had any stakes in a solicitors business from his working days, as well as his clothes, books, etc) should go straight to her as next of kin - and George should get the estate and the associated bits (the title, the money, etc) as the now next heir of Downton.

** In simple terms, Rosamund would only be "Lady Painswick" if her husband was knighted or had a title; he wasn't knighted - rich, ''very'' rich, but only a mere banker - so she is just known as "Lady Rosamund" instead. You call a British lord or lady "Lord/Lady First Name" unless they're the Earl or Countess or Marquess of something, in which case it's "Lord/Lady Grantham/Flintshire" etc
** Not quite the whole story. Lady Rosamund is a Lady in her own right, as the daughter of an Earl. Even if Mr. Painswick had had a title, if it was lower in rank than hers it would still be insulting her to call her Lady Painswick and not Lady Rosamund. Hence Lady Edith would have been Lady Edith Strallan, not Lady Strallan, had she married Sir Anthony - his title is less important than hers and does not override it.
** OP here. So does that mean that because - if I understand correctly - Bertie Pelham as the Marquess of Hexham who outranks her, she is Lady Hexham and not Lady Edith?

** Duty? She's a very loyal member of staff, so likely thought she was duty-bound to tell her employers. Plus, although she may feel that he got what he deserved, she's probably still highly uncomfortable that said comeuppance was meeted out by someone under her authority.

** I'm quite sure the show never actually addressed this, but my guess is Robert would just as soon eat the cost if it meant never having anything to do with Anthony again. (Remember he found out immediately after Edith was jilted - literally minutes after - that Matthew was going to accept Lavinia's inheritance and they wouldn't have to sell after all. With that weight lifted off his shoulders, what's so bad about a wedding breakfast that ended up going to the servants?)

** Handing them that information, though, does seem to have put Bates into TooDumbToLive territory-almost literally.

** Yes, but Matthew pretending he can't dress up on his own doesn't make much of a difference about Molesley's livelihood. Standing there idly may be frustrating, but Robert makes it sound like Matthew at least wants to throw him into a dungeon and starve him to death. Even assuming their house is his only chance to get a job, and he couldn't do anything really useful, like helping out in Downton Abbey where there is too much work to do, or in some charity action of Isobel's, or doing errands in Matthew's office. This was rather guilt-tripping Matthew into a lifestyle he was uncomfortable in. Not to mention not Matthew is the lord yet. Why would he have to do '''Robert's''' job? And if he has to take the responsibility, where is the power with it? Has he no say in reforming the system, changing the "roles"? He didn't even '''want''' to be a FeudalOverlord, ever and despised the mannerisms of the highborn, and now he suddenly ''will'' be the next lord and has a dresser forced on him without his consent, which is another thing - has a valet nothing else to do in a household?
** Aside from maintaining his employer's clothes, a valet really didn't. Servant roles were very strictly delineated, unless you were a scullery maid like Daisy. Taking care of Matthew's clothes wouldn't have occupied all of Molsely's time, and doing other, non-valet tasks would have been seen as beneath him -- not just by Molsely himself, but by everyone. Servants had just as rigid a caste system as the people who employed them, and while it was silly and wasteful, it was the way society was. Doing the work of a footman or gardener, or even office aide, would have been considered horribly shameful by Molesly and everybody who knew him. Not until World War I would anyone have even dreamed of trying to shake the system up.

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit under English law (or Scots or Northern Irish law for that matter). The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife (in legal terminology, he lacked standing). Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, UsefulNotes/{{Greece}}, UsefulNotes/{{Portugal}}) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...).[[/note]] Plus, as an educated Englishman of his age, Gregson likely had at least some French, which would have made learning Portuguese even easier (both being Romance languages, the grammars and vocabularies are very similar).)\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit under English law (or Scots or Northern Irish law for that matter). The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife (in legal terminology, he lacked standing). Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, UsefulNotes/{{Greece}}, UsefulNotes/{{Portugal}}) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...). Plus, as an educated Englishman of his age, he likely had at least some French, which would have made learning Portuguese even easier (both being Romance languages, the grammars and vocabularies are very similar).[[/note]])\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit under English law (or Scots or Northern Irish law for that matter). The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife (in legal terminology, he lacked standing). Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, UsefulNotes/{{Greece}}, UsefulNotes/{{Portugal}}) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit under English law (or Scots or Northern Irish law for that matter). The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife (in legal terminology, he lacked standing). Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, Greece, Portugal) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit under English law (or Scots or Northern Irish law for that matter). The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife. Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, Greece, Portugal) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit under English law. The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife. Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, Greece, Portugal) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife?[[note]]As review, as a "lunatic" in the terminology of the day, she could neither be the guilty nor the innocent party in a divorce suit. The way this works is like this: Consider an attempt to base the divorce on the infidelity of one of the parties to the marriage. In a "normal" situation, Gregson's affair with Edith would be raised by his wife in a suit by her against him for divorce. But as a mental incompetent, she was incapable of raising a suit and thus could not raise her husband's adultery. Gregson, for his part, was not legally considered to have been injured by his own adultery, and thus could not raise it in a suit to divorce his wife. Meanwhile, if Mrs Gregson were to be unfaithful (the mentally ill can be perfectly capable of having sex, depending on the nature of the illness), Michael could not raise it in any suit to divorce her because she was not responsible for her actions. Hence his characterisation of himself as being "chained" to a madwoman.[[/note]] Of the three countries (Germany, Greece, Portugal) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife? Of the three countries (Germany, Greece, Portugal) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies,[[note]]Portuguese troops actually suffered the most on the Western Front in terms of time spent in the trenches--while the Brits, French, and Germans were all regularly rotated out, spending at most 2 weeks on the front lines every 2-3 months, the Portuguese regularly spent as long as 6 whole months at the front.[[/note]] and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\

*** That's not touching on the act that there was absolutely no reason for him to go anywhere. He was having an affair with Edith, and infidelity was most certainly grounds for divorce. Granted, he may not have wanted to be the guilty party and make Edith "the other woman", but it would have been an option.

** The title, yes. The estate... not necessarily. Unless there is an entail (and there is nothing to suggest that the Merton estate is entailed) the estate can be treated like any other piece of property. If Lord Merton is allowed unlimited access to other people, there's no telling what they might convince him to do... like will his fortune to the RSPCA or marry a doctor's widow or God knows what else. It's much safer for Larry in particular to keep him isolated and away from other people until he dies. Also, in case someone forgot, Larry Grey is an entitled asshole with no redeeming qualities whatsoever, who wouldn't balk at keeping his father isolated in his last days of life.

* Other than the RuleOfDrama, why did Michael Gregson go to ''Germany'' of all countries to effect his plan to divorce his wife? Of the three countries (Germany, Greece, Portugal) he mentioned to Edith as allowing divorce by reason of the other spouse's mental incapacity, Germany has by far the worst climate. If you're emigrating for a few years, why not make it somewhere nice? Plus while at that time Greece really only had weather to recommend itself over Germany (both countries required seven years for naturalization, and Greece was at war with Turkey at the time), Portugal offered a quicker path to naturalization (only three years!) and was at worst only slightly more unstable than Germany--a fact for which the quicker naturalization would compensate.[[note]]Reading "unstable" as "annual percentage risk of coup/other government change that would put your life in danger", the expected value of going to Portugal for 3 years in 1923 could not be that much worse than going to Germany for 7 that same year. (As things happened, Portugal had its coup in 1926, while Germany would hold out until 1933, but (1) it could have turned out either way from the standpoint of 1923, and (2) things got seriously nastier in Germany well before the coup.[[/note]] Plus, while the Germans were of course "the most hated race in Europe" at that time, Portugal had been one of the Allies, and [[BindingAncientTreaty had been on good terms with Britain since the 14th century]]. Portugal was thus host to a reasonably large community of British ex-pats (mostly involved in the wine trade) and there were therefore fairly frequent ships to England from Lisbon and Porto. About the only advantage Germany would have over Portugal is that Portugal was a bit of a backwater technologically--but not that much of one. (One supposes that Gregson might have found the prospect of learning German less daunting than learning Portuguese, but if he did he'd be a very odd bird indeed--most experts rate Portuguese as easier to learn for English speakers than German.[[note]]The Germans agree--as they say, ''[[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache]]!'' ("German language, tough language!" This is largely because, although English is in fact a Germanic language, (1) English absorbed a lot of Romance vocabulary, so while it probably shares less of its vocabulary with Portuguese than with German, it's still quite a chunk, and (2) English grammar, while wildly different from both Portuguese and German, is (more or less by accident) less dissimilar from Portuguese than it is from German. (How English got that way is...[[UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish complicated]], and no, the reason isn't just contact with Norman Old French, Old Norse is ''at least'' as responsible...)[[/note]])\\