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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Wits and Beaux of Society, by 
+Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Wits and Beaux of Society
+       Volume 1
+
+Author: Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
+
+Release Date: March 19, 2006 [EBook #18020]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WITS AND BEAUX OF SOCIETY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Bill Tozier, Barbara Tozier, Patricia A. Benoy
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                 THE
+      WITS AND BEAUX OF SOCIETY
+
+                 BY
+       GRACE AND PHILIP WHARTON
+
+      New Edition with a Preface
+
+                 BY
+    JUSTIN HUNTLY MCCARTHY, M.P.
+
+  _And the original illustrations by_
+     H. K. BROWNE AND JAMES GODWIN
+
+         TWO VOLS.--VOL. I.
+
+              New York
+    WORTHINGTON CO., 747 BROADWAY
+                1890
+
+[Illustration: WHARTON'S ROGUISH PRESENT.]
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION.
+
+
+DEAR MR. AUGUSTIN DALY,
+
+May I write your name on the dedication page of this new edition of an
+old and pleasant book in token of our common interest in the people and
+the periods of which it treats, and as a small proof of our friendship?
+
+      Sincerely yours,
+    JUSTIN HUNTLY M'CARTHY.
+
+LONDON, _July, 1890._
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+    PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION                               p. xi
+    PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION                                p. xxv
+    PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION                                 p. xxix
+
+
+    GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.
+
+  Signs of the Restoration.--Samuel Pepys in his Glory.--A Royal
+      Company.--Pepys 'ready to Weep.'--The Playmate of Charles
+      II.--George Villiers's Inheritance.--Two Gallant Young
+      Noblemen.--The Brave Francis Villiers.--After the Battle of
+      Worcester.--Disguising the King.--Villiers in Hiding.--He
+      appears as a Mountebank.--Buckingham's Habits.--A Daring
+      Adventure.--Cromwell's Saintly Daughter.--Villiers and the
+      Rabbi.--The Buckingham Pictures and Estates.--York
+      House.--Villiers returns to England.--Poor Mary
+      Fairfax.--Villiers in the Tower.--Abraham Cowley, the
+      Poet.--The Greatest Ornament of Whitehall.--Buckingham's Wit
+      and Beauty.--Flecknoe's Opinion of Him.--His Duel with the Earl
+      of Shrewsbury.--Villiers as a Poet.--As a Dramatist.--A Fearful
+      Censure!--Villiers's Influence in Parliament.--A Scene in the
+      Lords.--The Duke of Ormond in Danger.--Colonel Blood's
+      Outrages.--Wallingford House and Ham House.--'Madame
+      Ellen.'--The Cabal.--Villiers again in the Tower.--A
+      Change.--The Duke of York's Theatre.--Buckingham and the
+      Princess of Orange.--His last Hours.--His Religion.--Death of
+      Villiers.--The Duchess of Buckingham.                      p. 1
+
+
+    COUNT DE GRAMMONT, ST. EVREMOND, AND LORD ROCHESTER.
+
+  De Grammont's Choice.--His Influence with Turenne.--The Church or
+      the Army?--An Adventure at Lyons.--A brilliant Idea.--De
+      Grammont's Generosity.--A Horse 'for the
+      Cards.'--Knight-Cicisbeism.--De Grammont's first Love.--His
+      Witty Attacks on Mazarin.--Anne Lucie de la Mothe
+      Houdancourt.--Beset with Snares.--De Grammont's Visits to
+      England.--Charles II.--The Court of Charles II.--Introduction
+      of Country-dances.--Norman Peculiarities.--St. Evremond, the
+      Handsome Norman.--The most Beautiful Woman in Europe.--Hortense
+      Mancini's Adventures.--Madame Mazarin's House at
+      Chelsea.--Anecdote of Lord Dorset.--Lord Rochester in his
+      Zenith.--His Courage and Wit--Rochester's Pranks in the
+      City.--Credulity, Past and Present--'Dr. Bendo,' and La Belle
+      Jennings.--La Triste Heritière.--Elizabeth, Countess of
+      Rochester.--Retribution and Reformation.--Conversion.--Beaux
+      without Wit.--Little Jermyn.--An Incomparable Beauty.--Anthony
+      Hamilton, De Grammont's Biographer.--The Three Courts.--'La
+      Belle Hamilton.'--Sir Peter Lely's Portrait of her.--The
+      Household Deity of Whitehall.--Who shall have the Calèche?--A
+      Chaplain in Livery.--De Grammont's Last Hours.--What might he
+      not have been?                                             p. 41
+
+
+    BEAU FIELDING.
+
+  On Wits and Beaux.--Scotland Yard in Charles II.'s day.--Orlando of
+      'The Tatler.'--Beau Fielding, Justice of the Peace.--Adonis in
+      Search of a Wife.--The Sham Widow.--Ways and Means.--Barbara
+      Villiers, Lady Castlemaine.--Quarrels with the King.--The
+      Beau's Second Marriage.--The Last Days of Fops and Beaux.  p. 80
+
+
+    OF CERTAIN CLUBS AND CLUB-WITS UNDER ANNE.
+
+  The Origin of Clubs.--The Establishment of Coffee-houses.--The
+      October Club.--The Beef-steak Club.--Of certain other
+      Clubs.--The Kit-kat Club.--The Romance of the Bowl.--The Toasts
+      of the Kit-kat.--The Members of the Kit-kat.--A good Wit, and a
+      bad Architect.--'Well-natured Garth.'--The Poets of the
+      Kit-kat.--Charles Montagu, Earl of Halifax.--Chancellor
+      Somers.--Charles Sackville, Lord Dorset.--Less celebrated
+      Wits.                                                      p. 91
+
+
+    WILLIAM CONGREVE.
+
+  When and where was he born?--The Middle Temple.--Congreve finds his
+      Vocation.--Verses to Queen Mary.--The Tennis-court
+      Theatre.--Congreve abandons the Drama.--Jeremy Collier.--The
+      Immorality of the Stage.--Very improper Things.--Congreve's
+      Writings.--Jeremy's 'Short Views.'--Rival Theatres.--Dryden's
+      Funeral.--A Tub-Preacher.--Horoscopic Predictions.--Dryden's
+      Solicitude for his Son.--Congreve's Ambition.--Anecdote of
+      Voltaire and Congreve.--The Profession of Mæcenas.--Congreve's
+      Private Life.--'Malbrook's' Daughter.--Congreve's Death and
+      Burial.                                                    p. 106
+
+
+    BEAU NASH.
+
+  The King of Bath.--Nash at Oxford.--'My Boy Dick.'--Offers of
+      Knighthood.--Doing Penance at York.--Days of Folly.--A very
+      Romantic Story.--Sickness and Civilization.--Nash descends upon
+      Bath.--Nash's Chef-d'oeuvre.--The Ball.--Improvements in the
+      Pump-room, &c.--A Public Benefactor.--Life at Bath in Nash's
+      time.--A Compact with the Duke of Beaufort.--Gaming at
+      Bath.--Anecdotes of Nash.--'Miss Sylvia.'--A Generous
+      Act.--Nash's Sun setting.--A Panegyric.--Nash's Funeral.--His
+      Characteristics.                                           p. 127
+
+
+    PHILIP, DUKE OF WHARTON.
+
+  Wharton's Ancestors.--His Early Years.--Marriage at
+      Sixteen.--Wharton takes leave of his Tutor.--The Young Marquis
+      and the Old Pretender.--Frolics at Paris.--Zeal for the Orange
+      Cause.--A Jacobite Hero.--The Trial of Atterbury.--Wharton's
+      Defence of the Bishop.--Hypocritical Signs of Penitence.--Sir
+      Robert Walpole duped.--Very Trying.--The Duke of Wharton's
+      'Whens.'--Military Glory at Gibraltar.--'Uncle
+      Horace.'--Wharton to 'Uncle Horace.'--The Duke's
+      Impudence.--High Treason.--Wharton's Ready Wit.--Last
+      Extremities.--Sad Days in Paris.--His Last Journey to
+      Spain.--His Death in a Bernardine Convent.                 p. 148
+
+
+    LORD HERVEY.
+
+  George II. arriving from Hanover.--His Meeting with the
+      Queen.--Lady Suffolk.--Queen Caroline.--Sir Robert
+      Walpole.--Lord Hervey.--A Set of Fine Gentlemen.--An Eccentric
+      Race.--Carr, Lord Hervey.--A Fragile Boy.--Description of
+      George II.'s Family.--Anne Brett.--A Bitter Cup.--The Darling
+      of the Family.--Evenings at St. James's.--Frederick, Prince of
+      Wales.--Amelia Sophia Walmoden.--Poor Queen Caroline!--Nocturnal
+      Diversions of Maids of Honour.--Neighbour George's Orange
+      Chest.--Mary Lepel, Lady Hervey.--Rivalry.--Hervey's Intimacy
+      with Lady Mary.--Relaxations of the Royal Household.--Bacon's
+      Opinion of Twickenham.--A Visit to Pope's Villa.--The Little
+      Nightingale.--The Essence of Small Talk.--Hervey's Affectation
+      and Effeminacy.--Pope's Quarrel with Hervey and Lady
+      Mary.--Hervey's Duel with Pulteney.--'The Death of Lord Hervey:
+      a Drama.'--Queen Caroline's last Drawing-room.--Her Illness and
+      Agony.--A Painful Scene.--The Truth discovered.--The Queen's
+      Dying Bequests.--The King's Temper.--Archbishop Potter is sent
+      for.--The Duty of Reconciliation.--The Death of Queen
+      Caroline.--A Change in Hervey's Life.--Lord Hervey's
+      Death.--Want of Christianity.--Memoirs of his Own Time.    p. 170
+
+
+    PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE, FOURTH EARL OF CHESTERFIELD.
+
+  The King of Table Wits.--Early Years.--Hervey's Description of his
+      Person.--Resolutions and Pursuits.--Study of Oratory.--The
+      Duties of an Ambassador.--King George II.'s Opinion of his
+      Chroniclers.--Life in the Country.--Melusina, Countess of
+      Walsingham.--George II. and his Father's Will.--Dissolving
+      Views.--Madame du Bouchet.--The Broad-Bottomed
+      Administration.--Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in Time of
+      Peril.--Reformation of the Calendar.--Chesterfield
+      House.--Exclusiveness.--Recommending 'Johnson's
+      Dictionary.'--'Old Samuel,' to Chesterfield.--Defensive
+      Pride.--The Glass of Fashion.--Lord Scarborough's Friendship
+      for Chesterfield.--The Death of Chesterfield's Son.--His
+      Interest in his Grandsons.--'I must go and Rehearse my
+      Funeral.'--Chesterfield's Will.--What is a Friend?--Les
+      Manières Nobles.--Letters to his Son.                      p. 210
+
+
+    THE ABBE SCARRON.
+
+  An Eastern Allegory.--Who comes Here?--A Mad Freak and its
+      Consequences.--Making an Abbé of him.--The May-Fair of
+      Paris.--Scarron's Lament to Pellisson.--The Office of the
+      Queen's Patient.--'Give me a Simple Benefice.'--Scarron's
+      Description of Himself.--Improvidence and Servility.--The
+      Society at Scarron's.--The Witty Conversation.--Francoise
+      D'Aubigné's Début.--The Sad Story of La Belle
+      Indienne.--Matrimonial Considerations.--'Scarron's Wife will
+      live for ever.'--Petits Soupers.--Scarron's last Moments.--A
+      Lesson for Gay and Grave.                                  p. 235
+
+
+    FRANCOIS DUC DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULT AND THE DUC DE SAINT-SIMON.
+
+  Rank and Good Breeding.--The Hôtel de Rochefoucault.--Racine and
+      his Plays.--La Rochefoucault's Wit and Sensibility.--Saint-Simon's
+      Youth.--Looking out for a Wife.--Saint-Simon's Court Life.--The
+      History of Louise de la Vallière.--A mean Act of Louis
+      Quatorze.--All has passed away.--Saint-Simon's Memoirs of His
+      Own Time.                                                  p. 253
+
+
+
+
+SUBJECTS OF THE ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+VOLUME I.
+
+
+                                                                   PAGE
+
+WHARTON'S ROGUISH PRESENT                              (_Frontispiece_)
+
+VILLIERS IN DISGUISE--THE MEETING WITH HIS SISTER                     14
+
+DE GRAMMONT'S MEETING WITH LA BELLE HAMILTON                          74
+
+BEAU FIELDING AND THE SHAM WIDOW                                      85
+
+A SCENE BEFORE KENSINGTON PALACE--GEORGE II. AND QUEEN CAROLINE      172
+
+POPE AT HIS VILLA--DISTINGUISHED VISITORS                            194
+
+A ROYAL ROBBER                                                       217
+
+DR. JOHNSON AT LORD CHESTERFIELD'S                                   226
+
+SCARRON AND THE WITS--FIRST APPEARANCE OF LA BELLE INDIENNE          247
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+When Grace and Philip Wharton found that they had pleased the world with
+their "Queens of Society," they very sensibly resolved to follow up
+their success with a companion work. Their first book had been all about
+women; the second book should be all about men. Accordingly they set to
+work selecting certain types that pleased them; they wrote a fresh
+collection of pleasant essays and presented the reading public with
+"Wits and Beaux of Society". The one book is as good as the other; there
+is not a pin to choose between them. There is the same bright easy,
+gossiping style, the same pleasing rapidity. There is nothing tedious,
+nothing dull anywhere. They do not profess to have anything to do with
+the graver processes of history--these entertaining volumes; they seek
+rather to amuse than to instruct, and they fulfil their purpose
+excellently. There is instruction in them, but it comes in by the way;
+one is conscious of being entertained, and it is only after the
+entertainment is over that one finds that a fair amount of information
+has been thrown in to boot. The Whartons have but old tales to tell, but
+they tell them very well, and that is the first part of their business.
+
+Looking over these articles is like looking over the list of a good
+club. Men are companionable creatures; they love to get together and
+gossip. It is maintained, and with reason, that they are fonder of their
+own society than women are. Men delight to breakfast together, to take
+luncheon together, to dine together, to sup together. They rejoice in
+clubs devoted exclusively to their service, as much taboo to women as a
+trappist monastery. Women are not quite so clannish. There are not very
+many women's clubs in the world; it is not certain that those which do
+exist are very brilliant or very entertaining. Women seldom give supper
+parties, "all by themselves they" after the fashion of that "grande dame
+de par le monde" of whom we have spoken elsewhere. A woman's
+dinner-party may succeed now and then by way of a joke, but it is a joke
+that is not often repeated. Have we not lately seen how an institution
+with a graceful English name, started in London for women and women
+only, has just so far relaxed its rigid rule as to allow men upon its
+premises between certain hours, and this relaxation we are told has been
+conceded in consequence of the demand of numerous ladies. Well, well, if
+men can on the whole get on better without the society of women than
+women can without the society of men it is no doubt because they are
+rougher creatures, moulded of a coarser clay, and are more entertained
+by eating and drinking, smoking and the telling of tales than women are.
+
+If all the men whom the Whartons labelled as wits and beaux of society
+could be gathered together they would make a most excellent club in the
+sense in which a club was understood in the last century. Johnson
+thought that he had praised a man highly when he called him a clubbable
+man, and so he had for those days which dreamed not of vast caravanserai
+calling themselves clubs and having thousands of members on their roll,
+the majority of whom do not know more than perhaps ten of their fellow
+members from Adam. In the sense that Dr. Johnson meant, all these wits
+and beaux whom our Whartons have gathered together were eminently
+clubbable. If some such necromancer could come to us as he who in
+Tourguenieff's story conjures up the shade of Julius Cæsar; and if in an
+obliging way he could make these wits and beaux greet us: if such a
+spiritualistic society as that described by Mr. Stockton in one of his
+diverting stories could materialise them all for our benefit: then one
+might count with confidence upon some very delightful company and some
+very delightful talk. For the people whom the Whartons have been good
+enough to group together are people of the most fascinating variety.
+They have wit in common and goodfellowship, they were famous
+entertainers in their time; they add to the gaiety of nations still. The
+Whartons have given what would in America be called a "Stag Party". If
+we join it we shall find much entertainment thereat.
+
+Do people read Theodore Hook much nowadays? Does the generation which
+loves to follow the trail with Allan Quatermain, and to ride with a
+Splendid Spur, does it call at all for the humours of the days of the
+Regency? Do those who have laughed over "The Wrong Box," ever laugh over
+Jack Brag? Do the students of Mr. Rudyard Kipling know anything of
+"Gilbert Gurney?" Somebody started the theory some time ago, that this
+was not a laughter-loving generation, that it lacked high spirits. It
+has been maintained that if a writer appeared now, with the rollicking
+good spirits, and reckless abandon of a Lever, he would scarcely win a
+warm welcome. We may be permitted to doubt this conclusion; we are as
+fond of laughter as ever, as ready to laugh if somebody will set us
+going. Mr. Stevenson prefers of late to be thought grim in his fiction,
+but he has set the sides shaking, both over that "Wrong Box" which we
+spoke of, and in earlier days. We are ready to laugh with Stockton from
+overseas, with our own Anstey, with anybody who has the heart to be
+merry, and the wit to make his mirth communicable. But, it may be
+doubted if we read our Lever quite as much as a wise doctor, who
+happened also to be a wise man of letters, would recommend. And we may
+well fancy that such a doctor dealing with a patient for whom laughter
+was salutary--as for whom is it not salutary--would exhibit Theodore
+Hook in rather large doses.
+
+Undoubtedly the fun is a little old fashioned, but it is none the worse
+for that. Those who share Mr. Hardcastle's tastes for old wine and old
+books will not like Theodore Hook any the less, because he does not
+happen to be at all "Fin de Siècle". He is like Berowne in the comedy,
+the merriest man--perhaps not always within the limits of becoming
+mirth--to spend an hour's talk withal. There is no better key to the age
+in which Hook glittered, than Hook's own stories. The London of that
+day--the London which is as dead and gone as Nineveh or Karnak or
+Troy--lives with extraordinary freshness in Theodore Hook's pages. And
+how entertaining those pages are. It is not always the greatest writers
+who are the most mirth provoking, but how much we owe to them. The man
+must have no mirth in him if he fail to be tickled by the best of
+Labiche's comedies, aye and the worst too, if such a term can be
+applied to any of the enchanting series; if he refuse to unbend over "A
+Day's Journey and a Life's Romance," if he cannot let himself go and
+enjoy himself over Gilbert Gurney's river adventure. If the revival of
+the Whartons' book were to serve no other purpose than to send some
+laughter loving souls to the heady well-spring of Theodore Hook's
+merriment, it would have done the mirthful a good turn and deserved well
+of its country.
+
+There is scarcely a queerer, or scarcely a more pathetic figure in the
+world than that of Beau Brummell. He seems to belong to ancient history,
+he and his titanic foppishness and his smart clothes and his smart
+sayings. Yet is it but a little while since the last of his adorers, the
+most devoted of his disciples passed away from the earth. Over in Paris
+there lingered till the past year a certain man of letters who was very
+brilliant and very poor and very eccentric. So long as people study
+French literature, and care to investigate the amount of high artistic
+workmanship which goes into even its minor productions, so long the name
+of Barbey D'Aurevilly will have its niche--not a very large one, it is
+true--in the temple. The author of that strange and beautiful story "Le
+Chevalier des Touches," was a great devotee of Brummell's. He was
+himself the "last of the dandies". All the money he had--and he had very
+little of it--he spent in dandification. But he never moved with the
+times. His foppishness was the foppishness of his youth, and to the last
+he wandered through Paris clad in the splendour of the days when young
+men were "lions," and when the quarrel between classicism and
+romanticism was vital. He wrote a book about Beau Brummell and a very
+curious little book it is, with its odd earnest defence of dandyism,
+with its courageous championship of the arts which men of letters so
+largely affect to despise.
+
+Poor Beau Brummell. After having played his small part on life's stage,
+his thin shade still occasionally wanders across the boards of the
+theatre. Blanchard Jerrold wrote a play upon him, which was acted at the
+Lyceum Theatre in 1859, when Emery played the title role. Jerrold's
+play, which has for sub-title "The King of Calais," treats of that
+period in Brummell's life in which he had retired across the channel to
+live upon black-mail and to drift into that Consulship at Caen which he
+so queerly resigned, to end a poor madman, trying to shave his own
+peruke. Jerrold's is a grim play; either it or a version on the same
+lines of Brummell's fall is being played across the Atlantic at this
+very hour by Mr. Mansfield whose study of the final decay and idiotcy of
+the famous beau is said to rival the impressiveness of his Mr. Hyde.
+Beau Brummell is never likely to be quite forgotten. Folly often brings
+with it a kind of immortality. The fool who fired the Temple of Ephesus
+has secured his place in history with Aristides and Themistocles; the
+fop who gave a kind of epic dignity to neck-clothes, and who asked the
+famous "Who's your fat friend?" question, is remembered as a figure of
+that age which includes the name of Sheridan and the name of Burke.
+
+Another and a no less famous Beau steps to salute us from the pages of
+the Whartons. Beau Nash is an old friend of ours in fiction, an old
+friend in the drama. Our dear old Harrison Ainsworth wrote a novel about
+him yesterday; to-day he figures in the pages of one of the most
+attractive of Mr. Lewis Wingfield's attractive stories. He found his
+way on to the stage under the care of Douglas Jerrold whose comedy of
+manners was acted at the Haymarket in the midsummer of 1834. There is a
+charm about these Beaux, these odd blossoms of last century
+civilisation, the Brummells and the Nashes and the Fieldings, so "high
+fantastical" in their bearing, such living examples of the eternal
+verities contained in the clothes' philosophy of Herr Diogenes
+Teufelsdröckh of Weissnichtwo. Their wigs were more important than their
+wit; the pattern of their waistcoats more important than the composition
+of their hearts; all morals, all philosophy are absorbed for them in the
+engrossing question of the fit of their breeches. D'Artois is of their
+kin, French d'Artois who helped to ruin the Old Order and failed to
+re-create it as Charles the Tenth, d'Artois whom Mercier describes as
+being poured into his faultlessly fitting breeches by the careful and
+united efforts of no less than four valets de chambre. But the English
+dandies were better than the Frenchman, for they did harm only to
+themselves, while he helped to ruin his cause, his party, and his king.
+
+As we turn the pages, we come to one name which immediately if
+whimsically suggests poetry. The man was, like Touchstone's Audrey, not
+poetical and yet a great poet has been pleased to address him, very much
+as Pindar might have addressed the Ancestral Hero of some mighty tyrant.
+
+    Ah, George Bubb Dodington Lord Melcombe--no,
+    Yours was the wrong way!--always understand,
+    Supposing that permissibly you planned
+    How statesmanship--your trade--in outward show
+    Might figure as inspired by simple zeal
+    For serving country, king, and commonweal,
+    (Though service tire to death the body, teaze
+    The soul from out an o'ertasked patriot-drudge)
+    And yet should prove zeal's outward show agrees
+    In all respects--right reason being judge--
+    With inward care that while the statesman spends
+    Body and soul thus freely for the sake
+    Of public good, his private welfare take
+    No harm by such devotedness.
+
+Thus Robert Browning in Robert Browning's penultimate book, that
+"Parleyings with certain people of importance in their day" which fell
+somewhat coldly upon all save Browning fanatics, and which, when it
+seemed to show that the poet's hand had palsied, served only as the
+discordant prelude to the swan song of "Asolando," the last and almost
+the greatest of his glories. Perhaps only Browning would ever have
+thought of undertaking a poetical parley with Bubb Dodington. Dodington
+is now largely, and not undeservedly forgotten. His dinners and his
+dresses, his poems and his pamphlets, his plays and his passions--the
+wind has carried them all away. If Pope had not nicknamed him Bubo, if
+Foote had not caricatured him in "The Patron," if Churchill had not
+lampooned him in "The Rosciad," he would scarcely have earned in his own
+day the notoriety which the publication of his "Diary" had in a manner
+preserved to later days. If he was hardly worth a corner in the
+Whartons' picture-gallery he was certainly scarcely deserving of the
+attention of Browning. Even his ineptitude was hardly important enough
+to have twenty pages of Browning's genius wasted upon it, twenty pages
+ending with the sting about
+
+                                     The scoff
+    That greets your very name: folks see but one
+    Fool more, as well as knave, in Dodington.
+
+Dodington has been occasionally classed with Lord Hervey but the
+classification is scarcely fair. With all his faults--and he had them in
+abundance--Lord Hervey was a better creature than Bubb Dodington. If he
+was effeminate, he had convictions and could stand by them. If Pope
+sneered at him as Sporus and called him a curd of asses' milk, he has
+left behind him some of the most brilliant memoirs ever penned. If he
+had some faults in common with Dodington he was endowed with virtues of
+which Dodington never dreamed.
+
+The name of Lord Chesterfield is in the air just now. Within the last
+few months the curiosity of the world has been stimulated and satisfied
+by the publication of some hitherto unknown letters by Lord
+Chesterfield. The pleasure which the student of history has taken in
+this new find is just dimmed at this moment by the death of Lord
+Carnarvon, whose care and scholarship gave them to the worlds. They are
+indeed a precious possession. A very eminent French critic, M.
+Brunetière, has inveighed lately with much justice against the passion
+for raking together and bringing out all manner of unpublished writings.
+He complains, and complains with justice, that while the existing
+classics of literature are left imperfectly edited, if not ignored, the
+activity of students is devoted to burrowing out all manner of
+unimportant material, anything, everything, so long as it has not been
+known beforehand to the world. The French critic protests against the
+class of scholars who go into ecstacies over a newly discovered washing
+list of Pascal or a bill from Racine's perruquier. The complaint tells
+against us as well on our side of the Channel. We hear a great deal
+about newly discovered fragments by this great writer and that great
+writer, which are of no value whatever, except that they happen to be
+new. But no such stricture applies to the letters of Lord Chesterfield
+which the late Lord Carnarvon so recently gave to the world. They are a
+valuable addition to our knowledge of the last century, a valuable
+addition to our knowledge of the man who wrote them. And knowledge about
+Lord Chesterfield is always welcome. Few of the famous figures of the
+last century have been more misunderstood than he. The world is too
+ready to remember Johnson's biting letter; too ready to remember the
+cruel caricatures of Lord Hervey. Even the famous letters have been
+taken too much at Johnson's estimate, and Johnson's estimate was
+one-sided and unfair. A man would not learn the highest life from the
+Chesterfield letters; they have little in common with the ethics of an A
+Kempis, a Jean Paul Richter, or a John Stuart Mill. But they have their
+value in their way, and if they contain some utterances so unutterably
+foolish as those in which Lord Chesterfield expressed himself upon Greek
+literature, they contain some very excellent maxims for the management
+of social life. Nobody could become a penny the worse for the study of
+Chesterfield; many might become the better. They are not a whit more
+cynical than, indeed they are not so cynical as, those letters of
+Thackeray's to young Brown, which with all their cleverness make us
+understand what Mr. Henley means when in his "Views and Reviews" he
+describes him as a "writer of genius who was innately and irredeemably a
+Philistine". The letters of Lord Chesterfield would not do much to make
+a man a hero, but there is little in literature more unheroic than the
+letters to Mr. Thomas Brown the younger.
+
+It is curious to contrast the comparative enthusiasm with which the
+Whartons write about Horace Walpole with the invective of Lord Macaulay.
+To the great historian Walpole was the most eccentric, the most
+artificial, the most capricious of men, who played innumerable parts and
+over-acted them all, a creature to whom whatever was little seemed great
+and whatever was great seemed little. To Macaulay he was a
+gentleman-usher at heart, a Republican whose Republicanism like the
+courage of a bully or the love of a fribble was only strong and ardent
+when there was no occasion for it, a man who blended the faults of Grub
+Street with the faults of St. James's Street, and who united to the
+vanity, the jealousy and the irritability of a man of letters, the
+affected superciliousness and apathy of a man of ton. The Whartons
+over-praise Walpole where Lord Macaulay under-rates him; the truth lies
+between the two. He was not in the least an estimable or an admirable
+figure, but he wrote admirable, indeed incomparable letters to which the
+world is indebted beyond expression. If we can almost say that we know
+the London of the last century as well as the London of to-day it is
+largely to Horace Walpole's letters that our knowledge is due. They can
+hardly be over-praised, they can hardly be too often read by the lover
+of last century London. Horace Walpole affected to despise men of
+letters. It is his punishment that his fame depends upon his letters,
+those letters which, though their writer was all unaware of it, are
+genuine literature, and almost of the best.
+
+We could linger over almost every page of the Whartons' volumes, for
+every page is full of pleasant suggestions. The name of George Villiers,
+second Duke of Buckingham brings up at once a picture of perhaps the
+brilliantest and basest period in English history. It brings up too
+memories of a fiction that is even dearer than history, of that
+wonderful romance of Dumas the Elder's, which Mr. Louis Stevenson has
+placed among the half-dozen books that are dearest to his heart, the
+"Vicomte de Bragelonne". Who that has ever followed, breathless and
+enraptured, the final fortunes of that gallant quadrilateral of
+musketeers will forget the part which is played by George Villiers, Duke
+of Buckingham, in that magnificent prose epic? There is little to be
+said for the real Villiers; he was a profligate and a scoundrel, and he
+did not show very heroically in his quarrel with the fiery young Ossory.
+It was one thing to practically murder Lord Shrewsbury; it was quite
+another thing to risk the wrath and the determined right hand of the
+Duke of Ormond's son. But the Villiers of Dumas' fancy is a fairer
+figure and a finer lover, and it is pleasant after reading the pages in
+which the authors of these essays trace the career of Dryden's epitome
+to turn to those volumes of the great Frenchman, to read the account of
+the duel with de Wardes and invoke a new blessing on the muse of
+fiction.
+
+In some earlier volumes of the same great series we meet with yet
+another figure who has his image in the Wharton picture gallery. In that
+"crowded and sunny field of life"--the words are Mr. Stevenson's, and
+they apply to the whole musketeer epic--that "place busy as a city,
+bright as a theatre, thronged with memorable faces, and sounding with
+delightful speech," the Abbé Scarron plays his part. It was here that
+many of us met Scarron for the first time, and if we have got to know
+him better since, we still remember with a thrill of pleasure that first
+encounter when in the society of the matchless Count de la Fere and the
+marvellous Aramis we made our bow in company with the young Raoul to the
+crippled wit and his illustrious companions. The Whartons write brightly
+about Scarron, but their best merit to my mind is that they at once
+prompt a desire to go to that corner of the bookshelf where the eleven
+volumes of the adventures of the immortal musketeers repose, and taking
+down the first volume of "Vingt Ans Après" seek for the twenty-third
+chapter, where Scarron receives society in his residence in the Rue des
+Tournelles. There Scudery twirls his moustaches and trails his enormous
+rapier and the Coadjutor exhibits his silken "Fronde". There the velvet
+eyes of Mademoiselle d'Aubigné smile and the beauty of Madame de
+Chevreuse delights, and all the company make fun of Mazarin and recite
+the verses of Voiture.
+
+There are others of these wits and beaux with whom we might like to
+linger; but our space is running short; it is time to say good-bye.
+Congreve the dramatist and gentleman, Rochefoucault the wit, Saint-Simon
+the king of memoir-writers, Rochester and St. Evremond and de Grammont,
+Selwyn and Sydney Smith and Sheridan each in turn appeals to us to tarry
+a little longer. But it is time to say good-bye to these shadows of the
+past with whom we have spent some pleasant hours. It is their duty now
+to offer some pleasant hours to others.
+
+    JUSTIN HUNTLY M'CARTHY.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.
+
+
+In revising this Publication, it has scarcely been found necessary to
+recall a single opinion relative to the subject of the Work. The general
+impressions of characters adopted by the Authors have received little
+modification from any remarks elicited by the appearance of 'The Wits
+and Beaux of Society.'
+
+It is scarcely to be expected that even _our_ descendants will know much
+more of the Wits and Beaux of former days than we now do. The chests at
+Strawberry Hill are cleared of their contents; Horace Walpole's latest
+letters are before us; Pepys and Evelyn have thoroughly dramatized the
+days of Charles II.; Lord Hervey's Memoirs have laid bare the darkest
+secrets of the Court in which he figures; voluminous memoirs of the less
+historic characters among the Wits and Beaux have been published; still
+it is possible that some long-disregarded treasury of old letters, like
+that in the Gallery at Wotton, may come to light. From that precious
+deposit a housemaid--blotted for ever be her name from memory's
+page--was purloining sheets of yellow paper, with antiquated writing on
+them, to light her fires with, when the late William Upcott came to the
+rescue, and saved Evelyn's 'Diary' for a grateful world. It is _just_
+possible that such a discovery may again be made, and that the doings of
+George Villiers, or the exile life of Wharton, or the inmost thoughts of
+other Wits and Beaux may be made to appear in clearer lights than
+heretofore; but it is much more likely that the popular opinions about
+these witty, worthless men are substantially true.
+
+All that has been collected, therefore, to form this work--and, as in
+the 'Queens of Society,' every known source has been consulted--assumes
+a sterling value as being collected; and, should hereafter fresh
+materials be disinterred from any old library closet in the homes of
+some one descendant of our heroes, advantage will be gladly taken to
+improve, correct, and complete the lives.
+
+One thing must, in justice, be said: if they have been written freely,
+fearlessly, they have been written without passion or prejudice. The
+writers, though not _quite_ of the stamp of persons who would never have
+'dared to address' any of the subjects of their biography, 'save with
+courtesy and obeisance,' have no wish to 'trample on the graves' of such
+very amusing personages as the 'Wits and Beaux of Society.' They have
+even been lenient to their memory, hailing every good trait gladly, and
+pointing out with no unsparing hand redeeming virtues; and it cannot
+certainly be said, in this instance, that the good has been 'interred
+with the bones' of the personages herein described, although the evil
+men do, 'will live after them.'
+
+But whilst a biographer is bound to give the fair as well as the dark
+side of his subject, he has still to remember that biography is a trust,
+and that it should not be an eulogium. It is his duty to reflect that in
+many instances it must be regarded even as a warning.
+
+The moral conclusions of these lives of 'Wits and Beaux' are, it is
+admitted, just: vice is censured; folly rebuked; ungentlemanly conduct,
+even in a beau of the highest polish, exposed; irreligion finds no
+toleration under gentle names--heartlessness no palliation from its
+being the way of the world. There is here no separate code allowed for
+men who live in the world, and for those who live out of it. The task of
+pourtraying such characters as the 'Wits and Beaux of Society' is a
+responsible one, and does not involve the mere attempt to amuse, or the
+mere desire to abuse, but requires truth and discrimination; as
+embracing just or unjust views of such characters, it may do much harm
+or much good. Nevertheless, in spite of these obvious considerations
+there do exist worthy persons, even in the present day, so unreasonable
+as to take offence at the revival of old stories anent their defunct
+grandfathers, though those very stories were circulated by accredited
+writers employed by the families themselves. Some individuals are
+scandalized when a man who was habitually drunk, is called a drunkard;
+and ears polite cannot bear the application of plain names to well-known
+delinquencies.
+
+There is something foolish, but respectably foolish, in this wish to
+shut out light which has been streaming for years over these old tombs
+and memories. The flowers that are cast on such graves cannot, however,
+cause us to forget the corruption within and underneath. In
+consideration, nevertheless, of a pardonable weakness, all expressions
+that can give pain, or which have been said to give pain, have been, in
+this Second Edition, omitted; and whenever a mis-statement has crept in,
+care has been taken to amend the error.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.
+
+
+The success of the 'Queens of Society' will have pioneered the way for
+the 'Wits and Beaux:' with whom, during the holiday time of their lives,
+these fair ladies were so greatly associated. The 'Queens,' whether all
+wits or not, must have been the cause of wit in others; their influence
+over dandyism is notorious: their power to make or mar a man of fashion,
+almost historical. So far, a chronicle of the sayings and doings of the
+'Wits' is worthy to serve as a _pendant_ to that of the 'Queens:' happy
+would it be for society if the annals of the former could more closely
+resemble the biography of the latter. But it may not be so: men are
+subject to temptations, to failures, to delinquencies, to calamities, of
+which women can scarcely dream, and which they can only lament and pity.
+
+Our 'Wits,' too--to separate them from the 'Beaux'--were men who often
+took an active part in the stirring events of their day: they assumed to
+be statesmen, though, too frequently, they were only politicians. They
+were brave and loyal: indeed, in the time of the Stuarts, all the Wits
+were Cavaliers, as well as the Beaux. One hears of no repartee among
+Cromwell's followers; no dash, no merriment, in Fairfax's staff;
+eloquence, indeed, but no wit in the Parliamentarians; and, in truth, in
+the second Charles's time, the king might have headed the lists of the
+Wits himself--such a capital man as his Majesty is known to have been
+for a wet evening or a dull Sunday; such a famous teller of a
+story--such a perfect diner-out: no wonder that in his reign we had
+George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham of that family, 'mankind's
+epitome,' who had every pretension to every accomplishment combined in
+himself. No wonder we could attract De Grammont and Saint Evremond to
+our court; and own, somewhat to our discredit be it allowed, Rochester
+and Beau Fielding. Every reign has had its wits, but those in Charles's
+time were so numerous as to distinguish the era by an especial
+brilliancy. Nor let it be supposed that these annals do not contain a
+moral application. They show how little the sparkling attributes herein
+pourtrayed conferred happiness; how far more the rare, though certainly
+real touches of genuine feeling and strong affection, which appear here
+and there even in the lives of the most thoughtless 'Wits and Beaux,'
+elevate the character in youth, or console the spirit in age. They prove
+how wise has been that change in society which now repudiates the 'Wit'
+as a distinct class; and requires general intelligences as a
+compensation for lost repartees, or long obsolete practical jokes.
+
+'Men are not all evil:' so in the life of George Villiers, we find him
+kind-hearted, and free from hypocrisy. His old servants--and the fact
+speaks in extenuation of one of our wildest Wits and Beaux--loved him
+faithfully. De Grammont, we all own, has little to redeem him except his
+good-nature: Rochester's latest days were almost hallowed by his
+penitence. Chesterfield is saved by his kindness to the Irish, and his
+affection for his son. Horace Walpole had human affections, though a
+most inhuman pen: and Wharton was famous for his good-humour.
+
+The periods most abounding in the Wit and the Beau have, of course, been
+those most exempt from wars, and rumours of wars. The Restoration; the
+early period of the Augustan age; the commencement of the Hanoverian
+dynasty,--have all been enlivened by Wits and Beaux, who came to light
+like mushrooms after a storm of rain, as soon as the political horizon
+was clear. We have Congreve, who affected to be the Beau as well as the
+Wit; Lord Hervey, more of the courtier than the Beau--a Wit by
+inheritance--a peer, assisted into a pre-eminent position by royal
+preference, and consequent _prestige_; and all these men were the
+offspring of the particular state of the times in which they figured: at
+earlier periods, they would have been deemed effeminate; in later ones,
+absurd.
+
+Then the scene shifts: intellect had marched forward gigantically: the
+world is grown exacting, disputatious, critical, and such men as Horace
+Walpole and Brinsley Sheridan appear; the characteristics of wit which
+adorned that age being well diluted by the feebler talents of Selwyn and
+Hook.
+
+Of these, and others, '_table traits_,' and other traits, are here
+given: brief chronicles of _their_ life's stage, over which a curtain
+has so long been dropped, are supplied carefully from well established
+sources: it is with characters, not with literary history, that we deal;
+and do our best to make the portraitures life-like, and to bring forward
+old memories, which, without the stamp of antiquity, might be suffered
+to pass into obscurity.
+
+Your Wit and your Beau, be he French or English, is no mediæval
+personage: the aristocracy of the present day rank among his immediate
+descendants: he is a creature of a modern and an artificial age; and
+with his career are mingled many features of civilized life, manners,
+habits, and traces of family history which are still, it is believed,
+interesting to the majority of English readers, as they have long been
+to
+
+    GRACE and PHILIP WHARTON
+
+_October, 1860_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+         THE WITS AND BEAUX OF SOCIETY.
+
+
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+    GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.
+
+  Signs of the Restoration.--Samuel Pepys in his Glory.--A Royal
+      Company.--Pepys 'ready to Weep.'--The Playmate of Charles
+      II.--George Villiers's Inheritance.--Two Gallant Young
+      Noblemen.--The Brave Francis Villiers.--After the Battle of
+      Worcester.--Disguising the King.--Villiers in Hiding.--He
+      appears as a Mountebank.--Buckingham's Habits.--A Daring
+      Adventure.--Cromwell's Saintly Daughter.--Villiers and the
+      Rabbi.--The Buckingham Pictures and Estates.--York
+      House.--Villiers returns to England.--Poor Mary
+      Fairfax.--Villiers in the Tower.--Abraham Cowley, the
+      Poet.--The Greatest Ornament of Whitehall.--Buckingham's Wit
+      and Beauty.--Flecknoe's Opinion of Him.--His Duel with the Earl
+      of Shrewsbury.--Villiers as a Poet.--As a Dramatist.--A Fearful
+      Censure!--Villiers's Influence in Parliament.--A Scene in the
+      Lords.--The Duke of Ormond in Danger.--Colonel Blood's
+      Outrages.--Wallingford House and Ham House.--'Madame
+      Ellen.'--The Cabal.--Villiers again in the Tower.--A
+      Change.--The Duke of York's Theatre.--Buckingham and the
+      Princess of Orange.--His last Hours.--His Religion.--Death of
+      Villiers.--The Duchess of Buckingham.
+
+
+Samuel Pepys, the weather-glass of his time, hails the first glimpse of
+the Restoration of Charles II. in his usual quaint terms and vulgar
+sycophancy.
+
+'To Westminster Hall,' says he; 'where I heard how the Parliament had
+this day dissolved themselves, and did pass very cheerfully through the
+Hall, and the Speaker without his mace. The whole Hall was joyful
+thereat, as well as themselves; and now they begin to talk loud of the
+king.' And the evening was closed, he further tells us, with a large
+bonfire in the Exchange, and people called out, 'God bless King
+Charles!'
+
+This was in March 1660; and during that spring Pepys was noting down
+how he did not think it possible that my 'Lord Protector,' Richard
+Cromwell, should come into power again; how there were great hopes of
+the king's arrival; how Monk, the Restorer, was feasted at Mercers' Hall
+(Pepys's own especial); how it was resolved that a treaty be offered to
+the king, privately; how he resolved to go to sea with 'my lord:' and
+how, while they lay at Gravesend, the great affair which brought back
+Charles Stuart was virtually accomplished. Then, with various
+parentheses, inimitable in their way, Pepys carries on his narrative. He
+has left his father's 'cutting-room' to take care of itself; and finds
+his cabin little, though his bed is convenient, but is certain, as he
+rides at anchor with 'my lord,' in the ship, that the king 'must of
+necessity come in,' and the vessel sails round and anchors in Lee Roads.
+'To the castles about Deal, where _our_ fleet' (_our fleet_, the saucy
+son of a tailor!) 'lay and anchored; great was the shoot of guns from
+the castles, and ships, and our answers.' Glorious Samuel! in his
+element, to be sure.
+
+Then the wind grew high: he began to be 'dizzy, and squeamish;'
+nevertheless employed 'Lord's Day' in looking through the lieutenant's
+glass at two good merchantmen, and the women in them; 'being pretty
+handsome;' then in the afternoon he first saw Calais, and was pleased,
+though it was at a great distance. All eyes were looking across the
+Channel just then--for the king was at Flushing; and, though the
+'Fanatiques' still held their heads up high, and the Cavaliers also
+talked high on the other side, the cause that Pepys was bound to, still
+gained ground.
+
+Then 'they begin to speak freely of King Charles;' churches in the City,
+Samuel declares, were setting up his arms; merchant-ships--more
+important in those days--were hanging out his colours. He hears, too,
+how the Mercers' Company were making a statue of his gracious Majesty to
+set up in the Exchange. Ah! Pepys's heart is merry: he has forty
+shillings (some shabby perquisite) given him by Captain Cowes of the
+'Paragon;' and 'my lord' in the evening 'falls to singing' a song upon
+the Rump to the tune of the 'Blacksmith.'
+
+The hopes of the Cavalier party are hourly increasing, and those of
+Pepys we may be sure also; for Pim, the tailor, spends a morning in his
+cabin 'putting a great many ribbons to a sail.' And the king is to be
+brought over suddenly, 'my lord' tells him: and indeed it looks like it,
+for the sailors are drinking Charles's health in the streets of Deal, on
+their knees; 'which, methinks,' says Pepys, 'is a little too much;' and
+'methinks' so, worthy Master Pepys, also.
+
+Then how the news of the Parliamentary vote of the king's declaration
+was received! Pepys becomes eloquent.
+
+'He that can fancy a fleet (like ours) in her pride, with pendants
+loose, guns roaring, caps flying, and the loud "_Vive le Roi!_" echoed
+from one ship's company to another; he, and he only, can apprehend the
+joy this enclosed vote was received with, or the blessing he thought
+himself possessed of that bore it.'
+
+Next, orders come for 'my lord' to sail forthwith to the king; and the
+painters and tailors set to work, Pepys superintending, 'cutting out
+some pieces of yellow cloth in the fashion of a crown and C. R.; and
+putting it upon a fine sheet'--and that is to supersede the States'
+arms, and is finished and set up. And the next day, on May 14, the Hague
+is seen plainly by _us_, 'my lord going up in his night-gown into the
+cuddy.'
+
+And then they land at the Hague; some 'nasty Dutchmen' come on board to
+offer their boats, and get money, which Pepys does not like; and in time
+they find themselves in the Hague, 'a most neat place in all respects:'
+salute the Queen of Bohemia and the Prince of Orange--afterwards William
+III.--and find at their place of supper nothing but a 'sallet' and two
+or three bones of mutton provided for ten of us, 'which was very
+strange. Nevertheless, on they sail, having returned to the fleet, to
+Schevelling: and, on the 23rd of the month, go to meet the king; who,
+'on getting into the boat, did kiss my lord with much affection.' And
+'extraordinary press of good company,' and great mirth all day,
+announced the Restoration. Nevertheless Charles's clothes had not been,
+till this time, Master Pepys is assured, worth forty shillings--and he,
+as a connoisseur, was scandalized at the fact.
+
+And now, before we proceed, let us ask who worthy Samuel Pepys was, that
+he should pass such stringent comments on men and manners? His origin
+was lowly, although his family ancient; his father having followed,
+until the Restoration, the calling of a tailor. Pepys, vulgar as he was,
+had nevertheless received an university education; first entering
+Trinity College, Cambridge, as a sizar. To our wonder we find him
+marrying furtively and independently; and his wife, at fifteen, was glad
+with her husband to take up an abode in the house of a relative, Sir
+Edward Montagu, afterwards Earl of Sandwich, the 'my lord' under whose
+shadow Samuel Pepys dwelt in reverence. By this nobleman's influence
+Pepys for ever left the 'cutting-room;' he acted first as secretary,
+(always as toad-eater, one would fancy), then became a clerk in the
+Admiralty; and as such went, after the Restoration, to live in Seething
+Lane, in the parish of St. Olave, Hart Street--and in St. Olave his
+mortal part was ultimately deposited.
+
+So much for Pepys. See him now, in his full-buttoned wig, and best
+cambric neckerchief, looking out for the king and his suit, who are
+coming on board the 'Nazeby.'
+
+'Up, and made myself as fine as I could, with the linning stockings on,
+and wide canons that I bought the other day at the Hague.' So began he
+the day. 'All day nothing but lords and persons of honour on board, that
+we were exceeding full. Dined in great deal of state, the royalle
+company by themselves in the coache, which was a blessed sight to see.'
+This royal company consisted of Charles, the Dukes of York and
+Gloucester, his brothers, the Queen of Bohemia, the Princess Royal, the
+Prince of Orange, afterwards William III.--all of whose hands Pepys
+kissed, after dinner. The King and Duke of York changed the names of the
+ships. The 'Rumpers,' as Pepys calls the Parliamentarians, had given one
+the name of the 'Nazeby;' and that was now christened the 'Charles:'
+'Richard' was changed into 'James.' The 'Speaker' into 'Mary,' the
+'Lambert,' was 'Henrietta,' and so on. How merry the king must have
+been whilst he thus turned the Roundheads, as it were, off the ocean;
+and how he walked here and there, up and down, (quite contrary to what
+Samuel Pepys 'expected,') and fell into discourse of his escape from
+Worcester, and made Samuel 'ready to weep' to hear of his travelling
+four days and three nights on foot, up to his knees in dirt, with
+'nothing but a green coat and a pair of breeches on,' (worse and worse,
+thought Pepys,) and a pair of country shoes that made his feet sore; and
+how, at one place he was made to drink by the servants, to show he was
+not a Roundhead; and how, at another place--and Charles, the best teller
+of a story in his own dominions, may here have softened his tone--the
+master of the house, an innkeeper, as the king was standing by the fire,
+with his hands on the back of a chair, kneeled down and kissed his hand
+'privately,' saying he could not ask him who he was, but bid 'God bless
+him, where he was going!'
+
+Then, rallying after this touch of pathos, Charles took his hearers over
+to Fecamp, in France--thence to Rouen, where, he said, in his easy,
+irresistible way, 'I looked so poor that the people went into the rooms
+before I went away, to see if I had not stolen something or other.'
+
+With what reverence and sympathy did our Pepys listen; but he was forced
+to hurry off to get Lord Berkeley a bed; and with 'much ado' (as one may
+believe) he did get 'him to bed with My Lord Middlesex;' so, after
+seeing these two peers of the realm in that dignified predicament--two
+in a bed--'to my cabin again,' where the company were still talking of
+the king's difficulties, and how his Majesty was fain to eat a piece of
+bread and cheese out of a poor body's pocket; and, at a Catholic house,
+how he lay a good while 'in the Priest's Hole, for privacy.'
+
+In all these hairbreadth escapes--of which the king spoke with
+infinite humour and good feeling--one name was perpetually
+introduced:--George--George Villiers, _Villers_, as the royal narrator
+called him; for the name was so pronounced formerly. And well he might;
+for George Villiers had been his playmate, classfellow, nay, bedfellow
+sometimes, in priests' holes; their names, their haunts, their hearts,
+were all assimilated; and misfortune had bound them closely to each
+other. To George Villiers let us now return; he is waiting for his royal
+master on the other side of the Channel--in England. And a strange
+character have we to deal with:--
+
+    'A man so various, that he seemed to be
+     Not one, but all mankind's epitome:
+     Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,
+     Was everything by starts, and nothing long;
+     But, in the course of one revolving moon,
+     Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon.'[1]
+
+Such was George Villiers: the Alcibiades of that age. Let us trace one
+of the most romantic, and brilliant, and unsatisfactory lives that has
+ever been written.
+
+George Villiers was born at Wallingford House, in the parish of St.
+Martin-in-the-Fields, on the 30th January, 1627. The Admiralty now
+stands on the site of the mansion in which he first saw the light. His
+father was George Villiers, the favourite of James I. and of Charles I.;
+his mother, the Lady Katherine Manners, daughter and heiress of Francis,
+Earl of Rutland. Scarcely was he a year old, when the assassination of
+his father, by Felton, threw the affairs of his family into confusion.
+His mother, after the Duke of Buckingham's death, gave birth to a son,
+Francis; who was subsequently, savagely killed by the Roundheads, near
+Kingston. Then the Duchess of Buckingham very shortly married again, and
+uniting herself to Randolph Macdonald, Earl of Antrim, became a rigid
+Catholic. She was therefore lost to her children, or rather, they were
+lost to her; for King Charles I., who had promised to be a 'husband to
+her, and a father to her children,' removed them from her charge, and
+educated them with the royal princes.
+
+The youthful peer soon gave indications of genius; and all that a
+careful education could do, was directed to improve his natural capacity
+under private tutors. He went to Cambridge; and thence, under the care
+of a preceptor named Aylesbury, travelled into France. He was
+accompanied by his young, handsome, fine-spirited brother, Francis; and
+this was the sunshine of his life. His father had indeed left him, as
+his biographer Brian Fairfax expresses it, 'the greatest name in
+England; his mother, the greatest estate of any subject.' With this
+inheritance there had also descended to him the wonderful beauty, the
+matchless grace, of his ill-fated father. Great abilities, courage,
+fascination of manners, were also his; but he had not been endowed with
+firmness of character, and was at once energetic and versatile. Even at
+this age, the qualities which became his ruin were clearly discoverable.
+
+George Villiers was recalled to England by the troubles which drove the
+king to Oxford, and which converted that academical city into a
+garrison, its under-graduates into soldiers, its ancient halls into
+barrack-rooms. Villiers was on this occasion entered at Christ Church:
+the youth's best feelings were aroused, and his loyalty was engaged to
+one to whom his father owed so much. He was now a young man of
+twenty-one years of age--able to act for himself; and he went heart and
+soul into the cause of his sovereign. Never was there a gayer, a more
+prepossessing Cavalier. He could charm even a Roundhead. The harsh and
+Presbyterian-minded Bishop Burnet, has told us that 'he was a man of a
+noble presence; had a great liveliness of wit, and a peculiar faculty of
+turning everything into ridicule, with bold figures and natural
+descriptions.' How invaluable he must have been in the Common-rooms at
+Oxford, then turned into guard-rooms, his eye upon some unlucky
+volunteer Don, who had put off his clerkly costume for a buff jacket,
+and could not manage his drill. Irresistible as his exterior is declared
+to have been, the original mind of Villiers was even far more
+influential. De Grammont tells us, 'he was extremely handsome, but still
+thought himself much more so than he really was; although he had a great
+deal of discernment, yet his vanities made him mistake some civilities
+as intended for his person which were only bestowed on his wit and
+drollery.'
+
+But this very vanity, so unpleasant in an old man, is only amusing in a
+younger wit. Whilst thus a gallant of the court and camp, the young
+nobleman proved himself to be no less brave than witty. Juvenile as he
+was, with a brother still younger, they fought on the royalist side at
+Lichfield, in the storming of the Cathedral Close. For thus allowing
+their lives to be endangered, their mother blamed Lord Gerard, one of
+the Duke's guardians; whilst the Parliament seized the pretext of
+confiscating their estates, which were afterwards returned to them, on
+account of their being under age at the time of confiscation. The youths
+were then placed under the care of the Earl of Northumberland, by whose
+permission they travelled in France and Italy, where they
+appeared--their estates having been restored--with princely
+magnificence. Nevertheless, on hearing of the imprisonment of Charles I.
+in the Isle of Wight, the gallant youths returned to England and joined
+the army under the Earl of Holland, who was defeated near Nonsuch, in
+Surrey.
+
+A sad episode in the annals of these eventful times is presented in the
+fate of the handsome, brave Francis Villiers. His murder, for one can
+call it by no other name, shows how keenly the personal feelings of the
+Roundheads were engaged in this national quarrel. Under most
+circumstances, Englishmen would have spared the youth, and respected the
+gallantry of the free young soldier, who, planting himself against an
+oak-tree which grew in the road, refused to ask for quarter, but
+defended himself against several assailants. But the name of Villiers
+was hateful in Puritan ears. 'Hew them down, root and branch!' was the
+sentiment that actuated the soldiery. His very loveliness exasperated
+their vengeance. At last, 'with nine wounds on his beautiful face and
+body,' says Fairfax, 'he was slain.' 'The oak-tree,' writes the devoted
+servant, 'is his monument,' and the letters of F. V. were cut in it in
+his day. His body was conveyed by water to York House, and was entombed
+with that of his father, in the Chapel of Henry VII.
+
+His brother fled towards St. Neot's, where he encountered a strange kind
+of peril. Tobias Rustat attended him; and was with him in the rising in
+Kent for King Charles I., wherein the Duke was engaged; and they, being
+put to the flight, the Duke's helmet, by a brush under a tree, was
+turned upon his back, and tied so fast with a string under his throat,
+'that without the present help of T. R.,' writes Fairfax, 'it had
+undoubtedly choked him, as I have credibly heard.'[2]
+
+Whilst at St. Neot's, the house in which Villiers had taken refuge was
+surrounded with soldiers. He had a stout heart, and a dexterous hand; he
+took his resolution; rushed out upon his foes, killed the officer in
+command, galloped off and joined the Prince in the Downs.
+
+The sad story of Charles I. was played out; but Villiers remained
+stanch, and was permitted to return and to accompany Prince Charles into
+Scotland. Then came the battle of Worcester in 1651: there Charles II.
+showed himself a worthy descendant of James IV. of Scotland. He resolved
+to conquer or die: with desperate gallantry the English Cavaliers and
+the Scotch Highlanders seconded the monarch's valiant onslaught on
+Cromwell's horse, and the invincible Life Guards were almost driven back
+by the shock. But they were not seconded; Charles II. had his horse
+twice shot under him, but, nothing daunted, he was the last to tear
+himself away from the field, and then only upon the solicitations of his
+friends.
+
+Charles retired to Kidderminster that evening. The Duke of Buckingham,
+the gallant Lord Derby, Wilmot, afterwards Earl of Rochester, and some
+others, rode near him. They were followed by a small body of horse.
+Disconsolately they rode on northwards, a faithful band of sixty being
+resolved to escort his Majesty to Scotland. At length they halted on
+Kinver Heath, near Kidderminster: their guide having lost the way. In
+this extremity Lord Derby said that he had been received kindly at an
+old house in a secluded woody country, between Tong Castle and Brewood,
+on the borders of Staffordshire. It was named 'Boscobel,' he said; and
+that word has henceforth conjured up to the mind's eye the remembrance
+of a band of tired heroes, riding through woody glades to an ancient
+house, where shelter was given to the worn-out horses and scarcely less
+harassed riders.
+
+But not so rapidly did they in reality proceed. A Catholic family,
+named Giffard, were living at White-Ladies, about twenty six miles from
+Worcester. This was only about half a mile from Boscobel: it had been a
+convent of Cistercian nuns, whose long white cloaks of old had once been
+seen, ghost-like, amid forest glades or on hillock green. The
+White-Ladies had other memories to grace it besides those of holy
+vestals, or of unholy Cavaliers. From the time of the Tudors, a
+respectable family named Somers had owned the White-Ladies, and
+inhabited it since its white-garbed tenants had been turned out, and the
+place secularized. 'Somers's House,' as it was called, (though more
+happily, the old name has been restored,) had received Queen Elizabeth
+on her progress. The richly cultivated old conventual gardens had
+supplied the Queen with some famous pears, and, in the fulness of her
+approval of the fruit, she had added them to the City arms. At that time
+one of these vaunted pear-trees stood securely in the market-place of
+Worcester.
+
+At the White-Ladies, Charles rested for half an hour; and here he left
+his garters, waistcoat, and other garments, to avoid discovery, ere he
+proceeded. They were long kept as relics.
+
+The mother of Lord Somers had been placed in this old house for
+security, for she was on the eve of giving birth to the future
+statesman, who was born in that sanctuary just at this time. His father
+at that very moment commanded a troop of horse in Cromwell's army, so
+that the risk the Cavaliers ran was imminent. The King's horse was led
+into the hall. Day was dawning; and the Cavaliers, as they entered the
+old conventual tenement, and saw the sunbeams on its walls, perceived
+their peril. A family of servants named Penderell held various offices
+there, and at Boscobel. William took care of Boscobel, George was a
+servant at White-Ladies; Humphrey was the miller to that house, Richard
+lived close by, at Hebbal Grange. He and William were called into the
+royal presence. Lord Derby then said to them, 'This is the King; have a
+care of him, and preserve him as thou didst me.'
+
+Then the attendant courtiers began undressing the King. They took off
+his buff-coat, and put on him a 'noggon coarse shirt,' and a green suit
+and another doublet--Richard Penderell's woodman's dress. Lord Wilmot
+cut his sovereign's hair with a knife, but Richard Penderell took up his
+shears and finished the work. 'Burn it,' said the king; but Richard kept
+the sacred locks. Then Charles covered his dark face with soot. Could
+anything have taken away the expression of his half-sleepy, half-merry
+eyes?
+
+They departed, and half an hour afterwards Colonel Ashenhurst, with a
+troop of Roundhead horse, rode up to the White-Ladies. The King,
+meantime, had been conducted by Richard Penderell into a coppice-wood,
+with a bill-hook in his hands for defence and disguise. But his
+followers were overtaken near Newport; and here Buckingham, with Lords
+Talbot and Leviston, escaped; and henceforth, until Charles's wanderings
+were transferred from England to France, George Villiers was separated
+from the Prince. Accompanied by the Earls of Derby and Lauderdale, and
+by Lord Talbot, he proceeded northwards, in hopes of joining General
+Leslie and the Scotch horse. But their hopes were soon dashed: attacked
+by a body of Roundheads, Buckingham and Lord Leviston were compelled to
+leave the high road, to alight from their horses, and to make their way
+to Bloore Park, near Newport, where Villiers found a shelter. He was
+soon, however, necessitated to depart: he put on a labourer's dress; he
+deposited his George, a gift from Henrietta Maria, with a companion, and
+set off for Billstrop, in Nottinghamshire, one Matthews, a carpenter,
+acting as his guide; at Billstrop he was welcomed by Mr. Hawley, a
+Cavalier; and from that place he went to Brookesby, in Leicestershire,
+the original seat of the Villiers family, and the birthplace of his
+father. Here he was received by Lady Villiers--the widow, probably, of
+his father's brother, Sir William Villiers, one of those contented
+country squires who not only sought no distinction, but scarcely thanked
+James I. when he made him a baronet. Here might the hunted refugee see,
+on the open battlements of the church, the shields on which were
+exhibited united quarterings of his father's family with those of his
+mother; here, listen to old tales about his grandfather, good Sir
+George, who married a serving-woman in his deceased wife's kitchen;[3]
+and that serving-woman became the leader of fashions in the court of
+James. Here he might ponder on the vicissitudes which marked the destiny
+of the house of Villiers, and wonder what should come next.
+
+That the spirit of adventure was strong within him, is shown by his
+daring to go up to London, and disguising himself as a mountebank. He
+had a coat made, called a 'Jack Pudding Coat:' a little hat was stuck on
+his head, with a fox's tail in it, and cocks' feathers here and there. A
+wizard's mask one day, a daubing of flour another, completed the
+disguise it was then so usual to assume: witness the long traffic held
+at Exeter Change by the Duchess of Tyrconnel, Francis Jennings, in a
+white mask, selling laces, and French gew-gaws, a trader to all
+appearance, but really carrying on political intrigues; every one went
+to chat with the 'White Milliner,' as she was called, during the reign
+of William and Mary. The Duke next erected a stage at Charing Cross--in
+the very face of the stern Rumpers, who, with long faces, rode past the
+sinful man each day as they came ambling up from the Parliament House. A
+band of puppet-players and violins set up their shows; and music covers
+a multitude of incongruities. The ballad was then the great vehicle of
+personal attack, and Villiers's dawning taste for poetry was shown in
+the ditties which he now composed, and in which he sometimes assisted
+vocally. Whilst all the other Cavaliers were forced to fly, he thus
+bearded his enemies in their very homes: sometimes he talked to them
+face to face, and kept the sanctimonious citizens in talk, till they
+found themselves sinfully disposed to laugh. But this vagrant life had
+serious evils: it broke down all the restraints which civilised society
+naturally, and beneficially, imposes. The Duke of Buckingham, Butler,
+the author of Hudibras, writes, 'rises, eats, goes to bed by the Julian
+account, long after all others that go by the new style, and keeps the
+same hours with owls and the Antipodes. He is a great observer of the
+Tartar customs, and never eats till the great cham, having dined, makes
+proclamation that all the world may go to dinner. He does not dwell in
+his house, but haunts it like an evil spirit, that walks all night, to
+disturb the family, and never appears by day. He lives perpetually
+benighted, runs out of his life, and loses his time as men do their ways
+in the dark: and as blind men are led by their dogs, so he is governed
+by some mean servant or other that relates to his pleasures. He is as
+inconstant as the moon which he lives under; and although he does
+nothing but advise with his pillow all day, he is as great a stranger to
+himself as he is to the rest of the world. His mind entertains all
+things that come and go; but like guests and strangers, they are not
+welcome if they stay long. This lays him open to all cheats, quacks, and
+impostors, who apply to every particular humour while it lasts, and
+afterwards vanish. He deforms nature, while he intends to adorn her,
+like Indians that hang jewels in their lips and noses. His ears are
+perpetually drilling with a fiddlestick, and endures pleasures with less
+patience than other men do their pains.'
+
+The more effectually to support his character as a mountebank, Villiers
+sold mithridate and galbanum plasters: thousands of spectators and
+customers thronged every day to see and hear him. Possibly many guessed
+that beneath all the fantastic exterior some ulterior project was
+concealed; yet he remained untouched by the City Guards. Well did Dryden
+describe him:--
+
+    'Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking,
+     Beside ten thousand freaks that died in thinking.
+     Blest madman, who could every hour employ
+     With something new to wish or to enjoy.'
+
+His elder sister, Lady Mary Villiers, had married the Duke of Richmond,
+one of the loyal adherents of Charles I. The duke was, therefore, in
+durance at Windsor, whilst the duchess was to be placed under strict
+surveillance at Whitehall.
+
+Villiers resolved to see her. Hearing that she was to pass into
+Whitehall on a certain day, he set up his stage where she could not fail
+to perceive him. He had something important to say to her. As she drew
+near, he cried out to the mob that he would give them a song on the
+Duchess of Richmond and the Duke of Buckingham: nothing could be more
+acceptable. 'The mob,' it is related, 'stopped the coach and the duchess
+... Nay, so outrageous were the mob, that they forced the duchess, who
+was then the handsomest woman in England, to sit in the boot of the
+coach, and to hear him sing all his impertinent songs. Having left off
+singing, he told them it was no more than reason that he should present
+the duchess with some of the songs. So he alighted from his stage,
+covered all over with papers and ridiculous little pictures. Having come
+to the coach, he took off a black piece of taffeta, which he always wore
+over one of his eyes, when his sister discovered immediately who he was,
+yet had so much presence of mind as not to give the least sign of
+mistrust; nay, she gave him some very opprobrious language, but was very
+eager at snatching the papers he threw into her coach. Among them was a
+packet of letters, which she had no sooner got but she went forward, the
+duke, at the head of the mob, attending and hallooing her a good way out
+of the town.'
+
+[Illustration: VILLIERS IN DISGUISE--THE MEETING WITH HIS SISTER.]
+
+A still more daring adventure was contemplated also by this young,
+irresistible duke. Bridget Cromwell, the eldest daughter of Oliver, was,
+at that time, a bride of twenty-six years of age; having married, in
+1647, the saintly Henry Ireton, Lord Deputy of Ireland. Bridget was the
+pattern heroine of the '_unco guid_,' the quintessence of all propriety;
+the impersonation of sanctity; an ultra republican, who scarcely
+accorded to her father the modest title of Protector. She was esteemed
+by her party a 'personage of sublime growth:' 'humbled, not exalted,'
+according to Mrs. Hutchinson, by her elevation: 'nevertheless,' says
+that excellent lady, 'as my Lady Ireton was walking in the St. James's
+Park, the Lady Lambert, as proud as her husband, came by where she was,
+and as the present princess always hath precedency of the relict of the
+dead, so she put by my Lady Ireton, who, notwithstanding her piety and
+humility, was a little grieved at the affront.'
+
+After this anecdote one cannot give much credence to this lady's
+humility: Bridget was, however, a woman of powerful intellect, weakened
+by her extreme, and, to use a now common term, _crochety_ opinions.
+Like most _esprits forts_, she was easily imposed upon. One day this
+paragon saw a mountebank dancing on a stage in the most exquisite style.
+His fine shape, too, caught the attention of one who assumed to be above
+all folly. It is sometimes fatal to one's peace to look out of a window;
+no one knows what sights may rivet or displease. Mistress Ireton was
+sitting at her window unconscious that any one with the hated and
+malignant name of 'Villiers' was before her. After some unholy
+admiration, she sent to speak to the mummer. The duke scarcely knew
+whether to trust himself in the power of the bloodthirsty Ireton's bride
+or not--yet his courage--his love of sport--prevailed. He visited her
+that evening: no longer, however, in his jack-pudding coat, but in a
+rich suit, disguised with a cloak over it. He wore still a plaster over
+one eye, and was much disposed to take it off, but prudence forbade; and
+thus he stood in the presence of the prim and saintly Bridget Ireton.
+The particulars of the interview rest on his statement, and they must
+not, therefore, be accepted implicitly. Mistress Ireton is said to have
+made advances to the handsome incognito. What a triumph to a man like
+Villiers, to have intrigued with my Lord Protector's sanctified
+daughter! But she inspired him with disgust. He saw in her the
+presumption and hypocrisy of her father; he hated her as Cromwell's
+daughter and Ireton's wife. He told her, therefore, that he was a Jew,
+and could not by his laws become the paramour of a Christian woman. The
+saintly Bridget stood amazed; she had imprudently let him into some of
+the most important secrets of her party. A Jew! It was dreadful! But how
+could a person of that persuasion be so strict, so strait-laced? She
+probably entertained all the horror of Jews which the Puritanical party
+cherished as a virtue; forgetting the lessons of toleration and
+liberality inculcated by Holy Writ. She sent, however, for a certain
+Jewish Rabbi to converse with the stranger. What was the Duke of
+Buckingham's surprise, on visiting her one evening, to see the learned
+doctor armed at all points with the Talmud, and thirsting for dispute,
+by the side of the saintly Bridget. He could noways meet such a body of
+controversy; but thought it best forthwith to set off for the Downs.
+Before he departed he wrote, however, to Mistress Ireton, on the plea
+that she might wish to know to what tribe of Jews he belonged. So he
+sent her a note written with all his native wit and point.[4]
+
+Buckingham now experienced all the miseries that a man of expensive
+pleasures with a sequestrated estate is likely to endure. One friend
+remained to watch over his interests in England. This was John Traylman,
+a servant of his late father's, who was left to guard the collection of
+pictures made by the late duke, and deposited in York House. That
+collection was, in the opinion of competent judges, the third in point
+of value in England, being only inferior to those of Charles I. and the
+Earl of Arundel.
+
+It had been bought, with immense expense, partly by the duke's agents in
+Italy, the Mantua Gallery supplying a great portion--partly in
+France--partly in Flanders; and to Flanders a great portion was destined
+now to return. Secretly and laboriously did old Traylman pack up and
+send off these treasures to Antwerp, where now the gay youth whom the
+aged domestic had known from a child was in want and exile. The pictures
+were eagerly bought by a foreign collector named Duart. The proceeds
+gave poor Villiers bread; but the noble works of Titian and Leonardo da
+Vinci, and others, were lost for ever to England.
+
+It must have been very irritating to Villiers to know that whilst he
+just existed abroad, the great estates enjoyed by his father were being
+subjected to pillage by Cromwell's soldiers, or sold for pitiful sums by
+the Commissioners appointed by the Parliament to break up and annihilate
+many of the old properties in England. Burleigh-on-the-Hill, the stately
+seat on which the first duke had lavished thousands, had been taken by
+the Roundheads. It was so large, and presented so long a line of
+buildings, that the Parliamentarians could not hold it without leaving
+in it a great garrison and stores of ammunition. It was therefore burnt,
+and the stables alone occupied; and those even were formed into a house
+of unusual size. York House was doubtless marked out for the next
+destructive decree. There was something in the very history of this
+house which might be supposed to excite the wrath of the Roundheads.
+Queen Mary (whom we must not, after Miss Strickland's admirable life of
+her, call Bloody Queen Mary, but who will always be best known by that
+unpleasant title) had bestowed York House on the See of York, as a
+compensation for York House, at Whitehall, which Henry VIII. had taken
+from Wolsey. It had afterwards come into possession of the Keepers of
+the Great Seal. Lord Bacon was born in York House, his father having
+lived there; and the
+
+    'Greatest, wisest, meanest of mankind,'
+
+built here an aviary which cost £300. When the Duke of Lennox wished to
+buy York House, Bacon thus wrote to him:--'For this you will pardon me:
+York House is the house where my father died, and where I first
+breathed; and there will I yield my last breath, if it so please God and
+the King.' It did not, however, please the King that he should; the
+house was borrowed only by the first Duke of Buckingham from the
+Archbishop of York, and then exchanged for another seat, on the plea
+that the duke would want it for the reception of foreign potentates, and
+for entertainments given to royalty.
+
+The duke pulled it down: and the house, which was erected as a temporary
+structure, was so superb that even Pepys, twenty years after it had been
+left to bats and cobwebs, speaks of it in raptures, as of a place in
+which the great duke's soul was seen in every chamber. On the walls were
+shields on which the arms of Manners and of Villiers--peacocks and
+lions--were quartered. York House was never, however, finished; but as
+the lover of old haunts enters Buckingham Street in the Strand, he will
+perceive an ancient water-gate, beautifully proportioned, built by Inigo
+Jones--smoky, isolated, impaired--but still speaking volumes of
+remembrance of the glories of the assassinated duke, who had purposed to
+build the whole house in that style.
+
+'_Yorschaux_,' as he called it--York House--the French ambassador had
+written word to his friends at home, 'is the most richly fitted up of
+any that I saw.' The galleries and state rooms were graced by the
+display of the Roman marbles, both busts and statues, which the first
+duke had bought from Rubens; whilst in the gardens the Cain and Abel of
+John of Bologna, given by Philip IV. of Spain to King Charles, and by
+him bestowed on the elder George Villiers, made that fair _pleasaunce_
+famous. It was doomed--as were what were called the 'superstitious'
+pictures in the house--to destruction: henceforth all was in decay and
+neglect. 'I went to see York House and gardens,' Evelyn writes in 1655,
+'belonging to the former greate Buckingham, but now much ruined through
+neglect.'
+
+Traylman, doubtless, kept George Villiers the younger in full possession
+of all that was to happen to that deserted tenement in which the old man
+mourned for the departed, and thought of the absent.
+
+The intelligence which he had soon to communicate was all-important.
+York House was to be occupied again; and Cromwell and his coadjutors had
+bestowed it on Fairfax. The blow was perhaps softened by the reflection
+that Fairfax was a man of generous temper; and that he had an only
+daughter, Mary Fairfax, young, and an heiress. Though the daughter of a
+Puritan, a sort of interest was attached, even by Cavaliers, to Mary
+Fairfax, from her having, at five years of age, followed her father
+through the civil wars on horseback, seated before a maid-servant; and
+having, on her journey, frequently fainted, she was so ill as to have
+been left in a house by the roadside, her father never expecting to see
+her again.
+
+In reference to this young girl, then about eighteen years of age,
+Buckingham now formed a plan. He resolved to return to England
+disguised, to offer his hand to Mary Fairfax, and so recover his
+property through the influence of Fairfax. He was confident of his own
+attractions; and, indeed, from every account, he appears to have been
+one of those reckless, handsome, speculative characters that often take
+the fancy of better men than themselves. 'He had,' says Burnet, 'no sort
+of literature, only he was drawn into chymistry; and for some years he
+thought he was very near the finding of the philosopher's stone, which
+had the effect that attends on all such men as he was, when they are
+drawn in, to lay out for it. He had no principles of religion, virtue,
+or friendship; pleasure, frolic, or extravagant diversion, was all he
+laid to heart. He was true to nothing; for he was not true to himself.
+He had no steadiness nor conduct; he could keep no secret, nor execute
+any design without spoiling it; he could never fix his thoughts, nor
+govern his estate, though then the greatest in England. He was bred
+about the king, and for many years he had a great ascendant over him;
+but he spoke of him to all persons with that contempt, that at last he
+drew a lasting disgrace upon himself. And he at length ruined both body
+and mind, fortune and reputation, equally.'
+
+This was a sad prospect for poor Mary Fairfax, but certainly if in their
+choice
+
+    ----'Weak women go astray,
+    Their stars are more in fault than they,'
+
+and she was less to blame in her choice than her father, who ought to
+have advised her against the marriage. Where and how they met is not
+known. Mary was not attractive in person: she was in her youth little,
+brown, and thin, but became a 'short fat body,' as De Grammont tells us,
+in her early married life; in the later period of her existence she was
+described by the Vicomtesse de Longueville as a 'little round crumpled
+woman, very fond of finery;' and she adds that, on visiting the duchess
+one day, she found her, though in mourning, in a kind of loose robe over
+her, all edged and laced with gold. So much for a Puritan's daughter!
+
+To this insipid personage the duke presented himself. She soon liked
+him, and in spite of his outrageous infidelities, continued to like him
+after their marriage.
+
+He carried his point: Mary Fairfax became his wife on the 6th of
+September, 1675, and, by the influence of Fairfax, his estate, or, at
+all events, a portion of the revenues, about £4,000 a year, it is said,
+were restored to him. Nevertheless, it is mortifying to find that in
+1682, he sold York House, in which his father had taken such pride, for
+£30,000. The house was pulled down; streets were erected on the
+gardens: George Street, Villiers Street, Duke Street, Buckingham Street,
+Off Alley recall the name of the ill-starred George, first duke, and of
+his needy, profligate son; but the only trace of the real greatness of
+the family importance thus swept away is in the motto inscribed on the
+point of old Inigo's water-gate, towards the street: '_Fidei coticula
+crux_.' It is sad for all good royalists to reflect that it was not the
+rabid Roundhead, but a degenerate Cavalier, who sold and thus destroyed
+York House.
+
+The marriage with Mary Fairfax, though one of interest solely, was not a
+_mésalliance_: her father was connected by the female side with the
+Earls of Rutland; he was also a man of a generous spirit, as he had
+shown, in handing over to the Countess of Derby the rents of the Isle of
+Man, which had been granted to him by the Parliament. In a similar
+spirit he was not sorry to restore York House to the Duke of Buckingham.
+
+Cromwell, however, was highly exasperated by the nuptials between Mary
+Fairfax and Villiers, which took place at Nun-Appleton, near York, one
+of Fairfax's estates. The Protector had, it is said, intended Villiers
+for one of his own daughters. Upon what plea he acted it is not stated:
+he committed Villiers to the Tower, where he remained until the death of
+Oliver, and the accession of Richard Cromwell.
+
+In vain did Fairfax solicit his release: Cromwell refused it, and
+Villiers remained in durance until the abdication of Richard Cromwell,
+when he was set at liberty, but not without the following conditions,
+dated February 21st, 1658-9:--
+
+'The humble petition of George Duke of Buckingham was this day read.
+Resolved that George Duke of Buckingham, now prisoner at Windsor Castle,
+upon his engagement upon his honour at the bar of this House, and upon
+the engagement of Lord Fairfax in £20,000 that the said duke shall
+peaceably demain himself for the future, and shall not join with, or
+abet, or have any correspondence with, any of the enemies of the Lord
+Protector, and of this Commonwealth, in any of the parts beyond the sea,
+or within this Commonwealth, shall be discharged of his imprisonment and
+restraint; and that the Governor of Windsor Castle be required to bring
+the Duke of Buckingham to the bar of this House on Wednesday next, to
+engage his honour accordingly. Ordered, that the security of £20,000 to
+be given by the Lord Fairfax, on the behalf of the Duke of Buckingham,
+be taken in the name of His Highness the Lord Protector.'
+
+During his incarceration at Windsor, Buckingham had a companion, of whom
+many a better man might have been envious: this was Abraham Cowley, an
+old college friend of the duke's. Cowley was the son of a grocer, and
+owed his entrance into academic life to having been a King's Scholar at
+Westminster. One day he happened to take up from his mother's parlour
+window a copy of Spenser's 'Faerie Queene.' He eagerly perused the
+delightful volume, though he was then only twelve years old: and this
+impulse being given to his mind, became at fifteen a reciter of verses.
+His 'Poetical Blossoms,' published whilst he was still at school, gave,
+however, no foretaste of his future eminence. He proceeded to Trinity
+College, Cambridge, where his friendship with Villiers was formed; and
+where, perhaps, from that circumstance, Cowley's predilections for the
+cause of the Stuarts was ripened into loyalty.
+
+No two characters could be more dissimilar than those of Abraham Cowley
+and George Villiers. Cowley was quiet, modest, sober, of a thoughtful,
+philosophical turn, and of an affectionate nature; neither boasting of
+his own merits nor depreciating others. He was the friend of Lucius
+Cary, Lord Falkland; and yet he loved, though he must have condemned,
+George Villiers. It is not unlikely that, whilst Cowley imparted his
+love of poetry to Villiers, Villiers may have inspired the pensive and
+blameless poet with a love of that display of wit then in vogue, and
+heightened that sense of humour which speaks forth in some of Cowley's
+productions. Few authors suggest so many new thoughts, really his own,
+as Cowley. 'His works,' it has been said, 'are a flower-garden run to
+weeds, but the flowers are numerous and brilliant, and a search after
+them will repay the pains of a collector who is not too indolent or
+fastidious.'
+
+As Cowley and his friend passed the weary hours in durance, many an old
+tale could the poet tell the peer of stirring times; for Cowley had
+accompanied Charles I. in many a perilous journey, and had protected
+Queen Henrietta Maria in her escape to France: through Cowley had the
+correspondence of the royal pair, when separated, been carried on. The
+poet had before suffered imprisonment for his loyalty; and, to disguise
+his actual occupation, had obtained the degree of Doctor of Medicine,
+and assumed the character of a physician, on the strength of knowing the
+virtues of a few plants.
+
+Many a laugh, doubtless, had Buckingham at the expense of _Dr._ Cowley:
+however, in later days, the duke proved a true friend to the poet, in
+helping to procure for him the lease of a farm at Chertsey from the
+queen, and here Cowley, rich upon £300 a year, ended his days.
+
+For some time after Buckingham's release, he lived quietly and
+respectably at Nun-Appleton, with General Fairfax and the vapid Mary.
+But the Restoration--the first dawnings of which have been referred to
+in the commencement of this biography--ruined him, body and mind.
+
+He was made a Lord of the Bedchamber, a Member of the Privy Council, and
+afterwards Master of the Horse,[5] and Lord Lieutenant of Yorkshire. He
+lived in great magnificence at Wallingford House; a tenement next to
+York House, intended to be the habitable and useful appendage to that
+palace.
+
+He was henceforth, until he proved treacherous to his sovereign, the
+brightest ornament of Whitehall. Beauty of person was hereditary: his
+father was styled the 'handsomest-bodied man in England,' and George
+Villiers the younger equalled George Villiers the elder in all personal
+accomplishments. When he entered the Presence-Chamber all eyes followed
+him; every movement was graceful and stately. Sir John Reresby
+pronounced him 'to be the finest gentleman he ever saw.' 'He was born,'
+Madame Dunois declared, 'for gallantry and magnificence.' His wit was
+faultless, but his manners engaging; yet his sallies often descended
+into buffoonery, and he spared no one in his merry moods. One evening a
+play of Dryden's was represented. An actress had to spout forth this
+line--
+
+    'My wound is great because it is so small!'
+
+She gave it out with pathos, paused, and was theatrically distressed.
+Buckingham was seated in one of the boxes. He rose, all eyes were fixed
+upon a face well known in all gay assemblies, in a tone of burlesque he
+answered--
+
+    'Then 'twould be greater were it none at all.'
+
+Instantly the audience laughed at the Duke's tone of ridicule, and the
+poor woman was hissed off the stage.
+
+The king himself did not escape Buckingham's shafts; whilst Lord
+Chancellor Clarendon fell a victim to his ridicule: nothing could
+withstand it. There, not in that iniquitous gallery at Whitehall, but in
+the king's privy chambers, Villiers might be seen, in all the radiance
+of his matured beauty. His face was long and oval, with sleepy, yet
+glistening eyes, over which large arched eyebrows seemed to contract a
+brow on which the curls of a massive wig (which fell almost to his
+shoulders) hung low. His nose was long, well formed, and flexible; his
+lips thin and compressed, and defined, as the custom was, by two very
+short, fine, black patches of hair, looking more like strips of
+sticking-plaster than a moustache. As he made his reverence, his rich
+robes fell over a faultless form. He was a beau to the very fold of the
+cambric band round his throat; with long ends of the richest, closest
+point that was ever rummaged out from a foreign nunnery to be placed on
+the person of this sacrilegious sinner.
+
+Behold, now, how he changes. Villiers is Villiers no longer. He is
+Clarendon, walking solemnly to the Court of the Star Chamber: a pair of
+bellows is hanging before him for the purse; Colonel Titus is walking
+with a fire shovel on his shoulder, to represent a mace; the king,
+himself a capital mimic, is splitting his sides with laughter; the
+courtiers are fairly in a roar. Then how he was wont to divert the king
+with his descriptions! 'Ipswich, for instance,' he said, 'was a town
+without inhabitants--a river it had without water--streets without
+names; and it was a place where asses wore boots:' alluding to the
+asses, when employed in rolling Lord Hereford's bowling-green, having
+boots on their feet to prevent their injuring the turf.
+
+Flecknoe, the poet, describes the duke at this period, in 'Euterpe
+Revived'--
+
+    The gallant'st person, and the noblest minde,
+    In all the world his prince could ever finde,
+    Or to participate his private cares,
+    Or bear the public weight of his affairs,
+    Like well-built arches, stronger with their weight,
+    And well-built minds, the steadier with their height;
+    Such was the composition and frame
+    O' the noble and the gallant Buckingham.'
+
+The praise, however, even in the duke's best days, was overcharged.
+Villiers was no 'well-built arch,' nor could Charles trust to the
+fidelity of one so versatile for an hour. Besides, the moral character
+of Villiers must have prevented him, even in those days, from bearing
+'the public weight of affairs.'
+
+A scandalous intrigue soon proved the unsoundness of Flecknoe's tribute.
+Amongst the most licentious beauties of the court was Anna Maria,
+Countess of Shrewsbury, the daughter of Robert Brudenel, Earl of
+Cardigan, and the wife of Francis, Earl of Shrewsbury: amongst many
+shameless women she was the most shameless, and her face seems to have
+well expressed her mind. In the round, fair visage, with its languishing
+eyes, and full, pouting mouth, there is something voluptuous and bold.
+The forehead is broad, but low; and the wavy hair, with its tendril
+curls, comes down almost to the fine arched eyebrows, and then, falling
+into masses, sets off white shoulders which seem to designate an
+inelegant amount of _embonpoint_. There is nothing elevated in the whole
+countenance, as Lely has painted her, and her history is a disgrace to
+her age and time.
+
+She had numerous lovers (not in the refined sense of the word), and, at
+last, took up with Thomas Killigrew. He had been, like Villiers, a
+royalist: first a page to Charles I., next a companion of Charles II.,
+in exile. He married the fair Cecilia Croft; yet his morals were so
+vicious that even in the Court of Venice to which he was accredited, in
+order to borrow money from the merchants of that city, he was too
+profligate to remain. He came back with Charles II., and was Master of
+the Revels, or King's Jester, as the court considered him, though
+without any regular appointment, during his life: the butt, at once, and
+the satirist of Whitehall.
+
+It was Killigrew's wit and descriptive powers which, when heightened by
+wine, were inconceivably great, that induced Villiers to select Lady
+Shrewsbury for the object of his admiration. When Killigrew perceived
+that he was supplanted by Villiers, he became frantic with rage, and
+poured out the bitterest invectives against the countess. The result was
+that, one night, returning from the Duke of York's apartments at St.
+James's, three passes with a sword were made at him through his chair,
+and one of them pierced his arm. This, and other occurrences, at last
+aroused the attention of Lord Shrewsbury, who had hitherto never doubted
+his wife: he challenged the Duke of Buckingham; and his infamous wife,
+it is said, held her paramour's horse, disguised as a page. Lord
+Shrewsbury was killed,[6] and the scandalous intimacy went on as before.
+No one but the queen, no one but the Duchess of Buckingham, appeared
+shocked at this tragedy, and no one minded their remarks, or joined in
+their indignation: all moral sense was suspended, or wholly stifled; and
+Villiers gloried in his depravity, more witty, more amusing, more
+fashionable than ever; and yet he seems, by the best-known and most
+extolled of his poems, to have had some conception of what a real and
+worthy attachment might be.
+
+The following verses are to his 'Mistress':--
+
+          'What a dull fool was I
+           To think so gross a lie,
+         As that I ever was in love before!
+         I have, perhaps, known one or two,
+           With whom I was content to be
+           At that which they call keeping company.
+         But after all that they could do,
+           I still could be with more.
+           Their absence never made me shed a tear;
+           And I can truly swear,
+         That, till my eyes first gazed on you,
+           I ne'er beheld the thing I could adore.
+
+          'A world of things must curiously be sought:
+           A world of things must be together brought
+         To make up charms which have the power to make,
+         Through a discerning eye, true love;
+         That is a master-piece above
+           What only looks and shape can do;
+           There must be wit and judgment too,
+         Greatness of thought, and worth, which draw,
+         From the whole world, respect and awe.
+
+        'She that would raise a noble love must find
+         Ways to beget a passion for her mind;
+         She must be that which she to be would seem,
+         For all true love is grounded on esteem:
+         Plainness and truth gain more a generous heart
+         Than all the crooked subtleties of art.
+         She must be--what said I?--she must be _you_:
+         None but yourself that miracle can do.
+         At least, I'm sure, thus much I plainly see,
+         None but yourself e'er did it upon me.
+         'Tis you alone that can my heart subdue,
+         To you alone it always shall be true.'
+
+The next lines are also remarkable for the delicacy and happy turn of
+the expressions--
+
+        'Though Phillis, from prevailing charms,
+         Have forc'd my Delia from my arms,
+         Think not your conquest to maintain
+         By rigour or unjust disdain.
+         In vain, fair nymph, in vain you strive,
+         For Love doth seldom Hope survive.
+         My heart may languish for a time,
+         As all beauties in their prime
+         Have justified such cruelty,
+         By the same fate that conquered me.
+         When age shall come, at whose command
+         Those troops of beauty must disband--
+         A rival's strength once took away,
+         What slave's so dull as to obey?
+         But if you'll learn a noble way
+         To keep his empire from decay,
+         And there for ever fix your throne,
+         Be kind, but kind to me alone.'
+
+Like his father, who ruined himself by building, Villiers had a
+monomania for bricks and mortar, yet he found time to write 'The
+Rehearsal,' a play on which Mr. Reed in his 'Dramatic Biography' makes
+the following observation: 'It is so perfect a masterpiece in its way,
+and so truly original, that notwithstanding its prodigious success, even
+the task of imitation, which most kinds of excellence have invited
+inferior geniuses to undertake, has appeared as too arduous to be
+attempted with regard to this, which through a whole century stands
+alone, notwithstanding that the very plays it was written expressly to
+ridicule are forgotten, and the taste it was meant to expose totally
+exploded.'
+
+The reverses of fortune which brought George Villiers to abject misery
+were therefore, in a very great measure, due to his own misconduct, his
+depravity, his waste of life, his perversion of noble mental powers: yet
+in many respects he was in advance of his age. He advocated, in the
+House of Lords, toleration to Dissenters. He wrote a 'Short Discourse on
+the Reasonableness of Men's having a Religion, or Worship of God;' yet,
+such was his inconsistency, that in spite of these works, and of one
+styled a 'Demonstration of the Deity,' written a short time before his
+death, he assisted Lord Rochester in his atheistic poem upon 'Nothing.'
+
+Butler, the author of Hudibras, too truly said of Villiers 'that he had
+studied _the whole body of vice_;' a most fearful censure--a most
+significant description of a bad man. 'His parts,' he adds, 'are
+disproportionate to the whole, and like a monster, he has more of some,
+and less of others, than he should have. He has pulled down all that
+nature raised in him, and built himself up again after a model of his
+own. He has dammed up all those lights that nature made into the noblest
+prospects of the world, and opened other little blind loopholes backward
+by turning day into night, and night into day.'
+
+The satiety and consequent misery produced by this terrible life are
+ably described by Butler. And it was perhaps partly this wearied,
+worn-out spirit that caused Villiers to rush madly into politics for
+excitement. In 1666 he asked for the office of Lord President of the
+North; it was refused: he became disaffected, raised mutinies, and, at
+last, excited the indignation of his too-indulgent sovereign. Charles
+dismissed him from his office, after keeping him for some time in
+confinement. After this epoch little is heard of Buckingham but what is
+disgraceful. He was again restored to Whitehall, and, according to
+Pepys, even closeted with Charles, whilst the Duke of York was excluded.
+A certain acquaintance of the duke's remonstrated with him upon the
+course which Charles now took in Parliament. 'How often have you said to
+me,' this person remarked, 'that the king was a weak man, unable to
+govern, but to be governed, and that you could command him as you liked?
+Why do you suffer him to do these things?'
+
+'Why,' answered the duke, 'I do suffer him to do these things, that I
+may hereafter the better command him.' A reply which betrays the most
+depraved principle of action, whether towards a sovereign or a friend,
+that can be expressed. His influence was for some time supreme, yet he
+became the leader of the opposition, and invited to his table the
+discontented peers, to whom he satirized the court, and condemned the
+king's want of attention to business. Whilst the theatre was ringing
+with laughter at the inimitable character of Bayes in the 'Rehearsal,'
+the House of Lords was listening with profound attention to the
+eloquence that entranced their faculties, making wrong seem right, for
+Buckingham was ever heard with attention.
+
+Taking into account his mode of existence, 'which,' says Clarendon, 'was
+a life by night more than by day, in all the liberties that nature could
+desire and wit invent,' it was astonishing how extensive an influence he
+had in both Houses of Parliament. 'His rank and condescension, the
+pleasantness of his humours and conversation, and the extravagance and
+keenness of his wit, unrestrained by modesty or religion, caused persons
+of all opinions and dispositions to be fond of his company, and to
+imagine that these levities and vanities would wear off with age, and
+that there would be enough of good left to make him useful to his
+country, for which he pretended a wonderful affection.'
+
+But this brilliant career was soon checked. The varnish over the hollow
+character of this extraordinary man was eventually rubbed off. We find
+the first hint of that famous coalition styled the _Cabal_ in Pepys's
+Diary, and henceforth the duke must be regarded as a ruined man.
+
+'He' (Sir H. Cholmly) 'tells me that the Duke of Buckingham his crimes,
+as far as he knows, are his being of a cabal with some discontented
+persons of the late House of Commons, and opposing the desires of the
+king in all his matters in that House; and endeavouring to become
+popular, and advising how the Commons' House should proceed, and how he
+would order the House of Lords. And he hath been endeavouring to have
+the king's nativity calculated; which was done, and the fellow now in
+the Tower about it.... This silly lord hath provoked, by his ill
+carriage, the Duke of York, my Lord Chancellor, and all the great
+persons, and therefore most likely will die.'
+
+One day, in the House of Lords, during a conference between the two
+Houses, Buckingham leaned rudely over the shoulder of Henry Pierrepont
+Marquis of Dorchester. Lord Dorchester merely removed his elbow. Then
+the duke asked him if he was uneasy. 'Yes,' the marquis replied, adding,
+'the duke dared not do this if he were anywhere else.' Buckingham
+retorted, 'Yes, he would: and he was a better man than my lord marquis:'
+on which Dorchester told him that he lied. On this Buckingham struck off
+Dorchester's hat, seized him by the periwig, pulled it aside, and held
+him. The Lord Chamberlain and others interposed and sent them both to
+the Tower. Nevertheless, not a month afterwards, Pepys speaks of seeing
+the duke's play of 'The Chances' acted at Whitehall. 'A good play,' he
+condescends to say, 'I find it, and the actors most good in it; and
+pretty to hear Knipp sing in the play very properly "All night I weepe,"
+and sung it admirably. The whole play pleases me well: and most of all,
+the sight of many fine ladies, amongst others, my Lady Castlemaine and
+Mrs. Middleton.'
+
+The whole management of public affairs was, at this period, intrusted to
+five persons, and hence the famous combination, the united letters of
+which formed the word 'Cabal:'--Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley,
+and Lauderdale. Their reprehensible schemes, their desperate characters,
+rendered them the opprobrium of their age, and the objects of censure to
+all posterity. Whilst matters were in this state a daring outrage, which
+spoke fearfully of the lawless state of the times, was ascribed, though
+wrongly, to Buckingham. The Duke of Ormond, the object of his inveterate
+hatred, was at that time Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Colonel Blood,--a
+disaffected disbanded officer of the Commonwealth, who had been
+attainted for a conspiracy in Ireland, but had escaped punishment,--came
+to England, and acted as a spy for the 'Cabal,' who did not hesitate to
+countenance this daring scoundrel.
+
+His first exploit was to attack the Duke of Ormond's coach one night in
+St. James's Street: to secure his person, bind him, put him on horseback
+after one of his accomplices, and carry him to Tyburn, where he meant to
+hang his grace. On their way, however, Ormond, by a violent effort,
+threw himself on the ground; a scuffle ensued: the duke's servants came
+up, and after receiving the fire of Blood's pistols, the duke escaped.
+Lord Ossory, the Duke of Ormond's son, on going afterward to court, met
+Buckingham, and addressed him in these words:--
+
+'My lord, I know well that you are at the bottom of this late attempt on
+my father; but I give you warning, if he by any means come to a violent
+end, I shall not be at a loss to know the author. I shall consider you
+as an assassin, and shall treat you as such; and wherever I meet you I
+shall pistol you, though you stood behind the king's chair; and I tell
+it you in his majesty's presence, that you may be sure I shall not fail
+of performance.'
+
+Blood's next feat was to carry off from the Tower the crown jewels. He
+was overtaken and arrested: and was then asked to name his accomplices.
+'No,' he replied, 'the fear of danger shall never tempt me to deny guilt
+or to betray a friend.' Charles II., with undignified curiosity, wished
+to see the culprit. On inquiring of Blood how he dared to make so bold
+an attempt on the crown, the bravo answered, 'My father lost a good
+estate fighting for the crown, and I considered it no harm to recover it
+by the crown.' He then told his majesty how he had resolved to
+assassinate him: how he had stood among the reeds in Battersea-fields
+with this design; how then, a sudden awe had come over him: and Charles
+was weak enough to admire Blood's fearless bearing and to pardon his
+attempt. Well might the Earl of Rochester write of Charles--
+
+    'Here lies my sovereign lord the king,
+       Whose word no man relies on;
+     Who never said a foolish thing,
+       And never did a wise one.'
+
+Notwithstanding Blood's outrages--the slightest penalty for which in
+our days would have been penal servitude for life--Evelyn met him, not
+long afterwards, at Lord Clifford's, at dinner, when De Grammont and
+other French noblemen were entertained. 'The man,' says Evelyn, 'had not
+only a daring, but a villanous, unmerciful look, a false countenance;
+but very well-spoken, and dangerously insinuating.'
+
+Early in 1662, the Duke of Buckingham had been engaged in practices
+against the court: he had disguised deep designs by affecting the mere
+man of pleasure. Never was there such splendour as at Wallingford
+House--such wit and gallantry; such perfect good breeding; such
+apparently openhanded hospitality. At those splendid banquets, John
+Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, 'a man whom the Muses were fond to inspire,
+but ashamed to avow,' showed his 'beautiful face,' as it was called; and
+chimed in with that wit for which the age was famous. The frequenters at
+Wallingford House gloried in their indelicacy. 'One is amazed,' Horace
+Walpole observes, 'at hearing the age of Charles II. called polite. The
+Puritans have affected to call everything by a Scripture' name; the new
+comers affected to call everything by its right name;
+
+    'As if preposterously they would confess
+     A forced hypocrisy in wickedness.'
+
+Walpole compares the age of Charles II. to that of Aristophanes--'which
+called its own grossness polite.' How bitterly he decries the stale
+poems of the time as 'a heap of senseless ribaldry;' how truly he shows
+that licentiousness weakens as well as depraves the judgment. 'When
+Satyrs are brought to court,' he observes, 'no wonder the Graces would
+not trust themselves there.'
+
+The Cabal is said, however, to have been concocted, not at Wallingford
+House, but at Ham House, near Kingston-on-Thames.
+
+In this stately old manor-house, the abode of the Tollemache family, the
+memory of Charles II. and of his court seems to linger still. Ham House
+was intended for the residence of Henry, Prince of Wales, and was built
+in 1610. It stands near the river Thames; and is flanked by noble
+avenues of elm and of chestnut trees, down which one may almost, as it
+were, hear the king's talk with his courtiers; see Arlington approach
+with the well-known patch across his nose; or spy out the lovely,
+childish Miss Stuart and her future husband, the Duke of Richmond,
+slipping behind into the garden, lest the jealous mortified king should
+catch a sight of the 'conscious lovers.'
+
+This stately structure was given by Charles II., in 1672, to the Duke
+and Duchess of Lauderdale: she, the supposed mistress of Cromwell; he,
+the cruel, hateful Lauderdale of the Cabal. This detestable couple,
+however, furnished with massive grandeur the apartments of Ham House.
+They had the ceilings painted by Verrio; the furniture was rich, and
+even now the bellows and brushes in some of the rooms are of silver
+filigree. One room is furnished with yellow damask, still rich, though
+faded; the very seats on which Charles, looking around him, saw
+Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley (the infamous Shaftesbury), and
+Lauderdale--and knew not, good easy man, that he was looking on a band
+of traitors--are still there. Nay, he even sat to Sir Peter Lely for a
+portrait for this very place--in which, schemes for the ruin of the
+kingdom were concocted. All, probably, was smooth and pleasing to the
+monarch as he ranged down the fine gallery, ninety-two feet long; or sat
+at dinner amid his foes in that hall, surrounded with an open
+balustrade; or disported himself on the river's green brink. Nay, one
+may even fancy Nell Gwynn taking a day's pleasure in this then lone and
+ever sweet locality. We hear her swearing, as she was wont to do,
+perchance at the dim looking-glasses, her own house in Pall Mall, given
+her by the king, having been filled up, for the comedian, entirely,
+ceiling and all, with looking-glass. How bold and pretty she looked in
+her undress! Even Pepys--no very sound moralist, though a vast
+hypocrite--tells us: Nelly, 'all unready' was 'very pretty, prettier far
+than he thought.' But to see how she was 'painted,' would, he thought,
+'make a man mad.'
+
+'Madame Ellen,' as after her _elevation_, as it was termed, she was
+called, might, since she held long a great sway over Charles's fancy, be
+suffered to scamper about Ham House--where her merry laugh perhaps
+scandalised the now Saintly Duchess of Lauderdale,--just to impose on
+the world; for Nell was regarded as the Protestant champion of the
+court, in opposition to her French rival, the Duchess of Portsmouth.
+
+Let us suppose that she has been at Ham House, and is gone off to Pall
+Mall again, where she can see her painted face in every turn. The king
+has departed, and Killigrew, who, at all events, is loyal, and the
+true-hearted Duke of Richmond, all are away to London. In yon
+sanctimonious-looking closet, next to the duchess's bed-chamber, with her
+psalter and her prayer-book on her desk, which is fixed to her great
+chair, and that very cane which still hangs there serving as her support
+when she comes forth from that closet, murmur and wrangle the component
+parts of that which was never mentioned without fear--the Cabal. The
+conspirators dare not trust themselves in the gallery: there is tapestry
+there, and we all know what coverts there are for eaves-droppers and
+spiders in tapestried walls: then the great Cardinal spiders do so click
+there, are so like the death-watch, that Villiers, who is inveterately
+superstitious, will not abide there. The hall, with its enclosing
+galleries, and the buttery near, are manifestly unsafe. So they heard,
+nay crouch, mutter, and concoct that fearful treachery which, as far as
+their country is concerned, has been a thing apart in our annals, in 'my
+Lady's' closet. Englishmen are turbulent, ambitious, unscrupulous; but
+the craft of Maitland, Duke of Lauderdale--the subtlety of Ashley, seem
+hardly conceivable either in a Scot or Southron.
+
+These meetings had their natural consequence. One leaves Lauderdale,
+Arlington, Ashley, and Clifford, to their fate. But the career of
+Villiers inspires more interest. He seemed born for better things. Like
+many men of genius, he was so credulous that the faith he pinned on one
+Heydon, an astrologer, at this time, perhaps buoyed him up with false
+hopes. Be it as it may, his plots now tended to open insurrection. In
+1666, a proclamation had been issued for his apprehension--he having
+then absconded. On this occasion he was saved by the act of one whom he
+had injured grossly--his wife. She managed to outride the
+serjeant-at-arms, and to warn him of his danger. She had borne his
+infidelities, after the fashion of the day, as a matter of course:
+jealousy was then an impertinence--constancy, a chimera; and her
+husband, whatever his conduct, had ever treated her with kindness of
+manner; he had that charm, that attribute of his family, in perfection,
+and it had fascinated Mary Fairfax.
+
+He fled, and played for a year successfully the pranks of his youth. At
+last, worn out, he talked of giving himself up to justice. 'Mr. Fenn, at
+the table, says that he hath been taken by the watch two or three times
+of late, at unseasonable hours, but so disguised they did not know him;
+and when I come home, by and by, Mr. Lowther tells me that the Duke of
+Buckingham do dine publickly this day at Wadlow's, at the Sun Tavern;
+and is mighty merry, and sent word to the Lieutenant of the Tower, that
+he would come to him as soon as he dined.' So Pepys states.
+
+Whilst in the Tower--to which he was again committed--Buckingham's
+pardon was solicited by Lady Castlemaine; on which account the king was
+very angry with her; called her a meddling 'jade;' she calling him
+'fool,' and saying if he was not a fool he never would suffer his best
+subjects to be imprisoned--referring to Buckingham. And not only did she
+ask his liberty, but the restitution of his places. No wonder there was
+discontent when such things were done, and public affairs were in such a
+state. We must again quote the graphic, terse language of Pepys:--'It
+was computed that the Parliament had given the king for this war only,
+besides all prizes, and besides the £200,000 which he was to spend of
+his own revenue, to guard the sea, above £5,000,000, and odd £100,000;
+which is a most prodigious sum. Sir H. Cholmly, as a true English
+gentleman, do decry the king's expenses of his privy purse, which in
+King James's time did not rise to above £5,000 a year, and in King
+Charles's to £10,000, do now cost us above £100,000, besides the great
+charge of the monarchy, as the Duke of York has £100,000 of it, and
+other limbs of the royal family.'
+
+In consequence of Lady Castlemaine's intervention, Villiers was restored
+to liberty--a strange instance, as Pepys remarks, of the 'fool's play'
+of the age. Buckingham was now as presuming as ever: he had a theatre of
+his own, and he soon showed his usual arrogance by beating Henry
+Killigrew on the stage, and taking away his coat and sword; all very
+'innocently' done, according to Pepys. In July he appeared in his place
+in the House of Lords, as 'brisk as ever,' and sat in his robes,
+'which,' says Pepys, 'is a monstrous thing that a man should be
+proclaimed against, and put in the Tower, and released without any
+trial, and yet not restored to his places.'
+
+We next find the duke intrusted with a mission to France, in concert
+with Halifax and Arlington. In the year 1680, he was threatened with an
+impeachment, in which, with his usual skill, he managed to exculpate
+himself by blaming Lord Arlington. The House of Commons passed a vote
+for his removal; and he entered the ranks of the opposition.
+
+But this career of public meanness and private profligacy was drawing to
+a close. Alcibiades no longer--his frame wasted by vice--his spirits
+broken by pecuniary difficulties--Buckingham's importance visibly sank
+away. 'He remained, at last,' to borrow the words of Hume, 'as incapable
+of doing hurt as he had ever been little desirous of doing good to
+mankind.' His fortune had now dwindled down to £300 a year in land; he
+sold Wallingford House, and removed into the City.
+
+And now the fruits of his adversity, not, we hope, too late, began to
+appear. Like Lord Rochester, who had ordered all his immoral works to be
+burnt, Buckingham now wished to retrieve the past. In 1685 he wrote the
+religious works which form so striking a contrast with his other
+productions.
+
+That he had been up to the very time of his ruin perfectly impervious to
+remorse, dead also to shame, is amply manifested by his conduct soon
+after his duel with the Earl of Shrewsbury.
+
+Sir George Etherege had brought out a new play at the Duke of York's
+Theatre. It was called, 'She Would if she Could.' Plays in those days
+began at what we now consider our luncheon hour. Though Pepys arrived at
+the theatre on this occasion at two o'clock--his wife having gone
+before--about a thousand people had then been put back from the pit. At
+last, seeing his wife in the eighteen-penny-box, Samuel 'made shift' to
+get there and there saw, 'but lord!' (his own words are inimitable) 'how
+dull, and how silly the play, there being nothing in the world good in
+it, and few people pleased in it. The king was there; but I sat mightily
+behind, and could see but little, and hear not at all. The play being
+done, I went into the pit to look for my wife, it being dark and
+raining, but could not find her; and so staid, going between the two
+doors and through the pit an hour and a half, I think, after the play
+was done; the people staying there till the rain was over, and to talk
+to one another. And among the rest, here was the Duke of Buckingham
+to-day openly in the pit; and there I found him with my Lord Buckhurst,
+and Sedley, and Etheridge the poet, the last of whom I did hear mightily
+find fault with the actors, that they were out of humour, and had not
+their parts perfect, and that Harris did do nothing, nor could so much
+as sing a ketch in it; and so was mightily concerned, while all the rest
+did, through the whole pit, blame the play as a silly, dull thing,
+though there was something very roguish and witty; but the design of the
+play, and end, mighty insipid.'
+
+Buckingham had held out to his Puritan friends the hope of his
+conversion for some years; and when they attempted to convert him, he
+had appointed a time for them to finish their work. They kept their
+promise, and discovered him in the most profligate society. It was
+indeed impossible to know in what directions his fancies might take him,
+when we find him believing in the predictions of a poor fellow in a
+wretched lodging near Tower Hill, who, having cast his nativity, assured
+the duke he would be king.
+
+He had continued for years to live with the Countess of Shrewsbury, and
+two months after her husband's death, had taken her to his home. Then,
+at last, the Duchess of Buckingham indignantly observed, that she and
+the countess could not possibly live together. 'So I thought, madam,'
+was the reply. 'I have therefore ordered your coach to take you to your
+father's.' It has been asserted that Dr. Sprat, the duke's chaplain,
+actually married him to Lady Shrewsbury, and that his legal wife was
+thenceforth styled 'The Duchess-dowager.'
+
+He retreated with his mistress to Claverdon, near Windsor, situated on
+the summit of a hill which is washed by the Thames. It is a noble
+building, with a great terrace in front, under which are twenty-six
+niches, in which Buckingham had intended to place twenty-six statues as
+large as life; and in the middle is an alcove with stairs. Here he lived
+with the infamous countess, by whom he had a son, whom he styled Earl of
+Coventry, (his second title,) and who died an infant.
+
+One lingers still over the social career of one whom Louis XIV. called
+'the only English gentleman he had ever seen.' A capital retort was made
+to Buckingham by the Princess of Orange, during an interview, when he
+stopped at the Hague, between her and the Duke. He was trying
+diplomatically to convince her of the affection of England for the
+States. 'We do not,' he said, 'use Holland like a mistress, we love her
+as a wife.' '_Vraiment je crois que vous nous aimez comme vous aimez la
+vôtre_,' was the sharp and clever answer.
+
+On the death of Charles II., in 1685, Buckingham retired to the small
+remnant of his Yorkshire estates. His debts were now set down at the sum
+of £140,000. They were liquidated by the sale of his estates. He took
+kindly to a country life, to the surprise of his old comrade in
+pleasure, Etherege. 'I have heard the news,' that wit cried, alluding to
+this change, 'with no less astonishment than if I had been told that the
+Pope had begun to wear a periwig and had turned beau in the
+seventy-fourth year of his age!'
+
+Father Petre and Father Fitzgerald were sent by James II. to convert the
+duke to Popery. The following anecdote is told of their conference with
+the dying sinner:--'We deny,' said the Jesuit Petre, 'that any one can
+be saved out of our Church. Your grace allows that our people may be
+saved.'--'No,' said the duke, 'I make no doubt you will all be damned to
+a man!' 'Sir,' said the father, 'I cannot argue with a person so void of
+all charity.'--'I did not expect, my reverend father,' said the duke,
+'such a reproach from you, whose whole reasoning was founded on the very
+same instance of want of charity to yourself.'
+
+Buckingham's death took place at Helmsby, in Yorkshire, and the
+immediate cause was an ague and fever, owing to having sat down on the
+wet grass after fox-hunting. Pope has given the following forcible, but
+inaccurate account of his last hours, and the place in which they were
+passed:--
+
+    'In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half hung,
+     The floors of plaster and the walls of dung,
+     On once a flock-bed, but repaired with straw,
+     With tape-tied curtains never meant to draw;
+     The George and Garter dangling from that bed,
+     Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red,
+     Great Villiers lies:--alas! how changed from him,
+     That life of pleasure and that soul of whim!
+     Gallant and gay, in Claverdon's proud alcove,
+     The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love,
+     Or, just as gay, at council in a ring
+     Of mimic'd statesmen and their merry King.
+     No wit to flatter left of all his store,
+     No fool to laugh at, which he valued more,
+     Then victor of his health, of fortune, friends,
+     And fame, this lord of useless thousands ends.'
+
+Far from expiring in the 'worst inn's worst room,' the duke breathed his
+last in Kirby Moorside, in a house which had once been the best in the
+place. Brian Fairfax, who loved this brilliant reprobate, has left the
+only authentic account on record of his last hours.
+
+The night previous to the duke's death Fairfax had received a message
+from him desiring him to prepare a bed for him in his house, Bishop
+Hill, in York. The next day, however, Fairfax was sent for to his
+master, whom he found dying. He was speechless, but gave the afflicted
+servant an earnest look of recognition.
+
+The Earl of Arran, son of the Duke of Hamilton, and a gentleman of the
+neighbourhood, stood by his bedside. He had then received the Holy
+Communion from a neighbouring clergyman of the Established Church. When
+the minister came it is said that he inquired of the duke what religion
+he professed. 'It is,' replied the dying man, 'an insignificant
+question, for I have been a shame and a disgrace to all religions: if
+you can do me any good, pray do.' When a Popish priest had been
+mentioned to him, he answered vehemently, 'No, no!'
+
+He was in a very low state when Lord Arran had found him. But though
+that nobleman saw death in his looks, the duke said he 'felt so well at
+heart that he knew he could be in no danger.'
+
+He appeared to have had inflammation in the bowels, which ended in
+mortification. He begged of Lord Arran to stay with him. The house seems
+to have been in a most miserable condition, for in a letter from Lord
+Arran to Dr. Sprat, he says, 'I confess it made my heart bleed to see
+the Duke of Buckingham in so pitiful a place, and so bad a condition,
+and what made it worse, he was not at all sensible of it, for he thought
+in a day or two he should be well; and when we reminded him of his
+condition, he said it was not as we apprehended. So I sent for a worthy
+gentleman, Mr. Gibson, to be assistant to me in this work; so we jointly
+represented his condition to him, who I saw was at first very uneasy;
+but I think we should not have discharged the duties of honest men if we
+had suffered him to go out of this world without desiring him to prepare
+for death.' The duke joined heartily in the beautiful prayers for the
+dying, of our Church, and yet there was a sort of selfishness and
+indifference to others manifest even at the last.
+
+'Mr. Gibson,' writes Lord Arran, 'asked him if he had made a will, or if
+he would declare who was to be his heir? but to the first, he answered
+he had made none; and to the last, whoever was named he answered, "No."
+First, my lady duchess was named, and then I think almost everybody that
+had any relation to him, but his answer always was, "No." I did fully
+represent my lady duchess' condition to him, but nothing that was said
+to him could make him come to any point.'
+
+In this 'retired corner,' as Lord Arran terms it, did the former wit and
+beau, the once brave and fine cavalier, the reckless plotter in
+after-life, end his existence. His body was removed to Helmsby Castle,
+there to wait the duchess' pleasure, being meantime embalmed. Not one
+farthing could his steward produce to defray his burial. His George and
+blue ribbon were sent to the King James, with an account of his death.
+
+In Kirby Moorside the following entry in the register of burials
+records the event, which is so replete with a singular retributive
+justice--so constituted to impress and sadden the mind:--
+
+    'Georges Villus Lord dooke of Buckingham.'
+
+He left scarcely a friend to mourn his life; for to no man had he been
+true. He died on the 16th of April according to some accounts; according
+to others, on the third of that month, 1687, in the sixty-first year of
+his age. His body, after being embalmed, was deposited in the family
+vault in Henry VII.'s chapel.[7] He left no children, and his title was
+therefore extinct. The Duchess of Buckingham, of whom Brian Fairfax
+remarks, 'that if she had none of the vanities, she had none of the
+vices of the court,' survived him several years. She died in 1705, at
+the age of sixty-six, and was buried in the vault of the Villiers'
+family, in the chapel of Henry VII.
+
+Such was the extinction of all the magnificence and intellectual
+ascendency that at one time centred in the great and gifted family of
+Villiers.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 1: Dryden.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The day after the battle at Kingston, the Duke's estates
+were confiscated. (8th July, 1648.)--Nichols's History of
+Leicestershire, iii. 213; who also says that the Duke offered marriage
+to one of the daughters of Cromwell, but was refused. He went abroad in
+1648, but returned with Charles II. to Scotland in 1650, and again
+escaped to France after the battle of Worcester, 1651. The sale of the
+pictures would seem to have commenced during his first exile.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Sir George Villiers's second wife was Mary, daughter of
+Antony Beaumont, Esq., of Glenfield, (Nichols's Leicestershire, iii.
+193,) who was son of Wm. Beaumont, Esq., of Cole Orton. She afterwards
+was married successively to Sir Wm. Rayner and Sir Thomas Compton, and
+was created Countess of Buckingham in 1618.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This incident is taken from Madame Dunois' Memoirs, part i.
+p. 86.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The duke became Master of the Horse in 1688; he paid
+£20,000 to the Duke of Albemarle for the post.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The duel with the Earl of Shrewsbury took place 17th
+January, 1667-8.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Brian Fairfax states, that at his death (the Duke of
+Buckingham's) he charged his debts on his estate, leaving much more than
+enough to cover them. By the register of Westminster Abbey it appears
+that he was buried in Henry VII.'s Chapel, 7th June, 1687.]
+
+
+
+
+    COUNT DE GRAMMONT, ST. EVREMOND, AND LORD ROCHESTER.
+
+  De Grammont's Choice.--His Influence with Turenne.--The Church or
+      the Army?--An Adventure at Lyons.--A brilliant Idea.--De
+      Grammont's Generosity.--A Horse 'for the
+      Cards.'--Knight-Cicisbeism.--De Grammont's first Love.--His
+      Witty Attacks on Mazarin.--Anne Lucie de la Mothe
+      Houdancourt.--Beset with Snares.--De Grammont's Visits to
+      England.--Charles II.--The Court of Charles II.--Introduction
+      of Country-dances.--Norman Peculiarities.--St. Evremond, the
+      Handsome Norman.--The most Beautiful Woman in Europe.--Hortense
+      Mancini's Adventures.--Madame Mazarin's House at
+      Chelsea.--Anecdote of Lord Dorset.--Lord Rochester in his
+      Zenith.--His Courage and Wit.--Rochester's Pranks in the
+      City.--Credulity, Past and Present.--'Dr. Bendo,' and La Belle
+      Jennings.--La Triste Heritière.--Elizabeth, Countess of
+      Rochester.--Retribution and Reformation.--Conversion.--Beaux
+      without Wit.--Little Jermyn.--An Incomparable Beauty.--Anthony
+      Hamilton, De Grammont's Biographer.--The Three Courts.--'La
+      Belle Hamilton.'--Sir Peter Lely's Portrait of her.--The
+      Household Deity of Whitehall.--Who shall have the Calèche?--A
+      Chaplain in Livery.--De Grammont's Last Hours.--What might he
+      not have been?
+
+
+It has been observed by a French critic, that the Mémoires de Grammont
+afford the truest specimens of French character in our language. To this
+it may be added, that the subject of that animated narrative was most
+completely French in principle, in intelligence, in wit that hesitated
+at nothing, in spirits that were never daunted, and in that incessant
+activity which is characteristic of his countrymen. Grammont, it was
+said, 'slept neither night nor day;' his life was one scene of incessant
+excitement.
+
+His father, supposed to have been the natural son of Henry the Great, of
+France, did not suppress that fact, but desired to publish it: for the
+morals of his time were so depraved, that it was thought to be more
+honourable to be the illegitimate son of a king than the lawful child of
+lowlier parents. Born in the Castle of Semeac, on the banks of the
+Garonne, the fame of two fair ancestresses, Corisande and Menadame, had
+entitled the family of De Grammont to expect in each successive member
+an inheritance of beauty. Wit, courage, good nature, a charming address,
+and boundless assurance, were the heritage of Philibert de Grammont.
+Beauty was not in his possession; good nature, a more popular quality,
+he had in abundance:
+
+    'His wit to scandal never stooping,
+     His mirth ne'er to buffoonery drooping.'
+
+As Philibert grew up, the two aristocratic professions of France were
+presented for his choice: the army, or the church. Neither of these
+vocations constitutes now the ambition of the high-born in France: the
+church, to a certain extent, retains its _prestige_, but the army, ever
+since officers have risen from the ranks, does not comprise the same
+class of men as in England. In the reign of Louis XIII., when De
+Grammont lived it was otherwise. All political power was vested in the
+church. Richelieu was, to all purposes, the ruler of France, the
+dictator of Europe; and, with regard to the church, great men, at the
+head of military affairs, were daily proving to the world, how much
+intelligence could effect with a small numerical power. Young men took
+one course or another: the sway of the cabinet, on the one hand, tempted
+them to the church; the brilliant exploits of Turenne, and of Condé, on
+the other, led them to the camp. It was merely the difference of dress
+between the two that constituted the distinction: the soldier might be
+as pious as the priest, the priest was sure to be as worldly as the
+soldier; the soldier might have ecclesiastical preferment; the priest
+sometimes turned out to fight.
+
+Philibert de Grammont chose to be a soldier. He was styled the Chevalier
+de Grammont, according to custom, his father being still living. He
+fought under Turenne, at the siege of Trino. The army in which he served
+was beleaguering that city when the gay youth from the banks of the
+Garonne joined it, to aid it not so much by his valour as by the fun,
+the raillery, the off-hand anecdote, the ready, hearty companionship
+which lightened the soldier's life in the trenches: adieu to
+impatience, to despair, even to gravity. The very generals could not
+maintain their seriousness when the light-hearted De Grammont uttered a
+repartee--
+
+    'Sworn enemy to all long speeches,
+       Lively and brilliant, frank and free,
+       Author of many a repartee:
+       Remember, over all, that he
+     Was not renowned for storming breaches.'
+
+Where he came, all was sunshine, yet there breathed not a colder, graver
+man than the Calvinist Turenne: modest, serious, somewhat hard, he gave
+the young nobility who served under him no quarter in their
+shortcomings; but a word, a look, from De Grammont could make him,
+_malgrê lui_, unbend. The gay chevalier's white charger's prancing, its
+gallant rider foremost in every peril, were not forgotten in
+after-times, when De Grammont, in extreme old age, chatted over the
+achievements and pleasures of his youth.
+
+Amongst those who courted his society in Turenne's army was Matta, a
+soldier of simple manners, hard habits, and handsome person, joined to a
+candid, honest nature. He soon persuaded De Grammont to share his
+quarters, and there they gave splendid entertainments, which,
+Frenchman-like, De Grammont paid for out of the successes of the
+gaming-tables. But chances were against them; the two officers were at
+the mercy of their _maitre d'hôtel_, who asked for money. One day, when
+De Grammont came home sooner than usual, he found Matta fast asleep.
+Whilst De Grammont stood looking at him, he awoke, and burst into a
+violent fit of laughter.
+
+'What is the matter?' cried the chevalier.
+
+'Faith, chevalier,' answered Matta, 'I was dreaming that we had sent
+away our _maitre d'hôtel_, and were resolved to live like our neighbours
+for the rest of the campaign.'
+
+'Poor fellow!' cried De Grammont. 'So, you are knocked down at once:
+what would have become of you if you had been reduced to the situation I
+was in at Lyons, four days before I came here? Come, I will tell you all
+about it.'
+
+'Begin a little farther back,' cried Matta, 'and tell me about the
+manner in which you first paid your respects to Cardinal Richelieu. Lay
+aside your pranks as a child, your genealogy, and all your ancestors
+together; you cannot know anything about them.'
+
+'Well,' replied De Grammont, 'it was my father's own fault that he was
+not Henry IV.'s son: see what the Grammonts have lost by this
+crossed-grained fellow! Faith, we might have walked before the Counts de
+Vendôme at this very moment.'
+
+Then he went on to relate how he had been sent to Pau, to the college,
+to be brought up to the church, with an old servant to act both as his
+valet and his guardian. How his head was too full of gaming to learn
+Latin. How they gave him his rank at college, as the youth of quality,
+when he did not deserve it; how he travelled up to Paris to his brother
+to be polished, and went to court in the character of an abbé. 'Ah,
+Matta, you know the kind of dress then in vogue. No, I would not change
+my dress, but I consented to draw over it a cassock. I had the finest
+head of hair in the world, well curled and powdered above my cassock,
+and below were my white buskins and spurs.'
+
+Even Richelieu, that hypocrite, he went on to relate, could not help
+laughing at the parti-coloured costume, sacerdotal above, soldier-like
+below; but the cardinal was greatly offended--not with the absence of
+decorum, but with the dangerous wit, that could laugh in public at the
+cowl and shaven crown, points which constituted the greatest portion of
+Richelieu's sanctity.
+
+De Grammont's brother, however, thus addressed the Chevalier:--'Well, my
+little parson,' said he, as they went home, 'you have acted your part to
+perfection; but now you must choose your career. If you like to stick to
+the church, you will possess great revenues, and nothing to do; if you
+choose to go into the army, you will risk your arm or your leg, but in
+time you may be a major-general with a wooden leg and a glass eye, the
+spectacle of an indifferent, ungrateful court. Make your choice.'
+
+The choice, Philibert went on to relate, was made. For the good of his
+soul, he renounced the church, but for his own advantage, he kept his
+abbacy. This was not difficult in days when secular abbés were common;
+nothing would induce him to change his resolution of being a soldier.
+Meantime he was perfecting his accomplishments as a fine gentleman, one
+of the requisites for which was a knowledge of all sorts of games. No
+matter that his mother was miserable at his decision. Had her son been
+an abbé, she thought he would have become a saint: nevertheless, when he
+returned home, with the air of a courtier and a man of the world, boy as
+he was, and the very impersonation of what might then be termed _la
+jeune France_, she was so enchanted with him that she consented to his
+going to the wars, attended again by Brinon, his valet, equerry, and
+Mentor in one. Next in De Grammont's narrative came his adventure at
+Lyons, where he spent the 200 louis his mother had given Brinon for him,
+in play, and very nearly broke the poor old servant's heart; where he
+had duped a horse-dealer; and he ended by proposing plans, similarly
+_honourable_, to be adopted for their present emergencies.
+
+The first step was to go to head-quarters, to dine with a certain Count
+de Cameran, a Savoyard, and invite him to supper. Here Matta interposed.
+'Are you mad?' he exclaimed. 'Invite him to supper! we have neither
+money nor credit; we are ruined; and to save us you intend to give a
+supper!'
+
+'Stupid fellow!' cried De Grammont. 'Cameran plays at quinze: so do I:
+we want money. He has more than he knows what to do with: we give a
+supper, he pays for it. However,' he added, 'it is necessary to take
+certain precautions. You command the Guards: when night comes on, order
+your _Sergent-de-place_ to have fifteen or twenty men under arms, and
+let them lay themselves flat on the ground between this and
+head-quarters. Most likely we shall win this stupid fellow's money. Now
+the Piedmontese are suspicious, and he commands the Horse. Now, you
+know, Matta, you cannot hold your tongue, and are very likely to let out
+some joke that will vex him. Supposing he takes it into his head that he
+is being cheated? He has always eight or ten horsemen: we must be
+prepared.'
+
+'Embrace me!' cried Matta, 'embrace me! for thou art unparalleled. I
+thought you only meant to prepare a pack of cards, and some false dice.
+But the idea of protecting a man who plays at quinze by a detachment of
+foot is excellent: thine own, dear Chevalier.'
+
+Thus, like some of Dumas' heroes, hating villany as a matter of course,
+but being by no means ashamed to acknowledge it, the Piedmontese was
+asked to supper. He came. Nevertheless, in the midst of the affair, when
+De Cameran was losing as fast as he could, Matta's conscience touched
+him: he awoke from a deep sleep, heard the dice shaking, saw the poor
+Savoyard losing, and advised him to play no more.
+
+'Don't you know, Count, you _cannot_ win?'
+
+'Why?' asked the Count.
+
+'Why, faith, because we are cheating you,' was the reply.
+
+The Chevalier turned round impatiently, 'Sieur Matta,' he cried, 'do you
+suppose it can be any amusement to Monsieur le Comte to be plagued with
+your ill-timed jests? For my part, I am so weary of the game, that I
+swear by Jupiter I can scarcely play any more.' Nothing is more
+distasteful to a losing gamester than a hint of leaving off; so the
+Count entreated the Chevalier to continue, and assured him that
+'Monsieur Matta might say what he pleased, for it did not give him the
+least uneasiness to continue.'
+
+The Chevalier allowed the Count to play upon credit, and that act of
+courtesy was taken very kindly: the dupe lost 1,500 pistoles, which he
+paid the next morning, when Matta was sharply reprimanded for his
+interference.
+
+'Faith,' he answered, 'it was a point of conscience with me; besides, it
+would have given me pleasure to have seen his Horse engaged with my
+Infantry, if he had taken anything amiss.'
+
+The sum thus gained set the spendthrifts up; and De Grammont satisfied
+his conscience by giving it away, to a certain extent, in charity. It is
+singular to perceive in the history of this celebrated man that moral
+taint of character which the French have never lost: this total absence
+of right reasoning on all points of conduct, is coupled in our Gallic
+neighbours with the greatest natural benevolence, with a generosity only
+kept back by poverty, with impulsive, impressionable dispositions, that
+require the guidance of a sound Protestant faith to elevate and correct
+them.
+
+The Chevalier hastened, it is related, to find out distressed comrades,
+officers who had lost their baggage, or who had been ruined by gaming;
+or soldiers who had been disabled in the trenches; and his manner of
+relieving them was as graceful and as delicate as the bounty he
+distributed was welcome. He was the darling of the army. The poor
+soldier knew him personally, and adored him; the general was sure to
+meet him in the scenes of action, and to seek his company in those of
+security.
+
+And, having thus retrieved his finances, the gay-hearted Chevalier used,
+henceforth, to make De Cameran go halves with him in all games in which
+the odds were in his own favour. Even the staid Calvinist, Turenne, who
+had not then renounced, as he did in after-life, the Protestant faith,
+delighted in the off-hand merriment of the Chevalier. It was towards the
+end of the siege of Trino, that De Grammont went to visit that general
+in some new quarters, where Turenne received him, surrounded by fifteen
+or twenty officers. According to the custom of the day, cards were
+introduced, and the general asked the Chevalier to play.
+
+'Sir,' returned the young soldier, 'my tutor taught me that when a man
+goes to see his friends it is neither prudent to leave his own money
+behind him nor civil to take theirs.'
+
+'Well,' answered Turenne, 'I can tell you you will find neither much
+money nor deep play among us; but that it cannot be said that we allowed
+you to go off without playing, suppose we each of us stake a horse.'
+
+De Grammont agreed, and, lucky as ever, won from the officers some
+fifteen or sixteen horses, by way of a joke; but seeing several faces
+pale, he said, 'Gentlemen, I should be sorry to see you go away from
+your general's quarters on foot; it will do very well if you all send me
+to-morrow your horses, except one, which I give for the cards.'
+
+The _valet-de-chambre_ thought he was jesting. 'I am serious,' cried
+the Chevalier. '_Parole d'honneur_ I give a horse for the cards; and
+what's more, take which you please, only don't take mine.'
+
+'Faith,' said Turenne, pleased with the novelty of the affair, 'I don't
+believe a horse was ever before given for the cards.'
+
+Young people, and indeed old people, can perhaps hardly remember the
+time when, even in England, money used to be put under the candlesticks
+'for the cards,' as it was said, but in fact for the servants, who
+waited. Winner or loser, the tax was to be paid, and this custom of
+vails was also prevalent in France.
+
+Trino at last surrendered, and the two friends rushed from their
+campaigning life to enjoy the gaieties of Turin, at that time the centre
+of pleasure; and resolved to perfect their characters as military
+heroes--by falling in love, if respectably, well; if disreputably, well
+too, perhaps all the more agreeable, and venturesome, as they thought.
+
+The court of Turin was then presided over by the Duchess of Savoy,
+_Madame Royale_, as she was called in France, the daughter of Henry IV.
+of France, the sister of Henrietta Maria of England. She was a woman of
+talent and spirit, worthy of her descent, and had certain other
+qualities which constituted a point of resemblance between her and her
+father; she was, like him, more fascinating than respectable.
+
+The customs of Turin were rather Italian than French. At that time
+every lady had her professed lover, who wore the liveries of his
+mistress, bore her arms, and sometimes assumed her very name. The
+office of the lover was, never to quit his lady in public, and never
+to approach her in private: to be on all occasions her esquire. In the
+tournament her chosen knight-cicisbeo came forth with his coat, his
+housings, his very lance distinguished with the cyphers and colours of
+her who had condescended to invest him with her preference. It was the
+remnant of chivalry that authorized this custom; but of chivalry
+demoralized--chivalry denuded of her purity, her respect, the chivalry
+of corrupted Italy, not of that which, perhaps, fallaciously, we
+assign to the earlier ages.
+
+Grammont and Matta enlisted themselves at once in the service of two
+beauties. Grammont chose for the queen of beauty, who was to 'rain
+influence' upon him, Mademoiselle de St. Germain, who was in the very
+bloom of youth. She was French, and, probably, an ancestress of that
+all-accomplished Comte de St. Germain, whose exploits so dazzled
+successive European courts, and the fullest account of whom, in all its
+brilliant colours, yet tinged with mystery, is given in the Memoirs of
+Maria Antoinette, by the Marquise d'Adhémar, her lady of the bed-chamber.
+
+The lovely object of De Grammont's 'first love' was a radiant brunette
+belle, who took no pains to set off by art the charms of nature. She had
+some defects: her black and sparkling eyes were small; her forehead, by
+no means 'as pure as moonlight sleeping upon snow,' was not fair,
+neither were her hands; neither had she small feet--but her form
+generally was perfect; her elbows had a peculiar elegance in them; and
+in old times to hold the elbow out well, and yet not to stick it out,
+was a point of early discipline. Then her glossy black hair set off a
+superb neck and shoulders; and, moreover, she was gay, full of mirth,
+life, complaisance, perfect in all the acts of politeness, and
+invariable in her gracious and graceful bearing.
+
+Matta admired her; but De Grammont ordered him to attach himself to the
+Marquise de Senantes, a married beauty of the court; and Matta, in full
+faith that all Grammont said and did was sure to succeed, obeyed his
+friend. The Chevalier had fallen in love with Mademoiselle de St.
+Germain at first sight, and instantly arrayed himself in her colour,
+which was green, whilst Matta wore blue, in compliment to the marquise;
+and they entered the next day upon duty, at La Venerie, where the
+Duchess of Savoy gave a grand entertainment. De Grammont, with his
+native tact and unscrupulous mendacity, played his part to perfection;
+but his comrade, Matta, committed a hundred solecisms. The very second
+time he honoured the marquise with his attentions, he treated her as if
+she were his humble servant: when he pressed her hand, it was a pressure
+that almost made her scream. When he ought to have ridden by the side of
+her coach, he set off, on seeing a hare start from her form; then he
+talked to her of partridges when he should have been laying himself at
+her feet. Both these affairs ended as might have been expected.
+Mademoiselle de St. Germain was diverted by Grammont, yet he could not
+touch her heart. Her aim was to marry; his was merely to attach himself
+to a reigning beauty. They parted without regret; and he left the then
+remote court of Turin for the gayer scenes of Paris and Versailles. Here
+he became as celebrated for his alertness in play as for his readiness
+in repartee; as noted for his intrigues, as he afterwards was for his
+bravery.
+
+Those were stirring days in France. Anne of Austria, then in her
+maturity, was governed by Mazarin, the most artful of ministers, an
+Italian to the very heart's core, with a love of amassing wealth
+engrafted in his supple nature that amounted to a monomania. The whole
+aim of his life was gain. Though gaming was at its height, Mazarin never
+played for amusement; he played to enrich himself; and when he played,
+he cheated.
+
+The Chevalier de Grammont was now rich, and Mazarin worshipped the rich.
+He was witty; and his wit soon procured him admission into the clique
+whom the wily Mazarin collected around him in Paris. Whatever were De
+Grammont's faults, he soon perceived those of Mazarin; he detected, and
+he detested, the wily, grasping, serpent-like attributes of the Italian;
+he attacked him on every occasion on which a 'wit combat' was possible:
+he gracefully showed Mazarin off in his true colours. With ease he
+annihilated him, metaphorically, at his own table. Yet De Grammont had
+something to atone for: he had been the adherent and companion in arms
+of Condé; he had followed that hero to Sens, to Nordlingen, to Fribourg,
+and had returned to his allegiance to the young king, Louis XIV., only
+because he wished to visit the court at Paris. Mazarin's policy,
+however, was that of pardon and peace--of duplicity and treachery--and
+the Chevalier seemed to be forgiven on his return to Paris, even by Anne
+of Austria. Nevertheless, De Grammont never lost his independence; and
+he could boast in after-life that he owed the two great cardinals who
+had governed France nothing that they could have refused. It was true
+that Richelieu had left him his abbacy; but he could not refuse it to
+one of De Grammont's rank. From Mazarin he had gained nothing except
+what he had won at play.
+
+After Mazarin's death the Chevalier intended to secure the favour of the
+king, Louis XIV., to whom, as he rejoiced to find, court alone was now
+to be paid. He had now somewhat rectified his distinctions between right
+and wrong, and was resolved to have no regard for favour unless
+supported by merit; he determined to make himself beloved by the
+courtiers of Louis, and feared by the ministers; to dare to undertake
+anything to do good, and to engage in nothing at the expense of
+innocence. He still continued to be eminently successful in play, of
+which he did not perceive the evil, nor allow the wickedness; but he was
+unfortunate in love, in which he was equally unscrupulous and more rash
+than at the gaming-table.
+
+Among the maids of honour of Anne of Austria was a young lady named Anne
+Lucie de la Mothe Houdancourt. Louis, though not long married, showed
+some symptoms of admiration for this _débutante_ in the wicked ways of
+the court.
+
+Gay, radiant in the bloom of youth and innocence, the story of this
+young girl presents an instance of the unhappiness which, without guilt,
+the sins of others bring upon even the virtuous. The queen-dowager, Anne
+of Austria, was living at St. Germains when Mademoiselle de la Mothe
+Houdancourt was received into her household. The Duchess de Noailles, at
+that time _Grande Maitresse_, exercised a vigilant and kindly rule over
+the maids of honour; nevertheless, she could not prevent their being
+liable to the attentions of Louis: she forbade him however to loiter, or
+indeed even to be seen in the room appropriated to the young damsels
+under her charge; and when attracted by the beauty of Annie Lucie de la
+Mothe, Louis was obliged to speak to her through a hole behind a clock
+which stood in a corridor.
+
+Annie Lucie, notwithstanding this apparent encouragement of the king's
+addresses, was perfectly indifferent to his admiration. She was secretly
+attached to the Marquis de Richelieu, who had, or pretended to have,
+honourable intentions towards her. Everything was tried, but tried in
+vain, to induce the poor girl to give up all her predilections for the
+sake of a guilty distinction--that of being the king's mistress: even
+her _mother_ reproached her with her coldness. A family council was
+held, in hopes of convincing her of her wilfulness, and Annie Lucie was
+bitterly reproached by her female relatives; but her heart still clung
+to the faithless Marquis de Richelieu, who, however, when he saw that a
+royal lover was his rival, meanly withdrew.
+
+Her fall seemed inevitable; but the firmness of Anne of Austria saved
+her from her ruin. That queen insisted on her being sent away; and she
+resisted even the entreaties of the queen, her daughter-in-law, and the
+wife of Louis XIV.; who, for some reasons not explained, entreated that
+the young lady might remain at the court. Anne was sent away in a sort
+of disgrace to the convent of Chaïllot, which was then considered to be
+quite out of Paris, and sufficiently secluded to protect her from
+visitors. According to another account, a letter full of reproaches,
+which she wrote to the Marquis de Richelieu upbraiding him for his
+desertion, had been intercepted.
+
+It was to this young lady that De Grammont, who was then, in the very
+centre of the court, 'the type of fashion and the mould of form,'
+attached himself to her as an admirer who could condescend to honour
+with his attentions those whom the king pursued. The once gay girl was
+thus beset with snares: on one side was the king, whose disgusting
+preference was shown when in her presence by sighs and sentiment; on the
+other, De Grammont, whose attentions to her were importunate, but failed
+to convince her that he was in love; on the other was the time-serving,
+heartless De Richelieu, whom her reason condemned, but whom her heart
+cherished. She soon showed her distrust and dislike of De Grammont: she
+treated him with contempt; she threatened him with exposure, yet he
+would not desist: then she complained of him to the king. It was then
+that he perceived that though love could equalize conditions, it could
+not act in the same way between rivals. He was commanded to leave the
+court. Paris, therefore, Versailles, Fontainbleau, and St. Germains were
+closed against this gay Chevalier; and how could he live elsewhere?
+Whither could he go? Strange to say, he had a vast fancy to behold the
+man who, stained with the crime of regicide, and sprung from the people,
+was receiving magnificent embassies from continental nations, whilst
+Charles II. was seeking security in his exile from the power of Spain in
+the Low Countries. He was eager to see the Protector, Cromwell. But
+Cromwell, though in the height of his fame when beheld by De
+Grammont--though feared at home and abroad--was little calculated to win
+suffrages from a mere man of pleasure like De Grammont. The court, the
+city, the country, were in his days gloomy, discontented, joyless: a
+proscribed nobility was the sure cause of the thin though few
+festivities of the now lugubrious gallery of Whitehall. Puritanism drove
+the old jovial churchmen into retreat, and dispelled every lingering
+vestige of ancient hospitality: long graces and long sermons,
+sanctimonious manners, and grim, sad faces, and sad-coloured dresses
+were not much to De Grammont's taste; he returned to France, and
+declared that he had gained no advantage from his travels. Nevertheless,
+either from choice or necessity, he made another trial of the damps and
+fogs of England.[8]
+
+When he again visited our country, Charles II. had been two years seated
+on the throne of his father. Everything was changed, and the British
+court was in its fullest splendour; whilst the rejoicings of the people
+of England at the Restoration were still resounding through the land.
+
+If one could include royal personages in the rather gay than worthy
+category of the 'wits and beaux of society,' Charles II. should figure
+at their head. He was the most agreeable companion, and the worst king
+imaginable. In the first place he was, as it were, a citizen of the
+world: tossed about by fortune from his early boyhood; a witness at the
+tender age of twelve of the battle of Edge Hill, where the celebrated
+Harvey had charge of him and of his brother. That inauspicious
+commencement of a wandering life had perhaps been amongst the least of
+his early trials. The fiercest was his long residence as a sort of royal
+prisoner in Scotland. A travelled, humbled man, he came back to England
+with a full knowledge of men and manners, in the prime of his life,
+with spirits unbroken by adversity, with a heart unsoured by that 'stern
+nurse,' with a gaiety that was always kindly, never uncourteous, ever
+more French than English; far more natural did he appear as the son of
+Henrietta Maria than as the offspring of the thoughtful Charles.
+
+In person, too, the king was then agreeable, though rather what the
+French would call _distingué_ than dignified; he was, however, tall, and
+somewhat elegant, with a long French face, which in his boyhood was
+plump and full about the lower part of the cheeks, but now began to sink
+into that well-known, lean, dark, flexible countenance, in which we do
+not, however, recognize the gaiety of the man whose very name brings
+with it associations of gaiety, politeness, good company, and all the
+attributes of a first-rate wit, except the almost inevitable ill-nature.
+There is in the physiognomy of Charles II. that melancholy which is
+often observable in the faces of those who are mere men of pleasure.
+
+De Grammont found himself completely in his own sphere at Whitehall,
+where the habits were far more French than English. Along that stately
+Mall, overshadowed with umbrageous trees, which retains--and it is to be
+hoped ever will retain--the old name of the 'Birdcage Walk,' one can
+picture to oneself the king walking so fast that no one can keep up with
+him; yet stopping from time to time to chat with some acquaintances. He
+is walking to Duck Island, which is full of his favourite water-fowl,
+and of which he has given St. Evremond the government. How pleasant is
+his talk to those who attend him as he walks along; how well the quality
+of good-nature is shown in his love of dumb animals: how completely he
+is a boy still, even in that brown wig of many curls, and with the
+George and Garter on his breast! Boy, indeed, for he is followed by a
+litter of young spaniels: a little brindled greyhound frisks beside him;
+it is for that he is ridiculed by the '_psalm_' sung at the Calves' Head
+Club: these favourites were cherished to his death.
+
+    'His dogs would sit in council boards
+     Like judges in their seats:
+     We question much which had most sense,
+     The master or the curs.'
+
+Then what capital stories Charles would tell, as he unbent at night
+amid the faithful, though profligate, companions of his exile! He told
+his anecdotes, it is true, over and over again, yet they were always
+embellished with some fresh touch--like the repetition of a song which
+has been encored on the stage. Whether from his inimitable art, or from
+his royalty, we leave others to guess, but his stories bore repetition
+again and again: they were amusing, and even novel to the very last.
+
+To this seducing court did De Grammont now come. It was a delightful
+exchange from the endless ceremonies and punctilios of the region over
+which Louis XIV. presided. Wherever Charles was, his palace appeared to
+resemble a large hospitable house--sometimes town, sometimes country--in
+which every one did as he liked; and where distinctions of rank were
+kept up as a matter of convenience, but were only valued on that score.
+
+In other respects, Charles had modelled his court very much on the plan
+of that of Louis XIV., which he had admired for its gaiety and spirit.
+Corneille, Racine, Molière, Boileau, were encouraged by _le Grand
+Monarque_. Wycherley and Dryden were attracted by Charles to celebrate
+the festivities, and to amuse the great and the gay. In various points
+De Grammont found a resemblance. The queen-consort, Catherine of
+Braganza, was as complacent to her husband's vices as the queen of
+Louis. These royal ladies were merely first sultanas, and had no right,
+it was thought, to feel jealousy, or to resent neglect. Each returning
+sabbath saw Whitehall lighted up, and heard the tabors sound for a
+_branle_, (Anglicised 'brawl'). This was a dance which mixed up
+everybody, and called a brawl, from the foot being shaken to a quick
+time. Gaily did his Majesty perform it, leading to the hot exercise Anne
+Hyde, Duchess of York, stout and homely, and leaving Lady Castlemaine to
+his son, the Duke of Monmouth. Then Charles, with ready grace, would
+begin the coranto, taking a single lady in this dance along the gallery.
+Lords and ladies one after another followed, and 'very noble,' writes
+Pepys, 'and great pleasure it was to see.' Next came the country dances,
+introduced by Mary, Countess of Buckingham, the grandmother of the
+graceful duke who is moving along the gallery;--and she invented those
+once popular dances in order to introduce, with less chance of failure,
+her rustic country cousins, who could not easily be taught to carry
+themselves well in the brawl, or to step out gracefully in the coranto,
+both of which dances required practice and time. In all these dances the
+king shines the most, and dances much better than his brother the Duke
+of York.
+
+In these gay scenes De Grammont met with the most fashionable belles of
+the court: fortunately for him they all spoke French tolerably; and he
+quickly made himself welcome amongst even the few--and few indeed there
+were--who plumed themselves upon untainted reputations. Hitherto those
+French noblemen who had presented themselves in England had been poor
+and absurd. The court had been thronged with a troop of impertinent
+Parisian coxcombs, who had pretended to despise everything English, and
+who treated the natives as if they were foreigners in their own country.
+De Grammont, on the contrary, was familiar with every one: he ate, he
+drank, he lived, in short, according to the custom of the country that
+hospitably received him, and accorded him the more respect, because they
+had been insulted by others.
+
+He now introduced the _petits soupers_, which have never been understood
+anywhere so well as in France, and which are even there dying out to
+make way for the less social and more expensive dinner; but, perhaps, he
+would even here have been unsuccessful, had it not been for the society
+and advice of the famous St. Evremond, who at this time was exiled in
+France, and took refuge in England.
+
+This celebrated and accomplished man had some points of resemblance with
+De Grammont. Like him, he had been originally intended for the church;
+like him he had turned to the military profession; he was an ensign
+before he was full sixteen; and had a company of foot given him after
+serving two or three campaigns. Like De Grammont, he owed the facilities
+of his early career to his being the descendant of an ancient and
+honourable family. St. Evremond was the Seigneur of St Denis le Guast,
+in Normandy, where he was born.
+
+Both these sparkling wits of society had at one time, and, in fact, at
+the same period, served under the great Condé; both were pre-eminent,
+not only in literature, but in games of chance. St. Evremond was famous
+at the University of Caen, in which he studied, for his fencing; and
+'St. Evremond's pass' was well known to swordsmen of his time;--both
+were gay and satirical; neither of them pretended to rigid morals; but
+both were accounted men of honour among their fellow-men of pleasure.
+They were graceful, kind, generous.
+
+In person St. Evremond had the advantage, being a Norman--a race which
+combines the handsomest traits of an English countenance with its blond
+hair, blue eyes, and fair skin. Neither does the slight tinge of the
+Gallic race detract from the attractions of a true, well-born Norman,
+bred up in that province which is called the Court-end of France, and
+polished in the capital. Your Norman is hardy, and fond of field-sports:
+like the Englishman, he is usually fearless; generous, but, unlike the
+English, somewhat crafty. You may know him by the fresh colour, the
+peculiar blue eye, long and large; by his joyousness and look of health,
+gathered up in his own marshy country, for the Norman is well fed, and
+lives on the produce of rich pasture-land, with cheapness and plenty
+around him. And St. Evremond was one of the handsomest specimens of this
+fine locality (so mixed up as it is with _us_); and his blue eyes
+sparkled with humour; his beautifully-turned mouth was all sweetness;
+and his noble forehead, the whiteness of which was set off by thick dark
+eyebrows, was expressive of his great intelligence, until a wen grew
+between his eyebrows, and so changed all the expression of his face that
+the Duchess of Mazarin used to call him the 'Old Satyr.' St. Evremond
+was also Norman in other respects: he called himself a thorough Roman
+Catholic, yet he despised the superstitions of his church, and prepared
+himself for death without them. When asked by an ecclesiastic sent
+expressly from the court of Florence to attend his death-bed, if he
+'would be reconciled,' he answered, 'With all my heart; I would fain be
+reconciled to my stomach, which no longer performs its usual
+functions.' And his talk, we are told, during the fortnight that
+preceded his death, was not regret for a life we should, in seriousness,
+call misspent, but because partridges and pheasants no longer suited his
+condition, and he was obliged to be reduced to boiled meats. No one,
+however, could tell what might also be passing in his heart. We cannot
+always judge of a life, any more than of a drama, by its last scene; but
+this is certain, that in an age of blasphemy St. Evremond could not
+endure to hear religion insulted by ridicule. 'Common decency,' said
+this man of the world, 'and a due regard to our fellow-creatures, would
+not permit it.' He did not, it seems, refer his displeasure to a higher
+source--to the presence of the Omniscient,--who claims from us all not
+alone the tribute of our poor frail hearts in serious moments, but the
+deep reverence of every thought in the hours of careless pleasure.
+
+It was now St. Evremond who taught De Grammont to collect around him the
+wits of that court, so rich in attractions, so poor in honour and
+morality. The object of St. Evremond's devotion, though he had, at the
+æra of the Restoration, passed his fiftieth year, was Hortense Mancini,
+once the richest heiress, and still the most beautiful woman in Europe,
+and a niece, on her mother's side, of Cardinal Mazarin. Hortense had
+been educated, after the age of six, in France. She was Italian in her
+accomplishments, in her reckless, wild disposition, opposed to that of
+the French, who are generally calculating and wary, even in their vices:
+she was Italian in the style of her surpassing beauty, and French to the
+core in her principles. Hortense, at the age of thirteen, had been
+married to Armand Duc de Meilleraye and Mayenne, who had fallen so
+desperately in love with this beautiful child, that he declared 'if he
+did not marry her he should die in three months.' Cardinal Mazarin,
+although he had destined his niece Mary to this alliance, gave his
+consent on condition that the duke should take the name of Mazarin. The
+cardinal died a year after this marriage, leaving his niece Hortense the
+enormous fortune of £1,625,000; yet she died in the greatest
+difficulties, and her corpse was seized by her creditors.
+
+The Duc de Mayenne proved to be a fanatic, who used to waken his wife
+in the dead of the night to hear his visions; who forbade his child to
+be nursed on fast-days; and who believed himself to be inspired. After
+six years of wretchedness poor Hortense petitioned for a separation and
+a division of property. She quitted her husband's home and took refuge
+first in a nunnery, where she showed her unbelief, or her irreverence,
+by mixing ink with holy-water, that the poor nuns might black their
+faces when they crossed themselves; or, in concert with Madame de
+Courcelles, another handsome married woman, she used to walk through the
+dormitories in the dead of night, with a number of little dogs barking
+at their heels; then she filled two great chests that were over the
+dormitories with water, which ran over, and, penetrating through the
+chinks of the floor, wet the holy sisters in their beds. At length all
+this sorry gaiety was stopped by a decree that Hortense was to return to
+the Palais Mazarin; and to remain there until the suit for a separation
+should be decided. That the result should be favourable was doubtful:
+therefore, one fine night in June, 1667, Hortense escaped. She dressed
+herself in male attire, and, attended by a female servant, managed to
+get through the gate at Paris, and to enter a carriage. Then she fled to
+Switzerland; and, had not her flight been shared by the Chevalier de
+Rohan, one of the handsomest men in France, one could hardly have blamed
+an escape from a half-lunatic husband. She was only twenty-eight when,
+after various adventures, she came in all her unimpaired beauty to
+England. Charles was captivated by her charms, and, touched by her
+misfortunes, he settled on her a pension of £4,000 a year, and gave her
+rooms in St. James's. Waller sang her praise:--
+
+    'When through the world fair Mazarine had run,
+     Bright as her fellow-traveller, the sun:
+     Hither at length the Roman eagle flies,
+     As the last triumph of her conquering eyes.'
+
+If Hortense failed to carry off from the Duchess of Portsmouth--then the
+star of Whitehall--the heart of Charles, she found, at all events, in
+St. Evremond, one of those French, platonic, life-long friends, who, as
+Chateaubriand worshipped Madame Récamier, adored to the last the exiled
+niece of Mazarin. Every day, when in her old age and his, the warmth of
+love had subsided into the serener affection of pitying, and yet
+admiring friendship, St. Evremond was seen, a little old man in a black
+coif, carried along Pall Mall in a sedan chair, to the apartment of
+Madame Mazarin, in St. James's. He always took with him a pound of
+butter, made in his own little dairy, for her breakfast. When De
+Grammont was installed at the court of Charles, Hortense was, however,
+in her prime. Her house at Chelsea, then a country village, was famed
+for its society and its varied pleasures. St. Evremond has so well
+described its attractions that his words should be literally given.
+'Freedom and discretion are equally to be found there. Every one is made
+more at home than in his own house, and treated with more respect than
+at court. It is true that there are frequent disputes there, but they
+are those of knowledge and not of anger. There is play there, but it is
+inconsiderable, and only practised for its amusement. You discover in no
+countenance the fear of losing, nor concern for what is lost. Some are
+so disinterested that they are reproached for expressing joy when they
+lose, and regret when they win. Play is followed by the most excellent
+repasts in the world. There you will find whatever delicacy is brought
+from France, and whatever is curious from the Indies. Even the commonest
+meats have the rarest relish imparted to them. There is neither a plenty
+which gives a notion of extravagance, nor a frugality that discovers
+penury or meanness.'
+
+What an assemblage it must have been! Here lolls Charles, Lord
+Buckhurst, afterwards Lord Dorset, the laziest, in matters of business
+or court advancement--the boldest, in point of frolic and pleasure, of
+all the wits and beaux of his time. His youth had been full of adventure
+and of dissipation. 'I know not how it is,' said Wilmot, Lord Rochester,
+'but my Lord Dorset can do anything, and is never to blame.' He had, in
+truth, a heart; he could bear to hear others praised; he despised the
+arts of courtiers; he befriended the unhappy; he was the most engaging
+of men in manners, the most loveable and accomplished of human beings;
+at once poet, philanthropist, and wit; he was also possessed of
+chivalric notions, and of daring courage.
+
+Like his royal master, Lord Dorset had travelled; and when made a
+gentleman of the bedchamber to Charles II., he was not unlike his
+sovereign in other traits; so full of gaiety, so high-bred, so lax, so
+courteous, so convivial, that no supper was complete without him: no
+circle 'the right thing,' unless Buckhurst, as he was long called, was
+there to pass the bottle round, and to keep every one in good-humour.
+Yet, he had misspent a youth in reckless immorality, and had even been
+in Newgate on a charge, a doubtful charge it is true, of highway robbery
+and murder, but had been found guilty of manslaughter only. He was again
+mixed up in a disgraceful affair with Sir Charles Sedley. When brought
+before Sir Robert Hyde, then Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, his name
+having been mentioned, the judge inquired whether that was the Buckhurst
+lately tried for robbery? and when told it was, he asked him whether he
+had so soon forgotten his deliverance at that time: and whether it would
+not better become him to have been at his prayers begging God's
+forgiveness than to come into such courses again?
+
+The reproof took effect, and Buckhurst became what was then esteemed a
+steady man; he volunteered and fought gallantly in the fleet under James
+Duke of York: and he completed his reform, to all outward show, by
+marrying Lady Falmouth.[9] Buckhurst, in society, the most good-tempered
+of men, was thus referred to by Prior, in his poetical epistle to
+Fleetwood Sheppard:--
+
+    'When crowding folks, with strange ill faces,
+     Were making legs, and begging places:
+     And some with patents, some with merit,
+     Tired out my good Lord Dorset's spirit.'
+
+Yet his pen was full of malice, whilst his heart was tender to all.
+Wilmot, Lord Rochester, cleverly said of him:--
+
+    'For pointed satire I would Buckhurst chuse,
+     The best good man with the worst-natured muse.'
+
+Still more celebrated as a beau and wit of his time, was John Wilmot,
+Lord Rochester. He was the son of Lord Wilmot, the cavalier who so
+loyally attended Charles II. after the Battle of Worcester; and, as, the
+offspring of that royalist, was greeted by Lord Clarendon, then
+Chancellor of the University of Oxford, when he took his degree as
+Master of Arts, with a kiss.[10] The young nobleman then travelled,
+according to custom; and then most unhappily for himself and for others,
+whom he corrupted by his example, he presented himself at the court of
+Charles II. He was at this time a youth of eighteen, and one of the
+handsomest persons of his age. The face of Buckhurst was hard and plain;
+that of De Grammont had little to redeem it but its varying
+intelligence; but the countenance of the young Earl of Rochester was
+perfectly symmetrical: it was of a long oval, with large, thoughtful,
+sleepy eyes; the eyebrows arched and high above them; the brow, though
+concealed by the curls of the now modest wig, was high and smooth; the
+nose, delicately shaped, somewhat aquiline; the mouth full, but
+perfectly beautiful, was set off by a round and well-formed chin. Such
+was Lord Rochester in his zenith; and as he came forward on state
+occasions, his false light curls hanging down on his shoulders--a
+cambric kerchief loosely tied, so as to let the ends, worked in point,
+fall gracefully down: his scarlet gown in folds over a suit of light
+steel armour--for men had become carpet knights then, and the coat of
+mail worn by the brave cavaliers was now less warlike, and was mixed up
+with robes, ruffles, and rich hose--and when in this guise he appeared
+at Whitehall, all admired; and Charles was enchanted with the
+simplicity, the intelligence, and modesty of one who was then an
+ingenuous youth, with good aspirations, and a staid and decorous
+demeanour.
+
+Woe to Lady Rochester--woe to the mother who trusted her son's innocence
+in that vitiated court! Lord Rochester forms one of the many instances
+we daily behold, that it is those most tenderly cared for, who often
+fall most deeply, as well as most early, into temptation. He soon lost
+every trace of virtue--of principle, even of deference to received
+notions of propriety. For a while there seemed hopes that he would not
+wholly fall: courage was his inheritance, and he distinguished himself
+in 1665, when as a volunteer, he went in quest of the Dutch East India
+fleet, and served with heroic gallantry under Lord Sandwich. And when he
+returned to court, there was a partial improvement in his conduct. He
+even looked back upon his former indiscretions with horror: he had now
+shared in the realities of life: he had grasped a high and honourable
+ambition; but he soon fell away--soon became almost a castaway. 'For
+five years,' he told Bishop Burnet, when on his death-bed, 'I was never
+sober.' His reputation as a wit must rest, in the present day, chiefly
+upon productions which have long since been condemned as unreadable.
+Strange to say, when not under the influence of wine, he was a constant
+student of classical authors, perhaps the worst reading for a man of his
+tendency: all that was satirical and impure attracting him most.
+Boileau, among French writers, and Cowley among the English, were his
+favourite authors. He also read many books of physic; for long before
+thirty his constitution was so broken by his life, that he turned his
+attention to remedies, and to medical treatment; and it is remarkable
+how many men of dissolute lives take up the same sort of reading, in the
+vain hope of repairing a course of dissolute living. As a writer, his
+style was at once forcible and lively; as a companion, he was wildly
+vivacious: madly, perilously, did he outrage decency, insult virtue,
+profane religion. Charles II. liked him on first acquaintance, for
+Rochester was a man of the most finished and fascinating manners; but at
+length there came a coolness, and the witty courtier was banished from
+Whitehall. Unhappily for himself, he was recalled, and commanded to wait
+in London until his majesty should choose to readmit him into his
+presence.
+
+Disguises and practical jokes were the fashion of the day. The use of
+the mask, which was put down by proclamation soon after the accession of
+Queen Anne, favoured a series of pranks with which Lord Rochester,
+during the period of his living concealed in London, diverted himself.
+The success of his scheme was perfect. He established himself, since he
+could not go to Whitehall, in the City. 'His first design,' De Grammont
+relates, 'was only to be initiated into the mysteries of those fortunate
+and happy inhabitants; that is to say, by changing his name and dress,
+to gain admittance to their feasts and entertainments.... As he was able
+to adapt himself to all capacities and humours, he soon deeply
+insinuated himself into the esteem of the substantial wealthy aldermen,
+and into the affections of their more delicate, magnificent, and tender
+ladies; he made one in all their feasts and at all their assemblies; and
+whilst in the company of the husbands, he declaimed against the faults
+and mistakes of government; he joined their wives in railing against the
+profligacy of the court ladies, and in inveighing against the king's
+mistresses: he agreed with them, that the industrious poor were to pay
+for these cursed extravagances; that the City beauties were not inferior
+to those at the other end of the town,... after which, to outdo their
+murmurings, he said, that he wondered Whitehall was not yet consumed by
+fire from heaven, since such rakes as Rochester, Killigrew, and Sidney
+were suffered there.'
+
+This conduct endeared him so much to the City, and made him so welcome
+at their clubs, that at last he grew sick of their cramming, and endless
+invitations.
+
+He now tried a new sphere of action; and instead of returning, as he
+might have done, to the court, retreated into the most obscure corners
+of the metropolis; and again changing his name and dress, gave himself
+out as a German doctor named Bendo, who professed to find out
+inscrutable secrets, and to apply infallible remedies; to know, by
+astrology, all the past, and to foretell the future.
+
+If the reign of Charles was justly deemed an age of high civilization,
+it was also one of extreme credulity. Unbelief in religion went hand in
+hand with blind faith in astrology and witchcraft; in omens,
+divinations, and prophecies: neither let us too strongly despise, in
+these their foibles, our ancestors. They had many excuses for their
+superstitions; and for their fears, false as their hopes, and equally
+groundless. The circulation of knowledge was limited: the public
+journals, that part of the press to which we now owe inexpressible
+gratitude for its general accuracy, its enlarged views, its purity, its
+information, was then a meagre statement of dry facts: an announcement,
+not a commentary. 'The Flying Post,' the 'Daily Courant,' the names of
+which may be supposed to imply speed, never reached lone country places
+till weeks after they had been printed on their one duodecimo sheet of
+thin coarse paper. Religion, too, just emerging into glorious light from
+the darkness of popery, had still her superstitions; and the mantle that
+priestcraft had contrived to throw over her exquisite, radiant, and
+simple form, was not then wholly and finally withdrawn. Romanism still
+hovered in the form of credulity.
+
+But now, with shame be it spoken, in the full noonday genial splendour
+of our Reformed Church, with newspapers, the leading articles of which
+rise to a level with our greatest didactic writers, and are competent
+even to form the mind as well as to amuse the leisure hours of the young
+readers: with every species of direct communication, we yet hold to
+fallacies from which the credulous in Charles's time would have shrunk
+in dismay and disgust. Table-turning, spirit-rapping, _clairvoyance_,
+Swedenborgianism, and all that family of follies, would have been far
+too strong for the faith of those who counted upon dreams as their
+guide, or looked up to the heavenly planets with a belief, partly
+superstitious, partly reverential, for their guidance; and in a dim and
+flickering faith trusted to their _stars_.
+
+'Dr. Bendo,' therefore, as Rochester was called--handsome, witty,
+unscrupulous, and perfectly acquainted with the then small circle of the
+court--was soon noted for his wonderful revelations. Chamber-women,
+waiting-maids, and shop-girls were his first customers: but, very soon,
+gay spinsters from the court came in their hoods and masks to ascertain
+with anxious faces, their fortunes; whilst the cunning, sarcastic 'Dr.
+Bendo,' noted in his diary all the intrigues which were confided to him
+by these lovely clients. La Belle Jennings, the sister of Sarah Duchess
+of Marlborough, was among his disciples; she took with her the beautiful
+Miss Price, and, disguising themselves as orange girls, these young
+ladies set off in a hackney-coach to visit Dr. Bendo; but when within
+half a street of the supposed fortune-teller's, were prevented by the
+interruption of a dissolute courtier named Brounker.
+
+'Everything by turns and nothing long.' When Lord Rochester was tired of
+being an astrologer, he used to roam about the streets as a beggar; then
+he kept a footman who knew the Court well, and used to dress him up in a
+red coat, supply him with a musket, like a sentinel, and send him to
+watch at the doors of all the fine ladies, to find out their goings on:
+afterwards, Lord Rochester would retire to the country, and write libels
+on these fair victims, and, one day, offered to present the king with
+one of his lampoons; but being tipsy, gave Charles, instead, one written
+upon himself.
+
+At this juncture we read with sorrow Bishop Burnet's forcible
+description of his career:--
+
+'He seems to have freed himself from all impressions of virtue or
+religion, of honour or good nature.... He had but one maxim, to which he
+adhered firmly, that he has to do everything, and deny himself in
+nothing that might maintain his greatness. He was unhappily made for
+drunkenness, for he had drunk all his friends dead, and was able to
+subdue two or three sets of drunkards one after another; so it scarce
+ever appeared that he was disordered after the greatest drinking: an
+hour or two of sleep carried all off so entirely, that no sign of them
+remained.... This had a terrible conclusion.'
+
+Like many other men, Rochester might have been saved by being kept far
+from the scene of temptation. Whilst he remained in the country he was
+tolerably sober, perhaps steady. When he approached Brentford on his
+route to London, his old propensities came upon him.
+
+When scarcely out of his boyhood he carried off a young heiress,
+Elizabeth Mallett, whom De Grammont calls _La triste heritière_: and
+triste, indeed, she naturally was. Possessed of a fortune of £2500 a
+year, this young lady was marked out by Charles II. as a victim for the
+profligate Rochester. But the reckless young wit chose to take his own
+way of managing the matter. One night, after supping at Whitehall with
+Miss Stuart, the young Elizabeth was returning home with her
+grandfather, Lord Haly, when their coach was suddenly stopped near
+Charing Cross by a number of bravos, both on horseback and on foot--the
+'Roaring Boys and Mohawks,' who were not extinct even in Addison's time.
+They lifted the affrighted girl out of the carriage, and placed her in
+one which had six horses; they then set off for Uxbridge, and were
+overtaken; but the outrage ended in marriage, and Elizabeth became the
+unhappy, neglected Countess of Rochester. Yet she loved him--perhaps in
+ignorance of all that was going on whilst _she_ stayed with her four
+children at home.
+
+'If,' she writes to him, 'I could have been troubled at anything, when I
+had the happiness of receiving a letter from you, I should be so,
+because you did not name a time when I might hope to see you, the
+uncertainty of which very much afflicts me.... Lay your commands upon me
+what I am to do, and though it be to forget my children, and the long
+hope I have lived in of seeing you, yet will I endeavour to obey you; or
+in the memory only torment myself, without giving you the trouble of
+putting you in mind that there lives a creature as
+
+    'Your faithful, humble servant.'
+
+And he, in reply: 'I went away (to Rochester) like a rascal, without
+taking leave, dear wife. It is an unpolished way of proceeding, which a
+modest man ought to be ashamed of. I have left you a prey to your own
+imaginations amongst my relations, the worst of damnations. But there
+will come an hour of deliverance, till when, may my mother be merciful
+unto you! So I commit you to what I shall ensue, woman to woman, wife to
+mother, in hopes of a future appearance in glory....
+
+'Pray write as often as you have leisure, to your
+
+    'ROCHESTER.'
+
+To his son, he writes: 'You are now grown big enough to be a man, if
+you can be wise enough; and the way to be truly wise is to serve God,
+learn your book, and observe the instructions of your parents first, and
+next your tutor, to whom I have entirely resigned you for this seven
+years; and according as you employ that time, you are to be happy or
+unhappy for ever. I have so good an opinion of you, that I am glad to
+think you will never deceive me. Dear child, learn your book and be
+obedient, and you will see what a father I shall be to you. You shall
+want no pleasure while you are good, and that you may be good are my
+constant prayers.'
+
+Lord Rochester had not attained the age of thirty, when he was
+mercifully awakened to a sense of his guilt here, his peril hereafter.
+It seemed to many that his very nature was so warped that penitence in
+its true sense could never come to him; but the mercy of God is
+unfathomable; He judges not as man judges; He forgives, as man knows not
+how to forgive.
+
+    'God, our kind Master, merciful as just,
+     Knowing our frame, remembers man is dust:
+     He marks the dawn of every virtuous aim,
+     And fans the smoking flax into a flame;
+     He hears the language of a silent tear,
+     And sighs are incense from a heart sincere.'
+
+And the reformation of Rochester is a confirmation of the doctrine of a
+special Providence, as well as of that of a retribution, even in this
+life.
+
+The retribution came in the form of an early but certain decay; of a
+suffering so stern, so composed of mental and bodily anguish, that never
+was man called to repentance by a voice so distinct as Rochester. The
+reformation was sent through the instrumentality of one who had been a
+sinner like himself, who had sinned _with_ him; an unfortunate lady,
+who, in her last hours, had been visited, reclaimed, consoled by Bishop
+Burnet. Of this, Lord Rochester had heard. He was then, to all
+appearance, recovering from his last sickness. He sent for Burnet, who
+devoted to him one evening every week of that solemn winter when the
+soul of the penitent sought reconciliation and peace.
+
+The conversion was not instantaneous; it was gradual, penetrating,
+effective, sincere. Those who wish to gratify curiosity concerning the
+death-bed of one who had so notoriously sinned, will read Burnet's
+account of Rochester's illness and death with deep interest; and nothing
+is so interesting as a death-bed. Those who delight in works of nervous
+thought, and elevated sentiments, will read it too, and arise from the
+perusal gratified. Those, however, who are true, contrite Christians
+will go still farther; they will own that few works so intensely touch
+the holiest and highest feelings; few so absorb the heart; few so
+greatly show the vanity of life; the unspeakable value of purifying
+faith. 'It is a book which the critic,' says Doctor Johnson, 'may read
+for its elegance, the philosopher for its arguments, the saint for its
+piety.'
+
+Whilst deeply lamenting his own sins, Lord Rochester became anxious to
+redeem his former associates from theirs.
+
+'When Wilmot, Earl of Rochester,'[11] writes William Thomas, in a
+manuscript preserved in the British Museum, 'lay on his death-bed, Mr.
+Fanshawe came to visit him, with an intention to stay about a week with
+him. Mr. Fanshawe, sitting by the bedside, perceived his lordship
+praying to God, through Jesus Christ, and acquainted Dr. Radcliffe, who
+attended my Lord Rochester in this illness and was then in the house,
+with what he had heard, and told him that my lord was certainly
+delirious, for to his knowledge, he said, he believed neither in God nor
+in Jesus Christ. The doctor, who had often heard him pray in the same
+manner, proposed to Mr. Fanshawe to go up to his lordship to be further
+satisfied touching this affair. When they came to his room the doctor
+told my lord what Mr. Fanshawe said, upon which his lordship addressed
+himself to Mr. Fanshawe to this effect: "Sir, it is true, you and I have
+been very bad and profane together, and then I was of the opinion you
+mention. But now I am quite of another mind, and happy am I that I am
+so. I am very sensible how miserable I was whilst of another opinion.
+Sir, you may assure yourself that there is a Judge and a future state;"
+and so entered into a very handsome discourse concerning the last
+judgment, future state &c., and concluded with a serious and pathetic
+exhortation to Mr. Fanshawe to enter into another course of life; adding
+that he (Mr. F.) knew him to be his friend; that he never was more so
+than at this time; and "sir," said he, "to use a Scripture expression, I
+am not mad, but speak the words of truth and soberness." Upon this Mr.
+Fanshawe trembled, and went immediately a-foot to Woodstock, and there
+hired a horse to Oxford, and thence took coach to London.'
+
+There were other butterflies in that gay court; beaux without wit;
+remorseless rakes, incapable of one noble thought or high pursuit; and
+amongst the most foolish and fashionable of these was Henry Jermyn, Lord
+Dover. As the nephew of Henry Jermyn, Lord St. Albans, this young
+simpleton was ushered into a court life with the most favourable
+auspices. Jermyn Street (built in 1667) recalls to us the residence of
+Lord St. Albans, the supposed husband of Henrietta Maria. It was also
+the centre of fashion when Henry Jermyn the younger was launched into
+its unholy sphere. Near Eagle Passage lived at that time La Belle
+Stuart, Duchess of Richmond; next door to her Henry Savile, Rochester's
+friend. The locality has since been purified by worthier associations:
+Sir Isaac Newton lived for a time in Jermyn Street, and Gray lodged
+there.
+
+It was, however, in De Grammont's time, the scene of all the various
+gallantries which were going on. Henry Jermyn was supported by the
+wealth of his uncle, that uncle who, whilst Charles II. was starving at
+Brussels, had kept a lavish table in Paris: little Jermyn, as the
+younger Jermyn was called, owed much indeed to his fortune, which had
+procured him great _éclat_ at the Dutch court. His head was large; his
+features small; his legs short; his physiognomy was not positively
+disagreeable, but he was affected and trifling, and his wit consisted in
+expressions learnt by rote, which supplied him either with raillery or
+with compliments.
+
+This petty, inferior being had attracted the regard of the Princess
+Royal--afterwards Princess of Orange--the daughter of Charles I. Then
+the Countess of Castlemaine--afterwards Duchess of Cleveland--became
+infatuated with him; he captivated also the lovely Mrs. Hyde, a
+languishing beauty, whom Sir Peter Lely has depicted in all her sleepy
+attractions, with her ringlets falling lightly over her snowy forehead
+and down to her shoulders. This lady was, at the time when Jermyn came
+to England, recently married to the son of the great Clarendon. She fell
+desperately in love with this unworthy being: but, happily for her
+peace, he preferred the honour (or dishonour) of being the favourite of
+Lady Castlemaine, and Mrs. Hyde escaped the disgrace she, perhaps,
+merited.
+
+De Grammont appears absolutely to have hated Jermyn; not because he was
+immoral, impertinent, and contemptible, but because it was Jermyn's
+boast that no woman, good or bad, could resist him. Yet, in respect to
+their unprincipled life, Jermyn and De Grammont had much in common. The
+Chevalier was at this time an admirer of the foolish beauty, Jane
+Middleton; one of the loveliest women of a court where it was impossible
+to turn without seeing loveliness.
+
+Mrs. Middleton was the daughter of Sir Roger Needham, and she has been
+described, even by the grave Evelyn, as a 'famous, and, indeed,
+incomparable beauty.' A coquette, she was, however, the friend of
+intellectual men; and it was probably at the house of St. Evremond that
+the Count first saw her. Her figure was good, she was fair and delicate;
+and she had so great a desire, Count Hamilton relates, to 'appear
+magnificently, that she was ambitious to vie with those of the greatest
+fortunes, though unable to support the expense.'
+
+Letters and presents now flew about. Perfumed gloves, pocket
+looking-glasses, elegant boxes, apricot paste, essences, and other small
+wares arrived weekly from Paris; English jewellery still had the
+preference, and was liberally bestowed; yet Mrs. Middleton, affected and
+somewhat precise, accepted the gifts but did not seem to encourage the
+giver.
+
+The Count de Grammont, piqued, was beginning to turn his attention to
+Miss Warmestre, one of the queen's maids of honour, a lively brunette,
+and a contrast to the languid Mrs. Middleton; when, happily for him, a
+beauty appeared on the scene, and attracted him, by higher qualities
+than mere looks, to a real, fervent, and honourable attachment.
+
+Amongst the few respected families of that period was that of Sir George
+Hamilton, the fourth son of James, Earl of Abercorn, and of Mary,
+grand-daughter of Walter, eleventh Earl of Ormond. Sir George had
+distinguished himself during the Civil Wars: on the death of Charles I.
+he had retired to France, but returned, after the Restoration, to
+London, with a large family, all intelligent and beautiful.
+
+From their relationship to the Ormond family, the Hamiltons were soon
+installed in the first circles of fashion. The Duke of Ormond's sons had
+been in exile with the king; they now added to the lustre of the court
+after his return. The Earl of Arran, the second, was a beau of the true
+Cavalier order; clever at games, more especially at tennis, the king's
+favourite diversion; he touched the guitar well; and made love _ad
+libitum_. Lord Ossory, his elder brother, had less vivacity but more
+intellect, and possessed a liberal, honest nature, and an heroic
+character.
+
+All the good qualities of these two young noblemen seem to have been
+united in Anthony Hamilton, of whom De Grammont gives the following
+character:--'The elder of the Hamiltons, their cousin, was the man who,
+of all the court, dressed best; he was well made in his person, and
+possessed those happy talents which lead to fortune, and procure success
+in love: he was a most assiduous courtier, had the most lively wit, the
+most polished manners, and the most punctual attention to his master
+imaginable; no person danced better, nor was any one a more general
+lover--a merit of some account in a court entirely devoted to love and
+gallantry. It is not at all surprising that, with these qualities, he
+succeeded my Lord Falmouth in the king's favour.'
+
+The fascinating person thus described was born in Ireland: he had
+already experienced some vicissitudes, which were renewed at the
+Revolution of 1688, when he fled to France--the country in which he had
+spent his youth--and died at St. Germains, in 1720, aged seventy-four.
+His poetry and his fairy tales are forgotten; but his 'Memoirs of the
+Count de Grammont' is a work which combines the vivacity of a French
+writer with the truth of an English historian.
+
+Ormond Yard, St. James's Square, was the London residence of the Duke of
+Ormond: the garden wall of Ormond House took up the greater part of York
+Street: the Hamilton family had a commodious house in the same courtly
+neighbourhood; and the cousins mingled continually. Here persons of the
+greatest distinction constantly met; and here the 'Chevalier de
+Grammont,' as he was still called, was received in a manner suitable to
+his rank and style; and soon regretted that he had passed so much time
+in other places; for, after he once knew the charming Hamiltons, he
+wished for no other friends.
+
+There were three courts at that time in the capital; that at Whitehall,
+in the king's apartments; that in the queen's, in the same palace; and
+that of Henrietta Maria, the Queen-Mother, as she was styled, at
+Somerset House. Charles's was pre-eminent in immorality, and in the
+daily outrage of all decency; that of the unworthy widow of Charles I.
+was just bordering on impropriety; that of Katherine of Braganza was
+still decorous, though not irreproachable. Pepys, in his Diary, has this
+passage:--'Visited Mrs. Ferrers, and stayed talking with her a good
+while, there being a little, proud, ugly, talking lady there, that was
+much crying up the queene-mother's court at Somerset House, above our
+queen's; there being before her no allowance of laughing and mirth that
+is at the other's; and, indeed, it is observed that the greatest court
+now-a-days is there. Thence to Whitehall, where I carried my wife to see
+the queene in her presence-chamber; and the maydes of honour and the
+young Duke of Monmouth, playing at cards.'
+
+Queen Katherine, notwithstanding that the first words she was ever known
+to say in English were '_You lie!_' was one of the gentlest of beings.
+Pepys describes her as having a modest, innocent look, among all the
+demireps with whom she was forced to associate. Again we turn to Pepys,
+an anecdote of whose is characteristic of poor Katherine's submissive,
+uncomplaining nature:--
+
+'With Creed, to the King's Head ordinary;... and a pretty gentleman in
+our company, who confirms my Lady Castlemaine's being gone from court,
+but knows not the reason; he told us of one wipe the queene, a little
+while ago, did give her, when she came in and found the queene under the
+dresser's hands, and had been so long. "I wonder your Majesty," says
+she, "can have the patience to sit so long a-dressing?"--"I have so much
+reason to use patience," says the queene, "that I can very well bear
+with it."'
+
+It was in the court of this injured queen that De Grammont went one
+evening to Mrs. Middleton's house: there was a ball that night, and
+amongst the dancers was the loveliest creature that De Grammont had ever
+seen. His eyes were riveted on this fair form; he had heard, but never
+till then seen her, whom all the world consented to call 'La Belle
+Hamilton,' and his heart instantly echoed the expression. From this time
+he forgot Mrs. Middleton, and despised Miss Warmestre: 'he found,' he
+said, that he 'had seen nothing at court till this instant.'
+
+'Miss Hamilton,' he himself tells us, 'was at the happy age when the
+charms of the fair sex begin to bloom; she had the finest shape, the
+loveliest neck, and most beautiful arms in the world; she was majestic
+and graceful in all her movements; and she was the original after which
+all the ladies copied in their taste and air of dress. Her forehead was
+open, white, and smooth; her hair was well set, and fell with ease into
+that natural order which it is so difficult to imitate. Her complexion
+was possessed of a certain freshness, not to be equalled by borrowed
+colours; her eyes were not large, but they were lively, and capable of
+expressing whatever she pleased.'[12] So far for her person; but De
+Grammont was, it seems, weary of external charms: it was the
+intellectual superiority that riveted his feelings, whilst his
+connoisseurship in beauty was satisfied that he had never yet seen any
+one so perfect.
+
+[Illustration: DE GRAMMONT'S MEETING WITH LA BELLE HAMILTON.]
+
+'Her mind,' he says, 'was a proper companion for such a form: she did
+not endeavour to shine in conversation by those sprightly sallies which
+only puzzle, and with still greater care she avoided that affected
+solemnity in her discourses which produces stupidity; but without any
+eagerness to talk, she just said what she ought, and no more. She had
+an admirable discernment in distinguishing between solid and false wit;
+and far from making an ostentatious display of her abilities, she was
+reserved, though very just in her decisions. Her sentiments were always
+noble, and even lofty to the highest extent, when there was occasion;
+nevertheless, she was less prepossessed with her own merit than is
+usually the case with those who have so much. Formed as we have
+described, she could not fail of commanding love; but so far was she
+from courting it, that she was scrupulously nice with respect to those
+whose merit might entitle them to form any pretensions to her.'
+
+Born in 1641, Elizabeth--for such was the Christian name of this lovely
+and admirable woman--was scarcely in her twentieth year when she first
+appeared at Whitehall. Sir Peter Lely was at that time painting the
+Beauties of the Court, and had done full justice to the intellectual and
+yet innocent face that riveted De Grammont. He had depicted her with her
+rich dark hair, of which a tendril or two fell on her ivory forehead,
+adorned at the back with large pearls, under which a gauze-like texture
+was gathered up, falling over the fair shoulders like a veil: a full
+corsage, bound by a light band either of ribbon or of gold lace,
+confining, with a large jewel or button, the sleeve on the shoulder,
+disguised somewhat the exquisite shape. A frill of fine cambric set off,
+whilst in whiteness it scarce rivalled, the shoulder and neck.
+
+The features of this exquisite face are accurately described by De
+Grammont, as Sir Peter has painted them. 'The mouth does not smile, but
+seems ready to break out into a smile. Nothing is sleepy, but everything
+is soft, sweet, and innocent in that face so beautiful and so beloved.'
+
+Whilst the colours were fresh on Lely's palettes, James Duke of York,
+that profligate who aped the saint, saw it, and henceforth paid his
+court to the original, but was repelled with fearless _hauteur_. The
+dissolute nobles of the court followed his example, even to the
+'lady-killer' Jermyn, but in vain. Unhappily for La Belle Hamilton, she
+became sensible to the attractions of De Grammont, whom she eventually
+married.
+
+Miss Hamilton, intelligent as she was, lent herself to the fashion of
+the day, and delighted in practical jokes and tricks. At the splendid
+masquerade given by the queen she continued to plague her cousin, Lady
+Muskerry; to confuse and expose a stupid court beauty, a Miss Blaque;
+and at the same time to produce on the Count de Grammont a still more
+powerful effect than even her charms had done. Her success in
+hoaxing--which we should now think both perilous and indelicate--seems
+to have only riveted the chain, which was drawn around him more
+strongly.
+
+His friend, or rather his foe, St. Evremond, tried in vain to discourage
+the Chevalier from his new passion. The former tutor was, it appeared,
+jealous of its influence, and hurt that De Grammont was now seldom at
+his house.
+
+De Grammont's answer to his remonstrances was very characteristic. 'My
+poor philosopher,' he cried, 'you understand Latin well--you can make
+good verses--you are acquainted with the nature of the stars in the
+firmament--but you are wholly ignorant of the luminaries in the
+terrestrial globe.'
+
+He then announced his intention to persevere, notwithstanding all the
+obstacles which attached to the suit of a man without either fortune or
+character, who had been exiled from his own country, and whose chief
+mode of livelihood was dependent on the gaming-table.
+
+One can scarcely read of the infatuation of La Belle Hamilton without a
+sigh. During a period of six years their marriage was in contemplation
+only; and De Grammont seems to have trifled inexcusably with the
+feelings of this once gay and ever lovely girl. It was not for want of
+means that De Grammont thus delayed the fulfilment of his engagement.
+Charles II., inexcusably lavish, gave him a pension of 1500 Jacobuses:
+it was to be paid to him until he should be restored to the favour of
+his own king. The fact was that De Grammont contributed to the pleasures
+of the court, and pleasure was the household deity of Whitehall.
+Sometimes, in those days of careless gaiety, there were promenades in
+Spring Gardens, or the Mall; sometimes the court beauties sallied forth
+on horseback; at other times there were shows on the river, which then
+washed the very foundations of Whitehall. There in the summer evenings,
+when it was too hot and dusty to walk, old Thames might be seen covered
+with little boats, filled with court and city beauties, attending the
+royal barges; collations, music, and fireworks completed the scene, and
+De Grammont always contrived some surprise--some gallant show: once a
+concert of vocal and instrumental music, which he had privately brought
+from Paris, struck up unexpectedly: another time a collation brought
+from the gay capital surpassed that supplied by the king. Then the
+Chevalier, finding that coaches with glass windows, lately introduced,
+displeased the ladies, because their charms were only partially seen in
+them, sent for the most elegant and superb _calèche_ ever seen: it came
+after a month's journey, and was presented by De Grammont to the king.
+It was a royal present in price, for it had cost two thousand livres.
+The famous dispute between Lady Castlemaine and Miss Stuart, afterwards
+Duchess of Richmond, arose about this _calèche_. The Queen and the
+Duchess of York appeared first in it in Hyde Park, which had then
+recently been fenced in with brick. Lady Castlemaine thought that the
+_calèche_ showed off a fine figure better than the coach; Miss Stuart
+was of the same opinion. Both these grown-up babies wished to have the
+coach on the same day, but Miss Stuart prevailed.
+
+The Queen condescended to laugh at the quarrels of these two foolish
+women, and complimented the Chevalier de Grammont on his present. 'But
+how is it,' she asked, 'that you do not even keep a footman, and that
+one of the common runners in the street lights you home with a link?'
+
+'Madame,' he answered, 'the Chevalier de Grammont hates pomp: my
+link-boy is faithful and brave.' Then he told the Queen that he saw she
+was unacquainted with the nation of link-boys, and related how that he
+had, at one time, had one hundred and sixty around his chair at night,
+and people had asked 'whose funeral it was? As for the parade of coaches
+and footmen,' he added, 'I despise it. I have sometimes had five or six
+_valets-de-chambre_, without a single footman in livery except my
+chaplain.'
+
+'How!' cried the Queen, laughing, 'a chaplain in livery? surely he was
+not a priest.'
+
+'_Pardon_, Madame, a priest, and the best dancer in the world of the
+Biscayan gig.'
+
+'Chevalier,' said the king, 'tell us the history of your chaplain
+Poussatin.'
+
+Then De Grammont related how, when he was with the great Condé, after
+the campaign of Catalonia, he had seen among a company of Catalans, a
+priest in a little black jacket, skipping and frisking: how Condé was
+charmed, and how they recognized in him a Frenchman, and how he offered
+himself to De Grammont for his chaplain. De Grammont had not much need,
+he said, for a chaplain in his house, but he took the priest, who had
+afterwards the honour of dancing before Anne of Austria, in Paris.
+
+Suitor after suitor interfered with De Grammont's at last honourable
+address to La Belle Hamilton. At length an incident occurred which had
+very nearly separated them for ever. Philibert de Grammont was recalled
+to Paris by Louis XIV. He forgot, Frenchman-like, all his engagements to
+Miss Hamilton, and hurried off. He had reached Dover, when her two
+brothers rode up after him. 'Chevalier de Grammont,' they said, 'have
+you forgotten nothing in London?'
+
+'I beg your pardon,' he answered, 'I forgot to marry your sister.' It is
+said that this story suggested to Molière the idea of _Le Mariage
+forcé_. They were, however, married.
+
+In 1669 La Belle Hamilton, after giving birth to a child, went to reside
+in France. Charles II., who thought she would pass for a handsome woman
+in France, recommended her to his sister, Henrietta Duchess of Orleans,
+and begged her to be kind to her.
+
+Henceforth the Chevalier De Grammont and his wife figured at Versailles,
+where the Countess de Grammont was appointed _Dame du Palais_. Her
+career was less brilliant than in England. The French ladies deemed her
+haughty and old, and even termed her _une Anglaise insupportable_.
+
+She had certainly too much virtue, and perhaps too much beauty still,
+for the Parisian ladies of fashion at that period to admire her.
+
+She endeavoured in vain, to reclaim her libertine husband, and to call
+him to a sense of his situation when he was on his death-bed. Louis
+XIV. sent the Marquis de Dangeau to convert him, and to talk to him on a
+subject little thought of by De Grammont--the world to come. After the
+Marquis had been talking for some time, De Grammont turned to his wife
+and said, 'Countess, if you don't look to it, Dangeau will juggle you
+out of my conversion.' St. Evremond said he would gladly die to go off
+with so successful a bon-mot.
+
+He became however, in time, serious, if not devout or penitent. Ninon de
+l'Enclos having written to St. Evremond that the Count de Grammont had
+not only recovered but had become devout, St. Evremond answered her in
+these words:--
+
+'I have learned with a great deal of pleasure that the Count de Grammont
+has recovered his former health, and acquired a new devotion. Hitherto I
+have been contented with being a plain honest man; but I must do
+something more: and I only wait for your example to become a devotee.
+You live in a country where people have wonderful advantages of saving
+their souls: there, vice is almost as opposite to the mode as virtue;
+sinning passes for ill-breeding, and shocks decency and good-manners, as
+much as religion. Formerly it was enough to be wicked, now one must be a
+scoundrel withal to be damned in France.'
+
+A report having been circulated that De Grammont was dead, St. Evremond
+expressed deep regret. The report was contradicted by Ninon de l'Enclos.
+The Chevalier was then eighty-six years of age; 'nevertheless he was,'
+Ninon says, 'so young, that I think him as lively as when he hated sick
+people, and loved them after they had recovered their health;' a trait
+very descriptive of a man whose good-nature was always on the surface,
+but whose selfishness was deep as that of most wits and beaux, who are
+spoiled by the world, and who, in return, distrust and deceive the
+spoilers. With this long life of eighty-six years, endowed as De
+Grammont was with elasticity of spirits, good fortune, considerable
+talent, an excellent position, a wit that never ceased to flow in a
+clear current; with all these advantages, what might he not have been to
+society, had his energy been well applied, his wit innocent, his talents
+employed worthily, and his heart as sure to stand muster as his manners?
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 8: M. de Grammont visited England during the Protectorate. His
+second visit, after being forbidden the court by Louis XIV., was in
+1662.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The Earl of Dorset married Elizabeth, widow of Charles
+Berkeley, Earl of Falmouth, and daughter of Hervey Bagot, Esq., of Pipe
+Hall, Warwickshire, who died without issue. He married, 7th March,
+1684-5, Lady Mary Compton, daughter of James Earl of Northampton.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Lord Rochester succeeded to the Earldom in 1659. It was
+created by Charles II. in 1652, at Paris.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Mr. William Thomas, the writer of this statement, heard it
+from Dr. Radcliffe at the table of Speaker Harley, (afterwards Earl of
+Oxford,) 16th June, 1702.]
+
+[Footnote 12: See De Grammont's Memoirs.]
+
+
+
+
+    BEAU FIELDING.
+
+  On Wits and Beaux.--Scotland Yard in Charles II.'s day.--Orlando of
+      'The Tatler.'--Beau Fielding, Justice of the Peace.--Adonis in
+      Search of a Wife.--The Sham Widow.--Ways and Means.--Barbara
+      Villiers, Lady Castlemaine.--Quarrels with the King.--The
+      Beau's Second Marriage.--The Last Days of Fops and Beaux.
+
+
+Let us be wise, boys, here's a fool coming, said a sensible man, when
+he saw Beau Nash's splendid carriage draw up to the door. Is a beau a
+fool? Is a sharper a fool? Was Bonaparte a fool? If you reply 'no' to
+the last two questions, you must give the same answer to the first. A
+beau is a fox, but not a fool--a very clever fellow, who, knowing the
+weakness of his brothers and sisters in the world, takes advantage of
+it to make himself a fame and a fortune. Nash, the son of a
+glass-merchant--Brummell, the hopeful of a small shopkeeper--became
+the intimates of princes, dukes, and fashionables; were petty kings of
+Vanity Fair, and were honoured by their subjects. In the kingdom of
+the blind, the one-eyed man is king; in the realm of folly, the
+sharper is a monarch. The only proviso is, that the cheat come not
+within the jurisdiction of the law. Such a cheat is the beau or dandy,
+or fine gentleman, who imposes on his public by his clothes and
+appearance. _Bonâ-fide_ monarchs have done as much: Louis XIV. won
+himself the title of Le Grand Monarque by his manners, his dress, and
+his vanity. Fielding, Nash, and Brummell did nothing more. It is not a
+question whether such roads to eminence be contemptible or not, but
+whether their adoption in one station of life be more so than in
+another. Was Brummell a whit more contemptible than 'Wales?' Or is
+John Thomas, the pride and glory of the 'Domestics' Free-and-Easy,'
+whose whiskers, figure, face, and manner are all superb, one atom more
+ridiculous than your recognized beau? I trow not. What right, then,
+has your beau to a place among wits? I fancy Chesterfield would be
+much disgusted at seeing his name side by side with that of Nash in
+this volume; yet Chesterfield had no objection, when at Bath, to do
+homage to the king of that city, and may have prided himself on
+exchanging pinches from diamond-set snuff-boxes with that superb
+gold-laced dignitary in the Pump-room. Certainly, people who thought
+little of Philip Dormer Stanhope, thought a great deal of the
+glass-merchant's reprobate son when he was in power, and submitted
+without a murmur to his impertinences. The fact is, that the beaux and
+the wits are more intimately connected than the latter would care to
+own: the wits have all been, or aspired to be, beaux, and beaux have
+had their fair share of wit; both lived for the same purpose--to shine
+in society: both used the same means--coats and bon-mots. The only
+distinction is, that the garments of the beaux were better, and their
+sayings not so good as those of the wits; while the conversation of
+the wits was better, and their apparel not so striking as those of the
+beaux. So, my Lord Chesterfield, who prided yourself quite as much on
+being a fine gentleman as on being a fine wit, you cannot complain at
+your proximity to Mr. Nash and others who _were_ fine gentlemen, and
+would have been fine wits if they could.
+
+Robert Fielding was, perhaps, the least of the beaux; but then, to make
+up for this, he belonged to a noble family: he married a duchess, and,
+what is more, he beat her. Surely in the kingdom of fools such a man is
+not to be despised. You may be sure he did not think he was, for was he
+not made the subject of two papers in 'The Tatler,' and what more could
+such a man desire?
+
+His father was a Suffolk squire, claiming relationship with the Earls of
+Denbigh, and therefore, with the Hapsburgs, from whom the Beau and the
+Emperors of Austria had the common honour of being descended. Perhaps
+neither of them had sufficient sense to be proud of the greatest
+intellectual ornament of their race, the author of 'Tom Jones;' but as
+our hero was dead before the humourist was born, it is not fair to
+conjecture what he might have thought on the subject.
+
+It does not appear that very much is known of this great gem of the race
+of Hapsburg. He had the misfortune to be very handsome, and the folly to
+think that his face would be his fortune: it certainly stood him in good
+stead at times, but it also brought him into a lamentable dilemma.
+
+His father was not rich, and sent his son to the Temple to study laws
+which he was only fitted to break. The young Adonis had sense enough to
+see that destiny did not beckon him to fame in the gloom of a musty law
+court, and removed a little further up to the Thames, and the more
+fashionable region of Scotland Yard. Here, where now Z 300 repairs to
+report his investigations to a Commissioner, the young dandies of
+Charles II.'s day strutted in gay doublets, swore hasty oaths of choice
+invention, smoked the true Tobago from huge pipe-bowls, and ogled the
+fair but not too bashful dames who passed to and fro in their chariots.
+The court took its name from the royalties of Scotland, who, when they
+visited the South, were there lodged, as being conveniently near to
+Whitehall Palace. It is odd enough that the three architects, Inigo
+Jones, Vanbrugh, and Wren, all lived in this yard.
+
+It was not to be supposed that a man who could so well appreciate a
+handsome face and well-cut doublet as Charles II. should long overlook
+his neighbour, Mr. Robert Fielding, and in due course the Beau, who had
+no other diploma, found himself in the honourable position of a justice
+of the peace.
+
+The emoluments of this office enabled Orlando, as 'The Tatler' calls
+him, to shine forth in all his glory. With an enviable indifference to
+the future, he launched out into an expenditure which alone would have
+made him popular in a country where the heaviest purse makes the
+greatest gentleman. His lacqueys were arrayed in the brightest yellow
+coats with black sashes--the Hapsburg colours. He had a carriage, of
+course, but, like Sheridan's, it was hired, though drawn by his own
+horses. This carriage was described as being shaped like a sea-shell;
+and 'the Tatler' calls it 'an open tumbril of less size than ordinary,
+to show the largeness of his limbs and the grandeur of his personage to
+the best advantage.' The said limbs were Fielding's especial pride: he
+gloried in the strength of his leg and arm; and when he walked down the
+street, he was followed by an admiring crowd, whom he treated with as
+much haughtiness as if he had been the emperor himself, instead of his
+cousin five hundred times removed. He used his strength to good or bad
+purpose, and was a redoubted fighter and bully, though good-natured
+withal. In the Mall, as he strutted, he was the cynosure of all female
+eyes. His dress had all the elegance of which the graceful costume of
+that period was capable, though Fielding did not, like Brummell,
+understand the delicacy of a quiet, but studied style. Those were
+simpler, somewhat more honest days. It was not necessary for a man to
+cloak his vices, nor be ashamed of his cloak. The beau then-a-day openly
+and arrogantly gloried in the grandeur of his attire; and bragging was a
+part of his character. Fielding was made by his tailor; Brummell made
+his tailor: the only point in common to both was that neither of them
+paid the tailor's bill.
+
+The fine gentleman, under the Stuarts, was fine only in his lace and his
+velvet doublet; his language was coarse, his manners coarser, his vices
+the coarsest of all. No wonder when the king himself could get so drunk
+with Sedley and Buckhurst as to be unable to give an audience appointed
+for; and when the chief fun of his two companions was to divest
+themselves of all the habiliments which civilization has had the ill
+taste to make necessary, and in that state run about the streets.
+
+'Orlando' wore the finest ruffles and the heaviest sword; his wig was
+combed to perfection; and in his pocket he carried a little comb with
+which to arrange it from time to time, even as the dandy of to-day pulls
+out his whiskers or curls his moustache. Such a man could not be passed
+over; and accordingly he numbered half the officers and gallants of the
+town among his intimates. He drank, swore, and swaggered, and the snobs
+of the day proclaimed him a 'complete gentleman.'
+
+His impudence, however, was not always tolerated. In the playhouses of
+the day, it was the fashion for some of the spectators to stand upon the
+stage, and the places in that position were chiefly occupied by young
+gallants. The ladies came most in masques: but this did not prevent
+Master Fielding from making his remarks very freely, and in no very
+refined strain to them. The modest damsels, whom Pope has described,
+
+    'The fair sat pouting at the courtier's play,
+     And not a mask went unimproved away:
+     The modest fan was lifted up no more,
+     And virgins smiled at what they blushed before,'
+
+were not too coy to be pleased with the fops' attentions, and replied in
+like strain. The players were unheeded; the audience laughed at the
+improvised and natural wit, when carefully prepared dialogues failed to
+fix their attention. The actors were disgusted, and, in spite of Master
+Fielding's herculean strength, kicked him off the stage, with a warning
+not to come again.
+
+The _rôle_ of a beau is expensive to keep up; and our justice of the
+peace could not, like Nash, double his income by gaming. He soon got
+deeply into debt, as every celebrated dresser has done. The old story,
+not new even in those days, was enacted and the brilliant Adonis had to
+keep watch and ward against tailors and bailiffs. On one occasion they
+had nearly caught him; but his legs being lengthy, he gave them fair
+sport as far as St. James's Palace, where the officers on guard rushed
+out to save their pet, and drove off the myrmidons of the law at the
+point of the sword.
+
+But debts do not pay themselves, nor die, and Orlando with all his
+strength and prowess could not long keep off the constable. Evil days
+gloomed at no very great distance before him, and the fear of a
+sponging-house and debtors' prison compelled him to turn his handsome
+person to account. Had he not broken a hundred hearts already? had he
+not charmed a thousand pairs of beaming eyes? was there not one owner of
+one pair who was also possessed of a pretty fortune? Who should have the
+honour of being the wife of such an Adonis? who, indeed, but she who
+could pay highest for it; and who could pay with a handsome income but a
+well-dowered widow? A widow it must be--a widow it should be. Noble
+indeed was the sentiment which inspired this great man to sacrifice
+himself on the altar of Hymen for the good of his creditors. Ye young
+men in the Guards, who do this kind of thing every day--that is,
+every day that you can meet with a widow with the proper
+qualifications--take warning by the lamentable history of Mr. Robert
+Fielding, and never trust to 'third parties.'
+
+[Illustration: BEAU FIELDING AND THE SHAM WIDOW.]
+
+A widow was found, fat, fair, and forty--and oh!--charm greater far than
+all the rest--with a fortune of sixty thousand pounds; this was a Mrs.
+Deleau, who lived at Whaddon in Surrey, and at Copthall-court in London.
+Nothing could be more charming; and the only obstacle was the absence of
+all acquaintance between the parties--for, of course, it was impossible
+for any widow, whatever her attractions, to be insensible to those of
+Robert Fielding. Under these circumstances, the Beau looked about for an
+agent, and found one in the person of a Mrs. Villars, hairdresser to the
+widow. He offered this person a handsome douceur in case of success, and
+she was to undertake that the lady should meet the gentleman in the most
+unpremeditated manner. Various schemes were resorted to: with the
+_alias_, for he was not above an _alias_, of Major-General Villars, the
+Beau called at the widow's country house, and was permitted to see the
+gardens. At a window he espied a lady, whom he took to be the object of
+his pursuit--bowed to her majestically, and went away, persuaded he must
+have made an impression. But, whether the widow was wiser than wearers
+of weeds have the reputation of being, or whether the agent had really
+no power in the matter, the meeting never came on.
+
+The hairdresser naturally grew anxious, the douceur was too good to be
+lost, and as the widow could not be had, some one must be supplied in
+her place.
+
+One day while the Beau was sitting in his splendid 'night-gown,' as the
+morning-dress of gentlemen was then called, two ladies were ushered into
+his august presence. He had been warned of this visit, and was prepared
+to receive the yielding widow. The one, of course, was the hairdresser,
+the other a young, pretty, and _apparently_ modest creature, who blushed
+much--though with some difficulty--at the trying position in which she
+found herself. The Beau, delighted, did his best to reassure her. He
+flung himself at her feet, swore, with oaths more fashionable than
+delicate, that she was the only woman he ever loved, and prevailed on
+the widow so far as to induce her to 'call again to-morrow.'
+
+Of course she came, and Adonis was in heaven. He wrote little poems to
+her--for, as a gallant, he could of course make verses--serenaded her
+through an Italian donna, invited her to suppers, at which the
+delicacies of the season were served without regard to the purveyor's
+account, and to which, coy as she was, she consented to come, and
+clenched the engagement with a ring, on which was the motto, 'Tibi
+Soli.' Nay, the Beau had been educated, and had some knowledge of 'the
+tongues,' so that he added to these attentions the further one of a song
+or two translated from the Greek. The widow ought to have been pleased,
+and was. One thing only she stipulated, namely, that the marriage should
+be private, lest her relations should forbid the banns.
+
+Having brought her so far, it was not likely that the fortune-hunter
+would stick at such a mere trifle, and accordingly an entertainment was
+got up at the Beau's own rooms, a supper suitable to the rank and wealth
+of the widow, provided by some obligingly credulous tradesman; a priest
+found--for, be it premised, our hero had changed so much of his religion
+as he had to change in the reign of James II., when Romanism was not
+only fashionable, but a sure road to fortune--and the mutually satisfied
+couple swore to love, honour, and obey one another till death them
+should part.
+
+The next morning, however, the widow left the gentleman's lodgings, on
+the pretext that it was injudicious for her friends to know of their
+union at present, and continued to visit her sposo and sup somewhat
+amply at his chambers from time to time. We can imagine the anxiety
+Orlando now felt for a cheque book at the heiress's bankers, and the
+many insinuations he may have delicately made, touching ways and means.
+We can fancy the artful excuses with which these hints were put aside by
+his attached wife. But the dupe was still in happy ignorance of the
+trick played on him, and for a time such ignorance was bliss. It must
+have been trying to him to be called on by Mrs. Villars for the promised
+douceur, but he consoled himself with the pleasures of hope.
+
+Unfortunately, however, he had formed the acquaintance of a woman of a
+very different reputation to the real Mrs. Deleau, and the intimacy
+which ensued was fatal to him.
+
+When Charles II. was wandering abroad, he was joined, among others, by a
+Mr. and Mrs. Palmer. The husband was a stanch old Romanist, with the
+qualities which usually accompanied that faith in those days--little
+respect for morality, and a good deal of bigotry. In later days he was
+one of the victims suspected of the Titus Oates plot, but escaped, and
+eventually died in Wales, in 1705, after having been James II.'s
+ambassador to Rome. This, in a few words, is the history of that Roger
+Palmer, afterwards Lord Castlemaine, who by some is said to have sold
+his wife--not at Smithfield, but at Whitehall--to his Majesty King
+Charles II., for the sum of one peerage--an Irish one, taken on
+consideration: by others, is alleged to have been so indignant with the
+king as to have remained for some time far from court; and so disgusted
+with his elevation to the peerage as scarcely to assume his title; and
+this last is the most authenticated version of the matter.
+
+Mrs. Palmer belonged to one of the oldest families in England, and
+traced her descent to Pagan de Villiers, in the days of William Rufus,
+and a good deal farther among the nobles of Normandy. She was the
+daughter of William, second Viscount Grandison, and rejoiced in the
+appropriate name of Barbara, for she _could_ be savage occasionally. She
+was very beautiful, and very wicked, and soon became Charles's mistress.
+On the Restoration she joined the king in England, and when the poor
+neglected queen came over was foisted upon her as a bedchamber-woman, in
+spite of all the objections of that ill used wife. It was necessary to
+this end that she should be the wife of a peer; and her husband accepted
+the title of Earl of Castlemaine, well knowing to what he owed it.
+Pepys, who admired Lady Castlemaine more than any woman in England,
+describes the husband and wife meeting at Whitehall with a cold
+ceremonial bow: yet the husband _was_ there. A quarrel between the two,
+strangely enough on the score of religion, her ladyship insisting that
+her child should be christened by a Protestant clergyman, while his
+lordship insisted on the ceremony being performed by a Romish priest,
+brought about a separation, and from that time Lady Castlemaine, lodged
+in Whitehall, began her empire over the king of England. That man, 'who
+never said a foolish thing, and never did a wise one,' was the slave of
+this imperious and most impudent of women. She forced him to settle on
+her an immense fortune, much of which she squandered at the
+basset-table, often staking a thousand pounds at a time, and sometimes
+losing fifteen thousand pounds a-night.
+
+Nor did her wickedness end here. We have some pity for one, who, like La
+Vallière, could be attracted by the attentions of a handsome,
+fascinating prince: we pity though we blame. But Lady Castlemaine was
+vicious to the very marrow: not content with a king's favour, she
+courted herself the young gallant of the town. Quarrels ensued between
+Charles and his mistress, in which the latter invariably came off
+victorious, owing to her indomitable temper; and the scenes recorded by
+De Grammont--when she threatened to burn down Whitehall, and tear her
+children in pieces--are too disgraceful for insertion. She forced the
+reprobate monarch to consent to all her extortionate demands: rifled the
+nation's pockets as well as his own; and at every fresh difference,
+forced Charles to give her some new pension. An intrigue with Jermyn,
+discovered and objected to by the King, brought on a fresh and more
+serious difference, which was only patched up by a patent of the Duchy
+of Cleveland. The Duchess of Cleveland was even worse than the Countess
+of Castlemaine. Abandoned in time by Charles, and detested by all people
+of any decent feeling, she consoled herself for the loss of a real king
+by taking up with a stage one. Hart and Goodman, the actors, were
+successively her cavalieri; the former had been a captain in the army;
+the latter a student at Cambridge. Both were men of the coarsest minds
+and most depraved lives. Goodman, in after-years was so reduced that,
+finding, as Sheridan advised his son to do, a pair of pistols handy, a
+horse saddled, and Hounslow Heath not a hundred miles distance, he took
+to the pleasant and profitable pastime of which Dick Turpin is the
+patron saint. He was all but hanged for his daring robberies, but
+unfortunately not quite so. He lived to suffer such indigence, that he
+and another rascal had but one under-garment between them, and entered
+into a compact that one should lie in bed while the other wore the
+article in question. Naturally enough the two fell out in time, and the
+end of Goodman--sad misnomer--was worse than his beginning: such was the
+gallant whom the imperious Duchess of Cleveland vouchsafed to honour.
+
+The life of the once beautiful Barbara Villiers grew daily more and more
+depraved: at the age of thirty she retired to Paris, shunned and
+disgraced. After numerous intrigues abroad and at home, she put the
+crowning point to her follies by falling in love with the handsome
+Fielding, when she herself numbered sixty-five summers.
+
+Whether the Beau still thought of fortune, or whether having once tried
+matrimony, he was so enchanted with it as to make it his cacoëthes, does
+not appear: the legend explains not for what reason he married the
+antiquated beauty only three weeks after he had been united to the
+supposed widow. For a time he wavered between the two, but that time was
+short: the widow discovered his second marriage, claimed him, and in so
+doing revealed the well-kept secret that she was not a widow; indeed,
+not even the relict of John Deleau, Esq., of Whaddon, but a wretched
+adventurer of the name of Mary Wadsworth, who had shared with Mrs.
+Villars the plunder of the trick. The Beau tried to preserve his
+dignity, and throw over his duper, but in vain. The first wife reported
+the state of affairs to the second: and the duchess, who had been
+shamefully treated by Master Fielding, was only too glad of an
+opportunity to get rid of him. She offered Mary Wadsworth a pension of
+£100 a year, and a sum of £200 in ready money, to prove the previous
+marriage. The case came on, and Beau Fielding had the honour of playing
+a part in a famous state trial.
+
+With his usual impudence he undertook to defend himself at the Old
+Bailey, and hatched up some old story to prove that the first wife was
+married at the time of their union to one Brady; but the plea fell to
+the ground, and the fine gentleman was sentenced to be burned in the
+hand. His interest in certain quarters saved him this ignominious
+punishment which would, doubtless, have spoiled a limb of which he was
+particularly proud. He was pardoned: the real widow married a far more
+honourable gentleman, in spite of the unenviable notoriety she had
+acquired; the sham one was somehow quieted, and the duchess died some
+four years later, the more peacefully for being rid of her tyrannical
+mate.
+
+Thus ended a petty scandal of the day, in which all the parties were so
+disreputable that no one could feel any sympathy for a single one of
+them. How the dupe himself ended is not known. The last days of fops and
+beaux are never glorious. Brummell died in slovenly penury; Nash in
+contempt. Fielding lapsed into the dimmest obscurity; and as far as
+evidence goes, there is as little certainty about his death as of that
+of the Wandering Jew. Let us hope that he is not still alive: though his
+friends seemed to have cared little whether he were so or not, to judge
+from a couple of verses written by one of them:--
+
+    'If Fielding is dead,
+       And rests under this stone,
+     Then he is not alive
+       You may bet two to one.
+
+    'But if he's alive,
+       And does not lie there--
+     Let him live till he's hanged,
+       For which no man will care.'
+
+
+
+
+    OF CERTAIN CLUBS AND CLUB-WITS UNDER ANNE.
+
+  The Origin of Clubs.--The Establishment of Coffee-houses.--The
+      October Club.--The Beef-steak Club.--Of certain other
+      Clubs.--The Kit-kat Club.--The Romance of the Bowl.--The Toasts
+      of the Kit-kat.--The Members of the Kit-kat.--A good Wit, and a
+      bad Architect.--'Well-natured Garth.'--The Poets of the
+      Kit-kat.--Charles Montagu, Earl of Halifax.--Chancellor
+      Somers.--Charles Sackville, Lord Dorset.--Less celebrated Wits.
+
+
+I suppose that, long before the building of Babel, man discovered that
+he was an associative animal, with the universal motto, '_L'union c'est
+la force_;' and that association, to be of any use, requires talk. A
+history of celebrated associations, from the building society just
+mentioned down to the thousands which are represented by an office, a
+secretary, and a brass-plate, in the present day, would give a curious
+scheme of the natural tendencies of man; while the story of their
+failures--and how many have not failed, sooner or later!--would be a
+pretty moral lesson to your anthropolaters who Babelize now-a-days, and
+believe there is nothing which a company with capital cannot achieve. I
+wonder what object there is, that two men can possibly agree in
+desiring, and which it takes more than one to attain, for which an
+association of some kind has not been formed at some time or other,
+since first the swarthy savage learned that it was necessary to unite to
+kill the lion which infested the neighbourhood! Alack for human nature!
+I fear by far the larger proportion of the objects of associations would
+be found rather evil than good, and, certes, nearly all of them might be
+ranged under two heads, according as the passions of hate or desire
+found a common object in several hearts. Gain on the one
+hand--destruction on the other--have been the chief motives of clubbing
+in all time.
+
+A delightful exception is to be found, though--to wit, in associations
+for the purpose of talking. I do not refer to parliaments and
+philosophical academies, but to those companies which have been formed
+for the sole purpose of mutual entertainment by interchange of thought.
+
+Now, will any kind reader oblige me with a derivation of the word
+'Club?' I doubt if it is easy to discover. But one thing is certain,
+whatever its origin, it is, in its present sense, purely English in idea
+and in existence. Dean Trench points this out, and, noting the fact that
+no other nation (he might have excepted the Chinese) has any word to
+express this kind of association, he has, with very pardonable natural
+pride, but unpardonably bad logic, inferred that the English are the
+most sociable people in the world. The contrary is true; nay, _was_
+true, even in the days of Addison, Swift, Steele--even in the days of
+Johnson, Walpole, Selwyn; ay, at all time since we have been a nation.
+The fact is, we are not the most sociable, but the most associative
+race; and the establishment of clubs is a proof of it. We cannot, and
+never could, talk freely, comfortably, and generally, without a company
+for talking. Conversation has always been with us as much a business as
+railroad-making, or what not. It has always demanded certain
+accessories, certain condiments, certain stimulants to work it up to the
+proper pitch. 'We all know' we are the cleverest and wittiest people
+under the sun; but then our wit has been stereotyped. France has no 'Joe
+Miller;' for a bon-mot there, however good, is only appreciated
+historically. Our wit is printed, not spoken; our best wits behind an
+inkhorn have sometimes been the veriest logs in society. On the
+Continent clubs were not called for, because society itself was the
+arena of conversation. In this country, on the other hand, a man could
+only chat when at his ease; could only be at his ease among those who
+agreed with him on the main points of religion and politics, and even
+then wanted the aid of a bottle to make him comfortable. Our want of
+sociability was the cause of our clubbing, and therefore the word 'club'
+is purely English.
+
+This was never so much the case as after the Restoration. Religion and
+politics never ran higher than when a monarch, who is said to have died
+a papist because he had no religion at all during his life, was brought
+back to supplant a furious puritanical Protectorate. Then, indeed, it
+was difficult for men of opposite parties to meet without bickering; and
+society demanded separate meeting-places for those who differed. The
+origin of clubs in this country is to be traced to two causes--the
+vehemence of religious and political partisanship, and the establishment
+of coffee-houses. These certainly gave the first idea of clubbery. The
+taverns which preceded them had given the English a zest for public life
+in a small way. 'The Mermaid' was, virtually, a club of wits long before
+the first real club was opened, and, like the clubs of the eighteenth
+century, it had its presiding geniuses in Shakespeare and Rare Ben.
+
+The coffee-houses introduced somewhat more refinement and less
+exclusiveness. The oldest of these was the 'Grecian.' 'One Constantine,
+a Grecian,' advertised in 'The Intelligencer' of January 23rd, 1664-5,
+that 'the right coffee bery or chocolate,' might be had of him 'as cheap
+and as good as is anywhere to be had for money,' and soon after began to
+sell the said 'coffee bery' in small cups at his own establishment in
+Devereux Court, Strand. Some two years later we have news of 'Will's,'
+the most famous, perhaps, of the coffee-houses. Here Dryden held forth
+with pedantic vanity: and here was laid the first germ of that critical
+acumen which has since become a distinguishing feature in English
+literature. Then, in the City, one Garraway, of Exchange Alley, first
+sold 'tea in leaf and drink, made according to the directions of the
+most knowing, and travellers into those eastern countries;' and thus
+established the well-known 'Garraway's,' whither, in Defoe's day,
+'foreign banquiers' and even ministers resorted, to drink the said
+beverage. 'Robin's,' 'Jonathan's,' and many another, were all opened
+about this time, and the rage for coffee-house life became general
+throughout the country.
+
+In these places the company was of course of all classes and colours;
+but, as the conversation was general, there was naturally at first a
+good deal of squabbling, till, for the sake of peace and comfort, a man
+chose his place of resort according to his political principles; and a
+little later there were regular Whig and Tory coffee-houses. Thus, in
+Anne's day, 'The Cocoa-nut,' in St. James's Street, was reserved for
+Jacobites, while none but Whigs frequented 'The St James's.' Still there
+was not sufficient exclusiveness; and as early as in Charles II.'s reign
+men of peculiar opinions began to appropriate certain coffee-houses at
+certain hours, and to exclude from them all but approved members. Hence
+the origin of clubs.
+
+The October Club was one of the earliest, being composed of some hundred
+and fifty rank Tories, chiefly country members of Parliament. They met
+at the 'Bell,' in King Street, Westminster, that street in which Spenser
+starved, and Dryden's brother kept a grocer's shop. A portrait of Queen
+Anne, by Dahl, hung in the club-room. This and the Kit-kat, the great
+Whig club, were chiefly reserved for politics; but the fashion of
+clubbing having once come in, it was soon followed by people of all
+fancies. No reader of the 'Spectator' can fail to remember the ridicule
+to which this was turned by descriptions of imaginary clubs for which
+the qualifications were absurd, and of which the business, on meeting,
+was preposterous nonsense of some kind. The idea of such fraternities,
+as the Club of Fat Men, the Ugly Club, the Sheromp Club, the Everlasting
+Club, the Sighing Club, the Amorous Club, and others, could only have
+been suggested by real clubs almost as ridiculous. The names, too, were
+almost as fantastical as those of the taverns in the previous century,
+which counted 'The Devil,' and 'The Heaven and Hell,' among their
+numbers. Many derived their titles from the standing dishes preferred at
+supper, the Beef-steak and the Kit-kat (a sort of mutton-pie), for
+instance.
+
+The Beef-steak Club, still in existence, was one of the most famous
+established in Anne's reign. It had at that time less of a political
+than a jovial character. Nothing but that excellent British fare, from
+which it took its name, was, at first, served at the supper-table. It
+was an assemblage of wits of every station, and very jovial were they
+supposed to be when the juicy dish had been discussed. Early in the
+century, Estcourt, the actor, was made provider to this club, and wore a
+golden gridiron as a badge of office, and is thus alluded to in Dr.
+King's 'Art of Cookery' (1709):--
+
+    'He that of honour, wit, and mirth partakes,
+     May be a fit companion o'er beef-stakes;
+     His name may be to future times enrolled
+     In Estcourt's book, whose gridiron's framed of gold.'
+
+Estcourt was one of the best mimics of the day, and a keen satirist to
+boot; in fact he seems to have owed much of his success on the stage to
+his power of imitation, for while his own manner was inferior, he could
+at pleasure copy exactly that of any celebrated actor. He _would_ be a
+player. At fifteen he ran away from home, and joining a strolling
+company, acted Roxana in woman's clothes: his friends pursued him, and,
+changing his dress for that of a girl of the time, he tried to escape
+them, but in vain. The histrionic youth was captured, and bound
+apprentice in London town; the 'seven long years' of which did not cure
+him of the itch for acting. But he was too good a wit for the stage, and
+amused himself, though not always his audience, by interspersing his
+part with his own remarks. The great took him by the hand, and old
+Marlborough especially patronized him: he wrote a burlesque of the
+Italian operas then beginning to be in vogue; and died in 1712-13.
+Estcourt was not the only actor belonging to the Beef-steak, nor even
+the only one who had concealed his sex under emergency; Peg Woffington,
+who had made as good a boy as he had done a girl, was afterwards a
+member of this club.
+
+In later years the beef-steak was cooked in a room at the top of Covent
+Garden Theatre, and counted many a celebrated wit among those who sat
+around its cheery dish. Wilkes the blasphemer, Churchill, and Lord
+Sandwich, were all members of it at the same time. Of the last, Walpole
+gives us information in 1763 at the time of Wilkes's duel with Martin in
+Hyde Park. He tells us that at the Beef-steak Club Lord Sandwich talked
+so profusely, 'that he drove harlequins out of the company.' To the
+honour of the club be it added, that his lordship was driven out after
+the harlequins, and finally expelled: it is sincerely to be hoped that
+Wilkes was sent after his lordship. This club is now represented by one
+held behind the Lyceum, with the thoroughly British motto, 'Beef and
+Liberty:' the name was happily chosen and therefore imitated. In the
+reign of George II. we meet with a 'Rump-steak, or Liberty Club;' and
+somehow steaks and liberty seem to be the two ideas most intimately
+associated in the Britannic mind. Can any one explain it?
+
+Other clubs there were under Anne,--political, critical, and
+hilarious--but the palm is undoubtedly carried off by the glorious
+Kit-kat.
+
+It is not every eating-house that is immortalized by a Pope, though
+Tennyson has sung 'The Cock' with its 'plump head-waiter,' who, by the
+way, was mightily offended by the Laureate's verses--or pretended to be
+so--and thought it 'a great liberty of Mr. ----, Mr. ----, what is his
+name? to put respectable private characters into his books.' Pope, or
+some say Arbuthnot, explained the etymology of this club's extraordinary
+title:--
+
+    'Whence deathless Kit-kat took its name,
+       Few critics can unriddle:
+     Some say from pastrycook it came,
+       And some from Cat and Fiddle.
+
+    'From no trim beaux its name it boasts,
+       Grey statesmen or green wits;
+     But from the pell-mell pack of toasts
+       Of old cats and young kits.'
+
+Probably enough the title was hit on a hap-hazard, and retained because
+it was singular, but as it has given a poet a theme, and a painter a
+name for pictures of a peculiar size, its etymology has become
+important. Some say that the pastry cook in Shire Lane, at whose house
+it was held, was named Christopher Katt. Some one or other was certainly
+celebrated for the manufacture of that forgotten delicacy, a mutton-pie,
+which acquired the name of a Kit-kat.
+
+    'A Kit-kat is a supper for a lord,'
+
+says a comedy of 1700, and certes it afforded at this club evening
+nourishment for many a celebrated noble profligate of the day. The
+supposed sign of the Cat and Fiddle (Kitt), gave another solution, but
+after all, Pope's may be satisfactorily received.
+
+The Kit-kat was, _par excellence_, the Whig Club of Queen Anne's time:
+it was established at the beginning of the eighteenth century, and was
+then composed of thirty-nine members, among whom were the Dukes of
+Marlborough, Devonshire, Grafton, Richmond, and Somerset. In later days
+it numbered the greatest wits of the age, of whom anon.
+
+This club was celebrated more than any for its _toasts_.
+
+Now, if men must drink--and sure the vine was given us for use, I do not
+say for abuse--they had better make it an occasion of friendly
+intercourse; nothing can be more degraded than the solitary
+sanctimonious toping in which certain of our northern brethren are known
+to indulge. They had better give to the quaffing of that rich gift, sent
+to be a medicine for the mind, to raise us above the perpetual
+contemplation of worldly ills, as much of romance and elegance as
+possible. It is the opener of the heart, the awakener of nobler feelings
+of generosity and love, the banisher of all that is narrow, and sordid,
+and selfish; the herald of all that is exalted in man. No wonder that
+the Greeks made a god of Bacchus, that the Hindu worshipped the mellow
+Soma, and that there has been scarce a poet who has not sung its praise.
+There was some beauty in the feasts of the Greeks, when the goblet was
+really wreathed with flowers; and even the German student, dirty and
+drunken as he may be, removes half the stain from his orgies with the
+rich harmony of his songs, and the hearty good-fellowship of his toasts.
+We drink still, perhaps we shall always drink till the end of time, but
+all the romance of the bowl is gone; the last trace of its beauty went
+with the frigid abandonment of the toast.
+
+There was some excuse for wine when it brought out that now forgotten
+expression of good-will. Many a feud was reconciled in the clinking of
+glasses; just as many another was begun when the cup was drained too
+deeply. The first quarter of the last century saw the end of all the
+social glories of the wassail in this country, and though men drank as
+much fifty years later, all its poetry and romance had then disappeared.
+
+It was still, however, the custom at that period to call on the name of
+some fair maiden, and sing her praises over the cup as it passed. It was
+a point of honour for all the company to join the health. Some beauties
+became celebrated for the number of their toasts; some even standing
+toasts among certain sets. In the Kit-kat Club the custom was carried
+out by rule, and every member was compelled to name a beauty, whose
+claims to the honour were then discussed, and if her name was approved,
+a separate bowl was consecrated to her, and verses to her honour
+engraved on it. Some of the most celebrated toasts had even their
+portraits hung in the club-room, and it was no slight distinction to be
+the favourite of the Kit-kat. When only eight years old, Lady Mary
+Wortley Montagu enjoyed this privilege. Her father, the Lord Dorchester,
+afterwards Evelyn, Duke of Kingston, in a fit of caprice, proposed 'the
+pretty little child' as his toast. The other members, who had never seen
+her, objected; the Peer sent for her, and there could no longer be any
+question. The forward little girl was handed from knee to knee, petted,
+probably, by Addison, Congreve, Vanbrugh, Garth, and many another famous
+wit. Another celebrated toast of the Kit-kat, mentioned by Walpole, was
+Lady Molyneux, who, he says, died smoking a pipe.
+
+This club was no less celebrated for its portraits than for the ladies
+it honoured. They, the portraits, were all painted by Kneller, and all
+of one size, which thence got the name of Kit-kat; they were hung round
+the club-room. Jacob Tonson, the publisher, was secretary to the club.
+
+Defoe tells us the Kit-kat held the first rank among the clubs of the
+early part of the last century, and certainly the names of its members
+comprise as many wits as we could expect to find collected in one
+society.
+
+Addison must have been past forty when he became a member of the
+Kit-kat. His 'Cato' had won him the general applause of the Whig party,
+who could not allow so fine a writer to slip from among them. He had
+long, too, played the courtier, and was 'quite a gentleman.' A place
+among the exclusives of the Kit-kat was only the just reward of such
+attainments, and he had it. I shall not be asked to give a notice of a
+man so universally known, and one who ranks rather with the humorists
+than the wits. It will suffice to say, that it was not till _after_ the
+publication of the 'Spectator,' and some time after, that he joined our
+society.
+
+Congreve I have chosen out of this set for a separate life, for this man
+happens to present a very average sample of all their peculiarities.
+Congreve was a literary man, a poet, a wit, a beau, and--what unhappily
+is quite as much to the purpose--a profligate. The only point he,
+therefore, wanted in common with most of the members, was a title; but
+few of the titled members combined as many good and bad qualities of the
+Kit-kat kind as did William Congreve.
+
+Another dramatist, whose name seems to be inseparable from Congreve's,
+was that mixture of bad and good taste--Vanbrugh. The author of 'The
+Relapse,' the most licentious play ever acted;--the builder of Blenheim,
+the ugliest house ever erected, was a man of good family, and Walpole
+counts him among those who 'wrote genteel comedy, because they lived in
+the best company.' We doubt the logic of this; but if it hold, how is it
+that Van wrote plays which the best company, even at that age,
+condemned, and neither good nor bad company can read in the present day
+without being shocked? If the conversation of the Kit-kat was anything
+like that in this member's comedies, it must have been highly edifying.
+However, I have no doubt Vanbrugh passed for a gentleman, whatever his
+conversation, and he was certainly a wit, and apparently somewhat less
+licentious in his morals than the rest. Yet what Pope said of his
+literature may be said, too, of some acts of his life:--
+
+    'How Van wants grace, who never wanted wit.'
+
+And his quarrel with 'Queen Sarah' of Marlborough, though the duchess
+was by no means the most agreeable woman in the world to deal with, is
+not much to Van's honour. When the nation voted half a million to build
+that hideous mass of stone, the irregular and unsightly piling of which
+caused Walpole to say that the architect 'had emptied quarries, rather
+than built houses,' and Dr. Evans to write this epitaph for the
+builder--
+
+    'Lie heavy on him, Earth, for he
+     Laid many a heavy load on thee,'
+
+Sarah haggled over 'seven-pence halfpenny a bushel;' Van retorted by
+calling her 'stupid and troublesome,' and 'that wicked woman of
+Marlborough,' and after the Duke's death, wrote that the Duke had left
+her 'twelve thousand pounds a-year to keep herself clean and go to law.'
+Whether she employed any portion of it on the former object we do not
+pretend to say, but she certainly spent as much as a miser could on
+litigation, Van himself being one of the unfortunates she attacked in
+this way.
+
+The events of Vanbrugh's life were varied. He began life in the army,
+but in 1697 gave the stage 'The Relapse.' It was sufficiently
+successful to induce him to follow it up with the 'Provoked Wife,' one
+of the wittiest pieces produced in those days. Charles, Earl of
+Carlisle, Deputy Earl Marshal, for whom he built Castle Howard, made
+him Clarencieux King-at-arms in 1704, and he was knighted by George
+I., 9th of September, 1714. In 1705 he joined Congreve in the
+management of the Haymarket, which he himself built. George I. made
+him Comptroller-general of the royal works. He had even an experience
+of the Bastille, where he was confined for sketching fortifications in
+France. He died in 1726, with the reputation of a good wit, and a bad
+architect. His conversation was, certainly, as light as his buildings
+were heavy.
+
+Another member, almost as well known in his day, was Sir Samuel Garth,
+the physician, 'well-natured Garth,' as Pope called him. He won his fame
+by his satire on the apothecaries in the shape of a poem called 'The
+Dispensary.' When delivering the funeral oration over Dryden's body,
+which had been so long unburied that its odour began to be disagreeable,
+he mounted a tub, the top of which fell through and left the doctor in
+rather an awkward position. He gained admission to the Kit-kat in
+consequence of a vehement eulogy on King William which he had introduced
+into his Harveian oration in 1697.[13] It was Garth, too, who
+extemporized most of the verses which were inscribed on the
+toasting-glasses of their club, so that he may, _par excellence_, be
+considered the Kit-kat poet. He was the physician and friend of
+Marlborough, with whose sword he was knighted by George I., who made him
+his physician in ordinary. Garth was a very jovial man, and, some say,
+not a very religious one. Pope said he was as good a Christian as ever
+lived, 'without knowing it.' He certainly had no affectation of piety,
+and if charitable and good-natured acts could take a man to heaven, he
+deserved to go there. He had his doubts about faith, and is said to have
+died a Romanist. This he did in 1719, and the poor and the Kit-kat must
+both have felt his loss. He was perhaps more of a wit than a poet,
+although he has been classed at times with Gray and Prior; he can
+scarcely take the same rank as other verse-making doctors, such as
+Akenside, Darwin, and Armstrong. He seems to have been an active,
+healthy man--perhaps too much so for a poet--for it is on record that he
+ran a match in the Mall with the Duke of Grafton, and beat him. He was
+fond, too, of a hard frost, and had a regular speech to introduce on
+that subject: 'Yes, sir, 'fore Gad, very fine weather, sir--very
+wholesome weather, sir--kills trees, sir--very good for man, sir.'
+
+Old Marlborough had another intimate friend at the club, who was
+probably one of its earliest members. This was Arthur Maynwaring, a
+poet, too, in a way, but more celebrated at this time for his _liaison_
+with Mrs. Oldfield, the famous but disreputable actress, with whom he
+fell in love when he was forty years old, and whom he instructed in the
+niceties of elocution, making her rehearse her parts to him in private.
+Maynwaring was born in 1668, educated at Oxford, and destined for the
+bar, for which he studied. He began life as a vehement Jacobite, and
+even supported that party in sundry pieces; but like some others, he was
+easily converted, when, on coming to town, he found it more fashionable
+to be a Whig. He held two or three posts under the Government, whose
+cause he now espoused: had the honour of the dedication of 'The Tatler'
+to him by Steele, and died suddenly in 1712. He divided his fortune
+between his sister and his mistress, Mrs. Oldfield, and his son by the
+latter. Mrs. Oldfield must have grown rich in her sinful career, for she
+could afford, when ill, to refuse to take her salary from the theatre,
+though entitled to it. She acted best in Vanbrugh's 'Provoked Husband,'
+so well, in fact, that the manager gave her an extra fifty pounds by way
+of acknowledgment.
+
+Poetising seems to have been as much a polite accomplishment of that age
+as letter-writing was of a later, and a smattering of science is of the
+present day. Gentlemen tried to be poets, and poets gentlemen. The
+consequence was, that both made fools of themselves. Among the
+poetasters who belonged to the Kit-kat, we must mention Walsh, a country
+gentleman, member of Parliament, and very tolerable scholar. He dabbled
+in odes, elegies, epitaphs, and all that small fry of the muse which was
+then so plentiful. He wrote critical essays on Virgil, in which he tried
+to make out that the shepherds in the days of the Roman poet were very
+well-bred gentlemen of good education! He was a devoted admirer and
+friend of Dryden, and he encouraged Pope in his earlier career so kindly
+that the little viper actually praised him! Walsh died somewhere about
+1709 in middle life.
+
+We have not nearly done with the poets of the Kit-kat. A still smaller
+one than Walsh was Stepney, who, like Garth, had begun life as a violent
+Tory and turned coat when he found his interest lay the other way. He
+was well repaid, for from 1692 to 1706 he was sent on no less than eight
+diplomatic missions, chiefly to German courts. He owed this preferment
+to the good luck of having been a schoolfellow of Charles Montagu,
+afterwards Earl of Halifax. He died about 1707, and had as grand a
+monument and epitaph in Westminster Abbey as if he had been a Milton or
+Dryden.
+
+When you meet a dog trotting along the road, you naturally expect that
+his master is not far off. In the same way, where you find a poet, still
+more a poetaster, there you may feel certain you will light upon a
+patron. The Kit-kat was made up of Mæcenases and their humble servants;
+and in the same club with Addison, Congreve, Vanbrugh, and the minor
+poets, we are not at all surprised to find Sir Robert Walpole, the Duke
+of Somerset, Halifax, and Somers.
+
+Halifax was, _par excellence_, the Mæcenas of his day, and Pope
+described him admirably in the character of Bufo:--
+
+    'Proud as Apollo, on his forked hill,
+     Sat full-blown Bufo, puff'd by every quill;
+     _Fed with soft dedication_ all day long,
+     Horace and he went hand in hand in song.'
+
+The dedications poured in thickly. Steele, Tickell, Philips, Smith, and
+a crowd of lesser lights, raised my lord each one on a higher pinnacle;
+and in return the powerful minister was not forgetful of the douceur
+which well-tuned verses were accustomed to receive. He himself had tried
+to be a poet, and in 1703 wrote verses for the toasting-cups of the
+Kit-kat. His lines to a Dowager Countess of ----, are good enough to
+make us surprised that he never wrote any better. Take a specimen:--
+
+    'Fair Queen of Fop-land in her royal style;
+     Fop-land the greatest part of this great isle!
+     Nature did ne'er so equally divide
+     A female heart 'twixt piety and pride:
+     Her waiting-maids prevent the peep of day,
+     And all in order at her toilet lay
+     Prayer-books, patch-boxes, sermon-notes, and paint,
+     At once t'improve the sinner and the saint.'
+
+A Mæcenas who paid for his dedications was sure to be well spoken of,
+and Halifax has been made out a wit and a poet, as well as a clever
+statesman. Halifax got his earldom and the garter from George I., and
+died, after enjoying them less than a year, in 1715.
+
+Chancellor Somers, with whom Halifax was associated in the impeachment
+case in 1701, was a far better man in every respect. His was probably
+the purest character among those of all the members of the Kit-kat. He
+was the son of a Worcester attorney, and born in 1652. He was educated
+at Trinity, Oxford, and rose purely by merit, distinguishing himself at
+the bar and on the bench, unwearied in his application to business, and
+an exact and upright judge. At school he was a terribly good boy,
+keeping to his book in play-hours. Throughout life his habits were
+simple and regular, and his character unblemished. He slept but little,
+and in later years had a reader to attend him at waking. With such
+habits he can scarcely have been a constant attender at the club; and as
+he died a bachelor, it would be curious to learn what ladies he selected
+for his toasts. In his latter years his mind was weakened, and he died
+in 1716 of apoplexy. Walpole calls him 'one of those divine men who,
+like a chapel in a palace, remained unprofaned, while all the rest is
+tyranny, corruption, and folly.'
+
+A huge stout figure rolls in now to join the toasters in Shire Lane. In
+the puffy, once handsome face, there are signs of age, for its owner is
+past sixty; yet he is dressed in superb fashion; and in an hour or so,
+when the bottle has been diligently circulated, his wit will be brighter
+and keener than that of any young man present. I do not say it will be
+repeatable, for the talker belongs to a past age, even coarser than that
+of the Kit-kat. He is Charles Sackville,[14] famous as a companion of
+the merriest and most disreputable of the Stuarts, famous--or, rather,
+infamous--for his mistress, Nell Gwynn, famous for his verses, for his
+patronage of poets, and for his wild frolics in early life, when Lord
+Buckhurst. Rochester called him
+
+    'The best good man with the worst-natured muse;'
+
+and Pope says he was
+
+    'The scourge of pride, though sanctified or great,
+     Of fops in learning and of knaves in state.'
+
+Our sailors still sing the ballad which he is said to have written on
+the eve of the naval engagement between the Duke of York and Admiral
+Opdam, which begins--
+
+    'To all you ladies now on land
+     We men at sea indite.'
+
+With a fine classical taste and a courageous spirit, he had in early
+days been guilty of as much iniquity as any of Charles's profligate
+court. He was one of a band of young libertines who robbed and murdered
+a poor tanner on the high-road, and were acquitted, less on account of
+the poor excuse they dished up for this act than of their rank and
+fashion. Such fine gentlemen could not be hanged for the sake of a mere
+workman in those days--no! no! Yet he does not seem to have repented of
+this transaction, for soon after he was engaged with Sedley and Ogle in
+a series of most indecent acts at the Cock Tavern in Bow-street, where
+Sedley, in 'birthday attire,' made a blasphemous oration from the
+balcony of the house. In later years he was the pride of the poets:
+Dryden and Prior, Wycherley, Hudibras, and Rymer, were all encouraged by
+him, and repaid him with praises. Pope and Dr. King were no less
+bountiful in their eulogies of this Mæcenas. His conversation was so
+much appreciated that gloomy William III. chose him as his companion, as
+merry Charles had done before. The famous Irish ballad, which my Uncle
+Toby was always humming, 'Lillibullero bullen-a-lah,' but which Percy
+attributes to the Marquis of Wharton, another member of the Kit-kat, was
+said to have been written by Buckhurst. He retained his wit to the last;
+and Congreve, who visited him when he was dying, said, 'Faith, he
+stutters more wit than other people have in their best health.' He died
+at Bath in 1706.
+
+Buckhurst does not complete the list of conspicuous members of this
+club, but the remainder were less celebrated for their wit. There was
+the Duke of Kingston, the father of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu;
+Granville, who imitated Waller, and attempted to make his 'Myra' as
+celebrated as the court-poet's Saccharissa, who, by the way, was the
+mother of the Earl of Sunderland; the Duke of Devonshire, whom Walpole
+calls 'a patriot among the men, a gallant among the ladies,' and who
+founded Chatsworth; and other noblemen, chiefly belonging to the latter
+part of the seventeenth century, and all devoted to William III., though
+they had been bred at the courts of Charles and James.
+
+With such an array of wits, poets, statesmen, and gallants, it can
+easily be believed that to be the toast of the Kit-kat was no slight
+honour; to be a member of it a still greater one; and to be one of its
+most distinguished, as Congreve was, the greatest. Let us now see what
+title this conceited beau and poet had to that position.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 13: The Kit-kat club was not founded till 1703.]
+
+[Footnote 14: For some notice of Lord Dorset, see p. 61.]
+
+
+
+
+    WILLIAM CONGREVE.
+
+  When and where was he born?--The Middle Temple.--Congreve finds his
+      Vocation.--Verses to Queen Mary.--The Tennis-court
+      Theatre.--Congreve abandons the Drama.--Jeremy Collier.--The
+      Immorality of the Stage.--Very improper Things.--Congreve's
+      Writings.--Jeremy's 'Short Views.'--Rival Theatres.--Dryden's
+      Funeral.--A Tub-Preacher.--Horoscopic Predictions.--Dryden's
+      Solicitude for his Son.--Congreve's Ambition.--Anecdote of
+      Voltaire and Congreve.--The Profession of Mæcenas.--Congreve's
+      Private Life.--'Malbrook's' Daughter.--Congreve's Death and
+      Burial.
+
+
+When 'Queen Sarah' of Marlborough read the silly epitaph which
+Henrietta, Duchess of Marlborough, had written and had engraved on the
+monument she set up to Congreve, she said, with one of the true Blenheim
+sneers, 'I know not what _happiness_ she might have in his company, but
+I am sure it was no _honour_,' alluding to her daughter's eulogistic
+phrases.
+
+Queen Sarah was right, as she often was when condemnation was called
+for: and however amusing a companion the dramatist may have been, he was
+not a man to respect, for he had not only the common vices of his age,
+but added to them a foppish vanity, toadyism, and fine gentlemanism (to
+coin a most necessary word), which we scarcely expect to meet with in a
+man who sets up for a satirist.
+
+It is the fate of greatness to have falsehoods told of it, and of
+nothing in connection with it more so than of its origin. If the
+converse be true, Congreve ought to have been a great man, for the place
+and time of his birth are both subjects of dispute. Oh! happy Gifford!
+or happy Croker! why did you not--perhaps you did--go to work to set the
+world right on this matter--you, to whom a date discovered is the
+highest palm (no pun intended, I assure you) of glory, and who would
+rather Shakespere had never written 'Hamlet,' or Homer the 'Iliad,' than
+that some miserable little forgotten scrap which decided a year or a
+place should have been consigned to flames before it fell into your
+hands? Why did you not bring the thunder of your abuse and the
+pop-gunnery of your satire to bear upon the question, 'How, when, and
+where was William Congreve born?'
+
+It was Lady Morgan, I think, who first 'saw the light' (that is, if she
+was born in the day-time) in the Irish Channel. If it had been only some
+one more celebrated, we should have had by this time a series of
+philosophical, geographical, and ethnological pamphlets to prove that
+she was English or Irish, according to the fancies or prejudices of the
+writers. It was certainly a very Irish thing to do, which is one
+argument for the Milesians, and again it was done in the Irish Channel,
+which is another and a stronger one; and altogether we are not inclined
+to go into forty-five pages of recondite facts and fine-drawn arguments,
+mingled with the most vehement abuse of anybody who ever before wrote on
+the subject, to prove that this country had the honour of producing her
+ladyship--the Wild Irish Girl. We freely give her up to the sister
+island. But not so William Congreve, though we are equally indifferent
+to the honour in his case.
+
+The one party, then, assert that he was born in this country, the other
+that he breathed his first air in the Emerald Isle. Whichever be the
+true state of the case, we, as Englishmen, prefer to agree in the
+commonly received opinion that he came into this wicked world at the
+village of Bardsea, or Bardsey, not far from Leeds in the county of
+York. Let the Bardseyans immediately erect a statue to his honour, if
+they have been remiss enough to neglect him heretofore.
+
+But our difficulties are not ended, for there is a similar doubt about
+the year of his birth. His earliest biographer assures us he was born in
+1672, and others that he was baptized three years before, in 1669. Such
+a proceeding might well be taken as a proof of his Hibernian extraction,
+and accordingly we find Malone supporting the earlier date, producing,
+of course, a certificate of baptism to support himself; and as we have
+a very great respect for his authority, we beg also to support Mr.
+Malone.
+
+This being settled, we have to examine who were his parents: and this is
+satisfactorily answered by his earliest biographer, who informs us that
+he was of a very ancient family, being 'the only surviving son of
+William Congreve, Esq. (who was second son to Richard Congreve, Esq., of
+Congreve and Stretton in that county),' to wit, Yorkshire. Congreve
+_père_ held a military command, which took him to Ireland soon after the
+dramatist's birth, and thus young William had the incomparable advantage
+of being educated at Kilkenny, and afterwards at Trinity, Dublin, the
+'silent sister,' as it is commonly called at our universities.
+
+At the age of nineteen, this youth sought the classic shades of the
+Middle Temple, of which he was entered a student, but by the honourable
+society of which he was never called to the bar; but whether this was
+from a disinclination to study 'Coke upon Lyttleton,' or from an
+incapacity to digest the requisite number of dinners, the devouring of
+which qualify a young gentleman to address an enlightened British jury,
+we have no authority for deciding. He was certainly not the first, nor
+the last, young Templar who has quitted special pleading on a crusade to
+the heights of Parnassus, and he began early to try the nib of his pen
+and the colour of his ink in a novel. Eheu! how many a novel has issued
+from the dull, dirty chambers of that same Temple! The waters of the
+Thames just there seem to have been augmented by a mingled flow of
+sewage and Helicon, though the former is undoubtedly in the greater
+proportion. This novel, called 'Incognita; or, Love and Duty
+Reconciled,' seems to have been--for I confess that I have not read more
+than a chapter of it, and hope I never may be forced to do so--great
+rubbish, with good store of villains and ruffians, love-sick maidens who
+tune their lutes--always conveniently at hand--and love-sick gallants
+who run their foes through the body with the greatest imaginable ease.
+It was, in fact, such a novel as James might have written, had he lived
+a century and a half ago. It brought its author but little fame, and
+accordingly he turned his attention to another branch of literature, and
+in 1693 produced 'The Old Bachelor,' a play of which Dryden, his friend,
+had so high an opinion that he called it the 'best first-play he had
+ever read.' However, before being put on the stage it was submitted to
+Dryden, and by him and others prepared for representation, so that it
+was well fathered. It was successful enough, and Congreve thus found his
+vocation. In his dedication--a regular piece of flummery of those days,
+for which authors were often well paid, either in cash or interest--he
+acknowledges a debt of gratitude to Lord Halifax, who appears to have
+taken the young man by the hand.
+
+The young Templar could do nothing better now than write another play.
+Play-making was as fashionable an amusement in those days of Old Drury,
+the only patented theatre then, as novel-writing is in 1860; and when
+the young ensign, Vanbrugh, could write comedies and take the direction
+of a theatre, it was no derogation to the dignity of the Staffordshire
+squire's grandson to do as much. Accordingly, in the following year he
+brought out a better comedy, 'The Double Dealer,' with a prologue which
+was spoken by the famous Anne Bracegirdle. She must have been eighty
+years old when Horace Walpole wrote of her to that other Horace--Mann:
+'Tell Mr. Chute that his friend Bracegirdle breakfasted with me this
+morning. As she went out and wanted her clogs, she turned to me and
+said: "I remember at the playhouse they used to call, Mrs. Oldfield's
+chair! Mrs. Barry's clogs! and Mrs. Bracegirdle's pattens!"' These three
+ladies were all buried in Westminster Abbey, and, except Mrs. Cibber,
+the most beautiful and most sinful of them all--though they were none of
+them spotless--are the only actresses whose ashes and memories are
+hallowed by the place, for we can scarcely say that they do _it_ much
+honour.
+
+The success of 'The Double Dealer,' was at first moderate, although that
+highly respectable woman, Queen Mary, honoured it with her august
+presence, which forthwith called up verses of the old adulatory style,
+though with less point and neatness than those addressed to the Virgin
+Queen:
+
+    'Wit is again the care of majesty,'
+
+said the poet, and
+
+    'Thus flourished wit in our forefathers' age,
+     And thus the Roman and Athenian stage.
+     Whose wit is best, we'll not presume to tell,
+     But this we know, our audience will excell;
+     For never was in Rome, nor Athens seen
+     So fair a circle, and so bright a queen.'
+
+But this was not enough, for when Her Majesty departed for another realm
+in the same year, Congreve put her into a highly eulogistic pastoral,
+under the name of Pastora, and made some compliments on her, which were
+considered the finest strokes of poetry and flattery combined, that an
+age of addresses and eulogies could produce.
+
+    'As lofty pines o'ertop the lowly steed,
+     So did her graceful height all nymphs exceed,
+     To which excelling height she bore a mind
+     Humble as osiers, bending to the wind.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+     I mourn Pastora dead; let Albion mourn,
+     And sable clouds her chalkie cliffs adorn.'
+
+This play was dedicated to Lord Halifax, of whom we have spoken, and who
+continued to be Congreve's patron.
+
+The fame of the young man was now made; but in the following year it was
+destined to shine out more brilliantly still. Old Betterton--one of the
+best Hamlets that ever trod the stage, and of whom Booth declared that
+when he was playing the Ghost to his Hamlet, his look of surprise and
+horror was so natural, that Booth could not for some minutes recover
+himself--was now a veteran in his sixtieth year. For forty years he had
+walked the boards, and made a fortune for the patentees of Drury. It was
+very shabby of them, therefore, to give some of his best parts to
+younger actors. Betterton was disgusted, and determined to set up for
+himself, to which end he managed to procure another patent, turned the
+Queen's Court in Portugal Row, Lincoln's Inn, into a theatre, and opened
+it on the 30th of April, 1695. The building had been before used as a
+theatre in the days of the Merry Monarch, and Tom Killegrew had acted
+here some twenty years before; but it had again become a 'tennis-quatre
+of the lesser sort,' says Cibber, and the new theatre was not very
+grand in fabric. But Betterton drew to it all the best actors and
+actresses of his former company; and Mrs. Barry and Mrs. Bracegirdle
+remained true to the old man. Congreve, to his honour, espoused the same
+cause, and the theatre opened with his play of 'Love for Love,' which
+was more successful than either of the former. The veteran himself spoke
+the prologue, and fair Bracegirdle the epilogue, in which the poet thus
+alluded to their change of stage:
+
+    'And thus our audience, which did once resort
+     To shining theatres to see our sport,
+     Now find us tost into a tennis-court.
+     Thus from the past, we hope for future grace:
+     I beg it----
+     And some here know I have a _begging face_.'
+
+The king himself completed the success of the opening by attending it,
+and the theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields might have ruined the older
+house, if it had not been for the rapidity with which Vanbrugh and
+Cibber, who wrote for Old Drury, managed to concoct their pieces; while
+Congreve was a slower, though perhaps better, writer. 'Love for Love'
+was hereafter a favourite of Betterton's, and when in 1709, a year
+before his death, the company gave the old man--then in ill health, poor
+circumstances, and bad spirits--a benefit, he chose this play, and
+himself, though more than seventy, acted the part of Valentine,
+supported by Mrs. Bracegirdle as Angelina, and Mrs. Barry as Frail.
+
+The young dramatist with all his success, was not satisfied with his
+fame, and resolved to show the world that he had as much poetry as wit
+in him. This he failed to do; and, like better writers, injured his own
+fame, by not being contented with what he had. Congreve--the wit, the
+dandy, the man about town--took it into his head to write a tragedy. In
+1697 'The Mourning Bride' was acted at the Tennis Court Theatre. The
+author was wise enough to return to his former muse, and some time after
+produced his best piece, so some think, 'The Way of the World,' which
+was also performed by Betterton's company; but, alas! for
+overwriting--that cacoëthes of imprudent men--it was almost hissed off
+the stage. Whether this was owing to a weariness of Congreve's style,
+or whether at the time of its first appearance Collier's attacks, of
+which anon, had already disgusted the public with the obscenity and
+immorality of this writer, I do not know: but, whatever the cause, the
+consequence was that Mr. William Congreve, in a fit of pique, made up
+his mind never to write another piece for the stage--a wise resolution,
+perhaps--and to turn fine gentleman instead. With the exception of
+composing a masque called the 'Judgment of Paris,' and an opera
+'Gemele,' which was never performed, he kept this resolution very
+honestly; and so Mr. William Congreve's career as a playwright ends at
+the early age of thirty.
+
+But though he abandoned the drama, he was not allowed to retire in
+peace. There was a certain worthy, but peppery little man, who, though a
+Jacobite and a clergyman, was stanch and true, and as superior in
+character--even, indeed, in vigour of writing--to Congreve, as Somers
+was to every man of his age. This very Jeremy Collier, to whom we owe it
+that there is any English drama fit to be acted before our sisters and
+wives in the present day. Jeremy, the peppery, purged the stage in a
+succession of Jeremiads.
+
+Born in 1650, educated at Cambridge as a poor scholar, ordained at the
+age of twenty-six, presented three years later with the living of
+Ampton, near Bury St. Edmunds, Jeremy had two qualities to recommend him
+to Englishmen--respectability and pluck. In an age when the clergy were
+as bad as the blackest sheep in their flocks, Jeremy was distinguished
+by purity of life; in an age when the only safety lay in adopting the
+principles of the Vicar of Bray, Jeremy was a Nonjuror, and of this
+nothing could cure him. The Revolution of 1688 was scarcely effected,
+when the fiery little partizan published a pamphlet, which was rewarded
+by a residence of some months in Newgate, _not_ in capacity of chaplain.
+But he was scarcely let out, when again went his furious pen, and for
+four years he continued to assail the new government, till his hands
+were shackled and his mouth closed in the prison of 'The Gate-house.'
+Now, see the character of the man. He was liberated upon giving bail,
+but had no sooner reflected on this liberation than he came to the
+conclusion that it was wrong, by offering security, to recognize the
+authority of magistrates appointed by a usurper, as he held William to
+be, and voluntarily surrendered himself to his judges. Of course he was
+again committed, but this time to the King's Bench, and would doubtless
+in a few years have made the tour of the London prisons, if his enemies
+had not been tired of trying him. Once more at liberty, he passed the
+next three years in retirement.
+
+After 1693, Jeremy Collier's name was not brought before the public till
+1696, when he publicly absolved Sir John Friend and Sir William Perkins,
+at their execution, for being concerned in a plot to assassinate King
+William. His 'Essays on Moral Subjects' were published in 1697; 2nd
+vol., 1705; 3rd vol., 1709. But the only way to put out a firebrand like
+this is to let it alone, and Jeremy, being, no longer persecuted, began,
+at last, to think the game was grown stupid, and gave it up. He was a
+well-meaning man, however, and as long as he had the luxury of a
+grievance, would injure no one.
+
+He found one now in the immorality of his age, and if he had left
+politics to themselves from the first, he might have done much more good
+than he did. Against the vices of a court and courtly circles it was
+useless to start a crusade single-handed; but his quaint clever pen
+might yet dress out a powerful Jeremiad against those who encouraged the
+licentiousness of the people. Jeremy was no Puritan, for he was a
+Nonjuror and a Jacobite, and we may, therefore, believe that the cause
+was a good one, when we find him adopting precisely the same line as the
+Puritans had done before him. In 1698 he published, to the disgust of
+all Drury and Lincoln's Inn, his 'Short View of the Immorality and
+Profaneness of the English Stage, together with the Sense of Antiquity
+upon this Argument.'
+
+While the King of Naples is supplying his ancient Venuses with gowns,
+and putting his Mars and Hercules into pantaloons, there are--such are
+the varieties of opinion--respectable men in this country who call Paul
+de Kock the greatest moral writer of his age, and who would yet like to
+see 'The Relapse,' 'Love for Love,' and the choice specimens of
+Wycherley, Farquhar, and even of Beaumont and Fletcher, acted at the
+Princess's and the Haymarket in the year of grace 1860. I am not writing
+'A Short View' of this or any other moral subject; but this I must
+say--the effect of a sight or sound on a human being's silly little
+passions must of necessity be relative. Staid people read 'Don Juan,'
+Lewis's 'Monk,' the plays of Congreve, and any or all of the
+publications of Holywell Street, without more than disgust at their
+obscenity and admiration for their beauties. But could we be pardoned
+for putting these works into the hands of 'sweet seventeen,' or making
+Christmas presents of them to our boys? Ignorance of evil is, to a
+certain extent, virtue: let boys be boys in purity of mind as long as
+they can: let the unrefined 'great unwashed' be treated also much in the
+same way as young people. I maintain that to a coarse mind all improper
+ideas, however beautifully clothed, suggest only sensual thoughts--nay,
+the very modesty of the garments makes them the more insidious--the more
+dangerous. I would rather give my boy Jonson, Massinger, or Beaumont and
+Fletcher, whose very improper things 'are called by their proper names,'
+than let him dive in the prurient innuendo of these later writers.
+
+But there is no need to argue the question--the public has decided it
+long since, and, except in indelicate ballets, and occasional rather
+_French_ passages in farce, our modern stage is free from immorality.
+Even in Garrick's days, when men were not much more refined than in
+those of Queen Anne, it was found impossible to put the old drama on the
+stage without considerable weeding. Indeed I doubt if even the liberal
+upholder of Paul de Kock would call Congreve a moral writer; but I
+confess I am not a competent judge, for _risum teneatis_, my critics, I
+have not read his works since I was a boy, and what is more, I have no
+intention of reading them. I well remember getting into my hands a large
+thick volume, adorned with miserable woodcuts, and bearing on its back
+the title 'Wycherley, Congreve, Vanbrugh, and Farquhar.' I devoured it
+at first with the same avidity with which one might welcome a
+bottle-imp, who at the hour of one's dulness turned up out of the carpet
+and offered you delights new and old for nothing but a tether on your
+soul: and with a like horror, boy though I was, I recoiled from it when
+any better moment came. It seemed to me, when I read this book, as if
+life were too rotten for any belief, a nest of sharpers, adulterers,
+cut-throats, and prostitutes. There was none--as far as I remember--of
+that amiable weakness, of that better sentiment, which in Ben Jonson or
+Massinger reconcile us to human nature. If truth be a test of genius, it
+must be a proof of true poetry, that man is not made uglier than he is.
+Nay, his very ugliness loses its intensity and palls upon our diseased
+tastes, for want of some goodness, some purity and honesty to relieve
+it. I will not say that there is none of this in Congreve. I only know,
+that my recollection of his plays is like that of a vile nightmare,
+which I would not for anything have return to me. I have read, since,
+books as bad, perhaps worse in some respects, but I have found the
+redemption here and there. I would no more place Shandy in any boy's
+hands than Congreve and Farquhar; and yet I can read Tristram again and
+again with delight; for amid all that is bad there stand out Trim and
+Toby, pure specimens of the best side of human nature, coming home to us
+and telling us that the world is not all bad. There may be such touches
+in 'Love for Love,' or 'The Way of the World'--I know not and care not.
+To my remembrance Congreve is but a horrible nightmare, and may the
+fates forbid I should be forced to go through his plays again.
+
+Perhaps, then, Jeremy was not far wrong, when he attacked these
+specimens of the drama with an unrelenting Nemesis; but he was before
+his age. It was less the obvious coarseness of these productions with
+which he found fault than their demoralizing tendency in a direction
+which we should now, perhaps, consider innocuous. Certainly the Jeremiad
+overdid it, and like a swift, but not straight bowler at cricket, he
+sent balls which no wicket-keeper could stop, and which, therefore, were
+harmless to the batter. He did not want boldness. He attacked Dryden,
+now close upon his grave: Congreve, a young man; Vanbrugh, Cibber,
+Farquhar, and the rest, all alive, all in the zenith of their fame, and
+all as popular as writers could be. It was as much as if a man should
+stand up to-day and denounce Dickens and Thackeray, with the exception
+that well-meaning people went along with Jeremy, whereas very few would
+do more than smile at the zeal of any one who tilted against our modern
+pets. Jeremy, no doubt, was bold, but he wanted tact, and so gave his
+enemy occasion to blaspheme. He made out cases where there were none,
+and let alone what we moderns should denounce. So Congreve took up the
+cudgels against him with much wit and much coarseness, and the two
+fought out the battle in many a pamphlet and many a letter. But Jeremy
+was not to be beaten. His 'Short View' was followed by 'A Defence of the
+Short View,' a 'Second Defence of the Short View,' 'A Farther Short
+View,' and, in short, a number of 'Short Views,' which had been better
+merged into one 'Long Sight.' Jeremy grew coarse and bitter; Congreve
+coarser and bitterer; and the whole controversy made a pretty chapter
+for the 'Quarrels of Authors.' But the Jeremiad triumphed in the long
+run, because, if its method was bad, its cause was good, and a
+succeeding generation voted Congreve immoral. Enough of Jeremy. We owe
+him a tribute for his pluck, and though no one reads him in the present
+day, we may be thankful to him for having led the way to a better state
+of things.[15]
+
+Congreve defended himself in eight letters addressed to Mr. Moyle, and
+we can only say of them, that, if anything, they are yet coarser than
+the plays he would excuse.
+
+The works of the young Templar, and his connection with Betterton,
+introduced him to all the writers and wits of his day. He and Vanbrugh,
+though rivals, were fellow-workers, and our glorious Haymarket Theatre,
+which has gone on at times when Drury and Covent Garden have been in
+despair, owes its origin to their confederacy. But Vanbrugh's theatre
+was on the site of the present Opera House, and _the_ Haymarket was set
+up as a rival concern. Vanbrugh's was built in 1705, and met the usual
+fate of theatres, being burnt down some eighty-four years after. It is
+curious enough that this house, destined for the 'legitimate
+drama'--often a very illegitimate performance--was opened by an opera
+set to _Italian_ music, so that 'Her Majesty's' has not much departed
+from the original cast of the place.
+
+Perhaps Congreve's best friend was Dryden. This man's life and death are
+pretty well known, and even his funeral has been described time and
+again. But Corinna--as she was styled--gave of the latter an account
+which has been called romantic, and much discredited. There is a deal of
+characteristic humour in her story of the funeral, and as it has long
+been lost sight of, it may not be unpalatable here: Dryden died on
+May-day, 1701, and Lord Halifax[16] undertook to give his body a
+_private_ funeral in Westminster Abbey.
+
+'On the Saturday following,' writes Corinna, 'the Company came. The
+Corps was put into a Velvet Hearse, and eighteen Mourning Coaches filled
+with Company attending. When, just before they began to move, Lord
+Jeffreys, with some of his rakish Companions, coming by, in Wine, ask'd
+whose Funeral? And being told; "What!" cries he, "shall Dryden, the
+greatest Honour and Ornament of the Nation, be buried after this private
+Manner? No, Gentlemen! let all that lov'd Mr. Dryden, and honour his
+Memory, alight, and join with me in gaining my Lady's Consent, to let me
+have the Honour of his Interment, which shall be after another manner
+than this, and I will bestow £1000 on a Monument in the Abbey for him."
+The Gentlemen in the Coaches, not knowing of the Bishop of Rochester's
+Favour, nor of Lord Halifax's generous Design (these two noble Spirits
+having, out of Respect to the Family, enjoin'd Lady Elsabeth and her Son
+to keep their Favour concealed to the World, and let it pass for her own
+Expense), readily came out of the Coaches, and attended Lord Jeffreys up
+to the Lady's Bedside, who was then sick. He repeated the purport of
+what he had before said, but she absolutely refusing, he fell on his
+knees, vowing never to rise till his request was granted. The rest of
+the Company, by his Desire, kneeled also; she being naturally of a
+timorous Disposition, and then under a sudden surprise, fainted away. As
+soon as she recover'd her Speech, she cry'd, "No, no!" "Enough
+gentlemen," reply'd he (rising briskly), "My Lady is very good, she
+says, Go, go!" She repeated her former Words with all her Strength, but
+alas in vain! her feeble voice was lost in their Acclamations of Joy!
+and Lord Jeffreys order'd the Hearseman to carry the Corps to Russell's,
+an undertaker in Cheapside, and leave it there, till he sent orders for
+the Embalment, which, he added, should be after the Royal Manner. His
+Directions were obey'd, the Company dispersed, and Lady Elsabeth and Mr.
+Charles remained Inconsolable. Next Morning Mr. Charles waited on Lord
+Halifax, &c., to excuse his Mother and self, by relating the real Truth.
+But neither his Lordship nor the Bishop would admit of any Plea;
+especially the latter, who had the Abbey lighted, the ground open'd, the
+Choir attending, an Anthem ready set, and himself waiting for some
+Hours, without any Corps to bury. Russell, after three days' Expectance
+of Orders for Embalment, without receiving any, waits on Lord Jeffreys,
+who, pretending Ignorance of the Matter, turn'd it off with an
+ill-natured Jest, saying, "Those who observed the orders of a drunken
+Frolick, deserved no better; that he remembered nothing at all of it,
+and he might do what he pleased with the Corps." On this Mr. Russell
+waits on Lady Elsabeth and Mr. Dryden; but alas, it was not in their
+power to answer. The season was very hot, the Deceas'd had liv'd high
+and fast; and being corpulent, and abounding with gross Humours, grew
+very offensive. The Undertaker, in short, threaten'd to bring home the
+Corps, and set it before the Door. It cannot be easily imagin'd what
+grief, shame, and confusion seized this unhappy Family. They begged a
+Day's Respite, which was granted. Mr. Charles wrote a very handsome
+Letter to Lord Jeffreys, who returned it with this cool Answer, "He knew
+nothing of the Matter, and would be troubled no more about it." He then
+addressed the Lord Halifax and Bishop of Rochester, who were both too
+justly tho' unhappily incensed, to do anything in it. In this extream
+Distress, Dr. Garth, a man who entirely lov'd Mr. Dryden, and was withal
+a Man of Generosity and great Humanity, sends for the Corps to the
+College of Physicians in Warwick Lane, and proposed a Funeral by
+Subscription, to which himself set a most noble example. Mr. Wycherley,
+and several others, among whom must not be forgotten Henry Cromwell,
+Esq., Captain Gibbons, and Mr. Christopher Metcalfe, Mr. Dryden's
+Apothecary and intimate Friend (since a Collegiate Physician), who with
+many others contributed most largely to the Subscription; and at last a
+Day, about three weeks after his Decease, was appointed for the
+Interment at the Abbey. Dr. Garth pronounced a fine Latin Oration over
+the Corps at the College; but the Audience being numerous, and the Room
+large, it was requisite the Orator should be elevated, that he might be
+heard. But as it unluckily happen'd there was nothing at hand but an old
+Beer-Barrel, which the Doctor with much good-nature mounted; and in the
+midst of his Oration, beating Time to the Accent with his Foot, the Head
+broke in, and his Feet sunk to the Bottom, which occasioned the
+malicious Report of his Enemies, "That he was turned a Tub-Preacher."
+However, he finished the Oration with a superior grace and genius, to
+the loud Acclamations of Mirth, which inspir'd the mix'd or rather
+Mob-Auditors. The Procession began to move, a numerous Train of Coaches
+attended the Hearse: But, good God! in what Disorder can only be
+express'd by a Sixpenny Pamphlet, soon after published, entitled
+"Dryden's Funeral." At last the Corps arrived at the Abbey, which was
+all unlighted. No Organ played, no Anthem sung; only two of the Singing
+boys preceded the Corps, who sung an Ode of Horace, with each a small
+candle in their Hand. The Butchers and other Mob broke in like a Deluge,
+so that only about eight or ten Gentlemen could gain Admission, and
+those forced to cut the Way with their drawn Swords. The Coffin in this
+Disorder was let down into Chaucer's Grave, with as much confusion, and
+as little Ceremony, as was possible; every one glad to save themselves
+from the Gentlemen's Swords, or the Clubs of the Mob. When the Funeral
+was over, Mr. Charles sent a Challenge to Lord Jeffreys, who refusing to
+answer it, he sent several others, and went often himself, but could
+neither get a Letter deliver'd, nor Admittance to speak to him, that he
+resolved, since his Lordship refused to answer him like a Gentleman, he
+would watch an Opportunity to meet him, and fight off hand, tho' with
+all the Rules of Honour; which his Lordship hearing, left the Town, and
+Mr. Charles could never have the satisfaction to meet him, tho' he
+sought it till his death with the utmost Application.'
+
+Dryden was, perhaps, the last man of learning that believed in
+astrology; though an eminent English author, now living, and celebrated
+for the variety of his acquirements, has been known to procure the
+casting of horoscopes, and to consult a noted 'astrologer,' who gives
+opinions for a small sum. The coincidences of prophecy are not more
+remarkable than those of star-telling; and Dryden and the author I have
+referred to were probably both captivated into belief by some fatuitous
+realization of their horoscopic predictions. Nor can we altogether blame
+their credulity, when we see biology, table-turning, rapping, and all
+the family of imposture, taken up seriously in our own time.
+
+On the birth of his son Charles, Dryden immediately cast his horoscope.
+The following account of Dryden's paternal solicitude for his son, and
+its result, may be taken as embellished, if not apocryphal. Evil hour,
+indeed--Jupiter, Venus, and the Sun were all 'under the earth;' Mars and
+Saturn were in square: eight, or a multiple of it, would be fatal to the
+child--the square foretold it. In his eighth, his twenty-fourth, or his
+thirty-second year, he was certain to die, though he might possibly
+linger on to the age of thirty-four. The stars did all they could to
+keep up their reputation. When the boy was eight years old he nearly
+lost his life by being buried under a heap of stones out of an old wall,
+knocked down by a stag and hounds in a hunt. But the stars were not to
+be beaten, and though the child recovered, went in for the game a second
+time in his twenty-third year, when he fell, in a fit of giddiness, from
+a tower, and, to use Lady Elsabeth's words, was 'mash'd to a mummy.'
+Still the battle was not over, and the mummy returned in due course to
+its human form, though considerably disfigured. Mars and Saturn were
+naturally disgusted at his recovery, and resolved to finish the
+disobedient youth. As we have seen, he in vain sought his fate at the
+hand of Jeffreys; but we must conclude that the offended constellations
+took Neptune in partnership, for in due course the youth met with a
+watery grave.
+
+After abandoning the drama, Congreve appears to have come out in the
+light of an independent gentleman. He was already sufficiently
+introduced into literary society; Pope, Steele, Swift, and Addison were
+not only his friends but his admirers, and we can well believe that
+their admiration was considerable, when we find the one dedicating his
+'Miscellany,' the other his translation of the 'Iliad,' to a man who was
+qualified neither by rank nor fortune to play Mæcenas.
+
+At what time he was admitted to the Kit-kat I am not in a position to
+state, but it must have been after 1715, and by that time he was a
+middle-aged man, his fame was long since achieved; and whatever might be
+thought of his works and his controversy with Collier, he was recognised
+as one of the literary stars at a period when the great courted the
+clever, and wit was a passport to any society. Congreve had plenty of
+that, and probably at the Kit-kat was the life of the party when
+Vanbrugh was away or Addison in a graver mood. Untroubled by conscience,
+he could launch out on any subject whatever; and his early life, spent
+in that species of so-called gaiety which was then the routine of every
+young man of the world, gave him ample experience to draw upon. But
+Congreve's ambition was greater than his talents. No man so little knew
+his real value, or so grossly asserted one which he had not. Gay,
+handsome, and in good circumstances, he aspired to be, not Congreve the
+poet, not Congreve the wit, not Congreve the man of mind, but simply
+Congreve the fine gentleman. Such humility would be charming if it were
+not absurd. It is a vice of scribes to seek a character for which they
+have little claim. Moore loved to be thought a diner-out rather than a
+poet; even Byron affected the fast man when he might have been content
+with the name of 'genius;' but Congreve went farther, and was ashamed of
+being poet, dramatist, genius, or what you will. An anecdote of him,
+told by Voltaire, who may have been an 'awfu' liar,' but had no
+temptation to invent in such a case as this, is so consistent with what
+we gather of the man's character, that one cannot but think it is true.
+
+The philosopher of Ferney was anxious to see and converse with a
+brother dramatist of such celebrity as the author of 'The Way of the
+World.' He expected to find a man of a keen satirical mind, who would
+join him in a laugh against humanity. He visited Congreve, and naturally
+began to talk of his works. The fine gentleman spoke of them as trifles
+utterly beneath his notice, and told him, with an affectation which
+perhaps was sincere, that he wished to be visited as a gentleman, not as
+an author. One can imagine the disgust of his brother dramatist.
+Voltaire replied, that had Mr. Congreve been nothing more than a
+gentleman, he should not have taken the trouble to call on him, and
+therewith retired with an expression of merited contempt.
+
+It is only in the present day that authorship is looked upon as a
+profession, though it has long been one. It is amusing to listen to the
+sneers of men who never wrote a book, or who, having written, have
+gained thereby some more valuable advantage than the publisher's cheque.
+The men who talk with horror of writing for money, are glad enough if
+their works introduce them to the notice of the influential, and aid
+them in procuring a place. In the same way, Congreve was not at all
+ashamed of fulsome dedications, which brought him the favour of the
+great. Yet we may ask, if, the labourer being worthy of his hire, and
+the labour of the brain being the highest, finest, and most exhausting
+that can be, the man who straight-forwardly and without affectation
+takes guineas from his publisher, is not honester than he who counts
+upon an indirect reward for his toil? Fortunately, the question is
+almost settled by the example of the first writers of the present day;
+but there are still people who think that one should sit down to a
+year's--ay, ten years'--hard mental work, and expect no return but fame.
+Whether such objectors have always private means to return to, or
+whether they have never known what it is to write a book, we do not care
+to examine, but they are to be found in large numbers among the
+educated; and indeed, to this present day, it is held by some among the
+upper classes to be utterly derogatory to write for money.
+
+Whether this was the feeling in Congreve's day or not is not now the
+question. Those were glorious days for an author, who did not mind
+playing the sycophant a little. Instead of having to trudge from door to
+door in Paternoster Row, humbly requesting an interview, which is not
+always granted--instead of sending that heavy parcel of MS., which costs
+you a fortune for postage, to publisher after publisher, till it is so
+often 'returned with thanks' that you hate the very sight of it, the
+young author of those days had a much easier and more comfortable part
+to play. An introduction to an influential man in town, who again would
+introduce you to a patron, was all that was necessary. The profession of
+Mæcenas was then as recognized and established as that of doctor or
+lawyer. A man of money could always buy brains; and most noblemen
+considered an author to be as necessary a part of his establishment as
+the footmen who ushered them into my lord's presence. A fulsome
+dedication in the largest type was all that he asked: and if a writer
+were sufficiently profuse in his adulation, he might dine at Mæcenas's
+table, drink his sack and canary without stint, and apply to him for
+cash whenever he found his pockets empty. Nor was this all: if a writer
+were sufficiently successful in his works to reflect honour on his
+patron, he was eagerly courted by others of the noble profession. He was
+offered, if not hard cash, as good an equivalent, in the shape of a
+comfortable government sinecure; and if this was not to be had, he was
+sometimes even lodged and boarded by his obliged dedicatee. In this way
+he was introduced into the highest society; and if he had wit enough to
+support the character, he soon found himself _facile princeps_ in a
+circle of the highest nobility in the land. Thus it is that in the clubs
+of the day we find title and wealth mingling with wit and genius; and
+the writer who had begun life by a cringing dedication, was now rewarded
+by the devotion and assiduity of the men he had once flattered. When
+Steele, Swift, Addison, Pope, and Congreve were the kings of their sets,
+it was time for authors to look and talk big. Eheu! those happy days are
+gone!
+
+Our dramatist, therefore, soon discovered that a good play was the key
+to a good place, and the Whigs took care that he should have it. Oddly
+enough, when the Tories came in they did not turn him out. Perhaps they
+wanted to gain him over to themselves; perhaps, like the Vicar of Bray,
+he did not mind turning his coat once or twice in a life-time. However
+this may be, he managed to keep his appointment without offending his
+own party; and when the latter returned to power, he even induced them
+to give him a comfortable little sinecure, which went by the name of
+Secretary to the Island of Jamaica, and raised the income from his
+appointments to £1200 a year.
+
+From this period he was little before the public. He could afford now to
+indulge his natural indolence and selfishness. His private life was
+perhaps not worse than that of the majority of his contemporaries. He
+had his intrigues, his mistresses, the same love of wine, and the same
+addiction to gluttony. He had the reputation of a wit, and with wits he
+passed his time, sufficiently easy in his circumstances to feel no
+damping to his spirits in the cares of this life. The Island of Jamaica
+probably gave him no further trouble than that of signing a few papers
+from time to time, and giving a receipt for his salary. His life,
+therefore, presents no very remarkable feature, and he is henceforth
+known more on account of his friends than for aught he may himself have
+done. The best of these friends was Walter Moyle, the scholar, who
+translated parts of Lucian and Xenophon, and was pretty well known as a
+classic. He was a Cornish man of independent means, and it was to him
+that Congreve addressed the letters in which he attempted to defend
+himself from the attacks of Collier.
+
+It was not to be expected that a wit and a poet should go through life
+without a platonic, and accordingly we find our man not only attached,
+but devoted to a lady of great distinction. This was no other than
+Henrietta, Duchess of Marlborough, the daughter of 'Malbrook' himself,
+and of the famous 'Queen Sarah.' Henrietta was the eldest daughter, and
+there was no son to inherit the prowess of Churchill and the parsimony
+of his wife. The nation--to which, by the way, the Marlboroughs were
+never grateful--would not allow the title of their pet warrior to become
+extinct, and a special Act of Parliament gave to the eldest daughter the
+honours of the duchy.[17] The two Duchesses of Marlborough hated each
+other cordially. Sarah's temper was probably the main cause of their
+bickering; but there is never a feud between parent and child in which
+both are not more or less blameable.
+
+The Duchess Henrietta conceived a violent fancy for the wit and poet,
+and whatever her husband, Lord Godolphin, may have thought of it, the
+connection ripened into a most intimate friendship, so much so that
+Congreve made the duchess not only his executrix, but the sole residuary
+legatee of all his property.[18] His will gives us some insight into the
+toadying character of the man. Only four near relations are mentioned as
+legatees, and only £540 is divided among them; whereas, after leaving
+£200 to Mrs. Bracegirdle, the actress; £100, 'and all my apparel and
+linnen of all sorts' to a Mrs. Rooke, he divides the rest between his
+friends of the nobility, Lords Cobham and Shannon, the Duchess of
+Newcastle, Lady Mary Godolphin, Colonel Churchill (who receives 'twenty
+pounds, together with my gold-headed cane'), and, lastly, 'to the poor
+of the parish,' the magnificent sum of _ten pounds_. 'Blessed are those
+who give to the rich;' these words must surely have expressed the
+sentiment of the worldly Congreve.
+
+However, Congreve got something in return from the Duchess Henrietta,
+which he might not have received from 'the poor of the parish,' to wit,
+a monument, and an inscription on it written by her own hand. I have
+already said what 'Queen Sarah' thought of the latter, and, for the
+rest, those who care to read the nonsense on the walls of Westminster
+Abbey can decide for themselves as to the honour the poet received from
+his titled friend.
+
+The latter days of William Congreve were passed in wit and gout: the
+wine, which warmed the one, probably brought on the latter. After a
+course of ass's milk, which does not seem to have done him much good,
+the ex-dramatist retired to Bath, a very fashionable place for departing
+life in, under easy and elegant circumstances. But he not only drank of
+the springs beloved of King Bladud, of apocryphal memory, but even went
+so far as to imbibe the snail-water, which was then the last species of
+quack cure in vogue. This, probably, despatched him. But it is only just
+to that disagreeable little reptile that infests our gardens, and whose
+slime was supposed to possess peculiarly strengthening properties, to
+state that his death was materially hastened by being overturned when
+driving in his chariot. He was close upon sixty, had long been blind
+from cataracts in his eyes, and as he was no longer either useful or
+ornamental to the world in general, he could perhaps be spared. He died
+soon after this accident in January, 1729. He had the sense to die at a
+time when Westminster Abbey, being regarded as a mausoleum, was open to
+receive the corpse of any one who had a little distinguished himself,
+and even of some who had no distinction whatever. He was buried there
+with great pomp, and his dear duchess set up his monument. So much for
+his body. What became of the soul of a dissolute, vain, witty, and
+unprincipled man, is no concern of ours. _Requiescat in pace_, if there
+is any peace for those who are buried in Westminster Abbey.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 15: Dryden, in the Preface to his Fables, acknowledged that
+Collier 'had, in many points, taxed him justly.']
+
+[Footnote 16: Charles Montagu, Earl of Halifax. Lord Halifax was born in
+1661, and died in 1715. He was called 'Mouse Montagu.']
+
+[Footnote 17: See Burke's 'Peerage.']
+
+[Footnote 18: The Duchess of Marlborough received £10,000 by Mr.
+Congreve's will.]
+
+
+
+
+    BEAU NASH.
+
+  The King of Bath.--Nash at Oxford.--'My Boy Dick.'--Offers of
+      Knighthood.--Doing Penance at York.--Days of Folly.--A very
+      Romantic Story.--Sickness and Civilization.--Nash descends upon
+      Bath.--Nash's Chef-d'oeuvre.--The Ball.--Improvements in the
+      Pump-room, &c.--A Public Benefactor.--Life at Bath in Nash's
+      time.--A Compact with the Duke of Beaufort.--Gaming at
+      Bath.--Anecdotes of Nash.--'Miss Sylvia.'--A Generous
+      Act.--Nash's Sun setting.--A Panegyric.--Nash's Funeral.--His
+      Characteristics.
+
+
+There is nothing new under the sun, said Walpole, by way of a very
+original remark. 'No,' whispered George Selwyn, 'nor under the grandson,
+either.'
+
+Mankind, as a body, has proved its silliness in a thousand ways, but in
+none, perhaps, so ludicrously as in its respect for a man's coat. He is
+not always a fool that knows the value of dress; and some of the wisest
+and greatest of men have been dandies of the first water. King Solomon
+was one, and Alexander the Great was another; but there never was a more
+despotic monarch, nor one more humbly obeyed by his subjects, than the
+King of Bath, and he won his dominions by the cut of his coat. But as
+Hercules was killed by a dress-shirt, so the beaux of the modern world
+have generally ruined themselves by their wardrobes, and brought remorse
+to their hearts, or contempt from the very people who once worshipped
+them. The husband of Mrs. Damer, who appeared in a new suit twice a-day,
+and whose wardrobe sold for £15,000, blew his brains out at a
+coffee-house. Beau Fielding, Beau Nash, and Beau Brummell all expiated
+their contemptible vanity in obscure old age of want and misery. As the
+world is full of folly, the history of a fool is as good a mirror to
+hold up to it as another; but in the case of Beau Nash the only question
+is, whether he or his subjects were the greater fools. So now for a
+picture of as much folly as could well be crammed into that hot basin in
+the Somersetshire hills, of which more anon.
+
+It is a hard thing for a man not to have had a father--harder still,
+like poor Savage, to have one whom he cannot get hold of; but perhaps it
+is hardest of all, when you have a father, and that parent a very
+respectable man, to be told that you never had one. This was Nash's
+case, and his father was so little known, and so seldom mentioned, that
+the splendid Beau was thought almost to have dropped from the clouds,
+ready dressed and powdered. He dropped in reality from anything but a
+heavenly place--the shipping town of Swansea: so that Wales can claim
+the honour of having produced the finest beau of his age.
+
+Old Nash was, perhaps, a better gentleman than his son; but with far
+less pretension. He was a partner in a glass-manufactory. The Beau, in
+after-years, often got rallied on the inferiority of his origin, and the
+least obnoxious answer he ever made was to Sarah of Marlborough, as rude
+a creature as himself, who told him he was ashamed of his parentage.
+'No, madam,' replied the King of Bath, 'I seldom mention my father, in
+company, not because I have any reason to be ashamed of him, but because
+he has some reason to be ashamed of me.' Nash, though a fop and a fool,
+was not a bad-hearted man, as we shall see. And if there were no other
+redeeming point in his character, it is a great deal to say for him,
+that in an age of toadyism, he treated rank in the same manner as he did
+the want of it, and did his best to remove the odious distinctions which
+pride would have kept up in his dominions. In fact, King Nash may be
+thanked for having, by his energy in this respect, introduced into
+society the first elements of that middle class which is found alone in
+England.
+
+Old Nash--whose wife, by the way, was niece to that Colonel Poyer who
+defended Pembroke Castle in the days of the first Revolution--was one of
+those silly men who want to make gentlemen of their sons, rather than
+good men. He had his wish. His son Richard was a very fine gentleman, no
+doubt; but, unfortunately, the same circumstances that raised him to
+that much coveted position, also made him a gambler and a profligate.
+Oh! foolish papas, when will you learn that a Christian snob is worth
+ten thousand irreligious gentlemen? When will you be content to bring up
+your boys for heaven rather than for the brilliant world? Nash, senior,
+sent his son first to school and then to Oxford, to be made a gentleman
+of. Richard was entered at Jesus College, the haunt of the Welsh. In my
+day, this quiet little place was celebrated for little more than the
+humble poverty of its members, one-third of whom rejoiced in the
+cognomen of Jones. They were not renowned for cleanliness, and it was a
+standing joke with us silly boys, to ask at the door for 'that Mr. Jones
+who had a tooth-brush.' If the college had the same character then, Nash
+must have astonished its dons, and we are not surprised that in his
+first year they thought it better to get rid of him.
+
+His father could ill afford to keep him at Oxford, and fondly hoped he
+would distinguish himself. 'My boy Dick' did so at the very outset, by
+an offer of marriage to one of those charming sylphs of that academical
+city, who are always on the look-out for credulous undergraduates. The
+affair was discovered, and Master Richard, who was not seventeen, was
+removed from the University.[19] Whether he ever, in after-life, made
+another offer, I know not, but there is no doubt that he _ought_ to have
+been married, and that the connections he formed in later years were far
+more disreputable than his first love affairs.
+
+The worthy glass manufacturer, having failed to make his son a gentleman
+in one way, took the best step to make him a blackguard, and, in spite
+of the wild inclinations he had already evinced, bought him a commission
+in the army. In this new position the incipient Beau did everything but
+his duty; dressed superbly, but would not be in time for parade, spent
+more money than he had, but did not obey orders; and finally, though not
+expelled from the army, he found it convenient to sell his commission,
+and return home, after spending the proceeds.
+
+Papa was now disgusted, and sent the young Hopeless to shift for
+himself. What could a well-disposed, handsome youth do to keep body and,
+not soul, but clothes together? He had but one talent, and that was for
+dress. Alas, for our degenerate days! When we are pitched upon our own
+bottoms, we must work; and that is a highly ungentlemanly thing to do.
+But in the beginning of the last century, such a degrading resource was
+quite unnecessary. There were always at hand plenty of establishments
+where a youth could obtain the necessary funds to pay his tailor, if
+fortune favoured him; and if not, he could follow the fashion of the
+day, and take to what the Japanese call 'the happy Despatch.' Nash
+probably suspected that he had no brains to blow out, and he determined
+the more resolutely to make fortune his mistress. He went to the
+gaming-table, and turned his one guinea into ten, and his ten into a
+hundred, and was soon blazing about in gold lace, and a new sword, the
+very delight of dandies.
+
+He had entered his name, by way of excuse, at the Temple, and we can
+quite believe that he ate all the requisite dinners, though it is not so
+certain that he paid for them. He soon found that a fine coat is not so
+very far beneath a good brain in worldly estimation, and when, on the
+accession of William the Third, the Templars, according to the old
+custom, gave his Majesty a banquet, Nash, as a promising Beau, was
+selected to manage the establishment. It was his first experience of the
+duties of an M.C., and he conducted himself so ably on this occasion
+that the king even offered to make a knight of him. Probably Master
+Richard thought of his empty purse, for he replied with some of that
+assurance which afterwards stood him in such good stead, 'Please your
+majesty, if you intend to make me a knight, I wish I may be one of your
+poor knights of Windsor, and then I shall have a fortune, at least able
+to support my title.' William did not see the force of this argument,
+and Mr. Nash remained Mr. Nash till the day of his death. He had another
+chance of the title, however, in days when he could have better
+maintained it, but again he refused. Queen Anne once asked him why he
+declined knighthood. He replied: 'There is Sir William Read, the
+mountebank, who has just been knighted, and I should have to call him
+"brother."' The honour was, in fact, rather a cheap one in those days,
+and who knows whether a man who had done such signal service to his
+country did not look forward to a peerage? Worse men than even Beau Nash
+have had it.
+
+Well, Nash could afford to defy royalty, for he was to be himself a
+monarch of all he surveyed, and a good deal more; but before we follow
+him to Bath, let us give the devil his due--which, by the way, he
+generally gets--and tell a pair of tales in the Beau's favour.
+
+Imprimis, his accounts at the Temple were £10 deficient. Now I don't
+mean that Nash was not as great a liar as most of his craft, but the
+truth of this tale rests on the authority of the 'Spectator,' though
+Nash took delight in repeating it.
+
+'Come hither, young man,' said the Benchers, coolly: 'Whereunto this
+deficit?'
+
+'Pri'thee, good masters,' quoth Nash, 'that £10 was spent on making a
+man happy.'
+
+'A man happy, young sir, pri'thee explain.'
+
+'Odds donners,' quoth Nash, 'the fellow said in my hearing that his wife
+and bairns were starving, and £10 would make him the happiest man _sub
+sole_, and on such an occasion as His Majesty's accession, could I
+refuse it him?'
+
+Nash was, proverbially more generous than just. He would not pay a debt
+if he could help it, but would give the very amount to the first friend
+that begged it. There was much ostentation in this, but then my friend
+Nash _was_ ostentatious. One friend bothered him day and night for £20
+that was owing to him, and he could not get it. Knowing his debtor's
+character, he hit, at last, on a happy expedient, and sent a friend to
+_borrow_ the money, 'to relieve his urgent necessities.' Out came the
+bank note, before the story of distress was finished. The friend carried
+it to the creditor, and when the latter again met Nash, he ought to have
+made him a pretty compliment on his honesty.
+
+Perhaps the King of Bath would not have tolerated in any one else the
+juvenile frolics he delighted in after-years to relate of his own early
+days. When at a loss for cash, he would do anything, but work, for a
+fifty pound note, and having, in one of his trips, lost all his money
+at York, the Beau undertook to 'do penance' at the minster door for that
+sum. He accordingly arrayed himself--not in sackcloth and ashes--but in
+an able-bodied blanket, and nothing else, and took his stand at the
+porch, just at the hour when the dean would be going in to read service.
+'He, ho,' cried that dignitary, who knew him, 'Mr. Nash in
+masquerade?'--'Only a Yorkshire penance, Mr. Dean,' quoth the reprobate;
+'for keeping bad company, too,' pointing therewith to the friends who
+had come to see the sport.
+
+This might be tolerated, but when in the eighteenth century a young man
+emulates the hardiness of Godiva, without her merciful heart, we may not
+think quite so well of him. Mr. Richard Nash, Beau Extraordinary to the
+Kingdom of Bath, once rode through a village in that costume of which
+even our first parent was rather ashamed, and that, too, on the back of
+a cow! The wager was, I believe, considerable. A young Englishman did
+something more respectable, yet quite as extraordinary, at Paris, not a
+hundred years ago, for a small bet. He was one of the stoutest,
+thickest-built men possible, yet being but eighteen, had neither whisker
+nor moustache to masculate his clear English complexion. At the Maison
+Dorée one night he offered to ride in the Champs Elysées in a lady's
+habit, and not be mistaken for a man. A friend undertook to dress him,
+and went all over Paris to hire a habit that would fit his round figure.
+It was hopeless for a time, but at last a good-sized body was found, and
+added thereto, an ample skirt. Félix dressed his hair with _mainte_
+plats and a _net_. He looked perfect, but in coming out of the
+hairdresser's to get into his fly, unconsciously pulled up his skirt and
+displayed a sturdy pair of well-trousered legs. A crowd--there is always
+a ready crowd in Paris--was waiting, and the laugh was general. This
+hero reached the horse-dealer's--'mounted,' and rode down the Champs. 'A
+very fine woman that,' said a Frenchman in the promenade, 'but what a
+back she has!' It was in the return bet to this that a now well-known
+diplomat drove a goat-chaise and six down the same fashionable resort,
+with a monkey, dressed as a footman, in the back seat. The days of folly
+did not, apparently end with Beau Nash.
+
+There is a long lacuna in the history of this worthy's life, which may
+have been filled up by a residence in a spunging-house, or by a
+temporary appointment as billiard-marker; but the heroic Beau accounted
+for his disappearance at this time in a much more romantic manner. He
+used to relate that he was once asked to dinner on board of a man-of-war
+under orders for the Mediterranean, and that such was the affection the
+officers entertained for him, that, having made him drunk--no difficult
+matter--they weighed anchor, set sail, and carried the successor of King
+Bladud away to the wars. Having gone so far, Nash was not the man to
+neglect an opportunity for imaginary valour. He therefore continued to
+relate, that, in the apocryphal vessel, he was once engaged in a yet
+more apocryphal encounter, and wounded in the leg. This was a little too
+much for the good Bathonians to believe, but Nash silenced their doubts.
+On one occasion, a lady who was present when he was telling this story,
+expressed her incredulity.
+
+'I protest, madam,' cried the Beau, lifting his leg up, 'it is true, and
+if I cannot be believed, your ladyship may, if you please, receive
+further information and feel the ball in my leg.'
+
+Wherever Nash may have passed the intervening years, may be an
+interesting speculation for a German professor, but is of little moment
+to us. We find him again, at the age of thirty, taking first steps
+towards the complete subjugation of the kingdom he afterwards ruled.
+
+There is, among the hills of Somersetshire, a huge basin formed by the
+river Avon, and conveniently supplied with a natural gush of hot water,
+which can be turned on at any time for the cleansing of diseased bodies.
+This hollow presents many curious anomalies; though sought for centuries
+for the sake of health, it is one of the most unhealthily-situated
+places in the kingdom; here the body and the pocket are alike cleaned
+out, but the spot itself has been noted for its dirtiness since the days
+of King Bladud's wise pigs; here, again, the diseased flesh used to be
+healed, but the healthy soul within it speedily besickened: you came to
+cure gout and rheumatism, and caught in exchange dice-fever.
+
+The mention of those pigs reminds me that it would be a shameful
+omission to speak of this city without giving the story of that
+apocryphal British monarch, King Bladud. But let me be the one
+exception; let me respect the good sense of the reader, and not insult
+him by supposing him capable of believing a mythic jumble of kings and
+pigs and dirty marshes, which he will, if he cares to, find at full
+length in any 'Bath Guide'--price sixpence.
+
+But whatever be the case with respect to the Celtic sovereign, there is,
+I presume, no doubt, that the Romans were here, and probably the
+centurians and tribunes cast the _alea_ in some pristine assembly-room,
+or wagged their plumes in some well-built Pump-room, with as much spirit
+of fashion as the full-bottomed-wig exquisites in the reign of King
+Nash. At any rate Bath has been in almost every age a common centre for
+health-seekers and gamesters--two antipodal races who always flock
+together--and if it has from time to time declined, it has only been for
+a period. Saxon churls and Norman lords were too sturdy to catch much
+rheumatic gout; crusaders had better things to think of than their
+imaginary ailments; good-health was in fashion under Plantagenets and
+Tudors; doctors were not believed in; even empirics had to praise their
+wares with much wit, and Morrison himself must have mounted a bank and
+dressed in Astleyian costume in order to find a customer; sack and
+small-beer were harmless, when homes were not comfortable enough to keep
+earl or churl by the fireside, and 'out-of-doors' was the proper
+drawing-room for a man: in short, sickness came in with civilization,
+indisposition with immoral habits, fevers with fine gentlemanliness,
+gout with greediness, and valetudinarianism--there _is_ no Anglo-Saxon
+word for that--with what we falsely call refinement. So, whatever Bath
+may have been to pampered Romans, who over-ate themselves, it had little
+importance to the stout, healthy middle ages, and it was not till the
+reign of Charles II. that it began to look up. Doctors and touters--the
+two were often one in those days--thronged there, and fools were found
+in plenty to follow them. At last the blessed countenance of portly Anne
+smiled on the pig styes of King Bladud. In 1703 she went to Bath, and
+from that time 'people of distinction' flocked there. The assemblage was
+not perhaps very brilliant or very refined. The visitors danced on the
+green, and played privately at hazard. A few sharpers found their way
+down from London; and at last the Duke of Beaufort instituted an M.C. in
+the person of Captain Webster--Nash's predecessor--whose main act of
+glory was in setting up gambling as a public amusement. It remained for
+Nash to make the place what it afterwards was, when Chesterfield could
+lounge in the Pump-room and take snuff with the Beau; when Sarah of
+Marlborough, Lord and Lady Hervey, the Duke of Wharton, Congreve, and
+all the little-great of the day thronged thither rather to kill time
+with less ceremony than in London, than to cure complaints more or less
+imaginary.
+
+The doctors were only less numerous than the sharpers; the place was
+still uncivilized; the company smoked and lounged without etiquette, and
+played without honour: the place itself lacked all comfort, all
+elegance, and all cleanliness.
+
+Upon this delightful place, the avatár of the God of Etiquette,
+personified in Mr. Richard Nash, descended somewhere about the year
+1705, for the purpose of regenerating the barbarians. He alighted just
+at the moment that one of the doctors we have alluded to, in a fit of
+disgust at some slight on the part of the town, was threatening to
+destroy its reputation, or, as he politely expressed it, 'to throw a
+toad into the spring.' The Bathonians were alarmed and in consternation,
+when young Nash, who must have already distinguished himself as a
+macaroni, stepped forward and offered to render the angry physician
+impotent. 'We'll charm his toad out again with music,' quoth he. He
+evidently thought very little of the watering-place, after his town
+experiences, and prepared to treat it accordingly. He got up a band in
+the Pump-room, brought thither in this manner the healthy as well as the
+sick, and soon raised the renown of Bath as a resort for gaiety as well
+as for mineral waters. In a word, he displayed a surprising talent for
+setting everything and everybody to rights, and was, therefore, soon
+elected, by tacit voting, the King of Bath.
+
+He rapidly proved his qualifications for the position. First he secured
+his Orphean harmony by collecting a band-subscription, which gave two
+guineas a-piece to six performers; then he engaged an official pumper
+for the Pump-room; and lastly, finding that the bathers still gathered
+under a booth to drink their tea and talk their scandal, he induced one
+Harrison to build assembly-rooms, guaranteeing him three guineas a week
+to be raised by subscription.
+
+All this demanded a vast amount of impudence on Mr. Nash's part, and
+this he possessed to a liberal extent. The subscriptions flowed in
+regularly, and Nash felt his power increase with his responsibility. So,
+then, our minor monarch resolved to be despotic, and in a short time
+laid down laws for the guests, which they obeyed most obsequiously. Nash
+had not much wit, though a great deal of assurance, but these laws were
+his _chef-d'oeuvre_. Witness some of them:--
+
+1. 'That a visit of ceremony at first coming and another at going away,
+are all that are expected or desired by ladies of quality and
+fashion--except impertinents.
+
+4. 'That no person takes it ill that any one goes to another's play or
+breakfast, and not theirs--except captious nature.
+
+5. 'That no gentleman give his ticket for the balls to any but
+gentlewomen. N.B.--Unless he has none of his acquaintance.
+
+6. 'That gentlemen crowding before the ladies at the ball, show ill
+manners; and that none do so for the future--except such as respect
+nobody but themselves.
+
+9. 'That the younger ladies take notice how many eyes observe them.
+N.B.--This does not extend to the _Have-at-alls_.
+
+10. 'That all whisperers of lies and scandal be taken for their
+authors.'
+
+Really this law of Nash's must have been repealed some time or other at
+Bath. Still more that which follows:--
+
+11. 'That repeaters of such lies and scandal be shunned by all company,
+except such as have been guilty of the same crime.'
+
+There is a certain amount of satire in these Lycurgus statutes that
+shows Nash in the light of an observer of society; but, query, whether
+any frequenter of Bath would not have devised as good?
+
+The dances of those days must have been somewhat tedious. They began
+with a series of minuets, in which, of course, only one couple danced at
+a time, the most distinguished opening the ball. These solemn
+performances lasted about two hours, and we can easily imagine that the
+rest of the company were delighted when the country dances, which
+included everybody, began. The ball opened at six; the country dances
+began at eight: at nine there was a lull for the gentlemen to offer
+their partners tea; in due course the dances were resumed, and at eleven
+Nash held up his hand to the musicians, and under no circumstances was
+the ball allowed to continue after that hour. Nash well knew the value
+of early hours to invalids, and he would not destroy the healing
+reputation of Bath for the sake of a little more pleasure. On one
+occasion the Princess Amelia implored him to allow one dance more. The
+despot replied, that his laws were those of Lycurgus, and could not be
+abrogated for any one. By this we see that the M.C. was already an
+autocrat in his kingdom.
+
+Nor is it to be supposed that his majesty's laws were confined to such
+merely professional arrangements. Not a bit of it; in a very short time
+his impudence gave him undenied right of interference with the coats and
+gowns, the habits and manners, even the daily actions of his subjects,
+for so the visitors at Bath were compelled to become. _Si parvis
+componere magna recibit_, we may admit that the rise of Nash and that of
+Napoleon were owing to similar causes. The French emperor found France
+in a state of disorder, with which sensible people were growing more and
+more disgusted; he offered to restore order and propriety; the French
+hailed him, and gladly submitted to his early decrees; then, when he had
+got them into the habit of obedience, he could make what laws he liked,
+and use his power without fear of opposition. The Bath emperor followed
+the same course, and it may be asked whether it does not demand as great
+an amount of courage, assurance, perseverance, and administrative power
+to subdue several hundreds of English ladies and gentlemen as to rise
+supreme above some millions of French republicans. Yet Nash experienced
+less opposition than Napoleon; Nash reigned longer, and had no infernal
+machine prepared to blow him up.
+
+Everybody was delighted with the improvements in the Pump-room, the
+balls, the promenades, the chairmen--the _Rouge_ ruffians of the mimic
+kingdom--whom he reduced to submission, and therefore nobody complained
+when Emperor Nash went further, and made war upon the white aprons of
+the ladies and the boots of the gentlemen. The society was in fact in a
+very barbarous condition at the time, and people who came for pleasure
+liked to be at ease. Thus ladies lounged into the balls in their
+riding-hoods or morning dresses, gentlemen in boots, with their pipes in
+their mouths. Such atrocities were intolerable to the late frequenter of
+London society, and in his imperious arrogance, the new monarch used
+actually to pull off the white aprons of ladies who entered the
+assembly-rooms with that _dégagé_ article, and throw them upon the back
+seats. Like the French emperor, again, he treated high and low in the
+same manner, and when the Duchess of Queensberry appeared in an apron,
+coolly pulled it off, and told her it was only fit for a maid-servant.
+Her grace made no resistance.
+
+The men were not so submissive; but the M.C. turned them into ridicule,
+and whenever a gentleman appeared at the assembly-rooms in boots, would
+walk up to him, and in a loud voice remark, 'Sir, I think you have
+forgot your horse.' To complete his triumph, he put the offenders into a
+song called 'Trentinella's Invitation to the Assembly.'
+
+    'Come, one and all,
+     To Hoyden Hall,
+       For there's the assembly this night:
+     None but proud fools,
+     Mind manners and rules;
+       We Hoydens do decency slight.
+
+    'Come trollops and slatterns,
+     Cockt hats and white aprons;
+       This best our modesty suits:
+     For why should not we
+     In a dress be as free
+       As Hogs-Norton squires in boots?'
+
+and as this was not enough, got up a puppet-show of a sufficient
+coarseness to suit the taste of the time, in which the practice of
+wearing boots was satirized.
+
+His next onslaught was upon that of carrying swords; and in this respect
+Nash became a public benefactor, for in those days, though Chesterfield
+was the writer on etiquette, people were not well-bred enough to keep
+their tempers, and rivals for a lady's hand at a minuet, or gamblers who
+disputed over their cards, invariably settled the matter by an option
+between suicide or murder under the polite name of duel. The M.C. wisely
+saw that these affairs would bring Bath in bad repute, and determined to
+supplant the rapier by the less dangerous cane. In this he was for a
+long time opposed, until a notorious torchlight duel between two
+gamblers, of whom one was run through the body, and the other, to show
+his contrition, turned Quaker, brought his opponents to a sense of the
+danger of a weapon always at hand; and henceforth the sword was
+abolished.
+
+These points gained, the autocrat laid down rules for the employment of
+the visitors' time, and these, from setting the fashion to some, soon
+became a law to all. The first thing to be done was, sensibly enough,
+the _ostensible_ object of their residence in Bath, the use of the
+baths. At an early hour four lusty chairmen waited on every lady to
+carry her, wrapped in flannels, in
+
+    'A little black box, just the size of a coffin,'
+
+to one of the five baths. Here, on entering, an attendant placed beside
+her a floating tray, on which were set her handkerchief, bouquet, and
+_snuff-box_, for our great-great-grandmothers _did_ take snuff; and here
+she found her friends in the same bath of naturally hot water. It was,
+of course, a réunion for society on the plea of health; but the early
+hours and exercise secured the latter, whatever the baths may have done.
+A walk in the Pump-room, to the music of a tolerable band, was the next
+measure; and there, of course, the gentlemen mingled with the ladies. A
+coffee-house was ready to receive those of either sex; for that was a
+time when madame and miss lived a great deal in public, and English
+people were not ashamed of eating their breakfast in public company.
+These breakfasts were often enlivened by concerts paid for by the rich
+and enjoyed by all.
+
+Supposing the peacocks now to be dressed out and to have their tails
+spread to the best advantage, we next find some in the public
+promenades, others in the reading-rooms, the ladies having their clubs
+as well as the men; others riding; others, perchance, already gambling.
+Mankind and womankind then dined at a reasonable hour, and the evening's
+amusements began early. Nash insisted on this, knowing the value of
+health to those, and they were many at that time, who sought Bath on its
+account. The balls began at six, and took place every Tuesday and
+Friday, private balls filling up the vacant nights. About the
+commencement of his reign, a theatre was built, and whatever it may have
+been, it afterwards became celebrated as the nursery of the London
+stage, and now, _O tempo passato!_ is almost abandoned. It is needless
+to add that the gaming-tables were thronged in the evenings.
+
+It was at them that Nash made the money which sufficed to keep up his
+state, which was vulgarly regal. He drove about in a chariot, flaming
+with heraldry, and drawn by six grays, with outriders, running footmen,
+and all the appendages which made an impression on the vulgar minds of
+the visitors of his kingdom. His dress was magnificent; his gold lace
+unlimited, his coats ever new; his hat alone was always of the same
+colour--_white_; and as the emperor Alexander was distinguished by his
+purple tunic and Brummell by his bow, Emperor Nash was known all England
+over by his white hat.
+
+It is due to the King of Bath to say that, however much he gained, he
+always played fair. He even patronized young players, and after fleecing
+them, kindly advised them to play no more. When he found a man fixed
+upon ruining himself, he did his best to keep him from that suicidal
+act. This was the case with a young Oxonian, to whom he had lost money,
+and whom he invited to supper, in order to give him his parental advice.
+The fool would not take the Beau's counsel and 'came to grief.' Even
+noblemen sought his protection. The Duke of Beaufort entered on a
+compact with him to save his purse, if not his soul. He agreed to pay
+Nash ten thousand guineas, whenever he lost the same amount at a
+sitting. It was a comfortable treaty for our Beau, who accordingly
+watched his grace. Yet it must be said, to Nash's honour, that he once
+saved him from losing eleven thousand, when he had already lost eight,
+by reminding him of his compact. Such was play in those days! It is said
+that the duke had afterwards to pay the fine, from losing the stipulated
+sum at Newmarket.
+
+He displayed as much honesty with the young Lord Townshend, who lost him
+his whole fortune, his estate, and even his carriage and horses--what
+madmen are gamblers!--and actually cancelled the whole debt, on
+condition my lord should pay him £5000 whenever he chose to claim it. To
+Nash's honour it must be said that he never came down upon the nobleman
+during his life. He claimed the sum from his executors, who paid
+it.--'Honourable to both parties.'
+
+But an end was put to the gaming at Bath and everywhere else--_except in
+a royal palace_, and Nash swore that, as he was a king, Bath came under
+the head of the exceptions--by an Act of Parliament. Of course Nash and
+the sharpers who frequented Bath--and their name was Legion--found means
+to evade this law for a time, by the invention of new games. But this
+could not last, and the Beau's fortune went with the death of the dice.
+
+Still, however, the very prohibition increased the zest for play for a
+time, and Nash soon discovered that a private table was more comfortable
+than a public one. He entered into an arrangement with an old woman at
+Bath, in virtue of which he was to receive a fourth share of the
+profits. This was probably not the only 'hell'-keeping transaction of
+his life, and he had once before quashed an action against a cheat in
+consideration of a handsome bonus; and, in fact, there is no saying what
+amount of dirty work Nash would not have done for a hundred or so,
+especially when the game of the table was shut up to him. The man was
+immensely fond of money; he liked to show his gold-laced coat and superb
+new waistcoat in the Grove, the Abbey Ground, and Bond Street, and to be
+known as Le Grand Nash. But, on the other hand, he did not love money
+for itself, and never hoarded it. It is, indeed, something to Nash's
+honour, that he died poor. He delighted, in the poverty of his mind, to
+display his great thick-set person to the most advantage; he was as vain
+as any fop, without the affectation of that character, for he was
+always blunt and free-spoken, but, as long as he had enough to satisfy
+his vanity, he cared nothing for mere wealth. He had generosity, though
+he neglected the precept about the right hand and the left, and showed
+some ostentation in his charities. When a poor ruined fellow at his
+elbow saw him win at a throw £200, and murmured 'How happy that would
+make me!' Nash tossed the money to him, and said, 'Go and be happy
+then.' Probably the witless beau did not see the delicate satire implied
+in his speech. It was only the triumph of a gamester. On other occasions
+he collected subscriptions for poor curates, and so forth, in the same
+spirit, and did his best towards founding an hospital, which has since
+proved of great value to those afflicted with rheumatic gout. In the
+same spirit, though himself a gamester, he often attempted to win young
+and inexperienced boys, who came to toss away their money at the rooms,
+from seeking their own ruin; and, on the whole, there was some goodness
+of heart in this gold-laced bear.
+
+That he was a bear there are anecdotes enough to show, and whether true
+or not, they sufficiently prove what the reputation of the man must have
+been. Thus, when a lady, afflicted with a curvature of the spine, told
+him that 'She had come _straight_ from London that day,' Nash replied
+with utter heartlessness, 'Then, ma'am, you've been damnably warpt on
+the road.' The lady had her revenge, however, for meeting the beau one
+day in the Grove, as she toddled along with her dog, and being
+impudently asked by him if she knew the name of Tobit's dog, she
+answered quickly, 'Yes, sir, his name was Nash, and a most impudent dog
+he was too.'
+
+It is due to Nash to state that he made many attempts to put an end to
+the perpetual system of scandal, which from some hidden cause seems
+always to be connected with mineral springs; but as he did not banish
+the old maids, of course he failed. Of the young ladies and their
+reputation he took a kind of paternal care, and in that day they seem to
+have needed it, for even at nineteen, those who had any money to lose,
+staked it at the tables with as much gusto as the wrinkled, puckered,
+greedy-eyed 'single woman,' of a certain or uncertain age. Nash
+protected and cautioned them, and even gave them the advantage of his
+own unlimited experience. Witness, for instance, the care he took of
+'Miss Sylvia,' a lovely heiress who brought her face and her fortune to
+enslave some and enrich others of the loungers of Bath. She had a
+terrible love of hazard, and very little prudence, so that Nash's good
+offices were much needed in the case. The young lady soon became the
+standing toast at all the clubs and suppers, and lovers of her, or her
+ducats, crowded round her; but though at that time she might have made a
+brilliant match, she chose, as young women will do, to fix her
+affections upon one of the worst men in Bath, who, naturally enough, did
+not return them. When this individual, as a climax to his misadventures,
+was clapt into prison, the devoted young creature gave the greater part
+of her fortune in order to pay off his debts, and falling into disrepute
+from this act of generosity, which was, of course, interpreted after a
+worldly fashion, she seems to have lost her honour with her fame, and
+the fair Sylvia took a position which could not be creditable to her. At
+last the poor girl, weary of slights, and overcome with shame, took her
+silk sash and hanged herself. The terrible event made a nine
+hours'--_not_ nine days'--sensation in Bath, which was too busy with
+mains and aces to care about the fate of one who had long sunk out of
+its circles.
+
+When Nash reached the zenith of his power, the adulation he received was
+somewhat of a parody on the flattery of courtiers. True, he had his
+bards from Grub Street who sang his praises, and he had letters to show
+from Sarah of Marlborough and others of that calibre, but his chief
+worshippers were cooks, musicians, and even imprisoned highwaymen--one
+of whom disclosed the secrets of the craft to him--who wrote him
+dedications, letters, poems, and what not. The good city of Bath set up
+his statue, and did Newton and Pope[20] the great honour of playing
+'supporters' to him, which elicited from Chesterfield some well-known
+lines:--
+
+    'This statue placed the busts between
+       Adds to the satire strength;
+     Wisdom and Wit are little seen,
+       But Folly at full length.'
+
+Meanwhile his private character was none of the best. He had in early
+life had one attachment, besides that unfortunate affair for which his
+friends had removed him from Oxford, and in that had behaved with great
+magnanimity. The young lady had honestly told him that he had a rival;
+the Beau sent for him, settled on her a fortune equal to that her father
+intended for her, and himself presented her to the favoured suitor. Now,
+however, he seems to have given up all thoughts of matrimony, and gave
+himself up to mistresses, who cared more for his gold than for himself.
+It was an awkward conclusion to Nash's generous act in that one case,
+that before a year had passed, the bride ran away with her husband's
+footman; yet, though it disgusted him with ladies, it does not seem to
+have cured him of his attachment to the sex in general.
+
+In the height of his glory Nash was never ashamed of receiving
+adulation. He was as fond of flattery as Le Grand Monarque--and he paid
+for it too--whether it came from a prince or a chair-man. Every day
+brought him some fresh meed of praise in prose or verse, and Nash was
+always delighted.
+
+But his sun was to set in time. His fortune went when gaming was put
+down, for he had no other means of subsistence. Yet he lived on: he had
+not the good sense to die; and he reached the patriarchal age of
+eighty-seven. In his old age he was not only garrulous, but bragging: he
+told stories of his exploits, in which he, Mr. Richard Nash, came out as
+the first swordsman, swimmer, leaper, and what not. But by this time
+people began to doubt Mr. Richard Nash's long-bow, and the yarns he spun
+were listened to with impatience. He grew rude and testy in his old age;
+suspected Quin, the actor, who was living at Bath, of an intention to
+supplant him; made coarse, impertinent repartees to the visitors at that
+city, and in general raised up a dislike to himself. Yet, as other
+monarchs have had their eulogists in sober mind, Nash had his in one of
+the most depraved; and Anstey, the low-minded author of 'The New Bath
+Guide,' panegyrized him a short time after his death in the following
+verses:--
+
+    'Yet here no confusion--no tumult is known;
+     Fair order and beauty establish their throne;
+     For order, and beauty, and just regulation,
+     Support all the works of this ample creation.
+     For this, in compassion to mortals below,
+     The gods, their peculiar favour to show,
+     Sent Hermes to Bath in the shape of a beau:
+     That grandson of Atlas came down from above
+     To bless all the regions of pleasure and love;
+     To lead the fair nymph thro' the various maze,
+     Bright beauty to marshal, his glory and praise;
+     To govern, improve, and adorn the gay scene,
+     By the Graces instructed, and Cyprian queen:
+     As when in a garden delightful and gay,
+     Where Flora is wont all her charms to display,
+     The sweet hyacinthus with pleasure we view,
+     Contend with narcissus in delicate hue;
+     The gard'ner, industrious, trims out his border,
+     Puts each odoriferous plant in its order;
+     The myrtle he ranges, the rose and the lily,
+     With iris, and crocus, and daffa-down-dilly;
+     Sweet peas and sweet oranges all he disposes,
+     At once to regale both your eyes and your noses.
+     Long reign'd the great Nash, this omnipotent lord,
+     Respected by youth, and by parents ador'd;
+     For him not enough at a ball to preside,
+     The unwary and beautiful nymph would he guide;
+     Oft tell her a tale, how the credulous maid
+     By man, by perfidious man, is betrayed:
+     Taught Charity's hand to relieve the distrest,
+     While tears have his tender compassion exprest;
+     But alas! he is gone, and the city can tell
+     How in years and in glory lamented he fell.
+     Him mourn'd all the Dryads on Claverton's mount;
+     Him Avon deplor'd, him the nymph of the fount,
+     The crystalline streams.
+     Then perish his picture--his statue decay--
+     A tribute more lasting the Muses shall pay.
+     If true, what philosophers all will assure us,
+     Who dissent from the doctrine of great Epicurus,
+     That the spirit's immortal (as poets allow):
+     In reward of his labours, his virtue and pains,
+     He is footing it now in the Elysian plains,
+     Indulged, as a token of Proserpine's favour,
+     To preside at her balls in a cream-colour'd beaver.
+     Then peace to his ashes--our grief be supprest,
+     Since we find such a phoenix has sprung from his nest;
+     Kind heaven has sent us another professor,
+     Who follows the steps of his great predecessor.'
+
+The end of the Bath Beau was somewhat less tragical than that of his
+London successor--Brummell. Nash, in his old age and poverty, hung about
+the clubs and supper-tables, button-holed youngsters, who thought him a
+bore, spun his long yarns, and tried to insist on obsolete fashions,
+when near the end of his life's century.
+
+The clergy took more care of him than the youngsters. They heard that
+Nash was an octogenarian, and likely to die in his sins, and resolved to
+do their best to shrive him. Worthy and well-meaning men accordingly
+wrote him long letters, in which there was a deal of warning, and there
+was nothing which Nash dreaded so much. As long as there was immediate
+fear of death, he was pious and humble; the moment the fear had passed,
+he was jovial and indifferent again. His especial delight, to the last,
+seems to have been swearing against the doctors, whom he treated like
+the individual in Anstey's 'Bath Guide,' shying their medicines out of
+window upon their own heads. But the wary old Beckoner called him in, in
+due time, with his broken, empty-chested voice; and Nash was forced to
+obey. Death claimed him--and much good it got of him--in 1761, at the
+age of eighty-seven: there are few beaux who lived so long.
+
+Thus ended a life, of which the moral lay, so to speak, out of it. The
+worthies of Bath were true to the worship of Folly, whom Anstey so well,
+though indelicately, describes as there conceiving Fashion; and though
+Nash, old, slovenly, disrespected, had long ceased to be either beau or
+monarch, treated his huge unlovely corpse with the honour due to the
+great--or little. His funeral was as glorious as that of any hero, and
+far more showy, though much less solemn, than the burial of Sir John
+Moore. Perhaps for a bit of prose flummery, by way of contrast to
+Wolfe's lines on the latter event, there is little to equal the account
+in a contemporary paper:--'Sorrow sate upon every face, and even
+children lisped that their sovereign was no more. The awfulness of the
+solemnity made the deepest impression on the minds of the distressed
+inhabitants. The peasant discontinued his toil, the ox rested from the
+plough, all nature seemed to sympathise with their loss, and the muffled
+bells rung a peal of bob-major.'
+
+The Beau left little behind him, and that little not worth much, even
+including his renown. Most of the presents which fools or flatterers had
+made him, had long since been sent _chèz ma tante_; a few trinkets and
+pictures, and a few books, which probably he had never read, constituted
+his little store.[21]
+
+Bath and Tunbridge--for he had annexed that lesser kingdom to his
+own--had reason to mourn him, for he had almost made them what they
+were; but the country has not much cause to thank the upholder of
+gaming, the institutor of silly fashion, and the high-priest of folly.
+Yet Nash was free from many vices we should expect to find in such a
+man. He did not drink, for instance; one glass of wine, and a moderate
+quantity of small beer, being his allowance for dinner. He was early in
+his hours, and made others sensible in theirs. He was generous and
+charitable when he had the money; and when he had not he took care to
+make his subjects subscribe it. In a word, there have been worse men and
+greater fools; and we may again ask whether those who obeyed and
+flattered him were not more contemptible than Beau Nash himself.
+
+So much for the powers of impudence and a fine coat!
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 19: Warner ('History of Bath,' p. 366), says, 'Nash was
+removed from Oxford by his friends.']
+
+[Footnote 20: A full-length statue of Nash was placed between busts of
+Newton and Pope.]
+
+[Footnote 21: In the 'Annual Register,' (vol. v. p. 37), it is stated
+that a pension of ten guineas a month was paid to Nash during the latter
+years of his life by the Corporation of Bath.]
+
+
+
+
+    PHILIP, DUKE OF WHARTON.
+
+  Wharton's Ancestors.--His Early Years.--Marriage at
+      Sixteen.--Wharton takes leave of his Tutor.--The Young Marquis
+      and the Old Pretender.--Frolics at Paris.--Zeal for the Orange
+      Cause.--A Jacobite Hero.--The Trial of Atterbury.--Wharton's
+      Defence of the Bishop.--Hypocritical Signs of Penitence.--Sir
+      Robert Walpole duped.--Very Trying.--The Duke of Wharton's
+      'Whens.'--Military Glory at Gibraltar.--'Uncle
+      Horace.'--Wharton to 'Uncle Horace.'--The Duke's
+      Impudence.--High Treason.--Wharton's Ready Wit.--Last
+      Extremities.--Sad Days in Paris.--His Last Journey to
+      Spain.--His Death in a Bernardine Convent.
+
+
+If an illustration were wanted of that character unstable as water which
+shall not excel, this duke would at once supply it: if we had to warn
+genius against self-indulgence--some clever boy against
+extravagance--some poet against the bottle--this is the 'shocking
+example' we should select: if we wished to show how the most splendid
+talents, the greatest wealth, the most careful education, the most
+unusual advantages, may all prove useless to a man who is too vain or
+too frivolous to use them properly, it is enough to cite that nobleman,
+whose acts gained for him the name of the _infamous_ Duke of Wharton.
+Never was character more mercurial, or life more unsettled than his;
+never, perhaps, were more changes crowded into a fewer number of years,
+more fame and infamy gathered into so short a space. Suffice it to say
+that when Pope wanted a man to hold up to the scorn of the world, as a
+sample of wasted abilities, it was Wharton that he chose, and his lines
+rise in grandeur in proportion to the vileness of the theme:
+
+    'Wharton, the scorn and wonder of our days,
+     Whose ruling passion was a love of praise.
+     Born with whate'er could win it from the wise,
+     Women and fools must like him or he dies;
+     Though raptured senates hung on all he spoke,
+     The club must hail him master of the joke.
+     Shall parts so various aim at nothing new?
+     He'll shine a Tully and a Wilmot too.
+
+           *       *       *       *       *
+
+     Thus with each gift of nature and of art,
+     And wanting nothing but an honest heart;
+     Grown all to all, from no one vice exempt,
+     And most contemptible, to shun contempt;
+     His passion still, to covet general praise,
+     His life to forfeit it a thousand ways;
+     A constant bounty which no friend has made;
+     An angel tongue which no man can persuade;
+     A fool with more of wit than all mankind;
+     Too rash for thought, for action too refined.'
+
+And then those memorable lines--
+
+    'A tyrant to the wife his heart approved,
+     A rebel to the very king he loved;
+     He dies, sad outcast of each church and state;
+     And, harder still! flagitious, yet not great.'
+
+Though it may be doubted if the 'lust of praise' was the cause of his
+eccentricities, so much as an utter restlessness and instability of
+character, Pope's description is sufficiently correct, and will prepare
+us for one of the most disappointing lives we could well have to read.
+
+Philip, Duke of Wharton, was one of those men of whom an Irishman would
+say, that they were fortunate before they were born. His ancestors
+bequeathed him a name that stood high in England for bravery and
+excellence. The first of the house, Sir Thomas Wharton, had won his
+peerage from Henry VIII. for routing some 15,000 Scots with 500 men, and
+other gallant deeds. From his father the marquis he inherited much of
+his talents; but for the heroism of the former, he seems to have
+received it only in the extravagant form of foolhardiness. Walpole
+remembered, but could not tell where, a ballad he wrote on being
+arrested by the guard in St. James's Park, for singing the Jacobite
+song, 'The King shall have his own again,' and quotes two lines to show
+that he was not ashamed of his own cowardice on the occasion:--
+
+    'The duke he drew out half his sword,
+     ---- the guard drew out the rest.'
+
+At the siege of Gibraltar, where he took up arms against his own king
+and country, he is said to have gone alone one night to the very walls
+of the town, and challenged the outpost. They asked him who he was, and
+when he replied, openly enough, 'The Duke of Wharton,' they actually
+allowed him to return without either firing on or capturing him. The
+story seems somewhat apocryphal, but it is quite possible that the
+English soldiers may have refrained from violence to a well-known
+mad-cap nobleman of their own nation.
+
+Philip, son of the Marquis of Wharton, at that time only a baron, was
+born in the last year but one of the seventeenth century, and came into
+the world endowed with every quality which might have made a great man,
+if he had only added wisdom to them. His father wished to make him a
+brilliant statesman, and, to have a better chance of doing so, kept him
+at home, and had him educated under his own eye. He seems to have easily
+and rapidly acquired a knowledge of classical languages; and his memory
+was so good that when a boy of thirteen he could repeat the greater part
+of the 'Æneid' and of Horace by heart. His father's keen perception did
+not allow him to stop at classics; and he wisely prepared him for the
+career to which he was destined by the study of history, ancient and
+modern, and of English literature, and by teaching him, even at that
+early age, the art of thinking and writing on any given subject, by
+proposing themes for essays. There is certainly no surer mode of
+developing the reflective and reasoning powers of the mind; and the boy
+progressed with a rapidity which was almost alarming. Oratory, too, was
+of course cultivated, and to this end the young nobleman was made to
+recite before a small audience passages from Shakspeare, and even
+speeches which had been delivered in the House of Lords, and we may be
+certain he showed no bashfulness in this display.
+
+He was precocious beyond measure, and at sixteen was a man. His first
+act of folly--or, perhaps, _he_ thought, of manhood--came off at this
+early age. He fell in love with the daughter of a Major-General Holmes;
+and though there is nothing extraordinary in that, for nine-tenths of us
+have been love-mad at as early an age, he did what fortunately very few
+do in a first love affair, he married the adored one. Early marriages
+are often extolled, and justly enough, as safeguards against profligate
+habits, but this one seems to have had the contrary effect on young
+Philip. His wife was in every sense too good for him: he was madly in
+love with her at first, but soon shamefully and openly faithless. Pope's
+line--
+
+    'A tyrant to the wife his heart approved,'
+
+requires explanation here. It is said that she did not present her
+boy-husband with a son for three years after their marriage, and on this
+child he set great value and great hopes. About that time he left his
+wife in the country, intending to amuse himself in town, and ordered her
+to remain behind with the child. The poor deserted woman well knew what
+was the real object of this journey, and could not endure the
+separation. In the hope of keeping her young husband out of harm, and
+none the less because she loved him very tenderly, she followed him soon
+after, taking the little Marquis of Malmsbury, as the young live branch
+was called, with her. The duke was, of course, disgusted, but his anger
+was turned into hatred, when the child, which he had hoped to make his
+heir and successor, caught in town the small-pox, and died in infancy.
+He was furious with his wife, refused to see her for a long time, and
+treated her with unrelenting coldness.
+
+The early marriage was much to the distaste of Philip's father, who had
+been lately made a marquis, and who hoped to arrange a very grand
+'alliance' for his petted son. He was, in fact, so much grieved by it,
+that he was fool enough to die of it in 1715, and the marchioness
+survived him only about a year, being no less disgusted with the
+licentiousness which she already discovered in her Young Hopeful.
+
+She did what she could to set him right, and the young married man was
+shipped off with a tutor, a French Huguenot, who was to take him to
+Geneva to be educated as a Protestant and a Whig. The young scamp
+declined to be either. He was taken, by way of seeing the world, to the
+petty courts of Germany, and of course to that of Hanover, which had
+kindly sent us the worst family that ever disgraced the English throne,
+and by the various princes and grand-dukes received with all the honours
+due to a young British nobleman.
+
+The tutor and his charge settled at last at Geneva, and my young lord
+amused himself with tormenting his strict guardian. Walpole tells us
+that he once roused him out of bed only to borrow a pin. There is no
+doubt that he led the worthy man a sad life of it; and to put a climax
+to his conduct, ran away from him at last, leaving with him, by way of
+hostage, a young bear-cub--probably quite as tame as himself--which he
+had picked up somewhere, and grown very fond of--birds of a feather,
+seemingly--with a message, which showed more wit than good-nature, to
+this effect:--'Being no longer able to bear with your ill-usage, I think
+proper to be gone from you; however, that you may not want company, I
+have left you the bear, as the most suitable companion in the world that
+could be picked out for you.'
+
+The tutor had to console himself with a _tu quoque_, for the young
+scapegrace had found his way to Lyons in October, 1716, and then did the
+very thing his father's son should not have done. The Chevalier de St.
+George, the Old Pretender, James III., or by whatever other _alias_ you
+prefer to call him, having failed in his attempt 'to have his own again'
+in the preceding year, was then holding high court in high dudgeon at
+Avignon. Any adherent would, of course, be welcomed with open arms; and
+when the young marquis wrote to him to offer his allegiance, sending
+with his letter a fine entire horse as a peace offering, he was warmly
+responded to. A person of rank was at once despatched to bring the youth
+to the ex-regal court; he was welcomed with much enthusiasm, and the
+empty title of Duke of Northumberland at once, most kindly, conferred on
+him. However, the young marquis does not seem to have _goûté_ the
+exile's court, for he stayed there one day only, and returning to Lyons,
+set off to enjoy himself at Paris. With much wit, no prudence, and a
+plentiful supply of money, which he threw about with the recklessness of
+a boy just escaped from his tutor, he could not fail to succeed in that
+capital; and, accordingly, the English received him with open arms. Even
+the ambassador, Lord Stair, though he had heard rumours of his wild
+doings, invited him repeatedly to dinner, and did his best, by advice
+and warning, to keep him out of harm's way. Young Philip had a horror of
+preceptors, paid or gratuitous, and treated the plenipotentiary with the
+same coolness as he had served the Huguenot tutor. When the former,
+praising the late marquis, expressed--by way of a slight hint--a hope
+'that he would follow so illustrious an example of fidelity to his
+prince, and affection to his country, by treading in the same steps,'
+the young scamp replied, cleverly enough, 'That he thanked his
+excellency for his good advice, and as his excellency had also a worthy
+and deserving father, he hoped he would likewise copy so bright an
+example, and tread in all his steps;' the pertness of which was
+pertinent enough, for old Lord Stair had taken a disgraceful part
+against his sovereign in the massacre of Glencoe.
+
+His frolics at Paris were of the most reckless character for a young
+nobleman. At the ambassador's own table he would occasionally send a
+servant to some one of the guests, to ask him to join in the Old
+Chevalier's health, though it was almost treason at that time to mention
+his name even. And again, when the windows at the embassy had been
+broken by a young English Jacobite, who was forthwith committed to Fort
+l'Evêque, the hare-brained marquis proposed, out of revenge, to break
+them a second time, and only abandoned the project because he could get
+no one to join him in it. Lord Stair, however, had too much sense to be
+offended at the follies of a boy of seventeen, even though that boy was
+the representative of a great English family; he, probably, thought it
+would be better to recall him to his allegiance by kindness and advice,
+than, by resenting his behaviour, to drive him irrevocably to the
+opposite party; but he was doubtless considerably relieved when, after
+leading a wild life in the capital of France, spending his money
+lavishly, and doing precisely everything which a young English nobleman
+ought not to do, my lord marquis took his departure in December, 1716.
+
+The political education he had received now made the unstable youth
+ready and anxious to shine in the State; but being yet under age, he
+could not, of course, take his seat in the House of Lords. Perhaps he
+was conscious of his own wonderful abilities; perhaps, as Pope declares,
+he was thirsting for praise, and wished to display them; certainly he
+was itching to become an orator, and as he could not sit in an English
+Parliament, he remembered that he had a peerage in Ireland, as Earl of
+Rathfernhame and Marquis of Catherlogh, and off he set to see if the
+Milesians would stand upon somewhat less ceremony. He was not
+disappointed there. 'His brilliant parts,' we are told by contemporary
+writers, but rather, we should think, his reputation for wit and
+eccentricity, 'found favour in the eyes of Hibernian quicksilvers, and
+in spite of his years, he was admitted to the Irish House of Lords.'
+
+When a friend had reproached him, before he left France, with infidelity
+to the principles so long espoused by his family, he is reported to have
+replied, characteristically enough, that 'he had pawned his principles
+to Gordon, the Chevalier's banker, for a considerable sum, and, till he
+could repay him, he must be a Jacobite; but when that was done, he would
+again return to the Whigs.' It is as likely as not that he borrowed from
+Gordon on the strength of the Chevalier's favour, for though a marquis
+in his own right, he was even at this period always in want of cash; and
+on the other hand, the speech, exhibiting the grossest want of any sense
+of honour, is in thorough keeping with his after-life. But whether he
+paid Gordon on his return to England--which is highly improbable--or
+whether he had not honour enough to keep his compact--which is extremely
+likely--there is no doubt that my lord marquis began, at this period, to
+qualify himself for the post of parish-weathercock to St. Stephens.
+
+His early defection to a man who, whether rightful heir or not, had that
+of romance in his history which is even now sufficient to make our young
+ladies 'thorough Jacobites' at heart, was easily to be excused, on the
+plea of youth and high spirit. The same excuse does not explain his
+rapid return to Whiggery--in which there is no romance at all--the
+moment he took his seat in the Irish House of Lords. There is only one
+way to explain the zeal with which he now advocated the Orange cause:
+he must have been either a very designing knave, or a very unprincipled
+fool. As he gained nothing by the change but a dukedom for which he did
+not care, and as he cared for little else that the government could give
+him, we may acquit him of any very deep motives. On the other hand, his
+life and some of his letters show that, with a vast amount of bravado,
+he was sufficiently a coward. When supplicated, he was always obstinate;
+when neglected, always supplicant. Now it required some courage in those
+days to be a Jacobite. Perhaps he cared for nothing but to astonish and
+disgust everybody with the facility with which he could turn his coat,
+as a hippodromist does with the ease with which he changes his costume.
+He was a boy and a peer, and he would make pretty play of his position.
+He had considerable talents, and now, as he sat in the Irish House,
+devoted them entirely to the support of the government.
+
+For the next four years he was employed, on the one hand in political,
+on the other in profligate, life. He shone in both; and was no less
+admired, by the wits of those days, for his speeches, his arguments, and
+his zeal, than for the utter disregard of public decency he displayed in
+his vices. Such a promising youth, adhering to the government, merited
+some mark of its esteem, and accordingly, before attaining the age of
+twenty-one, he was raised to a dukedom. Being of age, he took his seat
+in the English House of Lords, and had not been long there before he
+again turned coat, and came out in the light of a Jacobite hero. It was
+now that he gathered most of his laurels.
+
+The Hanoverian monarch had been on the English throne some six years.
+Had the Chevalier's attempt occurred at this period, it may be doubted
+if it would not have been successful. The 'Old Pretender' came too soon,
+the 'Young Pretender' too late. At the period of the first attempt, the
+public had had no time to contrast Stuarts and Guelphs: at that of the
+second, they had forgotten the one and grown accustomed to the other;
+but at the moment when our young duke appeared on the boards of the
+senate, the vices of the Hanoverians were beginning to draw down on them
+the contempt of the educated and the ridicule of the vulgar; and
+perhaps no moment could have been more favourable for advocating a
+restoration of the Stuarts. If Wharton had had as much energy and
+consistency as he had talent and impudence, he might have done much
+towards that desirable, or undesirable end.
+
+The grand question at this time before the House was the trial of
+Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester, demanded by Sir Robert Walpole. The man
+had a spirit almost as restless as his defender. The son of a man who
+might have been the original of the Vicar of Bray, he was very little of
+a poet, less of a priest, but a great deal of a politician. He was born
+in 1662, so that at this time he must have been nearly sixty years old.
+He had had by no means a hard life of it, for family interest, together
+with eminent talents, procured him one appointment after another, till
+he reached the bench at the age of fifty-one, in the reign of Anne. He
+had already distinguished himself in several ways, most, perhaps, by
+controversies with Hoadly, and by sundry high-church motions. But after
+his elevation, he displayed his principles more boldly, refused to sign
+the Declaration of the Bishops, which was somewhat servilely made to
+assure George the First of the fidelity of the Established Church,
+suspended the curate of Gravesend for three years because he allowed the
+Dutch to have a service performed in his church, and even, it is said,
+on the death of Anne, offered to proclaim King James III., and head a
+procession himself in his lawn sleeves. The end of this and other
+vagaries was, that in 1722, the Government sent him to the Tower, on
+suspicion of being connected with a plot in favour of the Old Chevalier.
+The case excited no little attention, for it was long since a bishop had
+been charged with high treason; it was added that his gaolers used him
+rudely; and, in short, public sympathy rather went along with him for a
+time. In March, 1723, a bill was presented to the Commons, for
+'inflicting certain pains and penalties' on Francis, Lord Bishop of
+Rochester, and it passed that House in April; but when carried up to the
+Lords, a defence was resolved on. The bill was read a third time on May
+15th, and on that occasion the Duke of Wharton, then only twenty-four
+years old, rose and delivered a speech in favour of the bishop. This
+oration far more resembled that of a lawyer summing up the evidence than
+of a parliamentary orator enlarging on the general issue. It was
+remarkable for the clearness of its argument, the wonderful memory of
+facts it displayed, and the ease and rapidity with which it annihilated
+the testimony of various witnesses examined before the House. It was
+mild and moderate, able and sufficient, but seems to have lacked all the
+enthusiasm we might expect from one who was afterwards so active a
+partisan of the Chevalier's cause. In short, striking as it was, it
+cannot be said to give the duke any claim to the title of a great
+orator; it would rather prove that he might have made a first-rate
+lawyer. It shows, however, that had he chosen to apply himself
+diligently to politics, he might have turned out a great leader of the
+Opposition.
+
+Neither this speech nor the bishop's able defence saved him; and in the
+following month he was banished the kingdom, and passed the rest of his
+days in Paris.
+
+Wharton, however, was not content with the House as an arena of
+political agitation. He was now old enough to have matured his
+principles thoroughly, and he completely espoused the cause of the
+exiled family. He amused himself with agitating throughout the country,
+influencing elections, and seeking popularity by becoming a member of
+the Wax-chandlers' Company. It is a proof of his great abilities, so
+shamefully thrown away, that he now, during the course of eight months,
+issued a paper, called 'The True Briton,' every Monday and Friday,
+written by himself, and containing varied and sensible arguments in
+support of his opinions, if not displaying any vast amount of original
+genius. This paper, on the model of 'The Tatler,' 'The Spectator,' &c.,
+had a considerable sale, and attained no little celebrity, so that the
+Duke of Wharton acquired the reputation of a literary man as well as of
+a political leader.
+
+But, whatever he might have been in either capacity, his disgraceful
+life soon destroyed all hope of success in them. He was now an
+acknowledged wit about town, and what was then almost a recognized
+concomitant of that character, an acknowledged profligate. He scattered
+his large fortune in the most reckless and foolish manner: though
+married, his moral conduct was as bad as that of any bachelor of the
+day: and such was his extravagance and open licentiousness, that, having
+wasted a princely revenue, he was soon caught in the meshes of Chancery,
+which very sensibly vested his fortune in the hands of trustees, and
+compelled him to be satisfied with an income of twelve hundred pounds a
+year.
+
+The young rascal now showed hypocritical signs of penitence--he was
+always an adept in that line--and protested he would go abroad and live
+quietly, till his losses should be retrieved. There is little doubt
+that, under this laudable design, he concealed one of attaching himself
+closer to the Chevalier party, and even espousing the faith of that
+unfortunate prince, or pretender, whichever he may have been. He set off
+for Vienna, leaving his wife behind to die, in April, 1726. He had long
+since quarrelled with her, and treated her with cruel neglect, and at
+her death he was not likely to be much afflicted. It is said, that,
+after that event, a ducal family offered him a daughter and large
+fortune in marriage, and that the Duke of Wharton declined the offer,
+because the latter was to be tied up, and he could not conveniently tie
+up the former. However this may be, he remained a widower for a short
+time: we may be sure, not long.
+
+The hypocrisy of going abroad to retrench was not long undiscovered. The
+fascinating scapegrace seems to have delighted in playing on the
+credulity of others; and Walpole relates that, on the eve of the day on
+which he delivered his famous speech for Atterbury, he sought an
+interview with the minister, Sir Robert Walpole, expressed great
+contrition at having espoused the bishop's cause hitherto, and a
+determination to speak against him the following day. The minister was
+taken in, and at the duke's request, supplied him with all the main
+arguments, pro and con. The deceiver, having got these well into his
+brain--one of the most retentive--repaired to his London haunts, passed
+the night in drinking, and the next day produced all the arguments he
+had digested, _in the bishop's favour_.
+
+At Vienna he was well received, and carried out his private mission
+successfully, but was too restless to stay in one place, and soon set
+off for Madrid. Tired now of politics, he took a turn at love. He was a
+poet after a fashion, for the pieces he has left are not very good: he
+was a fine gentleman, always spending more money than he had, and is
+said to have been handsome. His portraits do not give us this
+impression: the features are not very regular; and though not coarse,
+are certainly _not_ refined. The mouth, somewhat sensual, is still much
+firmer than his character would lead us to expect; the nose sharp at the
+point, but cogitative at the nostrils; the eyes long but not large;
+while the raised brow has all that openness which he displayed in the
+indecency of his vices, but not in any honesty in his political career.
+In a word, the face is not attractive. Yet he is described as having had
+a brilliant complexion, a lively, varying expression, and a charm of
+person and manner that was quite irresistible. Whether on this account,
+or for his talents and wit, which were really shining, his new Juliet
+fell as deeply in love with him as he with her.
+
+She was maid of honour--and a highly honourable maid--to the Queen of
+Spain. The Irish regiments long employed in the Spanish service had
+become more or less naturalized in that country, which accounts for the
+great number of thoroughly Milesian names still to be found there, some
+of them, as O'Donnell, owned by men of high distinction. Among other
+officers who had settled with their families in the Peninsula was a
+Colonel O'Byrne, who, like most of his countrymen there, died penniless,
+leaving his widow with a pension and his daughter without a sixpence. It
+can well be imagined that an offer from an English duke was not to be
+sneezed at by either Mrs. or Miss O'Byrne; but there were some grave
+obstacles to the match. The duke was a Protestant. But what of that?--he
+had never been encumbered with religion, nor even with a decent
+observance of its institutions, for it is said that, when in England, at
+his country seat, he had, to show how little he cared for
+respectability, made a point of having the hounds out on a Sunday
+morning. He was not going to lose a pretty girl for the sake of a faith
+with which he had got disgusted ever since his Huguenot tutor tried to
+make him a sober Christian. He had turned coat in politics, and would
+now try his weathercock capabilities at religion. Nothing like variety,
+so Romanist he became.
+
+But this was not all: his friends on the one hand objected to his
+marrying a penniless girl, and hers, on the other, warned her of his
+disreputable character. But when two people have made up their minds to
+be one, such trifles as these are of no consequence. A far more trying
+obstacle was the absolute refusal of her Most Catholic Majesty to allow
+her maid of honour to marry the duke.
+
+It is a marvel that after the life of dissipation he had led, this man
+should have retained the power of loving at all. But everything about
+him was extravagant, and now that he entertained a virtuous attachment,
+he was as wild in it as he had been reckless in less respectable
+connections. He must have been sincere at the time, for the queen's
+refusal was followed by a fit of depression that brought on a low fever.
+The queen heard of it, and, touched by the force of his devotion, sent
+him a cheering message. The moment was not to be lost, and, in spite of
+his weak state, he hurried to court, threw himself at her Majesty's
+feet, and swore he must have his lady-love or die. Thus pressed, the
+queen was forced to consent, but warned him that he would repent of it.
+The marriage took place, and the couple set off to Rome.
+
+Here the Chevalier again received him with open arms, and took the
+opportunity of displaying his imaginary sovereignty by bestowing on him
+the Order of the Garter--a politeness the duke returned by wearing while
+there the no less unrecognised title of Duke of Northumberland, which
+'His Majesty' had formerly conferred on him. But James III., though no
+saint, had more respect for decent conduct than his father and uncle;
+the duke ran off into every species of excess, got into debt as usual--
+
+    'When Wharton's just, and learns to pay his debts,
+     And reputation dwells at Mother Brett's,
+
+           *       *       *       *       *
+
+     Then, Celia, shall my constant passion cease,
+     And my poor suff'ring heart shall be at peace,'
+
+says a satirical poem of the day, called 'The Duke of Wharton's
+_Whens_'--was faithless to the wife he had lately been dying for; and
+in short, such a thorough blackguard, that not even the Jacobites could
+tolerate him, and they turned him out of the Holy City till he should
+learn not to bring dishonour on the court of their fictitious sovereign.
+
+The duke was not the man to be much ashamed of himself, though his poor
+wife may now have begun to think her late mistress in the right, and he
+was probably glad of an excuse for another change. At this time, 1727,
+the Spaniards were determined to wrest Gibraltar from its English
+defenders, and were sending thither a powerful army under the command of
+Los Torres. The Duke had tried many trades with more or less success,
+and now thought that a little military glory would tack on well to his
+highly honourable biography. At any rate there was novelty in the din of
+war, and for novelty he would go anywhere. It mattered little that he
+should fight against his own king and own countrymen: he was not half
+blackguard enough yet, he may have thought; he had played traitor for
+some time, he would now play rebel outright--the game _was_ worth the
+candle.
+
+So what does my lord duke do but write a letter (like the Chinese behind
+their mud-walls, he was always bold enough when well secured under the
+protection of the post, and was more absurd in ink even than in action)
+to the King of Spain, offering him his services as a volunteer against
+'Gib.' Whether his Most Catholic Majesty thought him a traitor, a
+madman, or a devoted partisan of his own, does not appear, for without
+waiting for an answer--waiting was always too dull work for Wharton--he
+and his wife set off for the camp before Gibraltar, introduced
+themselves to the Conde in Command, were received with all the
+honour--let us say honours--due to a duke--and established themselves
+comfortably in the ranks of the enemy of England. But all the duke's
+hopes of prowess were blighted. He had good opportunities. The Conde de
+los Torres made him his aide-de-camp, and sent him daily into the
+trenches to see how matters went on. When a defence of a certain Spanish
+outwork was resolved upon, the duke, from his rank, was chosen for the
+command. Yet in the trenches he got no worse wound than a slight one on
+the foot from a splinter of a shell, and this he afterwards made an
+excuse for not fighting a duel with swords; and as to the outwork, the
+English abandoned the attack, so that there was no glory to be found in
+the defence. He soon grew weary of such inglorious and rather dirty work
+as visiting trenches before a stronghold; and well he might; for if
+there be one thing duller than another and less satisfactory, it must be
+digging a hole out of which to kill your brother mortals; and thinking
+he should amuse himself better at the court, he set off for Madrid. Here
+the king, by way of reward for his brilliant services in doing nothing,
+made him _colonel-aggregate_--whatever that may be--of an Irish
+regiment; a very poor aggregate, we should think. But my lord duke
+wanted something livelier than the command of a band of Hispaniolized
+Milesians; and having found the military career somewhat uninteresting,
+wished to return to that of politics. He remembered with gusto the
+frolic life of the Holy City, and the political excitement in the
+Chevalier's court, and sent off a letter to 'His Majesty James III.,'
+expressing, like a rusticated Oxonian, his penitence for having been so
+naughty the last time, and offering to come and be very good again. It
+is to the praise of the Chevalier de St. George that he had worldly
+wisdom enough not to trust the gay penitent. He was tired, as everybody
+else was, of a man who could stick to nothing, and did not seem to care
+about seeing him again. Accordingly, he replied in true kingly style,
+blaming him for having taken up arms against their common country, and
+telling him in polite language--as a policeman does a riotous
+drunkard--that he had better go home. The duke thought so too, was not
+at all offended at the letter, and set off, by way of returning towards
+his Penates, for Paris, where he arrived in May, 1728.
+
+Horace Walpole--not _the_ Horace--but 'Uncle Horace,' or 'old Horace,'
+as he was called, was then ambassador to the court of the Tuileries. Mr.
+Walpole was one of the Houghton 'lot,' a brother of the famous minister
+Sir Robert, and though less celebrated, almost as able in his line. He
+had distinguished himself in various diplomatic appointments, in Spain,
+at Hanover and the Hague, and having successfully tackled Cardinal
+Fleury, the successor of the Richelieus and Mazarins at Paris, he was
+now in high favour at home. In after years he was celebrated for his
+duel with Chetwynd, who, when 'Uncle Horace' had in the House expressed
+a hope that the question might be carried, had exclaimed, 'I hope to see
+you hanged first!' 'You hope to see me hanged first, do you?' cried
+Horace, with all the ferocity of the Walpoles; and thereupon, seizing
+him by the most prominent feature of his face, shook him violently. This
+was matter enough for a brace of swords and coffee for four, and Mr.
+Chetwynd had to repent of his remark after being severely wounded. In
+those days our honourable House of Commons was as much an arena of wild
+beasts as the American senate of to-day.
+
+To this minister our noble duke wrote a hypocritical letter, which, as
+it shows how the man _could_ write penitently, is worth transcribing.
+
+    'Lions, June 28, 1728.
+
+'Sir,--Your excellency will be surpris'd to receive a letter from me;
+but the clemency with which the government of England has treated me,
+which is in a great measure owing to your brother's regard to my
+father's memory, makes me hope that you will give me leave to express my
+gratitude for it.
+
+'Since his present majesty's accession to the throne I have absolutely
+refused to be concerned with the Pretender or any of his affairs; and
+during my stay in Italy have behaved myself in a manner that Dr. Peters,
+Mr. Godolphin, and Mr. Mills can declare to be consistent with my duty
+to the present king. I was forc'd to go to Italy to get out of Spain,
+where, if my true design had been known, I should have been treated a
+little severely.
+
+'I am coming to Paris to put myself entirely under your excellency's
+protection; and hope that Sir Robert Walpole's good-nature will prompt
+him to save a family which his generosity induced him to spare. If your
+excellency would permit me to wait upon you for an hour, I am certain
+you would be convinc'd of the sincerity of my repentance for my former
+madness, would become an advocate with his majesty to grant me his most
+gracious pardon, which it is my comfort I shall never be required to
+purchase by any step unworthy of a man of honour. I do not intend, in
+case of the king's allowing me to pass the evening of my days under the
+shadow of his royal protection, to see England for some years, but shall
+remain in France or Germany, as my friends shall advise, and enjoy
+country sports till all former stories are buried in oblivion. I beg of
+your excellency to let me receive your orders at Paris, which I will
+send to your hostel to receive. The Dutchess of Wharton, who is with me,
+desires leave to wait on Mrs. Walpole, if you think proper.
+
+    'I am, &c.'
+
+After this, the ambassador could do no less than receive him; but he was
+somewhat disgusted when on leaving him the duke frankly told
+him--forgetting all about his penitent letter, probably, or too reckless
+to care for it--that he was going to dine with the Bishop of
+Rochester--Atterbury himself, then living in Paris--whose society was
+interdicted to any subject of King George. The duke, with his usual
+folly, touched on other subjects equally dangerous, his visit to Rome,
+and his conversion to Romanism; and, in short, disgusted the cautious
+Mr. Walpole. There is something delightfully impudent about all these
+acts of Wharton's; and had he only been a clown at Drury Lane instead of
+an English nobleman, he must have been successful. As it is, when one
+reads of the petty hatred and humbug of those days, when liberty of
+speech was as unknown as any other liberty, one cannot but admire the
+impudence of his Grace of Wharton, and wish that most dukes, without
+being as profligate, would be as free-spoken.
+
+With six hundred pounds in his pocket, our young Lothario now set up
+house at Rouen, with an establishment 'equal,' say the old-school
+writers, 'to his position, but not to his means.' In other words, he
+undertook to live in a style for which he could not pay. Twelve hundred
+a year may be enough for a duke, as for any other man, but not for one
+who considers a legion of servants a necessary appendage to his
+position. My lord duke, who was a good French scholar, soon found an
+ample number of friends and acquaintances, and not being particular
+about either, managed to get through his half-year's income in a few
+weeks. Evil consequence: he was assailed by duns. French duns know
+nothing about forgiving debtors; 'your money first, and then my pardon,'
+is their motto. My lord duke soon found this out. Still he had an
+income, and could pay them all off in time. So he drank and was merry,
+till one fine day came a disagreeable piece of news, which startled him
+considerably. The government at home had heard of his doings, and
+determined to arraign him for high treason.
+
+He could expect little else, for had he not actually taken up arms
+against his sovereign?
+
+Now Sir Robert Walpole was, no doubt, a vulgarian. He was not a man to
+love or sympathise with; but he _was_ good-natured at bottom. Our
+'frolic grace' had reason to acknowledge this. He could not complain of
+harshness in any measures taken against him, and he had certainly no
+claim to consideration from the government he had treated so ill. Yet
+Sir Robert was willing to give him every chance; and so far did he go,
+that he sent over a couple of friends to him to induce him only to ask
+pardon of the king, with a promise that it would be granted. For sure
+the Duke of Wharton's character was anomalous. The same man who had more
+than once humiliated himself when unasked, who had written to Walpole's
+brother the letter we have read, would not now, when entreated to do so,
+write a few lines to that minister to ask mercy. Nay, when the gentleman
+in question offered to be content even with a letter from the duke's
+valet, he refused to allow the man to write. Some people may admire what
+they will believe to be firmness, but when we review the duke's
+character and subsequent acts, we cannot attribute this refusal to
+anything but obstinate pride. The consequence of this folly was a
+stoppage of supplies, for as he was accused of high treason, his estate
+was of course sequestrated. He revenged himself by writing a paper which
+was published in 'Mist's Journal,' and which, under the cover of a
+Persian tale, contained a species of libel on the government.
+
+His position was now far from enviable; and, assailed by duns, he had
+no resource but to humble himself, not before those he had offended, but
+before the Chevalier, to whom he wrote in his distress, and who sent him
+£2,000, which he soon frittered away in follies. This gone, the duke
+begged and borrowed, for there are some people such fools that they
+would rather lose a thousand pounds to a peer than give sixpence to a
+pauper, and many a tale was told of the artful manner in which his grace
+managed to cozen his friends out of a louis or two. His ready wit
+generally saved him.
+
+Thus on one occasion an Irish toady invited him to dinner: the duke
+talked of his wardrobe, then sadly defective; what suit should he wear?
+The Hibernian suggested black velvet. 'Could you recommend a tailor?'
+'Certainly.' Snip came, an expensive suit was ordered, put on, and the
+dinner taken. In due course the tailor called for his money. The duke
+was not a bit at a loss, though he had but a few francs to his name.
+'Honest man,' quoth he, 'you mistake the matter entirely. Carry the bill
+to Sir Peter; for know that whenever I consent to wear another man's
+livery, my master pays for the clothes,' and inasmuch as the
+dinner-giver was an Irishman, he did actually discharge the account.
+
+At other times he would give a sumptuous entertainment, and in one way
+or another induce his guests to pay for it. He was only less adroit in
+coining excuses than Theodore Hook, and had he lived a century later, we
+might have a volume full of anecdotes to give of his ways and no means.
+Meanwhile his unfortunate duchess was living on the charity of friends,
+while her lord and master, when he could get anyone to pay for a band,
+was serenading young ladies. Yet he was jealous enough of his wife at
+times, and once sent a challenge to a Scotch nobleman, simply because
+some silly friend asked him if he had forbidden his wife to dance with
+the lord. He went all the way to Flanders to meet his opponent; but,
+perhaps fortunately for the duke, Marshal Berwick arrested the
+Scotchman, and the duel never came off.
+
+Whether he felt his end approaching, or whether he was sick of vile
+pleasures which he had recklessly pursued from the age of fifteen, he
+now, though only thirty years of age, retired for a time to a convent,
+and was looked on as a penitent and devotee. Penury, doubtless, cured
+him in a measure, and poverty, the porter of the gates of heaven, warned
+him to look forward beyond a life he had so shamefully misused. But it
+was only a temporary repentance; and when he left the religious house,
+he again rushed furiously into every kind of dissipation.
+
+At length, utterly reduced to the last extremities, he bethought himself
+of his colonelcy in Spain, and determined to set out to join his
+regiment. The following letter from a friend who accompanied him will
+best show what circumstances he was in:--
+
+                                                'Paris, June 1, 1729.
+
+'Dear Sir,--I am just returned from the Gates of Death, to return you
+Thanks for your last kind Letter of Accusations, which I am persuaded
+was intended as a seasonable Help to my Recollection, at a Time that it
+was necessary for me to send an Inquisitor General into my Conscience,
+to examine and settle all the Abuses that ever were committed in that
+little Court of Equity; but I assure you, your long Letter did not lay
+so much my Faults as my Misfortunes before me, which believe me, dear
+----, have fallen as heavy and as thick upon me as the Shower of Hail
+upon us two in E---- Forest, and has left me much at a Loss which way to
+turn myself. The Pilot of the Ship I embarked in, who industriously ran
+upon every Rock, has at last split the Vessel, and so much of a sudden,
+that the whole Crew, I mean his Domesticks, are all left to swim for
+their Lives, without one friendly Plank to assist them to Shore. In
+short, he left me sick, in Debt, and without a Penny; but as I begin to
+recover, and have a little time to Think, I can't help considering
+myself, as one whisk'd up behind a Witch upon a Broomstick, and hurried
+over Mountains and Dales through confus'd Woods and thorny Thickets, and
+when the Charm is ended, and the poor Wretch dropp'd in a Desart, he can
+give no other Account of his enchanted Travels, but that he is much
+fatigued in Body and Mind, his Cloaths torn, and worse in all other
+Circumstances, without being of the least Service to himself or any
+body else. But I will follow your Advice with an active Resolution, to
+retrieve my bad Fortune, and almost a Year miserably misspent.
+
+'But notwithstanding what I have suffered, and what my Brother Mad-man
+has done to undo himself, and every body who was so unlucky to have the
+least Concern with him, I could not but be movingly touch'd at so
+extraordinary a Vicissitude of Fortune, to see a great Man fallen from
+that shining Light, in which I beheld him in the House of Lords, to such
+a Degree of Obscurity, that I have observ'd the meanest Commoner here
+decline, and the Few he would sometimes fasten on, to be tired of his
+Company; for you know he is but a bad Orator in his Cups, and of late he
+has been but seldom sober.
+
+'A week before he left Paris, he was so reduced, that he had not one
+single Crown at Command, and was forc'd to thrust in with any
+Acquaintance for a Lodging; Walsh and I have had him by Turns, all to
+avoid a Crowd of Duns, which he had of all Sizes, from Fourteen hundred
+Livres to Four, who hunted him so close, that he was forced to retire to
+some of the neighbouring Villages for Safety. I, sick as I was, hurried
+about Paris to raise Money, and to St. Germain's to get him Linen; I
+bought him one Shirt and a Cravat, which with 500 Livres, his whole
+Stock, he and his Duchess, attended by one Servant, set out for Spain.
+All the News I have heard of them since is that a Day or two after, he
+sent for Captain Brierly, and two or three of his Domesticks, to follow
+him; but none but the Captain obey'd the Summons. Where they are now, I
+can't tell, but fear they must be in great Distress by this Time, if he
+has no other Supplies; and so ends my Melancholy Story.
+
+    'I am, &c.'
+
+Still his good-humour did not desert him; he joked about their poverty
+on the road, and wrote an amusing account of their journey to a friend,
+winding up with the well-known lines:--
+
+    'Be kind to my remains, and oh! defend,
+     Against your judgment, your departed friend.'
+
+His mind was as vigorous as ever, in spite of the waste of many
+debauches; and when recommended to make a new translation of
+'Telemachus;' he actually devoted one whole day to the work; the next he
+forgot all about it. In the same manner he began a play on the story of
+Mary Queen of Scots, and Lady M. W. Montagu wrote an epilogue for it,
+but the piece never got beyond a few scenes. His genius, perhaps, was
+not for either poetry or the drama. His mind was a keen, clear one,
+better suited to argument and to grapple tough polemic subjects. Had he
+but been a sober man, he might have been a fair, if not a great writer.
+The 'True Briton,' with many faults of license, shows what his
+capabilities were. His absence of moral sense may be guessed from his
+poem on the preaching of Atterbury, in which is a parallel almost
+blasphemous.
+
+At length he reached Bilboa and his regiment, and had to live on the
+meagre pay of eighteen pistoles a month. The Duke of Ormond, then an
+exile, took pity on his wife, and supported her for a time: she
+afterwards rejoined her mother at Madrid.
+
+Meanwhile, the year 1730 brought about a salutary change in the duke's
+morals. His health was fast giving way from the effects of divers
+excesses; and there is nothing like bad health for purging a bad soul.
+The end of a misspent life was fast drawing near, and he could only keep
+it up by broth with eggs beaten up in it. He lost the use of his limbs,
+but not of his gaiety. In the mountains of Catalonia he met with a
+mineral spring which did him some good; so much, in fact, that he was
+able to rejoin his regiment for a time. A fresh attack sent him back to
+the waters; but on his way he was so violently attacked that he was
+forced to stop at a little village. Here he found himself without the
+means of going farther, and in the worst state of health. The monks of a
+Bernardine convent took pity on him and received him into their house.
+He grew worse and worse; and in a week died on the 31st of May, without
+a friend to pity or attend him, among strangers, and at the early age of
+thirty-two.
+
+Thus ended the life of one of the cleverest fools that ever disgraced
+our peerage.
+
+
+
+
+    LORD HERVEY.
+
+  George II. arriving from Hanover.--His Meeting with the
+      Queen.--Lady Suffolk.--Queen Caroline.--Sir Robert
+      Walpole.--Lord Hervey.--A set of Fine Gentlemen.--An Eccentric
+      Race.--Carr, Lord Hervey.--A Fragile Boy.--Description of
+      George II.'s Family.--Anne Brett.--A Bitter Cup.--The Darling
+      of the Family.--Evenings at St. James's.--Frederick, Prince of
+      Wales.--Amelia Sophia Walmoden.--Poor Queen Caroline!--Nocturnal
+      Diversions of Maids of Honour.--Neighbour George's Orange
+      Chest.--Mary Lepel, Lady Hervey.--Rivalry.--Hervey's Intimacy
+      with Lady Mary.--Relaxations of the Royal Household.--Bacon's
+      Opinion of Twickenham.--A Visit to Pope's Villa.--The Little
+      Nightingale.--The Essence of Small Talk.--Hervey's Affectation
+      and Effeminacy.--Pope's Quarrel with Hervey and Lady
+      Mary.--Hervey's Duel with Pulteney.--'The Death of Lord Hervey:
+      a Drama.'--Queen Caroline's last Drawing-room.--Her Illness and
+      Agony.--A Painful Scene.--The Truth discovered.--The Queen's
+      Dying Bequests.--The King's Temper.--Archbishop Potter is sent
+      for.--The Duty of Reconciliation.--The Death of Queen
+      Caroline.--A Change in Hervey's Life.--Lord Hervey's
+      Death.--Want of Christianity.--Memoirs of his Own Time.
+
+
+The village of Kensington was disturbed in its sweet repose one day,
+more than a century ago, by the rumbling of a ponderous coach and six,
+with four outriders and two equerries kicking up the dust; whilst a
+small body of heavy dragoons rode solemnly after the huge vehicle. It
+waded, with inglorious struggles, through a deep mire of mud, between
+the Palace and Hyde Park, until the cortège entered Kensington Park, as
+the gardens were then called, and began to track the old road that led
+to the red-brick structure to which William III. had added a higher
+story, built by Wren. There are two roads by which coaches could
+approach the house: 'one,' as the famous John, Lord Hervey, wrote to his
+mother, 'so convex, the other so concave, that, by this extreme of
+faults, they agree in the common one of being, like the high road,
+impassable.' The rumbling coach, with its plethoric steeds, toils slowly
+on, and reaches the dismal pile, of which no association is so precious
+as that of its having been the birthplace of our loved Victoria Regina.
+All around, as the emblazoned carriage impressively veers round into the
+grand entrance, savours of William and Mary, of Anne, of Bishop Burnet
+and Harley, Atterbury and Bolingbroke. But those were pleasant days
+compared to those of the second George, whose return from Hanover in
+this mountain of a coach is now described.
+
+The panting steeds are gracefully curbed by the state coachman in his
+scarlet livery, with his cocked-hat and gray wig underneath it: now the
+horses are foaming and reeking as if they had come from the world's end
+to Kensington, and yet they have only been to meet King George on his
+entrance into London, which he has reached from Helvoetsluys, on his way
+from Hanover, in time, as he expects, to spend his birthday among his
+English subjects.
+
+It is Sunday, and repose renders the retirement of Kensington and its
+avenues and shades more sombre than ever. Suburban retirement is usually
+so. It is noon; and the inmates of Kensington Palace are just coming
+forth from the chapel in the palace. The coach is now stopping, and the
+equerries are at hand to offer their respectful assistance to the
+diminutive figure that, in full Field-marshal regimentals, a cocked-hat
+stuck crosswise on his head, a sword dangling even down to his heels,
+ungraciously heeds them not, but stepping down, as the great iron gates
+are thrown open to receive him, looks neither like a king or a
+gentleman. A thin, worn face, in which weakness and passion are at once
+pictured; a form buttoned and padded up to the chin; high Hessian boots
+without a wrinkle; a sword and a swagger, no more constituting him the
+military character than the 'your majesty' from every lip can make a
+poor thing of clay a king. Such was George II.: brutal, even to his
+submissive wife. Stunted by nature, he was insignificant in form, as he
+was petty in character; not a trace of royalty could be found in that
+silly, tempestuous physiognomy, with its hereditary small head: not an
+atom of it in his made-up, paltry little presence; still less in his
+bearing, language, or qualities.
+
+The queen and her court have come from chapel, to meet the royal
+absentee at the great gate: the consort, who was to his gracious majesty
+like an elder sister rather than a wife, bends down, not to his knees,
+but yet she bends, to kiss the hand of her royal husband. She is a fair,
+fat woman, no longer young, scarcely comely; but with a charm of
+manners, a composure, and a _savoir faire_ that causes one to regard her
+as mated, not matched to the little creature in that cocked-hat, which
+he does not take off even when she stands before him. The pair,
+nevertheless, embrace: it is a triennial ceremony performed when the
+king goes or returns from Hanover, but suffered to lapse at other times;
+but the condescension is too great: and Caroline ends, where she began:
+'gluing her lips to the ungracious hand held out to her in evident
+ill-humour.
+
+They turn, and walk through the court, then up the grand staircase, into
+the queen's apartment. The king has been swearing all the way at England
+and the English, because he has been obliged to return from Hanover,
+where the German mode of life and new mistresses were more agreeable to
+him than the English customs and an old wife. He displays, therefore,
+even on this supposed happy occasion, one of the worst outbreaks of his
+insufferable temper, of which the queen is the first victim. All the
+company in the palace, both ladies and gentlemen, are ordered to enter:
+he talks to them all, but to the queen he says not a word.
+
+She is attended by Mrs. Clayton, afterwards Lady Sundon, whose lively
+manners and great good temper and good will--lent out like leasehold to
+all, till she saw what their friendship might bring,--are always useful
+at these _tristes rencontres_. Mrs. Clayton is the amalgamating
+substance between chemical agents which have, of themselves, no
+cohesion; she covers with address what is awkward; she smooths down with
+something pleasant what is rude; she turns off--and her office in that
+respect is no sinecure at that court--what is indecent, so as to keep
+the small majority of the company who have respectable notions in good
+humour. To the right of Queen Caroline stands another of her majesty's
+household, to whom the most deferential attention is paid by all
+present; nevertheless, she is queen of the court, but not the queen of
+the royal master of that court. It is Lady Suffolk, the mistress of
+King George II., and long mistress of the robes to Queen Caroline. She
+is now past the bloom of youth, but her attractions are not in their
+wane; but endured until she had attained her seventy-ninth year. Of a
+middle height, well made, extremely fair, with very fine light hair, she
+attracts regard from her sweet, fresh face, which had in it a comeliness
+independent of regularity of feature. According to her invariable
+custom, she is dressed with simplicity; her silky tresses are drawn
+somewhat back from her snowy forehead, and fall in long tresses on her
+shoulders, not less transparently white. She wears a gown of rich silk,
+opening in front to display a chemisette of the most delicate cambric,
+which is scarcely less delicate than her skin. Her slender arms are
+without bracelets, and her taper fingers without rings. As she stands
+behind the queen, holding her majesty's fan and gloves, she is obliged,
+from her deafness, to lean her fair face with its sunny hair first to
+the right side, then to the left, with the helpless air of one
+exceedingly deaf--for she had been afflicted with that infirmity for
+some years: yet one cannot say whether her appealing looks, which seem
+to say, 'Enlighten me if you please,'--and the sort of softened manner
+in which she accepts civilities which she scarcely comprehends do not
+enhance the wonderful charm which drew every one who knew her towards
+this frail, but passionless woman.
+
+[Illustration: SCENE BEFORE KENSINGTON PALACE--GEORGE II. AND QUEEN
+CAROLINE.]
+
+The queen forms the centre of the group. Caroline, daughter of the
+Marquis of Brandenburgh-Anspach, notwithstanding her residence in
+England of many years, notwithstanding her having been, at the era at
+which this biography begins, ten years its queen--is still German in
+every attribute. She retains, in her fair and comely face, traces of
+having been handsome; but her skin is deeply scarred by the cruel
+small-pox. She is now at that time of life when Sir Robert Walpole even
+thought it expedient to reconcile her to no longer being an object of
+attraction to her royal consort. As a woman, she has ceased to be
+attractive to a man of the character of George II.; but, as a queen, she
+is still, as far as manners are concerned, incomparable. As she turns to
+address various members of the assembly, her style is full of sweetness
+as well as of courtesy, yet on other occasions she is majesty itself.
+The tones of her voice, with its still foreign accent, are most
+captivating; her eyes penetrate into every countenance on which they
+rest. Her figure, plump and matronly, has lost much of its contour; but
+is well suited for her part. Majesty in women should be _embonpoint_.
+Her hands are beautifully white, and faultless in shape. The king always
+admired her bust; and it is, therefore, by royal command, tolerably
+exposed. Her fair hair is upraised in full short curls over her brow:
+her dress is rich, and distinguished in that respect from that of the
+Countess of Suffolk.--'Her good Howard'--as she was wont to call her,
+when, before her elevation to the peerage, she was lady of the
+bedchamber to Caroline, had, when in that capacity, been often subjected
+to servile offices, which the queen, though apologizing in the sweetest
+manner, delighted to make her perform. 'My good Howard' having one day
+placed a handkerchief on the back of her royal mistress, the king, who
+half worshipped his intellectual wife, pulled it off in a passion,
+saying, 'Because you have an ugly neck yourself, you hide the queen's!'
+All, however, that evening was smooth as ice, and perhaps as cold also.
+The company are quickly dismissed, and the king, who has scarcely spoken
+to the queen, retires to his closet, where he is attended by the
+subservient Caroline, and by two other persons.
+
+Sir Robert Walpole, prime minister, has accompanied the king in his
+carriage, from the very entrance of London, where the famous statesman
+met him. He is now the privileged companion of their majesties, in their
+seclusion for the rest of the evening. His cheerful face, in its full
+evening disguise of wig and tie, his invariable good humour, his frank
+manners, his wonderful sense, his views, more practical than elevated,
+sufficiently account for the influence which this celebrated minister
+obtained over Queen Caroline, and the readiness of King George to submit
+to the tie. But Sir Robert's great source of ascendancy was his temper.
+Never was there in the annals of our country a minister so free of
+access: so obliging in giving, so unoffending when he refused; so
+indulgent and kind to those dependent on him; so generous, so faithful
+to his friends, so forgiving to his foes. This was his character under
+one phase: even his adherents sometimes blamed his easiness of temper;
+the impossibility in his nature to cherish the remembrance of a wrong,
+or even to be roused by an insult. But, whilst such were the amiable
+traits of his character, history has its lists of accusations against
+him for corruption of the most shameless description. The end of this
+veteran statesman's career is well known. The fraudulent contracts which
+he gave, the peculation and profusion of the secret service money, his
+undue influence at elections, brought around his later life a storm,
+from which he retreated into the Upper House, when created Earl of
+Orford. It was before this timely retirement from office that he burst
+forth in these words: 'I oppose nothing; give in to everything; am said
+to do everything; and to answer for everything; and yet, God knows, I
+dare not do what I think is right.'
+
+With his public capacity, however, we have not here to do: it is in his
+character of a courtier that we view him following the queen and king.
+His round, complacent face, with his small glistening eyes, arched
+eyebrows, and with a mouth ready to break out aloud into a laugh, are
+all subdued into a respectful gravity as he listens to King George
+grumbling at the necessity for his return home. No English cook could
+dress a dinner; no English cook could select a dessert; no English
+coachman could drive; nor English jockey ride; no Englishman--such were
+his habitual taunts--knew how to come into a room; no Englishwoman
+understood how to dress herself. The men, he said, talked of nothing but
+their dull politics, and the women of nothing but their ugly clothes.
+Whereas, in Hanover, all these things were at perfection: men were
+patterns of politeness and gallantry; women, of beauty, wit, and
+entertainment. His troops there were the bravest in the world; his
+manufacturers the most ingenious; his people the happiest: in Hanover,
+in short, plenty reigned, riches flowed, arts flourished, magnificence
+abounded, everything was in abundance that could make a prince great, or
+a people blessed.
+
+There was one standing behind the queen who listened to these outbreaks
+of the king's bilious temper, as he called it, with an apparently
+respectful solicitude, but with the deepest disgust in his heart. A
+slender, elegant figure, in a court suit, faultlessly and carefully
+perfect in that costume, stands behind the queen's chair. It is Lord
+Hervey. His lofty forehead, his features, which have a refinement of
+character, his well-turned mouth, and full and dimpled chin, form his
+claims to that beauty which won the heart of the lovely Mary Lepel;
+whilst the somewhat thoughtful and pensive expression of his
+physiognomy, when in repose, indicated the sympathising, yet, at the
+same time, satirical character of one who won the affections, perhaps
+unconsciously, of the amiable Princess Caroline, the favourite daughter
+of George II.
+
+A general air of languor, ill concealed by the most studied artifice of
+countenance, and even of posture, characterizes Lord Hervey. He would
+have abhorred robustness; for he belonged to the clique then called
+Maccaronis; a set of fine gentlemen, of whom the present world would not
+be worthy, tricked out for show, fitted only to drive out fading majesty
+in a stage coach; exquisite in every personal appendage, too fine for
+the common usages of society; _point-device_, not only in every curl and
+ruffle, but in every attitude and step; men with full satin roses on
+their shining shoes; diamond tablet rings on their forefingers; with
+snuff-boxes, the worth of which might almost purchase a farm; lace
+worked by the delicate fingers of some religious recluse of an
+ancestress, and taken from an altar-cloth; old point-lace, dark as
+coffee-water could make it; with embroidered waistcoats, wreathed in
+exquisite tambour-work round each capricious lappet and pocket; with cut
+steel buttons that glistened beneath the courtly wax-lights: with these
+and fifty other small but costly characteristics that established the
+reputation of an aspirant Maccaroni. Lord Hervey was, in truth, an
+effeminate creature: too dainty to walk; too precious to commit his
+frame to horseback; and prone to imitate the somewhat recluse habits
+which German rulers introduced within the court: he was disposed to
+candle-light pleasures and cockney diversions; to Marybone and the Mall,
+and shrinking from the athletic and social recreations which, like so
+much that was manly and English, were confined almost to the English
+squire _pur et simple_ after the Hanoverian accession; when so much
+degeneracy for a while obscured the English character, debased its tone,
+enervated its best races, vilified its literature, corrupted its morals,
+changed its costume, and degraded its architecture.
+
+Beneath the effeminacy of the Maccaroni, Lord Hervey was one of the few
+who united to intense _finery_ in every minute detail, an acute and
+cultivated intellect. To perfect a Maccaroni it was in truth advisable,
+if not essential, to unite some smattering of learning, a pretension to
+wit, to his super-dandyism; to be the author of some personal squib, or
+the translator of some classic. Queen Caroline was too cultivated
+herself to suffer fools about her, and Lord Hervey was a man after her
+own taste; as a courtier he was essentially a fine gentleman; and, more
+than that, he could be the most delightful companion, the most sensible
+adviser, and the most winning friend in the court. His ill-health, which
+he carefully concealed, his fastidiousness, his ultra-delicacy of
+habits, formed an agreeable contrast to the coarse robustness of 'Sir
+Robert,' and constituted a relief after the society of the vulgar,
+strong-minded minister, who was born for the hustings and the House of
+Commons rather than for the courtly drawing-room.
+
+John Lord Hervey, long vice-chamberlain to Queen Caroline, was, like Sir
+Robert Walpole, descended from a commoner's family, one of those good
+old squires who lived, as Sir Henry Wotton says, 'without lustre and
+without obscurity.' The Duchess of Marlborough had procured the
+elevation of the Herveys of Ickworth to the peerage. She happened to be
+intimate with Sir Thomas Felton, the father of Mrs. Hervey, afterwards
+Lady Bristol, whose husband, at first created Lord Hervey, and
+afterwards Earl of Bristol, expressed his obligations by retaining as
+his motto, when raised to the peerage, the words 'Je n'oublieray
+jàmais,' in allusion to the service done him by the Duke and Duchess of
+Marlborough.
+
+The Herveys had always been an eccentric race; and the classification of
+'men, women, and Herveys,' by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, was not more
+witty than true. There was in the whole race an eccentricity which
+bordered on the ridiculous, but did not imply want of sense or of
+talent. Indeed this third species, 'the Herveys,' were more gifted than
+the generality of 'men and women.' The father of Lord Hervey had been a
+country gentleman of good fortune, living at Ickworth, near Bury in
+Suffolk, and representing the town in parliament, as his father had
+before him, until raised to the peerage. Before that elevation he had
+lived on in his own county, uniting the character of the English squire,
+in that fox-hunting county, with that of a perfect gentleman, a scholar,
+and a most admirable member of society. He was a poet, also, affecting
+the style of Cowley, who wrote an elegy upon his uncle, William Hervey,
+an elegy compared to Milton's 'Lycidas' in imagery, music, and
+tenderness of thought. The shade of Cowley, whom Charles II. pronounced,
+at his death, to be 'the best man in England,' haunted this peer, the
+first Earl of Bristol. He aspired especially to the poet's _wit_; and
+the ambition to be a wit flew like wildfire among his family, especially
+infecting his two sons, Carr, the elder brother of the subject of this
+memoir, and Lord Hervey.
+
+It would have been well could the Earl of Bristol have transmitted to
+his sons his other qualities. He was pious, moral, affectionate,
+sincere; a consistent Whig of the old school, and, as such, disapproving
+of Sir Robert Walpole, of the standing army, the corruptions, and that
+doctrine of expediency so unblushingly avowed by the ministers.
+
+Created Earl of Bristol in 1714, the heir-apparent to his titles and
+estates was the elder brother, by a former marriage, of John, Lord
+Hervey; the dissolute, clever, whimsical Carr, Lord Hervey. Pope, in one
+of his satirical appeals to the _second_ Lord Hervey, speaks of his
+friendship with Carr, 'whose early death deprived the family' (of
+Hervey) 'of as much wit and honour as he left behind him in any part of
+it.' The _wit_ was a family attribute, but the _honour_ was dubious:
+Carr was as deistical as any Maccaroni of the day, and, perhaps, more
+dissolute than most: in one respect he has left behind him a celebrity
+which may be as questionable as his wit, or his honour; he is reputed to
+be the father of Horace Walpole, and if we accept presumptive evidence
+of the fact, the statement is clearly borne out, for in his wit, his
+indifference to religion, to say the least, his satirical turn, his
+love of the world, and his contempt of all that was great and good, he
+strongly resembles his reputed son; whilst the levity of Lady Walpole's
+character, and Sir Robert's laxity and dissoluteness, do not furnish any
+reasonable doubt to the statement made by Lady Louisa Stuart, in the
+introduction to Lord Wharncliffe's 'Life of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.'
+Carr, Lord Hervey, died early, and his half-brother succeeded him in his
+title and expectations.
+
+John, Lord Hervey, was educated first at Westminster School, under Dr.
+Freind, the friend of Mrs. Montagu; thence he was removed to Clare Hall,
+Cambridge: he graduated as a nobleman, and became M.A. in 1715.
+
+At Cambridge Lord Hervey might have acquired some manly prowess; but he
+had a mother who was as strange as the family into which she had
+married, and who was passionately devoted to her son: she evinced her
+affection by never letting him have a chance of being like other English
+boys. When his father was at Newmarket, Jack Hervey, as he was called,
+was to ride a race, to please his father; but his mother could not risk
+her dear boy's safety, and the race was won by a jockey. He was as
+precious and as fragile as porcelain: the elder brother's death made the
+heir of the Herveys more valuable, more effeminate, and more controlled
+than ever by his eccentric mother. A court was to be his hemisphere, and
+to that all his views, early in life, tended. He went to Hanover to pay
+his court to George I.: Carr had done the same, and had come back
+enchanted with George, the heir-presumptive, who made him one of the
+lords of the bedchamber. Jack Hervey also returned full of enthusiasm
+for the Prince of Wales, afterwards George II., and the Princess; and
+that visit influenced his destiny.
+
+He now proposed making the grand tour, which comprised Paris, Germany,
+and Italy. But his mother again interfered: she wept, she exhorted, she
+prevailed. Means were refused, and the stripling was recalled to hang
+about the court, or to loiter at Ickworth, scribbling verses, and
+causing his father uneasiness lest he should be too much of a poet, and
+too little of a public man.
+
+Such was his youth: disappointed by not obtaining a commission in the
+Guards, he led a desultory butterfly-like life; one day at Richmond with
+Queen Caroline, then Princess of Wales; another, at Pope's villa, at
+Twickenham; sometimes in the House of Commons, in which he succeeded his
+elder brother as member for Bury; and, at the period when he has been
+described as forming one of the quartett in Queen Caroline's closet at
+St. James's, as vice-chamberlain to his partial and royal patroness.
+
+His early marriage with Mary Lepel, the beautiful maid of honour to
+Queen Caroline, insured his felicity, though it did not curb his
+predilections for other ladies.
+
+Henceforth Lord Hervey lived all the year round in what were then called
+lodgings, that is, apartments appropriated to the royal household, or
+even to others, in St. James's, or at Richmond, or at Windsor. In order
+fully to comprehend all the intimate relations which he had with the
+court, it is necessary to present the reader with some account of the
+family of George II. Five daughters had been the female issue of his
+majesty's marriage with Queen Caroline. Three of these princesses, the
+three elder ones, had lived, during the life of George I., at St.
+James's with their grandfather; who, irritated by the differences
+between him and his son, then Prince of Wales, adopted that measure
+rather as showing his authority than from any affection to the young
+princesses. It was, in truth, difficult to say which of these royal
+ladies was the most unfortunate.
+
+Anne, the eldest, had shown her spirit early in life whilst residing
+with George I.; she had a proud, imperious nature, and her temper was,
+it must be owned, put to a severe test. The only time that George I. did
+the English the _honour_ of choosing one of the beauties of the nation
+for his mistress, was during the last year of his reign. The object of
+his choice was Anne Brett, the eldest daughter of the infamous Countess
+of Macclesfield by her second husband. The neglect of Savage, the poet,
+her son, was merely one passage in the iniquitous life of Lady
+Macclesfield. Endowed with singular taste and judgment, consulted by
+Colley Cibber on every new play he produced, the mother of Savage was
+not only wholly destitute of all virtue, but of all shame. One day,
+looking out of the window, she perceived a very handsome man assaulted
+by some bailiffs who were going to arrest him: she paid his debt,
+released, and married him. The hero of this story was Colonel Brett, the
+father of Anne Brett.
+
+The child of such a mother was not likely to be even
+decently-respectable; and Anne was proud of her disgraceful preeminence
+and of her disgusting and royal lover. She was dark, and her flashing
+black eyes resembled those of a Spanish beauty. Ten years after the
+death of George I., she found a husband in Sir William Leman, of
+Northall, and was announced, on that occasion, as the half-sister of
+Richard Savage.
+
+To the society of this woman, when at St. James's, as 'Mistress Brett,'
+the three princesses were subjected: at the same time the Duchess of
+Kendal, the king's German mistress, occupied other lodgings at St.
+James's.
+
+Miss Brett was to be rewarded with the coronet of a countess for her
+degradation, the king being absent on the occasion at Hanover; elated by
+her expectations, she took the liberty, during his majesty's absence, of
+ordering a door to be broken out of her apartment into the royal garden,
+where the princesses walked. The Princess Anne, not deigning to
+associate with her, commanded that it should be forthwith closed. Miss
+Brett imperiously reversed that order. In the midst of the affair, the
+king died suddenly, and Anne Brett's reign was over, and her influence
+soon as much forgotten as if she had never existed. The Princess Anne
+was pining in the dulness of her royal home, when a marriage with the
+Prince of Orange, was proposed for the consideration of his parents. It
+was a miserable match as well as a miserable prospect, for the prince's
+revenue amounted to no more than £12,000 a year; and the state and pomp
+to which the Princess Royal had been accustomed could not be
+contemplated on so small a fortune. It was still worse in point of that
+poor consideration, happiness. The Prince of Orange was both deformed
+and disgusting in his person, though his face was sensible in
+expression; and if he inspired one idea more strongly than another when
+he appeared in his uniform and cocked hat, and spoke bad French, or
+worse English, it was that of seeing before one a dressed-up baboon.
+
+It was a bitter cup for the princess to drink, but she drank it: she
+reflected that it might be the only way of quitting a court where, in
+case of her father's death, she would be dependent on her brother
+Frederick, or on that weak prince's strong-minded wife. So she
+consented, and took the dwarf; and that consent was regarded by a
+grateful people, and by all good courtiers, as a sacrifice for the sake
+of Protestant principles, the House of Orange being, _par excellence_,
+at the head of the orthodox dynasties in Europe. A dowry of £80,000 was
+forthwith granted by an admiring Commons--just double what had ever been
+given before. That sum was happily lying in the exchequer, being the
+purchase-money of some lands in St. Christopher's which had lately been
+sold; and King George was thankful to get rid of a daughter whose
+haughtiness gave him trouble. In person, too, the princess royal was not
+very ornamental to the Court. She was ill-made, with a propensity to
+grow fat; her complexion, otherwise very fine, was marked with the
+small-pox; she had, however, a lively, clean look--one of her chief
+beauties--and a certain royalty of manner.
+
+The Princess Amelia died, as the world thought, single, but consoled
+herself with various love flirtations. The Duke of Newcastle made love
+to her, but her affections were centred on the Duke of Grafton, to whom
+she was privately married, as is confidently asserted.
+
+The Princess Caroline was the darling of her family. Even the king
+relied on her truth. When there was any dispute, he used to say, 'Send
+for Caroline; she will tell us the right story.'
+
+Her fate had its clouds. Amiable, gentle, of unbounded charity, with
+strong affections, which were not suffered to flow in a legitimate
+channel, she became devotedly attached to Lord Hervey: her heart was
+bound up in him; his death drove her into a permanent retreat from the
+world. No debasing connection existed between them; but it is misery, it
+is sin enough to love another woman's husband--and that sin, that
+misery, was the lot of the royal and otherwise virtuous Caroline.
+
+The Princess Mary, another victim to conventionalities, was united to
+Frederick, Landgrave of Hesse Cassel; a barbarian, from whom she
+escaped, whenever she could, to come, with a bleeding heart, to her
+English home. She was, even Horace Walpole allows, 'of the softest,
+mildest temper in the world,' and fondly beloved by her sister Caroline,
+and by the 'Butcher of Culloden,' William, Duke of Cumberland.
+
+Louisa became Queen of Denmark in 1746, after some years' marriage to
+the Crown Prince. 'We are lucky,' Horace Walpole writes on that
+occasion, 'in the death of kings.'
+
+The two princesses who were still under the paternal roof were
+contrasts. Caroline was a constant invalid, gentle, sincere,
+unambitious, devoted to her mother, whose death nearly killed her.
+Amelia affected popularity, and assumed the _esprit fort_--was fond of
+meddling in politics, and after the death of her mother, joined the
+Bedford faction, in opposition to her father. But both these princesses
+were outwardly submissive when Lord Hervey became the Queen's
+chamberlain.
+
+The evenings at St. James's were spent in the same way as those at
+Kensington.
+
+Quadrille formed her majesty's pastime, and, whilst Lord Hervey played
+pools of cribbage with the Princess Caroline and the maids of honour,
+the Duke of Cumberland amused himself and the Princess Amelia at
+'buffet.' On Mondays and Fridays there were drawing-rooms held; and
+these receptions took place, very wisely, in the evening.
+
+Beneath all the show of gaiety and the freezing ceremony of those
+stately occasions, there was in that court as much misery as family
+dissensions, or, to speak accurately, family hatreds can engender.
+Endless jealousies, which seem to us as frivolous as they were rabid;
+and contentions, of which even the origin is still unexplained, had long
+severed the queen from her eldest son. George II. had always loved his
+mother: his affection for the unhappy Sophia Dorothea was one of the
+very few traits of goodness in a character utterly vulgar, sensual, and
+entirely selfish. His son, Frederick, Prince of Wales, on the other
+hand, hated his mother. He loved neither of his parents: but the queen
+had the preeminence in his aversion.
+
+The king, during the year 1736, was at Hanover. His return was
+announced, but under circumstances of danger. A tremendous storm arose
+just as he was prepared to embark at Helvoetsluys. All London was on the
+look out, weather-cocks were watched; tides, winds, and moons formed the
+only subjects of conversation; but no one of his majesty's subjects was
+so demonstrative as the Prince of Wales, and his cheerfulness, and his
+triumph even, on the occasion, were of course resentfully heard of by
+the queen.
+
+During the storm, when anxiety had almost amounted to fever, Lord Hervey
+dined with Sir Robert Walpole. Their conversation naturally turned on
+the state of affairs, prospectively. Sir Robert called the prince a
+'poor, weak, irresolute, false, lying, contemptible wretch.' Lord Hervey
+did not defend him, but suggested that Frederick, in case of his
+father's death, might be more influenced by the queen than he had
+hitherto been. 'Zounds, my lord!' interrupted Sir Robert, 'he would tear
+the flesh off her bones with red-hot irons sooner! The distinctions she
+shows to you, too, I believe, would not be forgotten. Then the notion he
+has of his great riches, and the desire he has of fingering them, would
+make him pinch her, and pinch her again, in order to make her buy her
+ease, till she had not a groat left.'
+
+What a picture of a heartless and selfish character! The next day the
+queen sent for Lord Hervey, to ask him if he knew the particulars of a
+great dinner which the prince had given to the lord mayor the previous
+day, whilst the whole country, and the court in particular, was
+trembling for the safety of the king, his father. Lord Hervey told her
+that the prince's speech at the dinner was the most ingratiating piece
+of popularity ever heard; the healths, of course, as usual. 'Heavens!'
+cried the queen: 'popularity always makes me sick, but _Fritz's_
+popularity makes me vomit! I hear that yesterday, on the prince's side
+of the House, they talked of the king's being cast away with the same
+_sang froid_ as you would talk of an overturn; and that my good son
+strutted about as if he had been already king. Did you mark the airs
+with which he came into my drawing-room in the morning? though he does
+not think fit to honour me with his presence, or _ennui_ me with his
+wife's, of an evening? I felt something here in my throat that swelled
+and half-choked me.'
+
+Poor Queen Caroline! with such a son, and such a husband, she must have
+been possessed of a more than usual share of German imperturbability to
+sustain her cheerfulness, writhing, as she often was, under the pangs of
+a long-concealed disorder, of which eventually she died. Even on the
+occasion of the king's return in time to spend his birthday in England,
+the queen's temper had been sorely tried. Nothing had ever vexed her
+more than the king's admiration for Amelia Sophia Walmoden, who, after
+the death of Caroline, was created Countess of Yarmouth. Madame Walmoden
+had been a reigning belle among the married women at Hanover, when
+George II. visited that country in 1735. Not that her majesty's
+affections were wounded; it was her pride that was hurt by the idea that
+people would think that this Hanoverian lady had more influence than she
+had. In other respects the king's absence was a relief: she had the
+_éclat_ of the regency; she had the comfort of having the hours which
+her royal torment decreed were to be passed in amusing his dulness, to
+herself; she was free from his 'quotidian sallies of temper, which,' as
+Lord Hervey relates, 'let it be charged by what hand it would, used
+always to discharge its hottest fire, on some pretence or other, upon
+her.'
+
+It is quite true that from the first dawn of his preference for Madame
+Walmoden, the king wrote circumstantial letters of fifty or sixty pages
+to the queen, informing her of every stage of the affair; the queen, in
+reply, saying that she was only _one_ woman, and an old woman, and
+adding, 'that he might love _more and younger women_.' In return, the
+king wrote, 'You must love the Walmoden, for she loves _you_;' a civil
+insult, which he accompanied with so minute a description of his new
+favourite, that the queen, had she been a painter, might have drawn her
+portrait at a hundred miles' distance.
+
+The queen, subservient as she seemed, felt the humiliation. Such was the
+debased nature of George II. that he not only wrote letters unworthy of
+a man to write, and unfit for a woman to read, to his wife, but he
+desired her to show them to Sir Robert Walpole. He used to 'tag several
+paragraphs,' as Lord Hervey expresses it, with these words, '_Montrez
+ceci, et consultez la-dessus de gros homme_,' meaning Sir Robert. But
+this was only a portion of the disgusting disclosures made by the vulgar
+licentious monarch to his too degraded consort.
+
+In the bitterness of her mortification the queen consulted Lord Hervey
+and Sir Robert as to the possibility of her losing her influence, should
+she resent the king's delay in returning. They agreed, that her taking
+the '_fière_ turn' would ruin her with her royal consort; Sir Robert
+adding, that if he had a mind to flatter her into her ruin, he might
+talk to her as if she were twenty-five, and try to make her imagine that
+she could bring the king back by the apprehension of losing her
+affection. He said it was now too late in her life to try new methods;
+she must persist in the soothing, coaxing, submissive arts which had
+been practised with success, and even press his majesty to bring this
+woman to England! 'He taught her,' says Lord Hervey, 'this hard lesson
+till she _wept_.' Nevertheless, the queen expressed her gratitude to the
+minister for his advice. 'My lord,' said Walpole to Hervey, 'she laid
+her thanks on me so thick that I found I had gone too far, for I am
+never so much afraid of her rebukes as of her commendations.'
+
+Such was the state of affairs between this singular couple.
+Nevertheless, the queen, not from attachment to the king, but from the
+horror she had of her son's reigning, felt such fears of the prince's
+succeeding to the throne as she could hardly express. He would, she was
+convinced, do all he could to ruin and injure her in case of his
+accession to the throne.
+
+The consolation of such a friend as Lord Hervey can easily be conceived,
+when he told her majesty that he had resolved, in case the king had been
+lost at sea, to have retired from her service, in order to prevent any
+jealousy or irritation that might arise from his supposed influence with
+her majesty. The queen stopped him short, and said, 'No, my lord, I
+should never have suffered that; you are one of the greatest pleasures
+of my life. But did I love you less than I do, or less like to have you
+about me, I should look upon the suffering you to be taken from me as
+such a meanness and baseness that you should not have stirred an inch
+from me. You,' she added, 'should have gone with me to Somerset House;'
+(which was hers in case of the king's death). She then told him she
+should have begged Sir Robert Walpole on her knees not to have sent in
+his resignation.
+
+The animosity of the Prince of Wales to Lord Hervey augmented, there can
+be no doubt, his unnatural aversion to the queen, an aversion which he
+evinced early in life. There was a beautiful, giddy maid of honour, who
+attracted not only the attention of Frederick, but the rival attentions
+of other suitors, and among them, the most favoured was said to be Lord
+Hervey, notwithstanding that he had then been for some years the husband
+of one of the loveliest ornaments of the court, the sensible and
+virtuous Mary Lepel. Miss Vane became eventually the avowed favourite of
+the prince, and after giving birth to a son, who was christened
+Fitz-Frederick Vane, and who died in 1736, his unhappy mother died a few
+months afterwards. It is melancholy to read a letter from Lady Hervey to
+Mrs. Howard, portraying the frolic and levity of this once joyous
+creature, among the other maids of honour; and her strictures show at
+once the unrefined nature of the pranks in which they indulged, and her
+once sobriety of demeanour.
+
+She speaks, on one occasion, in which, however, Miss Vane did not share
+the nocturnal diversion, of some of the maids of honour being out in the
+winter all night in the gardens at Kensington--opening and rattling the
+windows, and trying to frighten people out of their wits; and she gives
+Mrs. Howard a hint that the queen ought to be informed of the way in
+which her young attendants amused themselves. After levities such as
+these, it is not surprising to find poor Miss Vane writing to Mrs.
+Howard, with complaints that she was unjustly aspersed, and referring to
+her relatives, Lady Betty Nightingale and Lady Hewet, in testimony of
+the falsehood of reports which, unhappily, the event verified.
+
+The prince, however, never forgave Lord Hervey for being his rival with
+Miss Vane, nor his mother for her favours to Lord Hervey. In vain did
+the queen endeavour to reconcile Fritz, as she called him, to his
+father;--nothing could be done in a case where the one was all dogged
+selfishness; and where the other, the idol of the opposition party, as
+the prince had ever been, so _legère de tête_ as to swallow all the
+adulation offered to him, and to believe himself a demigod. 'The queen's
+dread of a rival,' Horace Walpole remarks, 'was a feminine weakness: the
+behaviour of her eldest son was a real thorn.' Some time before his
+marriage to a princess who was supposed to augment his hatred of his
+mother, Frederick of Wales had contemplated an act of disobedience. Soon
+after his arrival in England, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, hearing
+that he was in want of money, had sent to offer him her granddaughter,
+Lady Diana Spencer, with a fortune of £100,000. The prince accepted the
+young lady, and a day was fixed for his marriage in the duchess's lodge
+at the Great Park, Windsor. But Sir Robert Walpole, getting intelligence
+of the plot, the nuptials were stopped. The duchess never forgave either
+Walpole or the royal family, and took an early opportunity of insulting
+the latter. When the Prince of Orange came over to marry the Princess
+Royal, a sort of boarded gallery was erected from the windows of the
+great drawing-room of the palace, and was constructed so as to cross the
+garden to the Lutheran chapel in the Friary, where the duchess lived.
+The Prince of Orange being ill, went to Bath, and the marriage was
+delayed for some weeks. Meantime the widows of Marlborough House were
+darkened by the gallery. 'I wonder,' cried the old duchess, 'when my
+neighbour George will take away his orange-chest!' The structure, with
+its pent-house roof, really resembling an orange-chest.
+
+Mary Lepel, Lady Hervey, whose attractions, great as they were, proved
+insufficient to rivet the exclusive admiration of the accomplished
+Hervey, had become his wife in 1720, some time before her husband had
+been completely enthralled with the gilded prison doors of a court. She
+was endowed with that intellectual beauty calculated to attract a man of
+talent: she was highly educated, of great talent; possessed of _savoir
+faire_, infinite good temper, and a strict sense of duty. She also
+derived from her father, Brigadier Lepel, who was of an ancient family
+in Sark, a considerable fortune. Good and correct as she was, Lady
+Hervey viewed with a fashionable composure the various intimacies formed
+during the course of their married life by his lordship.
+
+The fact is, that the aim of both was not so much to insure their
+domestic felicity as to gratify their ambition. Probably they were
+disappointed in both these aims--certainly in one of them; talented,
+indefatigable, popular, lively, and courteous, Lord Hervey, in the House
+of Commons, advocated in vain, in brilliant orations, the measures of
+Walpole. Twelve years, fourteen years elapsed, and he was left in the
+somewhat subordinate position of vice-chamberlain, in spite of that high
+order of talents which he possessed, and which would have been displayed
+to advantage in a graver scene. The fact has been explained: the queen
+could not do without him; she confided in him; her daughter loved him;
+and his influence in that court was too powerful for Walpole to dispense
+with an aid so valuable to his own plans. Some episodes in a life thus
+frittered away, until, too late, promotion came, alleviated his
+existence, and gave his wife only a passing uneasiness, if even indeed
+they imparted a pang.
+
+One of these was his dangerous passion for Miss Vane; another, his
+platonic attachment to Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.
+
+Whilst he lived on the terms with his wife which is described even by
+the French as being a '_Ménage de Paris_,' Lord Hervey, found in another
+quarter the sympathies which, as a husband, he was too well-bred to
+require. It is probable that he always admired his wife more than any
+other person, for she had qualities that were quite congenial to the
+tastes of a wit and a beau in those times. Lady Hervey was not only
+singularly captivating, young, gay, and handsome; but a complete model
+also of the polished, courteous, high-bred woman of fashion. Her manners
+are said by Lady Louisa Stuart to have 'had a foreign tinge, which some
+called affected; but they were gentle, easy, and altogether exquisitely
+pleasing.' She was in secret a Jacobite--and resembled in that respect
+most of the fine ladies in Great Britain. Whiggery and Walpolism were
+vulgar: it was _haut ton_ to take offence when James II. was
+anathematized, and quite good taste to hint that some people wished well
+to the Chevalier's attempts: and this way of speaking owed its fashion
+probably to Frederick of Wales, whose interest in Flora Macdonald, and
+whose concern for the exiled family, were among the few amiable traits
+of his disposition. Perhaps they arose from a wish to plague his
+parents, rather than from a greatness of character foreign to this
+prince.
+
+Lady Hervey was in the bloom of youth, Lady Mary in the zenith of her
+age, when they became rivals: Lady Mary had once excited the jealousy of
+Queen Caroline when Princess of Wales.
+
+'How becomingly Lady Mary is dressed to-night,' whispered George II. to
+his wife, whom he had called up from the card-table to impart to her
+that important conviction. 'Lady Mary always dresses well,' was the cold
+and curt reply.
+
+Lord Hervey had been married about seven years when Lady Mary Wortley
+Montagu re-appeared at the court of Queen Caroline, after her long
+residence in Turkey. Lord Hervey was thirty-three years of age; Lady
+Mary was verging on forty. She was still a pretty woman, with a piquant,
+neat-featured face; which does not seem to have done any justice to a
+mind at once masculine and sensitive, nor to a heart capable of
+benevolence--capable of strong attachments, and of bitter hatred.
+
+Like Lady Hervey, she lived with her husband on well-bred terms: there
+existed no quarrel between them; no avowed ground of coldness; it was
+the icy boundary of frozen feeling that severed them; the sure and
+lasting though polite destroyer of all bonds, indifference. Lady Mary
+was full of repartee, of poetry, of anecdote, and was not averse to
+admiration; but she was essentially a woman of common sense, of views
+enlarged by travel, and of ostensibly good principles. A woman of
+delicacy was not to be found in those days, any more than other
+productions of the nineteenth century: a telegraphic message would have
+been almost as startling to a courtly ear as the refusal of a fine lady
+to suffer a _double entendre_. Lady Mary was above all scruples, and
+Lord Hervey, who had lived too long with George II. and his queen to
+have the moral sense in her perfection, liked her all the better for her
+courage--her merry, indelicate jokes, and her putting things down by
+their right names, on which Lady Mary plumed herself: she was what they
+term in the north of England, 'Emancipated.' They formed an old
+acquaintance with a confidential, if not a tender friendship; and that
+their intimacy was unpleasant to Lady Hervey was proved by her
+refusal--when, after the grave had closed over Lord Hervey, late in
+life, Lady Mary ill, and broken down by age, returned to die in
+England--to resume an acquaintance which had been a painful one to her.
+
+Lord Hervey was a martyr to illness of an epileptic character; and Lady
+Mary gave him her sympathy. She was somewhat of a doctor--and being
+older than her friend, may have had the art of soothing sufferings,
+which were the worse because they were concealed. Whilst he writhed in
+pain, he was obliged to give vent to his agony by alleging that an
+attack of cramp bent him double: yet he lived by rule--a rule harder to
+adhere to than that of the most conscientious homoeopath in the
+present day. In the midst of court gaieties and the duties of office, he
+thus wrote to Dr. Cheyne:--
+
+... 'To let you know that I continue one of your most pious votaries,
+and to tell you the method I am in. In the first place, I never take
+wine nor malt drink, nor any liquid but water and milk-tea; in the next,
+I eat no meat but the whitest, youngest, and tenderest, nine times in
+ten nothing but chicken, and never more than the quantity of a small one
+at a meal. I seldom eat any supper, but if any, nothing absolutely but
+bread and water; two days in the week I eat no flesh; my breakfast is
+dry biscuit, not sweet, and green tea; I have left off butter as
+bilious; I eat no salt, nor any sauce but bread-sauce.'
+
+Among the most cherished relaxations of the royal household were visits
+to Twickenham, whilst the court was at Richmond. The River Thames, which
+has borne on its waves so much misery in olden times--which was the
+highway from the Star-chamber to the tower--which has been belaboured in
+our days with so much wealth, and sullied with so much impurity; that
+river, whose current is one hour rich as the stream of a gold river, the
+next hour, foul as the pestilent churchyard,--was then, especially
+between Richmond and Teddington, a glassy, placid stream, reflecting on
+its margin the chestnut-trees of stately Ham, and the reeds and wild
+flowers which grew undisturbed in the fertile meadows of Petersham.
+
+Lord Hervey, with the ladies of the court, Mrs. Howard as their
+chaperon, delighted in being wafted to that village, so rich in names
+which give to Twickenham undying associations with the departed great.
+Sometimes the effeminate valetudinarian, Hervey, was content to attend
+the Princess Caroline to Marble Hill only, a villa residence built by
+George II. for Mrs. Howard, and often referred to in the correspondence
+of that period. Sometimes the royal barge, with its rowers in scarlet
+jackets, was seen conveying the gay party; ladies in slouched hats,
+pointed over fair brows in front, with a fold of sarsenet round them,
+terminated in a long bow and ends behind--with deep falling mantles over
+dresses never cognizant of crinoline: gentlemen, with cocked-hats, their
+bag-wigs and ties appearing behind; and beneath their puce-coloured
+coats, delicate silk tights and gossamer stockings were visible, as they
+trod the mossy lawn of the Palace Gardens at Richmond, or, followed by a
+tiny greyhound, prepared for the lazy pleasures of the day.
+
+Sometimes the visit was private; the sickly Princess Caroline had a
+fancy to make one of the group who are bound to Pope's villa.
+Twickenham, where that great little man had, since 1715, established
+himself, was pronounced by Lord Bacon to be the finest place in the
+world for study. 'Let Twitnam Park,' he wrote to his steward, Thomas
+Bushell, 'which I sold in my younger days, be purchased, if possible,
+for a residence for such deserving persons to study in, (since I
+experimentally found the situation of that place much convenient for the
+trial of my philosophical conclusions)--expressed in a paper sealed, to
+the trust--which I myself had put in practice and settled the same by
+act of parliament, if the vicissitudes of fortune had not intervened and
+prevented me.'
+
+Twickenham continued, long after Bacon had penned this injunction, to be
+the retreat of the poet, the statesman, the scholar; the haven where the
+retired actress, and broken novelist found peace; the abode of Henry
+Fielding, who lived in one of the back-streets; the temporary refuge,
+from the world of London, of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and the life-long
+home of Pope.
+
+Let us picture to ourselves a visit from the princess to Pope's
+villa:--As the barge, following the gentle bendings of the river, nears
+Twickenham, a richer green, a summer brightness, indicates it is
+approaching that spot of which even Bishop Warburton says that 'the
+beauty of the owner's poetic genius appeared to as much advantage in the
+disposition of these romantic materials as in any of his best-contrived
+poems.' And the loved toil which formed the quincunx, which perforated
+and extended the grotto until it extended across the road to a garden on
+the opposite side--the toil which showed the gentler parts of Pope's
+better nature--has been respected, and its effects preserved. The
+enamelled lawn, green as no other grass save that by the Thames side is
+green, was swept until late years by the light boughs of the famed
+willow. Every memorial of the bard was treasured by the gracious hands
+into which, after 1744, the classic spot fell--those of Sir William
+Stanhope.
+
+In the subterranean passage this verse appears; adulatory it must be
+confessed:--
+
+    'The humble roof, the garden's scanty line,
+     Ill suit the genius of the bard divine;
+     But fancy now assumes a fairer scope,
+     And Stanhope's plans unfold the soul of Pope.'
+
+It should have been Stanhope's 'gold,'--a metal which was not so
+abundant, nor indeed so much wanted in Pope's time as in our own. Let us
+picture to ourselves the poet as a host.
+
+As the barge is moored close to the low steps which lead up from the
+river to the villa, a diminutive figure, then in its prime, (if prime it
+_ever_ had), is seen moving impatiently forward. By that young-old face,
+with its large lucid speaking eyes that light it up, as does a rushlight
+in a cavern--by that twisted figure with its emaciated legs--by the
+large, sensible mouth, the pointed, marked, well-defined nose--by the
+wig, or hair pushed off in masses from the broad forehead and falling
+behind in tresses--by the dress, that loose, single-breasted black
+coat--by the cambric band and plaited shirt, without a frill, but fine
+and white, for the poor poet has taken infinite pains that day in
+self-adornment--by the delicate ruffle on that large thin hand, and
+still more by the clear, most musical voice which is heard welcoming his
+royal and noble guests, as he stands bowing low to the Princess
+Caroline, and bending to kiss hands--by that voice which gained him more
+especially the name of the little nightingale--is Pope at once
+recognized, and Pope in the perfection of his days, in the very zenith
+of his fame.
+
+One would gladly have been a sprite to listen from some twig of that
+then stripling willow which the poet had planted with his own hand, to
+talk of those who chatted for a while under its shade, before they went
+in-doors to an elegant dinner at the usual hour of twelve. How
+delightful to hear, unseen, the repartees of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,
+who comes down, it is natural to conclude, from her villa near to that
+of Pope. How fine a study might one not draw of the fine gentleman and
+the wit in Lord Hervey, as he is commanded by the gentle Princess
+Caroline to sit on her right hand; but his heart is across the table,
+with Lady Mary! How amusing to observe the dainty but not sumptuous
+repast contrived with Pope's exquisite taste, but regulated by his
+habitual economy--for his late father, a worthy Jacobite hatter, erst in
+the Strand, disdained to invest the fortune he had amassed, from the
+extensive sale of cocked-hats, in the Funds, over which an Hanoverian
+stranger ruled; but had lived on his capital of £20,000 (as spendthrifts
+do, without either moral, religious, or political reasons), as long as
+it lasted him; yet _he_ was no spendthrift. Let us look, therefore, with
+a liberal eye, noting, as we stand, how that fortune, in league with
+nature, who made the poet crooked, had maimed two of his fingers, such
+time as, passing a bridge, the poor little poet was overturned into the
+river, and he would have been drowned, had not the postilion broken the
+coach window and dragged the tiny body through the aperture. We mark,
+however, that he generally contrives to hide this defect, as he would
+fain have hidden every other, from the lynx eyes of Lady Mary, who knows
+him, however, thoroughly, and reads every line of that poor little heart
+of his, enamoured of her as it was.
+
+[Illustration: POPE AT HIS VILLA--DISTINGUISHED VISITORS.]
+
+Then the conversation! How gladly would we catch here some drops of what
+must have been the very essence of small-talk, and small-talk is the
+only thing fit for early dinners! Our host is noted for his easy
+address, his engaging manners, his delicacy, politeness, and a certain
+tact he had of showing every guest that he was welcome in the choicest
+expressions and most elegant terms. Then Lady Mary! how brilliant is her
+slightest turn! how she banters Pope--how she gives _double entendre_
+for _double entendre_ to Hervey! How sensible, yet how gay is all she
+says; how bright, how cutting, yet how polished is the _équivoque_ of
+the witty, high-bred Hervey! He is happy that day--away from the coarse,
+passionate king, whom he hated with a hatred that burns itself out in
+his lordship's 'Memoirs;' away from the somewhat exacting and pitiable
+queen; away from the hated Pelham, and the rival Grafton.
+
+And conversation never flags when all, more or less, are congenial; when
+all are well-informed, well-bred and resolved to please. Yet there is a
+canker in that whole assembly; that canker is a want of confidence; no
+one trusts the other; Lady Mary's encouragement of Hervey surprises and
+shocks the Princess Caroline, who loves him secretly; Hervey's
+attentions to the queen of letters scandalizes Pope, who soon afterwards
+makes a declaration to Lady Mary. Pope writhes under a lash just held
+over him by Lady Mary's hand. Hervey feels that the poet, though all
+suavity, is ready to demolish him at any moment, if he can; and the only
+really happy and complacent person of the whole party is, perhaps,
+Pope's old mother, who sits in the room next to that occupied for
+dinner, industriously spinning.
+
+This happy state of things came, however, as is often the case, in close
+intimacies, to a painful conclusion. There was too little reality, too
+little earnestness of feeling, for the friendship between Pope and Lady
+Mary, including Lord Hervey, to last long. His lordship had his
+affectations, and his effeminate nicety was proverbial. One day being
+asked at dinner if he would take some beef, he is reported to have
+answered, 'Beef? oh no! faugh! don't you know I never eat beef, nor
+_horse_, nor curry, nor any of those things?' Poor man! it was probably
+a pleasant way of turning off what he may have deemed an assault on a
+digestion that could hardly conquer any solid food. This affectation
+offended Lady Mary, whose _mot_, that there were three species, 'Men,
+women, and Herveys'--implies a perfect perception of the eccentricities
+even of her gifted friend, Lord Hervey, whose mother's friend she had
+been, and the object of whose admiration she undoubtedly was.
+
+Pope, who was the most irritable of men, never forgot or forgave even
+the most trifling offence. Lady Bolingbroke truly said of him that he
+played the politician about cabbages and salads, and everybody agrees
+that he could hardly tolerate the wit that was more successful than his
+own. It was about the year 1725, that he began to hate Lord Hervey with
+such a hatred as only he could feel; it was unmitigated by a single
+touch of generosity or of compassion. Pope afterwards owned that his
+acquaintance with Lady Mary and with Hervey was discontinued, merely
+because they had too much wit for him. Towards the latter end of 1732,
+'The Imitation of the Second Satire of the First Book of Horace,'
+appeared, and in it Pope attacked Lady Mary with the grossest and most
+indecent couplet ever printed: she was called Sappho, and Hervey, Lord
+Fanny; and all the world knew the characters at once.
+
+In retaliation for this satire, appeared 'Verses to the Imitator of
+Horace;' said to have been the joint production of Lord Hervey and Lady
+Mary. This was followed by a piece entitled 'Letter from a Nobleman at
+Hampton Court to a Doctor of Divinity.' To this composition Lord Hervey,
+its sole author, added these lines, by way, as it seems, of extenuation.
+
+Pope's first reply was in a prose letter, on which Dr. Johnson has
+passed a condemnation. 'It exhibits,' he says, 'nothing but tedious
+malignity.' But he was partial to the Herveys, Thomas and Henry Hervey,
+Lord Hervey's brothers, having been kind to him--'If you call a dog
+_Hervey_,' he said to Boswell, 'I shall love him.'
+
+Next came the epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, in which every infirmity and
+peculiarity of Hervey are handed down in calm, cruel irony, and polished
+verses, to posterity. The verses are almost too disgusting to be
+revived in an age which disclaims scurrility. After the most personal
+rancorous invective, he thus writes of Lord Hervey's conversation:--
+
+    His wit all see-saw between this and _that_--
+    Now high, now low--now _master_ up, now _miss_--
+    And he himself one vile antithesis.
+
+           *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Fop at the toilet, flatterer at the board,
+    Now trips a lady, and now struts a lord.
+    Eve's tempter, thus the rabbins have expressed--
+    A cherub's face--a reptile all the rest.
+    Beauty that shocks you, facts that none can trust,
+    Wit that can creep, and pride that bites the dust.'
+
+'It is impossible,' Mr. Croker thinks, 'not to admire, however we may
+condemn, the art by which acknowledged wit, beauty, and gentle
+manners--the queen's favour--and even a valetudinary diet, are
+travestied into the most odious offences.'
+
+Pope, in two lines, pointed to the intimacy between Lady Mary and Lord
+Hervey:--
+
+    'Once, and but once, this heedless youth was hit,
+     And liked that dangerous thing, a female wit.'
+
+Nevertheless, he _afterwards_ pretended that the name _Sappho_ was not
+applied to Lady Mary, but to women in general; and acted with a degree
+of mean prevarication which greatly added to the amount of his offence.
+
+The quarrel with Pope was not the only attack which Lord Hervey had to
+encounter. Among the most zealous of his foes was Pulteney, afterwards
+Lord Bath, the rival of Sir Robert Walpole, and the confederate with
+Bolingbroke in opposing that minister. The 'Craftsman,' contained an
+attack on Pulteney, written, with great ability, by Hervey. It provoked
+a _Reply_ from Pulteney. In this composition he spoke of Hervey as 'a
+thing below contempt,' and ridiculed his personal appearance in the
+grossest terms. A duel was the result, the parties meeting behind
+Arlington House, in Piccadilly, where Mr. Pulteney had the satisfaction
+of almost running Lord Hervey through with his sword. Luckily the poor
+man slipped down, so the blow was evaded, and the seconds interfered:
+Mr. Pulteney then embraced Lord Hervey, and expressing his regret for
+their quarrel, declared that he would never again, either in speech or
+writing, attack his lordship. Lord Hervey only bowed, in silence; and
+thus they parted.
+
+The queen having observed what an alteration in the palace Lord Hervey's
+death would cause, he said he could guess how it would be, and he
+produced 'The Death of Lord Hervey; or, a Morning at Court; a Drama:'
+the idea being taken it is thought, from Swift's verses on his own
+death, of which Hervey might have seen a surreptitious copy. The
+following scene will give some idea of the plot and structure of this
+amusing little piece. The part allotted to the Princess Caroline is in
+unison with the idea prevalent of her attachment to Lord Hervey:--
+
+ACT I.
+
+     SCENE: _The Queen's Gallery. The time, nine in the
+     morning._
+
+     _Enter the_ QUEEN, PRINCESS EMILY, PRINCESS CAROLINE,
+     _followed by_ LORD LIFFORD, _and_ MRS. PURCEL.
+
+     _Queen._ Mon Dieu, quelle chaleur! en vérité on étouffe. Pray
+     open a little those windows.
+
+     _Lord Lifford._ Hasa your Majesty heara de news?
+
+     _Queen._ What news, my dear Lord?
+
+     _Lord Lifford._ Dat my Lord Hervey, as he was coming last night
+     to _tone_, was rob and murdered by highwaymen and tron in a
+     ditch.
+
+     _Princess Caroline._ Eh! grand Dieu!
+
+     _Queen_ [_striking her hand upon her knee._] Comment est-il
+     véritablement mort? Purcel, my angel, shall I not have a little
+     breakfast?
+
+     _Mrs. Purcel._ What would your Majesty please to have?
+
+     _Queen._ A little chocolate, my soul, if you give me leave, and a
+     little sour cream, and some fruit.      [_Exit_ MRS. PURCEL.
+
+     _Queen_ [_to Lord Lifford._] Eh bien! my Lord Lifford, dites-nous
+     un peu comment cela est arrivé. I cannot imagine what he had to
+     do to be putting his nose there. Seulement pour un sot voyage
+     avec ce petit mousse, eh bien?
+
+     _Lord Lifford._ Madame, on scait quelque chose de celui de Mon.
+     Maran, qui d'abord qu'il a vu les voleurs s'est enfin venu à
+     grand galoppe à Londres, and after dat a waggoner take up the
+     body and put it in his cart.
+
+     _Queen._ [_to_ PRINCESS EMILY.] Are you not ashamed,
+     Amalie, to laugh?
+
+     _Princess Emily._ I only laughed at the cart, mamma.
+
+     _Queen._ Oh! that is a very fade plaisanterie.
+
+     _Princess Emily._ But if I may say it, mamma, I am not very
+     sorry.
+
+     _Queen._ Oh! fie donc! Eh bien! my Lord Lifford! My God! where is
+     this chocolate, Purcel?
+
+As Mr. Croker remarks, Queen Caroline's breakfast-table, and her
+parentheses, reminds one of the card-table conversation of Swift:--
+
+    'The Dean's dead: (pray what are trumps?)
+     Then Lord have mercy on his soul!
+     (Ladies, I'll venture for the vole.)
+     Six Deans, they say, must bear the pall;
+     (I wish I knew what king to call.)'
+
+Fragile as was Lord Hervey's constitution, it was his lot to witness the
+death-bed of the queen, for whose amusement he had penned the jeu
+d'esprit just quoted, in which there was, perhaps, as much truth as wit.
+
+The wretched Queen Caroline had, during fourteen years, concealed from
+every one, except Lady Sundon, an incurable disorder, that of hernia. In
+November (1737) she was attacked with what we should now call English
+cholera. Dr. Tessier, her house-physician, was called in, and gave her
+Daffey's elixir, which was not likely to afford any relief to the
+deep-seated cause of her sufferings. She held a drawing-room that night
+for the last time, and played at cards, even cheerfully. At length she
+whispered to Lord Hervey, 'I am not able to entertain people.' 'For
+heaven's sake, madam,' was the reply, 'go to your room: would to heaven
+the king would leave off talking of the Dragon of Wantley, and release
+you!' The Dragon of Wantley was a burlesque on the Italian opera, by
+Henry Carey, and was the theme of the fashionable world.
+
+The next day the queen was in fearful agony, very hot, and willing to
+take anything proposed. Still she did not, even to Lord Hervey, avow the
+real cause of her illness. None of the most learned court physicians,
+neither Mead nor Wilmot, were called in. Lord Hervey sat by the queen's
+bed-side, and tried to soothe her, whilst the Princess Caroline joined in
+begging him to give her mother something to relieve her agony. At
+length, in utter ignorance of the case, it was proposed to give her some
+snakeroot, a stimulant, and, at the same time, Sir Walter Raleigh's
+cordial; so singular was it thus to find that great mind still
+influencing a court. It was that very medicine which was administered by
+Queen Anne of Denmark, however, to Prince Henry; that medicine which
+Raleigh said, 'would cure him, or any other, of a disease, except in
+case of poison.'
+
+However, Ranby, house-surgeon to the king, and a favourite of Lord
+Hervey's, assuring him that a cordial with this name or that name was
+mere quackery, some usquebaugh was given instead, but was rejected by
+the queen soon afterwards. At last Raleigh's cordial was administered,
+but also rejected about an hour afterwards. Her fever, after taking
+Raleigh's cordial, was so much increased, that she was ordered instantly
+to be bled.
+
+Then, even, the queen never disclosed the fact that could alone dictate
+the course to be pursued. George II., with more feeling than judgment,
+slept on the outside of the queen's bed all that night; so that the
+unhappy invalid could get no rest, nor change her position, not daring
+to irritate the king's temper.
+
+The next day the queen said touchingly to her gentle, affectionate
+daughter, herself in declining health, 'Poor Caroline! you are very ill,
+too: we shall soon meet again in another place.'
+
+Meantime, though the queen declared to every one that she was sure
+nothing could save her, it was resolved to hold a _levée_. The foreign
+ministers were to come to court, and the king, in the midst of his real
+grief, did not forget to send word to his pages to be sure to have his
+last new ruffles sewed on the shirt he was to put on that day; a trifle
+which often, as Lord Hervey remarks, shows more of the real character
+than events of importance, from which one frequently knows no more of a
+person's state of mind than one does of his natural gait from his
+dancing.
+
+Lady Sundon was, meantime, ill at Bath, so that the queen's secret
+rested alone in her own heart. 'I have an ill,' she said, one evening,
+to her daughter Caroline, 'that nobody knows of.' Still, neither the
+princess nor Lord Hervey could guess at the full meaning of that sad
+assertion.
+
+The famous Sir Hans Sloane was then called in; but no remedy except
+large and repeated bleedings were suggested, and blisters were put on
+her legs. There seems to have been no means left untried by the faculty
+to hasten the catastrophe--thus working in the dark.
+
+The king now sat up with her whom he had so cruelly wounded in every
+nice feeling. On being asked, by Lord Hervey, what was to be done in
+case the Prince of Wales should come to inquire after the queen, he
+answered in the following terms, worthy of his ancestry--worthy of
+himself. It is difficult to say which was the most painful scene, that
+in the chamber where the queen lay in agony, or without, where the
+curse of family dissensions came like a ghoul to hover near the bed of
+death, and to gloat over the royal corpse. This was the royal
+dictum:--'If the puppy should, in one of his impertinent airs of duty
+and affection, dare to come to St. James's, I order you to go to the
+scoundrel, and tell him I wonder at his impudence for daring to come
+here; that he has my orders already, and knows my pleasure, and bid him
+go about his business; for his poor mother is not in a condition to see
+him act his false, whining, cringing tricks now, nor am I in a humour to
+bear with his impertinence; and bid him trouble me with no more
+messages, but get out of my house.'
+
+In the evening, whilst Lord Hervey sat at tea in the queen's outer
+apartment with the Duke of Cumberland, a page came to the duke to speak
+to the prince in the passage. It was to prefer a request to see his
+mother. This message was conveyed by Lord Hervey to the king, whose
+reply was uttered in the most vehement rage possible. 'This,' said he,
+'is like one of his scoundrel tricks; it is just of a piece with his
+kneeling down in the dirt before the mob to kiss her hand at the coach
+door when she came home from Hampton Court to see the Princess, though
+he had not spoken one word to her during her whole visit. I always hated
+the rascal, but now I hate him worse than ever. He wants to come and
+insult his poor dying mother; but she shall not see him: you have heard
+her, and all my daughters have heard her, very often this year at
+Hampton Court desire me if she should be ill, and out of her senses,
+that I would never let him come near her; and whilst she had her senses
+she was sure she should never desire it. No, no! he shall not come and
+act any of his silly plays here.'
+
+In the afternoon the queen said to the king, she wondered the _Griff_, a
+nickname she gave to the prince, had not sent to inquire after her yet;
+it would be so like one of his _paroitres_. 'Sooner or later,' she
+added, 'I am sure we shall be plagued with some message of that sort,
+because he will think it will have a good air in the world to ask to see
+me; and, perhaps, hopes I shall be fool enough to let him come, and give
+him the pleasure of seeing the last breath go out of my body, by which
+means he would have the joy of knowing I was dead five minutes sooner
+than he could know it in Pall Mall.'
+
+She afterwards declared that nothing would induce her to see him except
+the king's absolute commands. 'Therefore, if I grow worse,' she said,
+'and should I be weak enough to talk of seeing him, I beg you, sir, to
+conclude that I doat--or rave.'
+
+The king, who had long since guessed at the queen's disease, urged her
+now to permit him to name it to her physicians. She begged him not to do
+so; and for the first time, and the last, the unhappy woman spoke
+peevishly and warmly. Then Ranby, the house-surgeon, who had by this
+time discovered the truth, said, 'There is no more time to be lost; your
+majesty has concealed the truth too long: I beg another surgeon may be
+called in immediately.'
+
+The queen, who had, in her passion, started up in her bed, lay down
+again, turned her head on the other side, and, as the king told Lord
+Hervey, 'shed the only tear he ever saw her shed whilst she was ill.'
+
+At length, too late, other and more sensible means were resorted to: but
+the queen's strength was failing fast. It must have been a strange scene
+in that chamber of death. Much as the king really grieved for the
+queen's state, he was still sufficiently collected to grieve also lest
+Richmond Lodge, which was settled on the queen, should go to the hated
+_Griff_:[22] and he actually sent Lord Hervey to the lord chancellor to
+inquire about that point. It was decided that the queen could make a
+will, so the king informed her of his inquiries, in order to set her
+mind at ease, and to assure her it was impossible that the prince could
+in any way benefit pecuniarily from her death. The Princess Emily now
+sat up with her mother. The king went to bed. The Princess Caroline
+slept on a couch in the antechamber, and Lord Hervey lay on a mattress
+on the floor at the foot of the Princess Caroline's couch.
+
+On the following day (four after the first attack) mortification came
+on, and the weeping Princess Caroline and Lord Hervey were informed that
+the queen could not hold out many hours. Hervey was ordered to
+withdraw. The king, the Duke of Cumberland, and the queen's four
+daughters alone remained, the queen begging them not to leave her until
+she expired; yet her life was prolonged many days.
+
+When alone with her family, she took from her finger a ruby ring, which
+had been placed on it at the time of the coronation, and gave it to the
+king. 'This is the last thing,' she said, 'I have to give you; naked I
+came to you, and naked I go from you; I had everything I ever possessed
+from you, and to you whatever I have I return.' She then asked for her
+keys, and gave them to the king. To the Princess Caroline she intrusted
+the care of her younger sisters; to the Duke of Cumberland, that of
+keeping up the credit of the family. 'Attempt nothing against your
+brother, and endeavour to mortify him by showing superior merit,' she
+said to him. She advised the king to marry again; he heard her in sobs,
+and with much difficulty got out this sentence: '_Non, j'aurai des
+maitresses_' To which the queen made no other reply than '_Ah, mon Dieu!
+cela n'empêche pas._' 'I know,' says Lord Hervey, in his Memoirs, 'that
+this episode will hardly be credited, but it is literally true.'
+
+She then fancied she could sleep. The king kissed her, and wept over
+her; yet when she asked for her watch, which hung near the chimney, that
+she might give him the seal to take care of, his brutal temper broke
+forth. In the midst of his tears he called out, in a loud voice, 'Let it
+alone! _mon Dieu!_ the queen has such strange fancies; who should meddle
+with your seal? It is as safe there as in my pocket.'
+
+The queen then thought she could sleep, and, in fact, sank to rest. She
+felt refreshed on awakening and said, 'I wish it was over; it is only a
+reprieve to make me suffer a little longer; I cannot recover, but my
+nasty heart will not break yet.' She had an impression that she should
+die on a Wednesday: she had, she said, been born on a Wednesday, married
+on a Wednesday, crowned on a Wednesday, her first child was born on a
+Wednesday, and she had heard of the late king's death on a Wednesday.
+
+On the ensuing day she saw Sir Robert Walpole. 'My good Sir Robert,'
+she thus addressed him, 'you see me in a very indifferent situation. I
+have nothing to say to you but to recommend the king, my children, and
+the kingdom to your care.'
+
+Lord Hervey, when the minister retired, asked him what he thought of the
+queen's state.
+
+'My lord,' was the reply, 'she is as much dead as if she was in her
+coffin; if ever I heard a corpse speak, it was just now in that room!'
+
+It was a sad, an awful death-bed. The Prince of Wales having sent to
+inquire after the health of his dying mother, the queen became uneasy
+lest he should hear the true state of her case, asking 'if no one would
+send those ravens,' meaning the prince's attendants, out of the house.
+'They were only,' she said, 'watching her death, and would gladly tear
+her to pieces whilst she was alive.' Whilst thus she spoke of her son's
+courtiers, that son was sitting up all night in his house in Pall Mall,
+and saying, when any messenger came in from St. James's, 'Well, sure, we
+shall soon have good news, she cannot hold out much longer.' And the
+princesses were writing letters to prevent the Princess Royal from
+coming to England, where she was certain to meet with brutal unkindness
+from her father, who could not endure to be put to any expense. Orders
+were, indeed, sent to stop her if she set out. She came, however, on
+pretence of taking the Bath waters; but George II., furious at her
+disobedience, obliged her to go direct to and from Bath without
+stopping, and never forgave her.
+
+Notwithstanding her predictions, the queen survived the fatal Wednesday.
+Until this time no prelate had been called in to pray by her majesty,
+nor to administer the Holy Communion and as people about the court began
+to be scandalized by this omission, Sir Robert Walpole advised that the
+Archbishop of Canterbury should be sent for: his opinion was couched in
+the following terms, characteristic at once of the man, the times, and
+the court:--
+
+'Pray, madam,' he said to the Princess Emily, 'let this farce be played;
+the archbishop will act it very well. You may bid him be as short as you
+will: it will do the queen no hurt, no more than any good; and it will
+satisfy all the wise and good fools, who will call us atheists if we
+don't pretend to be as great fools as they are.'
+
+Unhappily, Lord Hervey, who relates this anecdote, was himself an
+unbeliever; yet the scoffing tone adopted by Sir Robert seems to have
+shocked even him.
+
+In consequence of this advice, Archbishop Potter prayed by the queen
+morning and evening, the king always quitting the room when his grace
+entered it. Her children, however, knelt by her bedside. Still the
+whisperers who censured were unsatisfied--the concession was thrown
+away. Why did not the queen receive the communion? Was it, as the world
+believed, either 'that she had reasoned herself into a very low and cold
+assent to Christianity?' or 'that she was heterodox?' or 'that the
+archbishop refused to administer the sacrament until she should be
+reconciled to her son?' Even Lord Hervey, who rarely left the
+antechamber, has only by his silence proved that she did _not_ take the
+communion. That antechamber was crowded with persons who, as the prelate
+left the chamber of death, crowded around, eagerly asking, 'Has the
+queen received?' 'Her majesty,' was the evasive reply, 'is in a heavenly
+disposition:' the public were thus deceived. Among those who were near
+the queen at this solemn hour was Dr. Butler, author of the 'Analogy.'
+He had been made clerk of the closet, and became, after the queen's
+death, Bishop of Bristol. He was in a remote living in Durham, when the
+queen, remembering that it was long since she had heard of him, asked
+the Archbishop of York 'whether Dr. Butler was dead?'--'No, madam,'
+replied that prelate (Dr. Blackburn), 'but he is buried;' upon which she
+had sent for him to court. Yet he was not courageous enough, it seems,
+to speak to her of her son and of the duty of reconciliation; whether
+she ever sent the prince any message or not is uncertain; Lord Hervey is
+silent on that point, so that it is to be feared that Lord
+Chesterfield's line--
+
+    'And, unforgiving, unforgiven, dies!'
+
+had but too sure a foundation in fact; so that Pope's sarcastic verses--
+
+    'Hang the sad verse on Carolina's urn,
+     And hail her passage to the realms of rest;
+     All _parts performed_ and _all_ her children blest,'
+
+may have been but too just, though cruelly bitter. The queen lingered
+till the 20th of November. During that interval of agony her consort was
+perpetually boasting to every one of her virtues, her sense, her
+patience, her softness, her delicacy; and ending with the praise,
+'_Comme elle soutenoit sa dignité avec grace, avec politesse, avec
+douceur!_' Nevertheless he scarcely ever went into her room. Lord Hervey
+states that he did, even in this moving situation, _snub_ her for
+something or other she did or said. One morning, as she lay with her
+eyes fixed on a point in the air, as people sometimes do when they want
+to keep their thoughts from wandering, the king coarsely told her 'she
+looked like a calf which had just had its throat cut.' He expected her
+to die in state. Then, with all his bursts of tenderness he always
+mingled his own praises, hinting that though she was a good wife he knew
+he had deserved a good one, and remarking, when he extolled her
+understanding, that he did not 'think it the worse for her having kept
+him company so many years.' To all this Lord Hervey listened with,
+doubtless, well-concealed disgust; for cabals were even then forming for
+the future influence that might or might not be obtained.
+
+The queen's life, meantime, was softly ebbing away in this atmosphere of
+selfishness, brutality, and unbelief. One evening she asked Dr. Tessier
+impatiently how long her state might continue.
+
+'Your Majesty,' was the reply, 'will soon be released.'
+
+'So much the better,' the queen calmly answered.
+
+At ten o'clock that night, whilst the king lay at the foot of her bed,
+on the floor, and the Princess Emily on a couch-bed in the room, the
+fearful death-rattle in the throat was heard. Mrs. Purcell, her chief
+and old attendant, gave the alarm: the Princess Caroline and Lord Hervey
+were sent for; but the princess was too late, her mother had expired
+before she arrived. All the dying queen said was, 'I have now got an
+asthma; open the window:' then she added, '_Pray!_' That was her last
+word. As the Princess Emily began to read some prayers, the sufferer
+breathed her last sigh. The Princess Caroline held a looking-glass to
+her lips, and finding there was no damp on it, said, ''Tis over!' Yet
+she shed not one tear upon the arrival of that event, the prospect of
+which had cost her so many heartrending sobs.
+
+The king kissed the lifeless face and hands of his often-injured wife,
+and then retired to his own apartment, ordering that a page should sit
+up with him for that and several other nights, for his Majesty was
+afraid of apparitions, and feared to be left alone. He caused himself,
+however, to be buried by the side of his queen, in Henry VII.'s chapel,
+and ordered that one side of his coffin and of hers should be withdrawn;
+and in that state the two coffins were discovered not many years ago.
+
+With the death of Queen Caroline, Lord Hervey's life, as to court, was
+changed. He was afterwards made lord privy seal, and had consequently to
+enter the political world, with the disadvantage of knowing that much
+was expected from a man of so high a reputation for wit and learning. He
+was violently opposed by Pelham, Duke of Newcastle, who had been adverse
+to his entering the ministry, and since, with Walpole's favour, it was
+impossible to injure him by fair means, it was resolved to oppose Lord
+Hervey by foul ones. One evening, when he was to speak, a party of
+fashionable Amazons, with two duchesses--her grace of Queensberry and
+her grace of Ancaster--at their head, stormed the House of Lords and
+disturbed the debate with noisy laughter and sneers. Poor Lord Hervey
+was completely daunted, and spoke miserably. After Sir Robert Walpole's
+fall Lord Hervey retired. The following letter from him to Lady Mary
+Wortley Montagu fully describes his position and circumstances:--
+
+'I must now,' he writes to her, 'since you take so friendly a part in
+what concerns me, give you a short account of my natural and political
+health; and when I say I am still alive, and still privy seal, it is all
+I can say for the pleasure of one or the honour of the other; for since
+Lord Orford's retiring, as I am too proud to offer my service and
+friendship where I am not sure they will be accepted of, and too
+inconsiderable to have those advances made to me (though I never forgot
+or failed to return any obligation I ever received), so I remain as
+illustrious a nothing in this office as ever filled it since it was
+erected. There is one benefit, however, I enjoy from this loss of my
+court interest, which is, that all those flies which were buzzing about
+me in the summer sunshine and full ripeness of that interest, have all
+deserted its autumnal decay, and from thinking my natural death not far
+off, and my political demise already over, have all forgot the death-bed
+of the one and the coffin of the other.'
+
+Again he wrote to her a characteristic letter:--
+
+'I have been confined these three weeks by a fever, which is a sort of
+annual tax my detestable constitution pays to our detestable climate at
+the return of every spring; it is now much abated, though not quite gone
+off.'
+
+He was long a helpless invalid; and on the 8th of August, 1743, his
+short, unprofitable, brilliant, unhappy life was closed. He died at
+Ickworth, attended and deplored by his wife, who had ever held a
+secondary part in the heart of the great wit and beau of the court of
+George II. After his death his son George returned to Lady Mary all the
+letters she had written to his father: the packet was sealed: an
+assurance was at the same time given that they had not been read. In
+acknowledging this act of attention, Lady Mary wrote that she could
+almost regret that he had not glanced his eye over a correspondence
+which might have shown him what so young a man might perhaps be inclined
+to doubt--'the possibility of a long and steady friendship subsisting
+between two persons of different sexes without the least mixture of
+love.'
+
+Nevertheless some expressions of Lord Hervey's seem to have bordered on
+the tender style, when writing to Lady Mary in such terms as these. She
+had complained that she was too old to inspire a passion (a sort of
+challenge for a compliment), on which he wrote: 'I should think anybody
+a great fool that said he liked spring better than summer, merely
+because it is further from autumn, or that they loved green fruit better
+than ripe only because it was further from being rotten. I ever did, and
+believe ever shall, like woman best--
+
+    '"Just in the noon of life--those golden days,
+      When the mind ripens ere the form decays."'
+
+Certainly this looks very unlike a pure Platonic, and it is not to be
+wondered at that Lady Hervey refused to call on Lady Mary, when, long
+after Lord Hervey's death, that fascinating woman returned to England. A
+wit, a courtier at the very fount of all politeness, Lord Hervey wanted
+the genuine source of all social qualities--Christianity. That moral
+refrigerator which checks the kindly current of neighbourly kindness,
+and which prevents all genial feeling from expanding, produced its usual
+effect--misanthropy. Lord Hervey's lines, in his 'Satire after the
+manner of Persius,' describe too well his own mental canker:--
+
+    'Mankind I know, their motives and their art,
+     Their vice their own, their virtue best apart,
+     Till played so oft, that all the cheat can tell,
+     And dangerous only when 'tis acted well.'
+
+Lord Hervey left in the possession of his family a manuscript work,
+consisting of memoirs of his own time, written in his own autograph,
+which was clean and legible. This work, which has furnished many of the
+anecdotes connected with his court life in the foregoing pages, was long
+guarded from the eye of any but the Hervey family, owing to an
+injunction given in his will by Augustus, third Earl of Bristol, Lord
+Hervey's son, that it should not see the light until after the death of
+his Majesty George III. It was not therefore published until 1848, when
+they were edited by Mr. Croker. They are referred to both by Horace
+Walpole, who had heard of them, if he had not seen them, and by Lord
+Hailes, as affording the most intimate portraiture of a court that has
+ever been presented to the English people. Such a delineation as Lord
+Hervey has left ought to cause a sentiment of thankfulness in every
+British heart for not being exposed to such influences, to such examples
+as he gives, in the present day, when goodness, affection, purity,
+benevolence, are the household deities of the court of our beloved,
+inestimable Queen Victoria.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 22: Prince Frederick.]
+
+
+
+
+    PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE, FOURTH EARL OF CHESTERFIELD.
+
+  The King of Table Wits.--Early Years.--Hervey's Description of his
+      Person.--Resolutions and Pursuits.--Study of Oratory.--The
+      Duties of an Ambassador.--King George II.'s Opinion of his
+      Chroniclers.--Life in the Country.--Melusina, Countess of
+      Walsingham.--George II. and his Father's Will.--Dissolving
+      Views.--Madame du Bouchet.--The Broad-Bottomed
+      Administration.--Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in Time of
+      Peril.--Reformation of the Calendar.--Chesterfield
+      House.--Exclusiveness.--Recommending 'Johnson's
+      Dictionary.'--'Old Samuel,' to Chesterfield.--Defensive
+      Pride.--The Glass of Fashion.--Lord Scarborough's Friendship
+      for Chesterfield.--The Death of Chesterfield's Son.--His
+      Interest in his Grandsons.--'I must go and Rehearse my
+      Funeral.'--Chesterfield's Will.--What is a Friend?--Les
+      Manières Nobles.--Letters to his Son.
+
+
+The subject of this memoir may be thought by some rather the modeller of
+wits than the original of that class; the great critic and judge of
+manners rather than the delight of the dinner-table: but we are told to
+the contrary by one who loved him not. Lord Hervey says of Lord
+Chesterfield that he was 'allowed by everybody to have more conversable
+entertaining table-wit than any man of his time; his propensity to
+ridicule, in which he indulged himself with infinite humour and no
+distinction; and his inexhaustible spirits, and no discretion; made him
+sought and feared--liked and not loved--by most of his acquaintance.'
+
+This formidable personage was born in London on the 2nd day of
+September, 1694. It was remarkable that the father of a man so
+vivacious, should have been of a morose temper; all the wit and spirit
+of intrigue displayed by him remind us of the frail Lady Chesterfield,
+in the time of Charles II.[23]--that lady who was looked on as a martyr
+because her husband was jealous of her: 'a prodigy,' says De Grammont,
+'in the city of London,' where indulgent critics endeavoured to excuse
+his lordship on account of his bad education, and mothers vowed that
+none of their sons should ever set foot in Italy, lest they should
+'bring back with them that infamous custom of laying restraint on their
+wives.'
+
+Even Horace Walpole cites Chesterfield as the 'witty earl:' apropos to
+an anecdote which he relates of an Italian lady, who said that she was
+only four-and-twenty; 'I suppose,' said Lord Chesterfield, 'she means
+four-and-twenty stone.'
+
+By his father the future wit, historian, and orator was utterly
+neglected; but his grandmother, the Marchioness of Halifax, supplied to
+him the place of both parents, his mother--her daughter, Lady Elizabeth
+Saville--having died in his childhood. At the age of eighteen,
+Chesterfield, then Lord Stanhope, was entered at Trinity Hall,
+Cambridge. It was one of the features of his character to fall at once
+into the tone of the society into which he happened to be thrown. One
+can hardly imagine his being 'an absolute pedant,' but such was,
+actually, his own account of himself:--'When I talked my best, I quoted
+Horace; when I aimed at being facetious, I quoted Martial; and when I
+had a mind to be a fine gentleman, I talked Ovid. I was convinced that
+none but the ancients had common sense; that the classics contained
+everything that was either necessary, useful, or ornamental to men; and
+I was not even without thoughts of wearing the toga virilis of the
+Romans, instead of the vulgar and illiberal dress of the moderns.'
+
+Thus, again, when in Paris, he caught the manners, as he had acquired
+the language, of the Parisians. 'I shall not give you my opinion of the
+French, because I am very often taken for one of them, and several have
+paid me the highest compliment they think it in their power to
+bestow--which is, "Sir, you are just like ourselves." I shall only tell
+you that I am insolent; I talk a great deal; I am very loud and
+peremptory; I sing and dance as I walk along; and, above all, I spend an
+immense sum in hair-powder, feathers, and white gloves.'
+
+Although he entered Parliament before he had attained the legal age,
+and was expected to make a great figure in that assembly, Lord
+Chesterfield preferred the reputation of a wit and a beau to any other
+distinction. 'Call it vanity, if you will,' he wrote in after-life to
+his son, 'and possibly it was so; but my great object was to make every
+man and every woman love me. I often succeeded: but why? by taking great
+pains.'
+
+According to Lord Hervey's account he often even sacrificed his interest
+to his vanity. The description given of Lord Chesterfield by one as
+bitter as himself implies, indeed, that great pains were requisite to
+counterbalance the defects of nature. Wilkes, one of the ugliest men of
+his time, used to say, that with an hour's start he would carry off the
+affections of any woman from the handsomest man breathing. Lord
+Chesterfield, according to Lord Hervey, required to be still longer in
+advance of a rival.
+
+'With a person,' Hervey writes, 'as disagreeable, as it was possible for
+a human figure to be without being deformed, he affected following many
+women of the first beauty and the most in fashion. He was very short,
+disproportioned, thick and clumsily made; had a broad, rough-featured,
+ugly face, with black teeth, and a head big enough for a Polyphemus. One
+Ben Ashurst, who said a few good things, though admired for many, told
+Lord Chesterfield once, that he was like a stunted giant--which was a
+humorous idea and really apposite.'
+
+Notwithstanding that Chesterfield, when young, injured both soul and
+body by pleasure and dissipation, he always found time for serious
+study: when he could not have it otherwise, he took it out of his sleep.
+How late soever he went to bed, he resolved always to rise early; and
+this resolution he adhered to so faithfully, that at the age of
+fifty-eight he could declare that for more than forty years he had never
+been in bed at nine o'clock in the morning, but had generally been up
+before eight. He had the good sense, in this respect, not to exaggerate
+even this homely virtue. He did not rise with the dawn, as many early
+risers pride themselves in doing, putting all the engagements of
+ordinary life out of their usual beat, just as if the clocks had been
+set two hours forward. The man in ordinary society, who rises at four in
+this country, and goes to bed at nine, is a social and family nuisance.
+Strong good sense characterized Chesterfield's early pursuits. Desultory
+reading he abhorred. He looked on it as one of the resources of age, but
+as injurious to the young in the extreme. 'Throw away,' thus he writes
+to his son, 'none of your time upon those trivial, futile books,
+published by idle necessitous authors for the amusement of idle and
+ignorant readers.'
+
+Even in those days such books 'swarm and buzz about one:' 'flap them
+away,' says Chesterfield, 'they have no sting.' The earl directed the
+whole force of his mind to oratory, and became the finest speaker of his
+time. Writing to Sir Horace Mann, about the Hanoverian debate (in 1743,
+Dec. 15), Walpole praising the speeches of Lords Halifax and Sandwich,
+adds, 'I was there, and heard Lord Chesterfield make the finest oration
+I have ever heard there.' This from a man who had listened to Pulteney,
+to Chatham, to Carteret, was a singularly valuable tribute.
+
+Whilst a student at Cambridge, Chesterfield was forming an acquaintance
+with the Hon. George Berkeley, the youngest son of the second Earl of
+Berkeley, and remarkable rather as being the second husband of Lady
+Suffolk, the favourite of George II., than from any merits or demerits
+of his own.
+
+This early intimacy probably brought Lord Chesterfield into the close
+friendship which afterwards subsisted between him and Lady Suffolk, to
+whom many of his letters are addressed.
+
+His first public capacity was a diplomatic appointment: he afterwards
+attained to the rank of an ambassador, whose duty it is, according to a
+witticism of Sir Henry Wotton's '_to lie_ abroad for the good of his
+country;' and no man was in this respect more competent to fulfil these
+requirements than Chesterfield. Hating both wine and tobacco, he had
+smoked and drunk at Cambridge, 'to be in the fashion;' he gamed at the
+Hague, on the same principle; and, unhappily, gaming became a habit and
+a passion. Yet never did he indulge it when acting, afterwards, in a
+ministerial capacity. Neither when Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, or as
+Under-secretary of State, did he allow a gaming-table in his house. On
+the very night that he resigned office he went to _White's_.
+
+The Hague was then a charming residence: among others who, from
+political motives, were living there, were John Duke of Marlborough and
+Queen Sarah, both of whom paid Chesterfield marked attention. Naturally
+industrious, with a ready insight into character--a perfect master in
+that art which bids us keep one's thoughts close, and our countenances
+open, Chesterfield was admirably fitted for diplomacy. A master of
+modern languages and of history, he soon began to like business. When in
+England, he had been accused of having 'a need of a certain proportion
+of talk in a day:' 'that,' he wrote to Lady Suffolk, 'is now changed
+into a need of such a proportion of writing in a day.'
+
+In 1728 he was promoted: being sent as ambassador to the Hague, where he
+was popular, and where he believed his stay would be beneficial both to
+soul and body, there being 'fewer temptations, and fewer opportunities
+to sin,' as he wrote to Lady Suffolk, 'than in England.' Here his days
+passed, he asserted, in doing the king's business, very ill--and his own
+still worse:--sitting down daily to dinner with fourteen or fifteen
+people; whilst at five the pleasures of the evening began with a lounge
+on the Voorhoot, a public walk planted by Charles V.:--then, either a
+very bad French play, or a '_reprise quadrille_,' with three ladies, the
+youngest of them fifty, and the chance of losing, perhaps, three florins
+(besides one's time)--lasted till ten o'clock; at which time 'His
+Excellency' went home, 'reflecting with satisfaction on the innocent
+amusements of a well-spent day, that left nothing behind them,' and
+retired to bed at eleven, 'with the testimony of a good conscience.'
+
+All, however, of Chesterfield's time was not passed in this serene
+dissipation. He began to compose 'The History of the Reign of George
+II.' at this period. About only half a dozen chapters were written. The
+intention was not confined to Chesterfield: Carteret and Bolingbroke
+entertained a similar design, which was completed by neither. When the
+subject was broached before George II., he thus expressed himself; and
+his remarks are the more amusing as they were addressed to Lord Hervey,
+who was, at that very moment, making his notes for that bitter chronicle
+of his majesty's reign, which has been ushered into the world by the
+late Wilson Croker--'They will all three,' said King George II., 'have
+about as much truth in them as the _Mille et Une Nuits_. Not but I shall
+like to read Bolingbroke's, who of all those rascals and knaves that
+have been lying against me these ten years has certainly the best parts,
+and the most knowledge. He is a scoundrel, but he is a scoundrel of a
+higher class than Chesterfield. Chesterfield is a little, tea-table
+scoundrel, that tells little womanish lies to make quarrels in families:
+and tries to make women lose their reputations, and make their husbands
+beat them, without any object but to give himself airs; as if anybody
+could believe a woman could like a dwarf baboon.'
+
+Lord Hervey gave the preference to Bolingbroke; stating as his reason,
+that 'though Lord Bolingbroke had no idea of wit, his satire was keener
+than any one's. Lord Chesterfield, on the other hand, would have a great
+deal of wit in them; but, in every page you see he intended to be witty:
+every paragraph would be an epigram. _Polish_, he declared, would be his
+bane;' and Lord Hervey was perfectly right.
+
+In 1732 Lord Chesterfield was obliged to retire from his embassy on the
+plea of ill-health, but probably, from some political cause. He was in
+the opposition against Sir Robert Walpole in the Excise Bill; and felt
+the displeasure of that all-powerful minister by being dismissed from
+his office of High Steward.
+
+Being badly received at court he now lived in the country; sometimes at
+Buxton, where his father drank the waters, where he had his recreations,
+when not persecuted by two young brothers. Sir William Stanhope and John
+Stanhope, one of whom performed 'tolerably ill upon a broken hautboy,
+and the other something worse upon a cracked flute.' There he won three
+half-crowns from the curate of the place, and a shilling from 'Gaffer
+Foxeley' at a cock-match. Sometimes he sought relaxation in Scarborough,
+where fashionable beaux 'danced with the pretty ladies all night,' and
+hundreds of Yorkshire country bumpkins 'played the inferior parts; and,
+as it were, only tumble, whilst the others dance upon the high ropes of
+gallantry.' Scarborough was full of Jacobites: the popular feeling was
+then all rife against Sir Robert Walpole's excise scheme. Lord
+Chesterfield thus wittily satirized that famous measure:--
+
+'The people of this town are, at present, in great consternation upon a
+report they have heard from London, which, if true, they think will ruin
+them. They are informed, that considering the vast consumption of these
+waters, there is a design laid of _excising_ them next session; and,
+moreover, that as bathing in the sea is become the general practice of
+both sexes, and as the kings of England have always been allowed to be
+masters of the seas, every person so bathing shall be gauged, and pay so
+much per foot square, as their cubical bulk amounts to.'
+
+In 1733, Lord Chesterfield married Melusina, the supposed niece, but, in
+fact, the daughter of the Duchess of Kendal, the mistress of George I.
+This lady was presumed to be a great heiress, from the dominion which
+her mother had over the king. Melusina had been created (for life)
+Baroness of Aldborough, county Suffolk, and Countess of Walsingham,
+county Norfolk, nine years previous to her marriage.
+
+Her father being George I., as Horace Walpole terms him, 'rather a good
+sort of man than a shining king,' and her mother 'being no genius,'
+there was probably no great attraction about Lady Walsingham, except her
+expected dowry.
+
+During her girlhood Melusina resided in the apartments at St.
+James's--opening into the garden; and here Horace Walpole describes his
+seeing George I., in the rooms appropriated to the Duchess of Kendal,
+next to those of Melusina Schulemberg, or, as she was then called, the
+Countess of Walsingham. The Duchess of Kendal was then very 'lean and
+ill-favoured.' 'Just before her,' says Horace, 'stood a tall, elderly
+man, rather pale, of an aspect rather good-natured than august: in a
+dark tie-wig, a plain coat, waistcoat, and breeches of snuff-coloured
+cloth, with stockings of the same colour, and a blue riband over all.
+That was George I.'
+
+[Illustration: A ROYAL ROBBER.]
+
+The Duchess of Kendal had been maid of honour to the Electress
+Sophia, the mother of George I. and the daughter of Elizabeth of
+Bohemia. The duchess was always frightful; so much so that one night the
+electress, who had acquired a little English, said to Mrs. Howard,
+afterwards Lady Suffolk,--glancing at Mademoiselle Schulemberg--'Look at
+that _mawkin_, and think of her being my son's passion!'
+
+The duchess, however, like all the Hanoverians, knew how to profit by
+royal preference. She took bribes:--she had a settlement of £3,000 a
+year. But her daughter was eventually disappointed of the expected
+bequest from her father, the king.[24]
+
+In the apartments at St. James's Lord Chesterfield for some time lived,
+when he was not engaged in office abroad; and there he dissipated large
+sums in play. It was here, too, that Queen Caroline, the wife of George
+II., detected the intimacy that existed between Chesterfield and Lady
+Suffolk. There was an obscure window in Queen Caroline's apartments,
+which looked into a dark passage, lighted only by a single lamp at
+night. One Twelfth Night Lord Chesterfield, having won a large sum at
+cards, deposited it with Lady Suffolk, thinking it not safe to carry it
+home at night. He was watched, and his intimacy with the mistress of
+George II. thereupon inferred. Thenceforth he could obtain no court
+influence; and, in desperation, he went into the opposition.
+
+On the death of George I., a singular scene, with which Lord
+Chesterfield's interests were connected, occurred in the Privy Council.
+Dr Wake, Archbishop of Canterbury, produced the king's will, and
+delivered it to his successor, expecting that it would be opened and
+read in the council; what was his consternation, when his Majesty,
+without saying a word, put it into his pocket, and stalked out of the
+room with real German imperturbability! Neither the astounded prelate
+nor the subservient council ventured to utter a word. The will was never
+more heard of: and rumour declared that it was burnt. The contents, of
+course, never transpired; and the legacy of £40,000, said to have been
+left to the Duchess of Kendal, was never more spoken of, until Lord
+Chesterfield, in 1733, married the Countess of Walsingham. In 1743, it
+is said, he claimed the legacy--in right of his wife--the Duchess of
+Kendal being then dead: and was 'quieted' with £20,000, and got, as
+Horace Walpole observes, nothing from the duchess--'except his wife.'
+
+The only excuse that was urged to extenuate this act on the part of
+George II., was that his royal father had burned two wills which had
+been made in his favour. These were supposed to be the wills of the Duke
+and Duchess of Zell and of the Electress Sophia. There was not even
+common honesty in the house of Hanover at that period.
+
+Disappointed in his wife's fortune, Lord Chesterfield seems to have
+cared very little for the disappointed heiress. Their union was
+childless. His opinion of marriage appears very much to have coincided
+with that of the world of malcontents who rush, in the present day, to
+the court of Judge Cresswell, with 'dissolving views.' On one occasion
+he writes thus: 'I have at last done the best office that can be done to
+most married people; that is, I have fixed the separation between my
+brother and his wife, and the definitive treaty of peace will be
+proclaimed in about a fortnight.'
+
+Horace Walpole related the following anecdote of Sir William Stanhope
+(Chesterfield's brother) and his lady, whom he calls 'a fond couple.'
+After their return from Paris, when they arrived at Lord Chesterfield's
+house at Blackheath, Sir William, who had, like his brother, a cutting,
+polite wit, that was probably expressed with the 'allowed simper' of
+Lord Chesterfield, got out of the chaise and said, with a low bow,
+'Madame, I hope I shall never see your face again.' She replied, 'Sir, I
+will take care that you never shall;' and so they parted.
+
+There was little probability of Lord Chesterfield's participating in
+domestic felicity, when neither his heart nor his fancy were engaged in
+the union which he had formed. The lady to whom he was really attached,
+and by whom he had a son, resided in the Netherlands: she passed by the
+name of Madame du Bouchet, and survived both Lord Chesterfield and her
+son. A permanent provision was made for her, and a sum of five hundred
+pounds bequeathed to her, with these words: 'as a small reparation for
+the injury I did her.' 'Certainly,' adds Lord Mahon, in his Memoir of
+his illustrious ancestor, 'a small one.'
+
+For some time Lord Chesterfield remained in England, and his letters are
+dated from Bath, from Tonbridge, from Blackheath. He had, in 1726, been
+elevated to the House of Lords upon the death of his father. In that
+assembly his great eloquence is thus well described by his
+biographer:--[25]
+
+'Lord Chesterfield's eloquence, the fruit of much study, was less
+characterized by force and compass than by elegance and perspicuity, and
+especially by good taste and urbanity, and a vein of delicate irony
+which, while it sometimes inflicted severe strokes, never passed the
+limits of decency and propriety. It was that of a man who, in the union
+of wit and good sense with politeness, had not a competitor. These
+qualities were matured by the advantage which he assiduously sought and
+obtained, of a familiar acquaintance with almost all the eminent wits
+and writers of his time, many of whom had been the ornaments of a
+preceding age of literature, while others were destined to become those
+of a later period.'
+
+The accession of George II., to whose court Lord Chesterfield had been
+attached for many years, brought him no political preferment. The court
+had, however, its attractions even for one who owed his polish to the
+belles of Paris, and who was almost always, in taste and manners, more
+foreign than English. Henrietta, Lady Pomfret, the daughter and heiress
+of John, Lord Jeffreys, the son of Judge Jeffreys, was at that time the
+leader of fashion.
+
+Six daughters, one of them, Lady Sophia, surpassingly lovely recalled
+the perfections of that ancestress, Arabella Fermor whose charms Pope
+has so exquisitely touched in the 'Rape of the Lock.' Lady Sophia became
+eventually the wife of Lord Carteret, the minister, whose talents and
+the charms of whose eloquence constituted him a sort of rival to
+Chesterfield. With all his abilities, Lord Chesterfield may be said to
+have failed both as a courtier and as a political character, as far as
+permanent influence in any ministry was concerned, until in 1744, when
+what was called the 'Broad-bottomed administration' was formed, when he
+was admitted into the cabinet. In the following year, however, he went,
+for the last time, to Holland, as ambassador, and succeeded beyond the
+expectations of his party in the purposes of his embassy. He took leave
+of the States-General just before the battle of Fontenoy, and hastened
+to Ireland, where he had been nominated Lord-Lieutenant previous to his
+journey to Holland. He remained in that country only a year; but long
+enough to prove how liberal were his views--how kindly the dispositions
+of his heart.
+
+Only a few years before Lord Chesterfield's arrival in Dublin, the Duke
+of Shrewsbury had given as a reason for accepting the vice-regency of
+that country, (of which King James I. had said, there was 'more ado'
+than with any of his dominions,) 'that it was a place where a man had
+business enough to keep him from falling asleep, and not enough to keep
+him awake.'
+
+Chesterfield, however, was not of that opinion. He did more in one year
+than the duke would have accomplished in five. He began by instituting a
+principle of impartial justice. Formerly, Protestants had alone been
+employed as 'managers;' the Lieutenant was to see with Protestant eyes,
+to hear with Protestant ears.
+
+'I have determined to proscribe no set of persons whatever,' says
+Chesterfield, 'and determined to be governed by none. Had the Papists
+made any attempt to put themselves above the law, I should have taken
+good care to have quelled them again. It was said my lenity to the
+Papists had wrought no alteration either in their religious or their
+political sentiments. I did not expect that it would: but surely that
+was no reason for cruelty towards them.'
+
+Often by a timely jest Chesterfield conveyed a hint, or even shrouded a
+reproof. One of the ultra-zealous informed him that his coachman was a
+Papist, and went every Sunday to mass. 'Does he indeed? I will take care
+he never drives me there,' was Chesterfield's cool reply.
+
+It was at this critical period, when the Hanoverian dynasty was shaken
+almost to its downfall by the insurrection in Scotland of 1745, that
+Ireland was imperilled: 'With a weak or wavering, or a fierce and
+headlong Lord-Lieutenant--with a Grafton or a Strafford,' remarks Lord
+Mahon, 'there would soon have been a simultaneous rising in the Emerald
+Isle.' But Chesterfield's energy, his lenity, his wise and just
+administration saved the Irish from being excited into rebellion by the
+emissaries of Charles Edward, or slaughtered, when conquered, by the
+'Butcher,' and his tiger-like dragoons. When all was over, and that sad
+page of history in which the deaths of so many faithful adherents of the
+exiled family are recorded, had been held up to the gaze of bleeding
+Caledonia, Chesterfield recommended mild measures, and advised the
+establishment of schools in the Highlands; but the age was too
+narrow-minded to adopt his views. In January, 1748, Chesterfield retired
+from public life. 'Could I do any good,' he wrote to a friend, 'I would
+sacrifice some more quiet to it; but convinced as I am that I can do
+none, I will indulge my ease, and preserve my character. I have gone
+through pleasures while my constitution and my spirits would allow me.
+Business succeeded them; and I have now gone through every part of it
+without liking it at all the better for being acquainted with it. Like
+many other things, it is most admired by those who know it least.... I
+have been behind the scenes both of pleasure and business; I have seen
+all the coarse pulleys and dirty ropes which exhibit and move all the
+gaudy machines; and I have seen and smelt the tallow candles which
+illuminate the whole decoration, to the astonishment and admiration of
+the ignorant multitude.... My horse, my books, and my friends will
+divide my time pretty equally.'
+
+He still interested himself in what was useful; and carried a Bill in
+the House of Lords for the Reformation of the Calendar, in 1751. It
+seems a small matter for so great a mind as his to accomplish, but it
+was an achievement of infinite difficulty. Many statesmen had shrunk
+from the undertaking; and even Chesterfield found it essential to
+prepare the public, by writing in some periodical papers on the subject.
+Nevertheless the vulgar outcry was vehement: 'Give us back the eleven
+days we have been robbed of!' cried the mob at a general election. When
+Bradley was dying, the common people ascribed his sufferings to a
+judgment for the part he had taken in that 'impious transaction,' the
+alteration of the calendar. But they were not less _bornés_ in their
+notions than the Duke of Newcastle, then prime minister. Upon Lord
+Chesterfield giving him notice of his Bill, that bustling premier, who
+had been in a hurry for forty years, who never 'walked but always ran,'
+greatly alarmed, begged Chesterfield not to stir matters that had been
+long quiet; adding, that he did not like 'new-fangled things.' He was,
+as we have seen, overruled, and henceforth the New Style was adopted;
+and no special calamity has fallen on the nation, as was expected, in
+consequence. Nevertheless, after Chesterfield had made his speech in the
+House of Lords, and when every one had complimented him on the clearness
+of his explanation--'God knows,' he wrote to his son, 'I had not even
+attempted to explain the Bill to them; I might as soon have talked
+Celtic or Sclavonic to them as astronomy. They would have understood it
+full as well.' So much for the 'Lords' in those days!
+
+After his _furore_ for politics had subsided, Chesterfield returned to
+his ancient passion for play. We must linger a little over the still
+brilliant period of his middle life, whilst his hearing was spared;
+whilst his wit remained, and the charming manners on which he had formed
+a science, continued; and before we see him in the mournful decline of a
+life wholly given to the world.
+
+He had now established himself in Chesterfield House. Hitherto his
+progenitors had been satisfied with Bloomsbury Square, in which the Lord
+Chesterfield mentioned by De Grammont resided; but the accomplished
+Chesterfield chose a site near Audley Street, which had been built on
+what was called Mr. Audley's land, lying between Great Brook Field and
+the 'Shoulder of Mutton Field.' And near this locality with the elegant
+name, Chesterfield chose his spot, for which he had to wrangle and fight
+with the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, who asked an exorbitant sum
+for the ground. Isaac Ware, the editor of 'Palladio,' was the architect
+to whom the erection of this handsome residence was intrusted. Happily
+it is still untouched by any _renovating_ hand. Chesterfield's favourite
+apartments, looking on the most spacious private garden in London, are
+just as they were in his time; one especially, which he termed the
+'finest room in London,' was furnished and decorated by him. 'The
+walls,' says a writer in the 'Quarterly Review,' 'are covered half way
+up with rich and classical stores of literature; above the cases are in
+close series the portraits of eminent authors, French and English, with
+most of whom he had conversed; over these, and immediately under the
+massive cornice, extend all round in foot-long capitals the Horatian
+lines:--
+
+    'Nunc . veterum . libris . Nunc . somno . et . inertibus . Horis.
+     Lucen . solicter . jucunda . oblivia . vitea.
+
+'On the mantel-pieces and cabinets stand busts of old orators,
+interspersed with voluptuous vases and bronzes, antique or Italian, and
+airy statuettes in marble or alabaster of nude or semi-nude opera
+nymphs.'
+
+What Chesterfield called the 'cannonical pillars' of the house were
+columns brought from Cannons, near Edgeware, the seat of the Duke of
+Chandos. The antechamber of Chesterfield House has been erroneously
+stated as the room in which Johnson waited the great lord's pleasure.
+That state of endurance was probably passed by 'Old Samuel' in
+Bloomsbury.
+
+In this stately abode--one of the few, the very few, that seem to hold
+_noblesse_ apart in our levelling metropolis--Chesterfield held his
+assemblies of all that London, or indeed England, Paris, the Hague, or
+Vienna, could furnish of what was polite and charming. Those were days
+when the stream of society did not, as now, flow freely, mingling with
+the grace of aristocracy the acquirements of hard-working professors;
+there was then a strong line of demarcation; it had not been broken down
+in the same way as now, when people of rank and wealth live in rows,
+instead of inhabiting hotels set apart. Paris has sustained a similar
+revolution, since her gardens were built over, and their green shades,
+delicious, in the centre of that hot city, are seen no more. In the very
+Faubourg St. Germain, the grand old hotels are rapidly disappearing, and
+with them something of the exclusiveness of the higher orders. Lord
+Chesterfield, however, triumphantly pointing to the fruits of his taste
+and distribution of his wealth, witnessed, in his library at
+Chesterfield House, the events which time produced. He heard of the
+death of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, and of her bequest to him of
+twenty thousand pounds, and her best and largest brilliant diamond ring,
+'out of the great regard she had for his merit, and the infinite
+obligations she had received from him.' He witnessed the change of
+society and of politics which occurred when George II. expired, and the
+Earl of Bute, calling himself a descendant of the house of Stuart, 'and
+humble enough to be proud of it,' having quitted the isle of Bute, which
+Lord Chesterfield calls 'but a little south of Nova Zembla,' took
+possession, not only of the affections, but even of the senses of the
+young king, George III., who, assisted by the widowed Princess of Wales
+(supposed to be attached to Lord Bute), was 'lugged out of the
+seraglio,' and 'placed upon the throne.'
+
+Chesterfield lived to have the honour of having the plan of 'Johnson's
+Dictionary' inscribed to him, and the dishonour of neglecting the great
+author. Johnson, indeed, denied the truth of the story which gained
+general belief, in which it was asserted that he had taken a disgust at
+being kept waiting in the earl's antechamber, the reason being assigned
+that his lordship 'had company with him;' when at last the door opened,
+and forth came Colley Cibber. Then Johnson--so report said--indignant,
+not only for having been kept waiting but also for _whom_, went away, it
+was affirmed, in disgust; but this was solemnly denied by the doctor,
+who assured Boswell that his wrath proceeded from continual neglect on
+the part of Chesterfield.
+
+Whilst the Dictionary was in progress, Chesterfield seemed to forget the
+existence of him, whom, together with the other literary men, he
+affected to patronize.
+
+He once sent him ten pounds, after which he forgot Johnson's address,
+and said 'the great author had changed his lodgings.' People who really
+wish to benefit others can always discover where they lodge. The days of
+patronage were then expiring, but they had not quite ceased, and a
+dedication was always to be in some way paid for.
+
+When the publication of the Dictionary drew near, Lord Chesterfield
+flattered himself that, in spite of all his neglect, the great
+compliment of having so vast an undertaking dedicated to him would still
+be paid, and wrote some papers in the 'World,' recommending the work,
+more especially referring to the 'plan,' and terming Johnson the
+'dictator,' in respect to language: 'I will not only obey him,' he said,
+'as my dictator, like an old Roman, but like a modern Roman, will
+implicitly believe in him as my pope.'
+
+Johnson, however, was not to be propitiated by those 'honeyed words.' He
+wrote a letter couched in what he called 'civil terms,' to Chesterfield,
+from which we extract the following passages:
+
+'When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your lordship, I
+was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the enchantment of your
+address; and could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself
+_vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre_--that I might obtain that regard
+for which I saw the world contending; but I found my attendance so
+little encouraged, that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to
+continue it. When I had once addressed your lordship in publick, I had
+exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly scholar
+can possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well pleased to
+have his all neglected, be it ever so little.
+
+'Seven years, my lord, have now past, since I waited in your outward
+room, or was repulsed from your door, during which time I have been
+pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to
+complain, and have brought it, at last, to the verge of publication
+without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile
+of favour: such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a patron
+before.... Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a
+man who is struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached
+ground, encumbers him with help? The notice which you have been pleased
+to take of my labours, had it been early, had been kind; but it has been
+delayed till I am indifferent and cannot enjoy it; till I am solitary
+and cannot impart it; till I am known and do not want it. I hope it is
+no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations where no benefit has
+been received, or to be unwilling that the publick should consider me as
+owing that to a patron which Providence has enabled me to do for
+myself.'
+
+The conduct of Johnson, on this occasion, was approved by most manly
+minds, except that of his publisher, Mr. Robert Dodsley; Dr. Adams, a
+friend of Dodsley, said he was sorry that Johnson had written that
+celebrated letter (a very model of polite contempt). Dodsley said he was
+sorry too, for he had a property in the Dictionary, to which his
+lordship's patronage might be useful. He then said that Lord
+Chesterfield had shown him the letter. 'I should have thought,' said
+Adams, 'that Lord Chesterfield would have concealed it.' 'Pooh!' cried
+Dodsley, 'do you think a letter from Johnson could hurt Lord
+Chesterfield? not at all, sir. It lay on his table, where any one might
+see it. He read it to me; said, "this man has great powers," pointed out
+the severest passages, and said, "how well they were expressed."' The
+art of dissimulation, in which Chesterfield was perfect, imposed on Mr.
+Dodsley.
+
+Dr. Adams expostulated with the doctor, and said Lord Chesterfield
+declared he would part with the best servant he had, if he had known
+that he had turned away a man who was '_always_ welcome.' Then Adams
+insisted on Lord Chesterfield's affability, and easiness of access to
+literary men. But the sturdy Johnson replied, 'Sir, that is not Lord
+Chesterfield; he is the proudest man existing.' 'I think,' Adams
+rejoined, 'I know one that is prouder; you, by your own account, are the
+prouder of the two.' 'But mine,' Johnson answered, with one of his happy
+turns, 'was defensive pride.' 'This man,' he afterwards said, referring
+to Chesterfield, 'I thought had been a lord among wits, but I find he is
+only a wit among lords.'
+
+In revenge, Chesterfield in his Letters depicted Johnson, it is said, in
+the character of the 'respectable Hottentot.' Amongst other things, he
+observed of the Hottentot, 'he throws his meat anywhere but down his
+throat.' This being remarked to Johnson, who was by no means pleased at
+being immortalized as the Hottentot--'Sir,' he answered, 'Lord
+Chesterfield never saw me eat in his life.'
+
+[Illustration: DR. JOHNSON AT LORD CHESTERFIELD'S.]
+
+Such are the leading points of this famous and lasting controversy. It
+is amusing to know that Lord Chesterfield was not always precise as to
+directions to his letters. He once directed to Lord Pembroke, who was
+always swimming 'To the Earl of Pembroke, in the Thames, over against
+Whitehall. This, as Horace Walpole remarks, was sure of finding him
+within a certain fathom.'
+
+Lord Chesterfield was now admitted to be the very 'glass of fashion,'
+though age, and, according to Lord Hervey, a hideous person, impeded his
+being the 'mould of form.' 'I don't know why,' writes Horace Walpole, in
+the dog-days, from Strawberry Hill, 'but people are always more anxious
+about their hay than their corn, or twenty other things that cost them
+more: I suppose my Lord Chesterfield, or some such dictator, made it
+fashionable to care about one's hay. Nobody betrays solicitude about
+getting in his rents.' 'The prince of wits,' as the same authority calls
+him--'his entrance into the world was announced by his bon-mots, and his
+closing lips dropped repartees that sparkled with his juvenile fire.'
+
+No one, it was generally allowed, had such a force of table-wit as Lord
+Chesterfield; but while the 'Graces' were ever his theme, he indulged
+himself without distinction or consideration in numerous sallies. He
+was, therefore, at once sought and feared; liked but not loved; neither
+sex nor relationship, nor rank, nor friendship, nor obligation, nor
+profession, could shield his victim from what Lord Hervey calls, 'those
+pointed, glittering weapons, that seemed to shine only to a stander-by,
+but cut deep into those they touched.'
+
+He cherished 'a voracious appetite for abuse;' fell upon every one that
+came in his way, and thus treated each one of his companions at the
+expense of the other. To him Hervey, who had probably often smarted,
+applied the lines of Boileau--
+
+    'Mais c'est un petit fou qui se croit tout permis,
+     Et qui pour un bon mot va perdre vingt amis.'
+
+Horace Walpole (a more lenient judge of Chesterfield's merits) observes
+that 'Chesterfield took no less pains to be the phoenix of fine
+gentlemen, than Tully did to qualify himself as an orator. Both
+succeeded: Tully immortalized his name; Chesterfield's reign lasted a
+little longer than that of a fashionable beauty.' It was, perhaps,
+because, as Dr. Johnson said, all Lord Chesterfield's witty sayings were
+puns, that even his brilliant wit failed to please, although it amused,
+and surprised its hearers.
+
+Notwithstanding the contemptuous description of Lord Chesterfield's
+personal appearance by Lord Hervey, his portraits represent a handsome,
+though hard countenance, well-marked features, and his figure and air
+appear to have been elegant. With his commanding talents, his wonderful
+brilliancy and fluency of conversation, he would perhaps sometimes have
+been even tedious, had it not been for his invariable cheerfulness. He
+was always, as Lord Hervey says, 'present' in his company. Amongst the
+few friends who really loved this thorough man of the world, was Lord
+Scarborough, yet no two characters were more opposite. Lord Scarborough
+had judgment, without wit: Chesterfield wit, and no judgment; Lord
+Scarborough had honesty and principle; Lord Chesterfield had neither.
+Everybody liked the one, but did not care for his company. Everyone
+disliked the other, but wished for his company. The fact was,
+Scarborough was 'splendid and absent.' Chesterfield 'cheerful and
+present:' wit, grace, attention to what is passing, the surface, as it
+were, of a highly-cultured mind, produced a fascination with which all
+the honour and respectability in the Court of George II. could not
+compete.
+
+In the earlier part of Chesterfield's career, Pope, Bolingbroke, Hervey,
+Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, and, in fact, all that could add to the
+pleasures of the then early dinner-table, illumined Chesterfield House
+by their wit and gaiety. Yet in the midst of this exciting life, Lord
+Chesterfield found time to devote to the improvement of his natural son,
+Philip Stanhope, a great portion of his leisure. His celebrated Letters
+to that son did not, however, appear during the earl's life; nor were
+they in any way the source of his popularity as a wit, which was due to
+his merits in that line alone.
+
+The youth to whom these letters, so useful and yet so objectionable,
+were addressed, was intended for a diplomatist. He was the very reverse
+of his father: learned, sensible, and dry; but utterly wanting in the
+graces, and devoid of eloquence. As an orator, therefore, he failed; as
+a man of society, he must also have failed; and his death, in 1768, some
+years before that of his father, left that father desolate, and
+disappointed. Philip Stanhope had attained the rank of envoy to Dresden,
+where he expired.
+
+During the five years in which Chesterfield dragged out a mournful life
+after this event, he made the painful discovery that his son had married
+without confiding that step to the father to whom he owed so much. This
+must have been almost as trying as the awkward, ungraceful deportment of
+him whom he mourned. The world now left Chesterfield ere he had left the
+world. He and his contemporary Lord Tyrawley were now old and infirm.
+'The fact is,' Chesterfield wittily said, 'Tyrawley and I have been dead
+these two years, but we don't choose to have it known.'
+
+'The Bath,' he wrote to his friend Dayrolles, 'did me more good than I
+thought anything could do me; but all that good does not amount to what
+builders call half-repairs, and only keeps up the shattered fabric a
+little longer than it would have stood without them; but take my word
+for it, it will stand but a very little while longer. I am now in my
+grand climacteric, and shall not complete it. Fontenelle's last words at
+a hundred and three were, _Je souffre d'être._ deaf and infirm as I am,
+I can with truth say the same thing at sixty-three. In my mind it is
+only the strength of our passions, and the weakness of our reason, that
+makes us so fond of life; but when the former subside and give way to
+the latter, we grow weary of being, and willing to withdraw. I do not
+recommend this train of serious reflections to you, nor ought you to
+adopt them.... You have children to educate and provide for, you have
+all your senses, and can enjoy all the comforts both of domestic and
+social life. I am in every sense _isolé_, and have wound up all my
+bottoms; I may now walk off quietly, without missing nor being missed.'
+
+The kindness of his nature, corrupted as it was by a life wholly
+worldly, and but little illumined in its course by religion, shone now
+in his care of his two grandsons, the offspring of his lost son, and of
+their mother, Eugenia Stanhope. To her he thus wrote:--
+
+'The last time I had the pleasure of seeing you, I was so taken up in
+playing with the boys, that I forgot their more important affairs. How
+soon would you have them placed at school? When I know your pleasure as
+to that, I will send to Monsieur Perny, to prepare everything for their
+reception. In the mean time, I beg that you will equip them thoroughly
+with clothes, linen, &c., all good, but plain; and give me the amount,
+which I will pay; for I do not intend, from this time forwards, the two
+boys should cost you one shilling.'
+
+He lived, latterly, much at Blackheath, in the house which, being built
+on Crown land, has finally become the Ranger's lodge; but which still
+sometimes goes by the name of Chesterfield House. Here he spent large
+sums, especially on pictures, and cultivated Cantelupe melons; and here,
+as he grew older, and became permanently afflicted with deafness, his
+chief companion was a useful friend, Solomon Dayrolles--one of those
+indebted hangers-on whom it was an almost invariable custom to find, at
+that period, in great houses--and perhaps too frequently in our own day.
+
+Dayrolles, who was employed in the embassy under Lord Sandwich at the
+Hague, had always, to borrow Horace Walpole's ill-natured expression,
+'been a led-captain to the Dukes of Richmond and Grafton, used to be
+sent to auctions for them, and to walk in the parks with their
+daughters, and once went dry-nurse in Holland with them. He has
+belonged, too, a good deal to my Lord Chesterfield, to whom I believe he
+owes this new honour, "that of being minister at the Hague," as he had
+before made him black-rod in Ireland, and gave the ingenious reason that
+he had a black face.' But the great 'dictator' in the empire of
+politeness was now in a slow but sure decline. Not long before his
+death he was visited by Monsieur Suard, a French gentleman, who was
+anxious to see '_l'homme le plus aimable, le plus poli et le plus
+spirituel des trois royaumes_,' but who found him fearfully altered;
+morose from his deafness, yet still anxious to please. 'It is very sad,'
+he said, with his usual politeness, 'to be deaf, when one would so much
+enjoy listening. I am not,' he added, 'so philosophic as my friend the
+President de Montesquieu, who says, "I know how to be blind, but I do
+not yet know how to be deaf."' 'We shortened our visit,' says M. Suard,
+'lest we should fatigue the earl.' 'I do not detain you,' said
+Chesterfield, 'for I must go and rehearse my funeral.' It was thus that
+he styled his daily drive through the streets of London.
+
+Lord Chesterfield's wonderful memory continued till his latest hour. As
+he lay, gasping in the last agonies of extreme debility, his friend, Mr.
+Dayrolles, called in to see him half an hour before he expired. The
+politeness which had become part of his very nature did not desert the
+dying earl. He managed to say, in a low voice, to his valet, 'Give
+Dayrolles a chair.' This little trait greatly struck the famous Dr.
+Warren, who was at the bedside of this brilliant and wonderful man. He
+died on the 24th of March, 1773, in the 79th year of his age.
+
+The preamble to a codicil (Feb. 11, 1773) contains the following
+striking sentences, written when the intellect was impressed with the
+solemnity of that solemn change which comes alike to the unreflecting
+and to the heart stricken, holy believer:--
+
+     'I most humbly recommend my soul to the extensive mercy of that
+     Eternal, Supreme, Intelligent Being who gave it me; most
+     earnestly at the same time deprecating his justice. Satiated with
+     the pompous follies of this life, of which I have had an uncommon
+     share, I would have no posthumous ones displayed at my funeral,
+     and therefore desire to be buried in the next burying-place to
+     the place where I shall die, and limit the whole expense of my
+     funeral to £100.'
+
+His body was interred, according to his wish, in the vault of the chapel
+in South Audley Street, but it was afterwards removed to the family
+burial-place in Shelford Church, Nottinghamshire.
+
+In his will he left legacies to his servants.[26] 'I consider them,' he
+said, 'as unfortunate friends; my equals by nature, and my inferiors
+only in the difference of our fortunes.' There was something lofty in
+the mind that prompted that sentence.
+
+His estates reverted to a distant kinsman, descended from a younger son
+of the first earl; and it is remarkable, on looking through the Peerage
+of Great Britain, to perceive how often this has been the case in a race
+remarkable for the absence of virtue. Interested marriages, vicious
+habits, perhaps account for the fact; but retributive justice, though it
+be presumptuous to trace its course, is everywhere.
+
+He had so great a horror in his last days of gambling, that in
+bequeathing his possessions to his heir, as he expected, and godson,
+Philip Stanhope, he inserts this clause:--
+
+     'In case my said godson, Philip Stanhope, shall at any time
+     hereinafter keep, or be concerned in keeping of, any race-horses,
+     or pack of hounds, or reside one night at Newmarket, that
+     infamous seminary of iniquity and ill-manners, during the course
+     of the races there; or shall resort to the said races; or shall
+     lose, in any one day, at any game or bet whatsoever, the sum of
+     £500, then, in any the cases aforesaid, it is my express will
+     that he, my said godson, shall forfeit and pay, out of my estate,
+     the sum of £5,000 to and for the use of the Dean and Chapter of
+     Westminster.'
+
+When we say that Lord Chesterfield was a man who had _no friend_, we sum
+up his character in those few words. Just after his death a small but
+distinguished party of men dined together at Topham Beauclerk's. There
+was Sir Joshua Reynolds; Sir William Jones, the orientalist; Bennet
+Langton; Steevens; Boswell; Johnson. The conversation turned on Garrick,
+who, Johnson said, had friends, but no friend. Then Boswell asked, 'what
+is a friend?' 'One who comforts and supports you, while others do not.'
+'Friendship, you know, sir, is the cordial drop to make the nauseous
+draught of life go down.' Then one of the company mentioned Lord
+Chesterfield as one who had no friend; and Boswell said: 'Garrick was
+pure gold, but beat out to thin leaf, Lord Chesterfield was tinsel.'
+And, for once, Johnson did not contradict him. But not so do we judge
+Lord Chesterfield. He was a man who acted on false principles through
+life; and those principles gradually undermined everything that was
+noble and generous in character; just as those deep under-ground
+currents, noiseless in their course, work through fine-grained rock, and
+produce a chasm. Everything with Chesterfield was self: for self, and
+self alone, were agreeable qualities to be assumed; for self, was the
+country to be served, because that country protects and serves us: for
+self, were friends to be sought and cherished, as useful auxiliaries, or
+pleasant accessories: in the very core of the cankered heart, that
+advocated this corrupting doctrine of expediency, lay unbelief; that
+worm which never died in the hearts of so many illustrious men of that
+period--the refrigerator of the feelings.
+
+One only gentle and genuine sentiment possessed Lord Chesterfield, and
+that was his love for his son. Yet in this affection the worldly man
+might be seen in mournful colours. He did not seek to render his son
+good; his sole desire was to see him successful: every lesson that he
+taught him, in those matchless Letters which have carried down
+Chesterfield's fame to us when his other productions have virtually
+expired, exposes a code of dissimulation which Philip Stanhope, in his
+marriage, turned upon the father to whom he owed so much care and
+advancement. These Letters are, in fact, a complete exposition of Lord
+Chesterfield's character and views of life. No other man could have
+written them; no other man have conceived the notion of existence being
+one great effort to deceive, as well as to excel, and of society forming
+one gigantic lie. It is true they were addressed to one who was to enter
+the maze of a diplomatic career, and must be taken, on that account,
+with some reservation.
+
+They have justly been condemned on the score of immorality; but we must
+remember that the age in which they were written was one of lax notions,
+especially among men of rank, who regarded all women accessible, either
+from indiscretion or inferiority of rank, as fair game, and acted
+accordingly. But whilst we agree with one of Johnson's bitterest
+sentences as to the immorality of Chesterfield's letters, we disagree
+with his styling his code of manners the manners of a dancing-master.
+Chesterfield was in himself a perfect instance of what he calls _les
+manières nobles_; and this even Johnson allowed.
+
+'Talking of Chesterfield,' Johnson said, 'his manner was exquisitely
+elegant, and he had more knowledge than I expected.' Boswell: 'Did you
+find, sir, his conversation to be of a superior sort?'--Johnson: 'Sir,
+in the conversation which I had with him, I had the best right to
+superiority, for it was upon philology and literature.'
+
+It was well remarked how extraordinary a thing it was that a man who
+loved his son so entirely should do all he could to make him a rascal.
+And Foote even contemplated bringing on the stage a father who had thus
+tutored his son; and intended to show the son an honest man in
+everything else, but practising his father's maxims upon him, and
+cheating him.
+
+'It should be so contrived,' Johnson remarked, referring to Foote's
+plan, 'that the father should be the _only_ sufferer by the son's
+villany, and thus there would be poetical justice.' 'Take out the
+immorality,' he added, on another occasion, 'and the book
+(Chesterfield's Letters to his Son) should be put into the hands of
+every young gentleman.'
+
+We are inclined to differ, and to confess to a moral taint throughout
+the whole of the Letters; and even had the immorality been expunged, the
+false motives, the deep, invariable advocacy of principles of
+expediency, would have poisoned what otherwise might be of effectual
+benefit to the minor virtues of polite society.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 23: The Countess of Chesterfield here alluded to was the
+second wife of Philip, second Earl of Chesterfield. Philip Dormer,
+fourth Earl, was grandson of the second Earl by his third wife.]
+
+[Footnote 24: In the 'Annual Register,' for 1774, p. 20, it is stated
+that as George I. had left Lady Walsingham a legacy which his successor
+did not think proper to deliver, the Earl of Chesterfield was determined
+to recover it by a suit in Chancery, had not his Majesty, on questioning
+the Lord Chancellor on the subject, and being answered that he could
+give no opinion extrajudicially, thought proper to fulfil the bequest.]
+
+[Footnote 25: Lord Mahon, now Earl of Stanhope, if not the most
+eloquent, one of the most honest historians of our time.]
+
+[Footnote 26: Two years' wages were left to the servants.]
+
+
+
+
+    THE ABBÉ SCARRON.
+
+  An Eastern Allegory.--Who comes Here?--A Mad Freak and its
+      Consequences.--Making an Abbé of him.--The May-Fair of
+      Paris.--Scarron's Lament to Pellisson.--The Office of the
+      Queen's Patient.--'Give me a Simple Benefice.'--Scarron's
+      Description of Himself.--Improvidence and Servility.--The
+      Society at Scarron's.--The Witty Conversation.--Francoise
+      D'Aubigné's Début.--The Sad Story of La Belle
+      Indienne.--Matrimonial Considerations.--'Scarron's Wife will
+      live for ever.'--Petits Soupers.--Scarron's last Moments.--A
+      Lesson for Gay and Grave.
+
+
+There is an Indian or Chinese legend, I forget which, from which Mrs.
+Shelley may have taken her hideous idea of Frankenstein. We are told in
+this allegory that, after fashioning some thousands of men after the
+most approved model, endowing them with all that is noble, generous,
+admirable, and loveable in man or woman, the eastern Prometheus grew
+weary in his work, stretched his hand for the beer-can, and draining it
+too deeply, lapsed presently into a state of what Germans call
+'other-man-ness.'--There is a simpler Anglo-Saxon term for this
+condition, but I spare you. The eastern Prometheus went on seriously
+with his work, and still produced the same perfect models, faultless
+alike in brain and leg. But when it came to the delicate finish, when
+the last touches were to be made, his hand shook a little, and the more
+delicate members went awry. It was thus that instead of the power of
+seeing every colour properly, one man came out with a pair of optics
+which turned everything to green, and this verdancy probably transmitted
+itself to the intelligence. Another, to continue the allegory, whose
+tympanum had slipped a little under the unsteady fingers of the
+man-maker, heard everything in a wrong sense, and his life was
+miserable, because, if you sang his praises, he believed you were
+ridiculing him, and if you heaped abuse upon him, he thought you were
+telling lies of him.
+
+But as Prometheus Orientalis grew more jovial, it seems to have come
+into his head to make mistakes on purpose. 'I'll have a friend to laugh
+with,' quoth he; and when warned by an attendant Yaksha, or demon, that
+men who laughed one hour often wept the next, he swore a lusty oath,
+struck his thumb heavily on a certain bump in the skull he was
+completing, and holding up his little doll, cried, 'Here is one who will
+laugh at everything!'
+
+I must now add what the legend neglects to tell. The model laugher
+succeeded well enough in his own reign, but he could not beget a large
+family. The laughers who never weep, the real clowns of life, who do
+not, when the curtain drops, retire, after an infinitesimal allowance of
+'cordial,' to a half-starved, complaining family, with brats that cling
+round his parti-coloured stockings, and cry to him--not for jokes--but
+for bread, these laughers, I say, are few and far between. You should,
+therefore, be doubly grateful to me for introducing to you now one of
+the most famous of them; one who with all right and title to be
+lugubrious, was the merriest man of his age.
+
+On Shrove Tuesday, in the year 1638, the good city of Mans was in a
+state of great excitement: the carnival was at its height, and everybody
+had gone mad for one day before turning pious for the long, dull forty
+days of Lent. The market-place was filled with maskers in quaint
+costumes, each wilder and more extravagant than the last. Here were
+magicians with high peaked hats covered with cabalistic signs, here
+Eastern sultans of the medieval model, with very fierce looks and very
+large scimitars: here Amadis de Gaul with a wagging plume a yard high,
+here Pantagruel, here harlequins, here Huguenots ten times more
+lugubrious than the despised sectaries they mocked, here Cæsar and
+Pompey in trunk hose and Roman helmets, and a mass of other notabilities
+who were great favourites in that day, appeared.
+
+But who comes here? What is the meaning of these roars of laughter that
+greet the last mask who runs into the market-place? Why do all the women
+and children hurry together, calling up one another, and shouting with
+delight? What is this thing? Is it some new species of bird, thus
+covered with feathers and down? In a few minutes the little figure is
+surrounded by a crowd of boys and women, who begin to pluck him of his
+borrowed plumes, while he chatters to them like a magpie, whistles like
+a song-bird, croaks like a raven, or in his natural character showers a
+mass of funny nonsense on them, till their laughter makes their sides
+ache. The little wretch is literally covered with small feathers from
+head to foot, and even his face is not to be recognized. The women pluck
+him behind and before; he dances round and tries to evade their fingers.
+This is impossible; he breaks away, runs down the market pursued by a
+shouting crowd, is again surrounded, and again subjected to a plucking
+process. The bird must be stripped; he must be discovered. Little by
+little his back is bared, and little by little is seen a black jerkin,
+black stockings, and, wonder upon wonder! the bands of a canon. Now they
+have cleared his face of its plumage, and a cry of disgust and shame
+hails the disclosure. Yes, this curious masker is no other than a
+reverend abbé, a young canon of the cathedral of Mans! 'This is too
+much--it is scandalous--it is disgraceful. The church must be respected,
+the sacred order must not descend to such frivolities.' The people,
+lately laughing, are now furious at the shameless abbé and not his
+liveliest wit can save him; they threaten and cry shame on him, and in
+terror of his life, he beats his way through the crowd, and takes to his
+heels. The mob follows, hooting and savage. The little man is nimble;
+those well-shaped legs--_qui ont si bien dansé_--stand him in good
+stead. Down the streets, and out of the town go hare and hounds. The
+pursuers gain on him--a bridge, a stream filled with tall reeds, and
+delightfully miry, are all the hope of refuge he sees before him. He
+leaps gallantly from the bridge in among the oziers, and has the joy of
+listening to the disappointed curses of the mob, when reaching the
+stream, their quarry is nowhere to be seen. The reeds conceal him, and
+there he lingers till nightfall, when he can issue from his
+lurking-place, and escape from the town.
+
+Such was the mad freak which deprived the Abbé Scarron of the use of his
+limbs for life. His health was already ruined when he indulged this
+caprice; the damp of the river brought on a violent attack, which closed
+with palsy, and the gay young abbé had to pay dearly for the pleasure of
+astonishing the citizens of Mans. The disguise was easily accounted
+for--he had smeared himself with honey, ripped open a feather-bed, and
+rolled himself in it.
+
+This little incident gives a good idea of what Scarron was in his
+younger days--ready at any time for any wild caprice.
+
+Paul Scarron was the son of a Conseiller du Parlement of good family,
+resident in Paris. He was born in 1610, and his early days would have
+been wretched enough, if his elastic spirits had allowed him to give way
+to misery. His father was a good-natured, weak-minded man, who on the
+death of his first wife married a second, who, as one hen will peck at
+another's chicks, would not, as a stepmother, leave the little Paul in
+peace. She was continually putting her own children forward, and
+ill-treating the late 'anointed' son. The father gave in too readily,
+and young Paul was glad enough to be set free from his unhappy home.
+There may be some excuse in this for the licentious living to which he
+now gave himself up. He was heir to a decent fortune, and of course
+thought himself justified in spending it before-hand. Then, in spite of
+his quaint little figure, he had something attractive about him, for his
+merry face was good-looking, if not positively handsome. If we add to
+this, spirits as buoyant as an Irishman's--a mind that not only saw the
+ridiculous wherever it existed, but could turn the most solemn and awful
+themes to laughter, a vast deal of good-nature, and not a little
+assurance--we can understand that the young Scarron was a favourite with
+both men and women, and among the reckless pleasure-seekers of the day
+soon became one of the wildest. In short, he was a fast young Parisian,
+with as little care for morality or religion as any youth who saunters
+on the Boulevards of the French capital to this day.
+
+But his stepmother was not content with getting rid of young Paul, but
+had her eye also on his fortune, and therefore easily persuaded her
+husband that the service of the church was precisely the career for
+which the young reprobate was fitted. There was an uncle who was Bishop
+of Grenoble, and a canonry could easily be got for him. The fast youth
+was compelled to give in to this arrangement, but declined to take full
+orders; so that while drawing the revenue of his stall, he had nothing
+to do with the duties of his calling. Then, too, it was rather a
+fashionable thing to be an abbé, especially a gay one. The position
+placed you on a level with people of all ranks. Half the court was
+composed of love-making ecclesiastics, and the _soutane_ was a kind of
+diploma for wit and wickedness. Viewed in this light, the church was as
+jovial a profession as the army, and the young Scarron went to the full
+extent of the letter allowed to the black gown. It was only such stupid
+superstitious louts as those of Mans, who did not know anything of the
+ways of Paris life, who could object to such little freaks as he loved
+to indulge in.
+
+The merry little abbé was soon the delight of the Marais. This distinct
+and antiquated quarter of Paris was then the Mayfair of that capital.
+Here lived in ease, and contempt of the bourgeoisie, the great, the gay,
+the courtier, and the wit. Here Marion de Lorme received old Cardinals
+and young abbés; here were the salons of Madame de Martel, of the
+Comtesse de la Suze, who changed her creed in order to avoid seeing her
+husband in this world or the next, and the famous--or infamous--Ninon de
+l'Enclos; and at these houses young Scarron met the courtly
+Saint-Evremond, the witty Sarrazin, and the learned but arrogant
+Voiture. Here he read his skits and parodies, here travestied Virgil,
+made epigrams on Richelieu, and poured out his indelicate but always
+laughable witticisms. But his indulgences were not confined to
+intrigues; he also drank deep, and there was not a pleasure within his
+reach which he ever thought of denying himself. He laughed at religion,
+thought morality a nuisance, and resolved to be merry at all costs.
+
+The little account was brought in at last. At the age of five-and-twenty
+his constitution was broken up. Gout and rheumatism assailed him
+alternately or in leash. He began to feel the annoyance of the
+constraint they occasioned; he regretted those legs which had figured
+so well in a ronde or a minuet, and those hands which had played the
+lute to dames more fair than modest; and to add to this, the pain he
+suffered was not slight. He sought relief in gay society, and was
+cheerful in spite of his sufferings. At length came the Shrove Tuesday
+and the feathers; and the consequences were terrible. He was soon a prey
+to doctors, whom he believed in no more than in the church of which he
+was so great a light. His legs were no longer his own, so he was obliged
+to borrow those of a chair. He was soon tucked down into a species of
+dumb-waiter on castors, in which he could be rolled about in a party. In
+front of this chair was fastened a desk, on which he wrote; for too wise
+to be overcome by his agony, he drove it away by cultivating his
+imagination, and in this way some of the most fantastic productions in
+French literature were composed by this quaint little abbé.
+
+Nor was sickness his only trial now. Old Scarron was a citizen, and had,
+what was then criminal, sundry ideas of the liberty of the nation. He
+saw with disgust the tyranny of Richelieu, and joined a party in the
+Parliament to oppose the cardinal's measures. He even had the courage to
+speak openly against one of the court edicts; and the pitiless cardinal,
+who never overlooked any offence, banished him to Touraine, and
+naturally extended his animosity to the conseiller's son. This happened
+at a moment at which the cripple believed himself to be on the road to
+favour. He had already won that of Madame de Hautefort, on whom Louis
+XIII. had set his affections, and this lady had promised to present him
+to Anne of Austria. The father's honest boldness put a stop to the son's
+intended servility, and Scarron lamented his fate in a letter to
+Pellisson:
+
+    O mille écus, par malheur retranchés,
+    Que vous pouviez m'épargner de péchés!
+    Quand un valet me dit, tremblant et hâve,
+    Nous n'avons plus de bûches dans la cave
+    Que pour aller jusqu'à demain matin,
+    Je peste alors sur mon chien de destin,
+    Sur le grand froid, sur le bois de la grève,
+    Qu'on vend si cher, et qui si-tôt s'achève.
+    Je jure alors, et même je médis
+    De l'action de mon père étourdi,
+    Quand sans songer à ce qu'il allait faire
+    Il m'ébaucha sous un astre contraire,
+    Et m'acheva par un discours maudit
+    Qu'il fit depuis sur un certain édit.
+
+The father died in exile: his second wife had spent the greater part of
+the son's fortune, and secured the rest for her own children. Scarron
+was left with a mere pittance, and, to complete his troubles, was
+involved in a lawsuit about the property. The cripple, with his usual
+impudence, resolved to plead his own cause, and did it only too well; he
+made the judges laugh so loud that they took the whole thing to be a
+farce on his part, and gave--most ungratefully--judgment against him.
+
+Glorious days were those for the penniless, halcyon days for the toady
+and the sycophant. There was still much of the old oriental munificence
+about the court, and sovereigns like Mazarin and Louis XIV. granted
+pensions for a copy of flattering verses, or gave away places as the
+reward of a judicious speech. Sinecures were legion, yet to many a
+holder they were no sinecures at all, for they entailed constant
+servility and a complete abdication of all freedom of opinion.
+
+Scarron was nothing more than a merry buffoon. Many another man has
+gained a name for his mirth, but most of them have been at least
+independent. Scarron seems to have cared for nothing that was honourable
+or dignified. He laughed at everything but money, and at that he smiled,
+though it is only fair to say that he was never avaricious, but only
+cared for ease and a little luxury.
+
+When Richelieu died, and the gentler, but more subtle Mazarin mounted
+his throne, Madame de Hautefort made another attempt to present her
+_protégé_ to the queen, and this time succeeded. Anne of Austria had
+heard of the quaint little man who could laugh over a lawsuit in which
+his whole fortune was staked, and received him graciously. He begged for
+some place to support him. What could he do? What was he fit for?
+'Nothing, your majesty, but the important office of The Queen's Patient;
+for that I am fully qualified.' Anne smiled, and Scarron from that time
+styled himself 'par la grace de Dieu, le malade de la Reine.' But there
+was no stipend attached to this novel office. Mazarin procured him a
+pension of 500 crowns. He was then publishing his 'Typhon, or the
+Gigantomachy,' and dedicated it to the cardinal, with an adulatory
+sonnet. He forwarded the great man a splendidly bound copy, which was
+accepted with nothing more than thanks. In a rage the author suppressed
+the sonnet and substituted a satire. This piece was bitterly cutting,
+and terribly true. It galled Mazarin to the heart, and he was
+undignified enough to revenge himself by cancelling the poor little
+pension of £60 per annum which had previously been granted to the
+writer. Scarron having lost his pension, soon afterwards asked for an
+abbey, but was refused. 'Then give me,' said he, 'a simple benefice, so
+simple, indeed, that all its duties will be comprised in believing in
+God.' But Scarron had the satisfaction of gaining a great name among the
+cardinal's many enemies, and with none more so than De Retz, then
+_coadjuteur_[27] to the Archbishop of Paris, and already deeply
+implicated in the Fronde movement. To insure the favour of this rising
+man, Scarron determined to dedicate to him a work he was just about to
+publish, and on which he justly prided himself as by far his best. This
+was the 'Roman Comique,' the only one of his productions which is still
+read. That it should be read, I can quite understand, on account not
+only of the ease of its style, but of the ingenuity of its improbable
+plots, the truth of the characters, and the charming bits of satire
+which are found here and there, like gems amid a mass of mere fun. The
+scene is laid at Mans, the town in which the author had himself
+perpetrated his chief follies; and many of the characters were probably
+drawn from life, while it is likely enough that some of the stories were
+taken from facts which had there come to his knowledge. As in many of
+the romances of that age, a number of episodes are introduced into the
+main story, which consists of the adventures of a strolling company.
+These are mainly amatory, and all indelicate, while some are as coarse
+as anything in French literature. Scarron had little of the clear wit of
+Rabelais to atone for this; but he makes up for it, in a measure, by the
+utter absurdity of some of his incidents. Not the least curious part of
+the book is the Preface, in which he gives a description of himself, in
+order to contradict, as he affirms, the extravagant reports circulated
+about him, to the effect that he was set upon a table, in a cage, or
+that his hat was fastened to the ceiling by a pulley, that he might
+'pluck it up or let it down, to do compliment to a friend, who honoured
+him with a visit.' This description is a tolerable specimen of his
+style, and we give it in the quaint language of an old translation,
+published in 1741:--
+
+'I am past thirty, as thou may'st see by the back of my Chair. If I live
+to be forty, I shall add the Lord knows how many Misfortunes to those I
+have already suffered for these eight or nine Years past. There was a
+Time when my Stature was not to be found fault with, tho' now 'tis of
+the smallest. My Sickness has taken me shorter by a Foot. My Head is
+somewhat too big, considering my Height; and my Face is full enough, in
+all Conscience, for one that carries such a Skeleton of a Body about
+him. I have Hair enough on my Head not to stand in need of a Peruke; and
+'tis gray, too, in spite of the Proverb. My Sight is good enough, tho'
+my Eyes are large; they are of a blue Colour, and one of them is sunk
+deeper into my Head than the other, which was occasion'd by my leaning
+on that Side. My Nose is well enough mounted. My Teeth, which in the
+Days of Yore look'd like a Row of square Pearl, are now of an Ashen
+Colour; and in a few Years more, will have the Complexion of a
+Small-coal Man's Saturday Shirt. I have lost one Tooth and a half on the
+left Side, and two and a half precisely on the right; and I have two
+more that stand somewhat out of their Ranks. My Legs and Thighs, in the
+first place, compose an obtuse Angle, then a right one, and lastly an
+acute. My Thighs and Body make another; and my Head, leaning perpetually
+over my Belly, I fancy makes me not very unlike the Letter Z. My Arms
+are shortened, as well as my Legs; and my Fingers as well as my Arms. In
+short, I am a living Epitome of human Misery. This, as near as I can
+give it, is my Shape. Since I am got so far, I will e'en tell thee
+something of my Humour. Under the Rose, be it spoken, Courteous Reader,
+I do this only to swell the Bulk of my Book, at the Request of the
+Bookseller--the poor Dog, it seems, being afraid he should be a Loser by
+this Impression, if he did not give Buyer enough for his Money.'
+
+This allusion to the publisher reminds us that, on the suppression of
+his pension--on hearing of which Scarron only said, 'I should like,
+then, to suppress myself'--he had to live on the profits of his works.
+In later days it was Madame Scarron herself who often carried them to
+the bookseller's, when there was not a penny in the house. The publisher
+was Quinet, and the merry wit, when asked whence he drew his income,
+used to reply with mock haughtiness, 'De mon Marquisat de Quinet.' His
+comedies, which have been described as mere burlesques--I confess I have
+never read them, and hope to be absolved--were successful enough, and if
+Scarron had known how to keep what he made, he might sooner or later
+have been in easy circumstances. He knew neither that nor any other art
+of self-restraint, and, therefore, was in perpetual vicissitudes of
+riches and penury. At one time he could afford to dedicate a piece to
+his sister's greyhound, at another he was servile in his address to some
+prince or duke.
+
+In the latter spirit, he humbled himself before Mazarin, in spite of the
+publication of his 'Mazarinade,' and was, as he might have expected,
+repulsed. He then turned to Fouquet, the new Surintendant de Finances,
+who was liberal enough with the public money, which he so freely
+embezzled, and extracted from him a pension of 1,600 francs (about £64).
+In one way or another, he got back a part of the property his stepmother
+had alienated from him, and obtained a prebend in the diocese of Mans,
+which made up his income to something more respectable.
+
+He was now able to indulge to the utmost his love of society. In his
+apartment, in the Rue St. Louis, he received all the leaders of the
+Fronde, headed by De Retz, and bringing with them their pasquinades on
+Mazarin, which the easy Italian read and laughed at and pretended to
+heed not at all. Politics, however, was not the staple of the
+conversation at Scarron's. He was visited as a curiosity, as a clever
+buffoon, and those who came to see, remained to laugh. He kept them all
+alive by his coarse, easy, impudent wit; in which there was more
+vulgarity and dirtiness than ill-nature. He had a fund of _bonhommie_,
+which set his visitors at their ease, for no one was afraid of being
+bitten by the chained dog they came to pat. His salon became famous; and
+the admission to it was a diploma of wit. He kept out all the dull, and
+ignored all the simply great. Any man who could say a good thing, tell a
+good story, write a good lampoon, or mimic a fool, was a welcome guest.
+Wits mingled with pedants, courtiers with poets. Abbés and gay women
+were at home in the easy society of the cripple, and circulated freely
+round his dumb-waiter.
+
+The ladies of the party were not the most respectable in Paris, yet some
+who were models of virtue met there, without a shudder, many others who
+were patterns of vice. Ninon de l'Enclos--then young--though age made no
+alteration in _her_--and already slaying her scores, and ruining her
+hundreds of admirers, there met Madame de Sévigné, the most respectable,
+as well as the most agreeable, woman of that age. Mademoiselle de
+Scudéry, leaving, for the time, her twelve-volume romance, about Cyrus
+and Ibrahim, led on a troop of Molière's Précieuses Ridicules, and here
+recited her verses, and talked pedantically to Pellisson, the ugliest
+man in Paris, of whom Boileau wrote:
+
+    'L'or même à Pellisson donne un teint de beauté.'
+
+Then there was Madame de la Sablière, who was as masculine as her
+husband the marquis was effeminate; the Duchesse de Lesdiguières, who
+was so anxious to be thought a wit that she employed the Chevalier de
+Méré to make her one; and the Comtesse de la Suze, a clever but foolish
+woman.
+
+The men were poets, courtiers, and pedants. Ménage with his tiresome
+memory, Montreuil and Marigni the song-writers, the elegant De Grammont,
+Turenne, Coligni, the gallant Abbé Têtu, and many another celebrity,
+thronged the rooms where Scarron sat in his curious wheelbarrow.
+
+The conversation was decidedly light; often, indeed, obscene, in spite
+of the presence of ladies; but always witty. The hostility of Scarron to
+the reigning cardinal was a great recommendation, and when all else
+flagged, or the cripple had an unusually sharp attack, he had but to
+start with a line of his 'Mazarinade,' and out came a fresh lampoon, a
+new caricature, or fresh rounds of wit fired off at the Italian, from
+the well-filled cartridge-boxes of the guests, many of whom kept their
+_mots_ ready made up for discharge.
+
+But a change came over the spirit of the paralytic's dream. In the Rue
+St. Louis, close to Scarron's, lived a certain Madame Neuillant, who
+visited him as a neighbour, and one day excited his curiosity by the
+romantic history of a mother and daughter, who had long lived in
+Martinique, who had been ruined by the extravagance and follies of a
+reprobate husband and father; and were now living in great poverty--the
+daughter being supported by Madame de Neuillant herself. The
+good-natured cripple was touched by this story, and begged his neighbour
+to bring the unhappy ladies to one of his parties. The evening came; the
+abbé was, as usual, surrounded by a circle of lady wits, dressed in the
+last fashions, flaunting their fans, and laughing merrily at his
+sallies. Madame de Neuillant was announced, and entered, followed by a
+simply-dressed lady, with the melancholy face of one broken-down by
+misfortunes, and a pretty girl of fifteen. The contrast between the
+new-comers and the fashionable _habituées_ around him at once struck the
+abbé. The girl was not only badly, but even shabbily dressed, and the
+shortness of her gown showed that she had grown out of it, and could not
+afford a new one. The _grandes dames_ turned upon her their eye-glasses,
+and whispered comments behind their fans. She was very pretty, they
+said, very interesting, elegant, lady-like, and so on; but, _parbleu!_
+how shamefully _mal mise!_ The new-comers were led up to the cripple's
+dumb-waiter, and the _grandes dames_ drew back their ample petticoats as
+they passed. The young girl was overcome with shame, their whispers
+reached her; she cast down her pretty eyes, and growing more and more
+confused, she could bear it no longer, and burst into tears. The abbé
+and his guests were touched by her shyness, and endeavoured to restore
+her confidence. Scarron himself leant over, and whispered a few kind
+words in her ear; then breaking out into some happy pleasantry, he gave
+her time to recover her composure. Such was the first _début_ in
+Parisian society of Françoise d'Aubigné, who was destined, as Madame
+Scarron, to be afterwards one of its leaders, and, as Madame de
+Maintenon, to be its ruler.
+
+[Illustration: SCARRON AND THE WITS--FIRST APPEARANCE OF LA BELLE
+INDIENNE.]
+
+Some people are cursed with bad sons--some with erring daughters.
+Françoise d'Aubigné was long the victim of a wicked father. Constans
+d'Aubigné belonged to an old and honourable family, and was the son of
+that famous old Huguenot general, Théodore-Agrippa d'Aubigné, who fought
+for a long time under Henry of Navarre, and in his old age wrote the
+history of his times. To counterbalance this distinction, the son
+Constans brought all the discredit he could on the family. After a
+reckless life, in which he squandered his patrimony, he married a rich
+widow, and then, it is said, contrived to put her out of the way. He was
+imprisoned as a murderer, but acquitted for want of evidence. The story
+goes, that he was liberated by the daughter of the governor of the gaol,
+whom he had seduced in the prison, and whom he married when free. He
+sought to retrieve his fortune in the island of Martinique, ill-treated
+his wife, and eventually ran away, and left her and her children to
+their fate. They followed him to France, and found him again
+incarcerated. Madame d'Aubigné was foolishly fond of her
+good-for-nothing spouse, and lived with him in his cell, where the
+little Françoise, who had been born in prison, was now educated.
+
+Rescued from starvation by a worthy Huguenot aunt, Madame de Vilette,
+the little girl was brought up as a Protestant, and a very stanch one
+she proved for a time. But Madame d'Aubigné, who was a Romanist, would
+not allow her to remain long under the Calvinist lady's protection, and
+sent her to be converted by her godmother, the Madame de Neuillant above
+mentioned. This woman, who was as merciless as a woman can be, literally
+broke her into Romanism, treated her like a servant, made her groom the
+horses, and comb the maid's hair, and when all these efforts failed,
+sent her to a convent to be finished off. The nuns did by specious
+reasoning what had been begun by persecution, and young Françoise, at
+the time she was introduced to Scarron, was a highly respectable member
+of 'the only true church.'
+
+Madame d'Aubigné was at this time supporting herself by needlework. Her
+sad story won the sympathy of Scarron's guests, who united to relieve
+her wants. _La belle Indienne_, as the cripple styled her, soon became a
+favourite at his parties, and lost her shyness by degrees. Ninon de
+l'Enclos, who did not want heart, took her by the hand, and a friendship
+thus commenced between that inveterate Laïs and the future wife of Louis
+XIV. which lasted till death.
+
+The beauty of Françoise soon brought her many admirers, among whom was
+even one of Ninon's slaves; but as marriage was not the object of these
+attentions, and the young girl would not relinquish her virtue, she
+remained for some time unmarried but respectable. Scarron was
+particularly fond of her, and well knew that, portionless as she was,
+the poor girl would have but little chance of making a match. His
+kindness touched her, his wit charmed her; she pitied his infirmities,
+and as his neighbour, frequently saw and tried to console him. On the
+other hand the cripple, though forty years old, and in a state of health
+which it is impossible to describe, fell positively in love with the
+young girl, who alone of all the ladies who visited him combined wit
+with perfect modesty. He pitied her destitution. There was mutual pity,
+and we all know what passion that feeling is akin to.
+
+Still, for a paralytic, utterly unfit for marriage in any point of view,
+to offer to a beautiful young girl, would have seemed ridiculous, if not
+unpardonable. But let us take into account the difference in ideas of
+matrimony between ourselves and the French. We must remember that
+marriage has always been regarded among our neighbours as a contract for
+mutual benefit, into which the consideration of money of necessity
+entered largely. It is true that some qualities are taken as equivalents
+for actual cash: thus, if a young man has a straight and well-cut nose
+he may sell himself at a higher price than a young man there with the
+hideous pug; if a girl is beautiful, the marquis will be content with
+some thousands of francs less for her dower than if her hair were red or
+her complexion irreclaimably brown. If Julie has a pretty foot, a
+_svelte_ waist, and can play the piano thunderingly, or sing in the
+charmingest soprano, her ten thousand francs are quite as acceptable as
+those of stout awkward, glum-faced Jeannette. The faultless boots and
+yellow kids of young Adolphe counterbalance the somewhat apocryphal
+vicomté of ill-kempt and ill-attired Henri.
+
+But then there must be _some_ fortune. A Frenchman is so much in the
+habit of expecting it, that he thinks it almost a crime to fall in love
+where there is none. Françoise, pretty, clever, agreeable as she was,
+was penniless, and even worse, she was the daughter of a man who had
+been imprisoned on suspicion of murder, and a woman who had gained her
+livelihood by needlework. All these considerations made the fancy of the
+merry abbé less ridiculous, and Françoise herself, being sufficiently
+versed in the ways of the world to understand the disadvantage under
+which she laboured, was less amazed and disgusted than another girl
+might have been, when, in due course, the cripple offered her himself
+and his dumb-waiter. He had little more to give--his pension, a tiny
+income from his prebend and his Marquisat de Quinet.
+
+The offer of the little man was not so amusing as other episodes of his
+life. He went honestly to work; represented to her what a sad lot would
+hers be, if Madame de Neuillant died, and what were the temptations of
+beauty without a penny. His arguments were more to the point than
+delicate, and he talked to the young girl as if she was a woman of the
+world. Still, she accepted him, cripple as he was.
+
+Madame de Neuillant made no objection, for she was only too glad to be
+rid of a beauty, who ate and drank, but did not marry.
+
+On the making of the contract, Scarron's fun revived. When asked by the
+notary what was the young lady's fortune, he replied: 'Four louis, two
+large wicked eyes, one fine figure, one pair of good hands, and lots of
+mind.' 'And what do you give her?' asked the lawyer.--'Immortality,'
+replied he, with the air of a bombastic poet 'The names of the wives of
+kings die with them--that of Scarron's wife will live for ever!'
+
+His marriage obliged him to give up his canonry, which he sold to
+Ménage's man-servant, a little bit of simony which was not even noticed
+in those days. It is amusing to find a man who laughed at all religion,
+insisting that his wife should make a formal avowal of the Romish
+faith. Of the character of this marriage we need say no more than that
+Scarron had at that time the use of no more than his eyes, tongue, and
+hands. Yet such was then, as now, the idea of matrimony in France, that
+the young lady's friends considered her fortunate.
+
+Scarron in love was a picture which amazed and amused the whole society
+of Paris, but Scarron married was still more curious. The queen, when
+she heard of it, said that Françoise would be nothing but a useless bit
+of furniture in his house. She proved not only the most useful appendage
+he could have, but the salvation alike of his soul and his reputation.
+The woman who charmed Louis XIV. by her good sense, had enough of it to
+see Scarron's faults, and prided herself on reforming him as far as it
+was possible. Her husband had hitherto been the great Nestor of
+indelicacy, and when he was induced to give it up, the rest followed his
+example. Madame Scarron checked the licence of the abbé's conversation,
+and even worked a beneficial change in his mind.
+
+The joviality of their parties still continued. Scarron had always been
+famous for his _petits soupers_, the fashion of which he introduced, but
+as his poverty would not allow him to give them in proper style, his
+friends made a pic-nic of it, and each one either brought or sent his
+own dish of ragout, or whatever it might be, and his own bottle of wine.
+This does not seem to have been the case after the marriage, however;
+for it is related as a proof of Madame Scarron's conversational powers,
+that, when one evening a poorer supper than usual was served, the waiter
+whispered in her ear, 'Tell them another story, Madame, if you please,
+for we have no joint to-night.' Still both guests and host could well
+afford to dispense with the coarseness of the cripple's talk, which
+might raise a laugh, but must sometimes have caused disgust, and the
+young wife of sixteen succeeded in making him purer both in his
+conversation and his writings.
+
+The household she entered was indeed a villainous one. Scarron rather
+gloried in his early delinquencies, and, to add to this, his two sisters
+had characters far from estimable. One of them had been maid of honour
+to the Princesse de Conti, but had given up her appointment to become
+the mistress of the Duc de Trêmes. The laugher laughed even at his
+sister's dishonour, and allowed her to live in the same house on a
+higher _étage_. When, on one occasion, some one called on him to solicit
+the lady's interest with the duke, he coolly said, 'You are mistaken; it
+is not I who know the duke; go up to the next storey.' The offspring of
+this connection he styled 'his nephews after the fashion of the Marais.'
+Françoise did her best to reclaim this sister and to conceal her shame,
+but the laughing abbé made no secret of it.
+
+But the laugher was approaching his end. His attacks became more and
+more violent: still he laughed at them. Once he was seized with a
+terrible choking hiccup, which threatened to suffocate him. The first
+moment he could speak he cried, 'If I get well, I'll write a satire on
+the hiccup.' The priests came about him, and his wife did what she could
+to bring him to a sense of his future danger. He laughed at the priests
+and at his wife's fears. She spoke of hell. 'If there is such a place,'
+he answered, 'it won't be for me, for without you I must have had my
+hell in this life.' The priests told him, by way of consolation, that
+'God had visited him more than any man.'--He does me too much honour,'
+answered the mocker. 'You should give him thanks,' urged the
+ecclesiastic. 'I can't see for what,' was the shameless answer.
+
+On his death-bed he parodied a will, leaving to Corneille 'two hundred
+pounds of patience; to Boileau (with whom he had a long feud), the
+gangrene; and to the Academy, the power to alter the French language as
+they liked.' His legacy in verse to his wife is grossly disgusting, and
+quite unfit for quotation. Yet he loved her well, avowed that his chief
+grief in dying was the necessity of leaving her, and begged her to
+remember him sometimes, and to lead a virtuous life.
+
+His last moments were as jovial as any. When he saw his friends weeping
+around him he shook his head and cried, 'I shall never make you weep as
+much as I have made you laugh.' A little later a softer thought of hope
+came across him. 'No more sleeplessness, no more gout,' he murmured;
+'the Queen's patient will be well at last' At length the laugher was
+sobered. In the presence of death, at the gates of a new world, he
+muttered, half afraid, 'I never thought it was so easy to laugh at
+death,' and so expired. This was in October, 1660, when the cripple had
+reached the age of fifty.
+
+Thus died a laugher. It is unnecessary here to trace the story of his
+widow's strange rise to be the wife of a king. Scarron was no honour to
+her, and in later years she tried to forget his existence. Boileau fell
+into disgrace for merely mentioning his name before the king. Yet
+Scarron was in many respects a better man than Louis; and, laugher as he
+was, he had a good heart. There is a time for mirth and a time for
+mourning, the Preacher tells us. Scarron never learned this truth, and
+he laughed too much and too long. Yet let us not end the laugher's life
+in sorrow:
+
+    'It is well to be merry and wise,' &c.
+
+Let us be merry as the poor cripple, who bore his sufferings so well,
+and let us be wise too. There is a lesson for gay and grave in the life
+of Scarron, the laugher.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 27: _Coadjuteur._--A high office in the Church of Rome.]
+
+
+
+
+    FRANÇOIS DUC DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULT AND THE DUC DE SAINT-SIMON.
+
+  Rank and Good Breeding.--The Hôtel de Rochefoucault.--Racine and
+      his Plays.--La Rochefoucault's Wit and Sensibility.--Saint
+      Simon's Youth.--Looking out for a Wife.--Saint-Simon's Court
+      Life.--The History of Louise de la Vallière.--A mean Act of
+      Louis Quatorze.--All has passed away.--Saint-Simon's Memoirs of
+      His Own Time.
+
+
+The precursor of Saint-Simon, the model of Lord Chesterfield, this
+ornament of his age, belonged, as well as Saint-Simon, to that state of
+society in France which was characterised--as Lord John Russell, in his
+'Memoirs of the Duchess of Orleans,' tells us--by an idolatry of power
+and station. 'God would not condemn a person of that rank,' was the
+exclamation of a lady of the old _régime_, on hearing, that a notorious
+sinner, 'Pair de France,' and one knows not what else, had gone to his
+account impenitent and unabsolved; and though the sentiment may strike
+us as profane, it was, doubtless, genuine.
+
+Rank, however was often adorned by accomplishments which, like an
+exemption from rules of conduct, it almost claimed as a privilege.
+Good-breeding was a science in France; natural to a peasant, even, it
+was studied as an epitome of all the social virtues. '_N'étre pas poli_'
+was the sum total of all dispraise: a man could only recover from it by
+splendid valour or rare gifts; a woman could not hope to rise out of
+that Slough of Despond to which good-breeding never came. We were behind
+all the arts of civilization in England, as François de Rochefoucault
+(we give the orthography of the present day) was in his cradle. This
+brilliant personage, who combined the wit and the moralist, the courtier
+and the soldier, the man of literary tastes and the sentimentalist _par
+excellence_, was born in 1613. In addition to his hereditary title of
+duc, he had the empty honour, as Saint-Simon calls it, of being Prince
+de Marsillac, a designation which was lost in that of _De la
+Rochefoucault_--so famous even to the present day. As he presented
+himself at the court of the regency, over which Anne of Austria
+nominally presided, no youth there was more distinguished for his
+elegance or for the fame of his exploits during the wars of the Fronde
+than this youthful scion of an illustrious house. Endowed by nature with
+a pleasing countenance, and, what was far more important in that
+fastidious region, an air of dignity, he displayed wonderful
+contradictions in his character and bearing. He had, says Madame de
+Maintenon, '_beaucoup d'esprit, et peu de savoir_;' an expressive
+phrase. 'He was,' she adds, 'pliant in nature, intriguing, and
+cautious;' nevertheless she never, she declares, possessed a more steady
+friend, nor one more confiding and better adapted to advise. Brave as he
+was, he held personal valour, or affected to do so, in light estimation.
+His ambition was to rule others. Lively in conversation, though
+naturally pensive, he assembled around him all that Paris or Versailles
+could present of wit and intellect.
+
+The old Hôtel de Rochefoucault, in the Rue de Seine, in the Faubourg St.
+Germain, in Paris, still grandly recalls the assemblies in which Racine,
+Boileau, Madame de Sévigné, the La Fayettes, and the famous Duchesse de
+Longueville, used to assemble. The time honoured family of De la
+Rochefoucault still preside there; though one of its fairest ornaments,
+the young, lovely, and pious Duchesse de la Rochefoucault of our time,
+died in 1852--one of the first known victims to diphtheria in France, in
+that unchanged old locality. There, when the De Longuevilles, the
+Mazarins, and those who had formed the famous council of state of Anne
+of Austria had disappeared, the poets and wits who gave to the age of
+Louis XIV. its true brilliancy, collected around the Duc de la
+Rochefoucault. What a scene it must have been in those days, as Buffon
+said of the earth in spring '_tout four-mille de vie!_' Let us people
+the salon of the Hôtel de Rochefoucault with visions of the past; see
+the host there, in his chair, a martyr to the gout, which he bore with
+all the cheerfulness of a Frenchman, and picture to ourselves the great
+men who were handing him his cushion, or standing near his _fauteuil_.
+
+Racine's joyous face may be imagined as he comes in fresh from the
+College of Harcourt. Since he was born in 1639, he had not arrived at
+his zenith till La Rochefoucault was almost past his prime. For a man at
+thirty-six in France can no longer talk prospectively of the departure
+of youth; it is gone. A single man of thirty, even in Paris, is '_un
+vieux garçon_:' life begins too soon and ends too soon with those
+pleasant sinners, the French. And Racine, when he was first routed out
+of Port Royal, where he was educated, and presented to the whole
+Faubourg St. Germain, beheld his patron, La Rochefoucault, in the
+position of a disappointed man. An early adventure of his youth had
+humbled, perhaps, the host of the Hôtel de Rochefoucault. At the battle
+of St. Antoine, where he had distinguished himself, 'a musket-ball had
+nearly deprived him of sight. On this occasion he had quoted these
+lines, taken from the tragedy of '_Alcyonnée_.' It must, however, be
+premised that the famous Duchess de Longueville had urged him to engage
+in the wars of the Fronde. To her these lines were addressed:--
+
+    'Pour mériter son coeur, pour plaire à ses beaux yeux,
+     J'ai fait la guerre aux Rois, je l'aurais faite aux dieux.'
+
+But now he had broken off his intimacy with the duchesse, and he
+therefore parodied these lines:--
+
+    'Pour ce coeur inconstant, qu'enfin je connais mieux,
+     J'ai fait la guerre aux Rois, j'en ai perdue les yeux.'
+
+Nevertheless, La Rochefoucault was still the gay, charming, witty host
+and courtier. Racine composed, in 1660, his '_Nymphe de Seine_,' in
+honour of the marriage of Louis XIV., and was then brought into notice
+of those whose notice was no empty compliment, such as, in our day,
+illustrious dukes pay to more illustrious authors, by asking them to be
+jumbled in a crowd at a time when the rooks are beginning to caw. We
+catch, as they may, the shadow of a dissolving water-ice, or see the
+exit of an unattainable tray of negus. No; in the days of Racine, as in
+those of Halifax and Swift in England, solid fruits grew out of fulsome
+praise; and Colbert, then minister, settled a pension of six hundred
+livres, as francs were called in those days (twenty-four pounds), on the
+poet. And with this the former pupil of Port Royal was fain to be
+content. Still he was so poor that he _almost_ went into the church, an
+uncle offering to resign him a priory of his order if he would become a
+regular. He was a candidate for orders, and wore a sacerdotal dress when
+he wrote the tragedy of 'Theagenes,' and that of the 'Frères Ennemis,'
+the subject of which was given him by Molière.
+
+He continued, in spite of a quarrel with the saints of Port Royal, to
+produce noble dramas from time to time, but quitted theatrical pursuits
+after bringing out (in 1677) 'Phèdre,' that _chef-d'oeuvre_ not only
+of its author, but, as a performance, of the unhappy but gifted Rachel.
+Corneille was old, and Paris looked to Racine to supply his place, yet
+he left the theatrical world for ever. Racine had been brought up with
+deep religious convictions; they could not, however, preserve him from a
+mad, unlawful attachment. He loved the actress Champmesle: but
+repentance came. He resolved not only to write no more plays, but to do
+penance for those already given to the world. He was on the eve of
+becoming, in his penitence, a Carthusian friar, when his religious
+director advised marriage instead. He humbly did as he was told, and
+united himself to the daughter of a treasurer for France, of Amiens, by
+whom he had seven children. It was only at the request of Madame de
+Maintenon that he wrote 'Esther' for the convent of St. Cyr, where it
+was first acted.
+
+His death was the result of his benevolent, sensitive nature. Having
+drawn up an excellent paper on the miseries of the people, he gave it to
+Madame de Maintenon to read it to the king. Louis, in a transport of
+ill-humour, said, 'What! does he suppose because he is a poet that he
+ought to be minister of state?' Racine is said to have been so wounded
+by this speech that he was attacked by a fever and died. His decease
+took place in 1699, nineteen years after that of La Rochefoucault, who
+died in 1680.
+
+Amongst the circle whom La Rochefoucault loved to assemble were
+Boileau--Despréaux, and Madame de Sévigné--the one whose wit and the
+other whose grace completed the delights of that salon. A life so
+prosperous as La Rochefoucault's had but one cloud--the death of his son
+who was killed during the passage of the French troops over the Rhine.
+We attach to the character of this accomplished man the charms of wit;
+we may also add the higher attractions of sensibility. Notwithstanding
+the worldly and selfish character which is breathed forth in his 'Maxims
+and Reflections,' there lay at the bottom of his heart true piety.
+Struck by the death of a neighbour, this sentiment seems even on the
+point of being expressed; but, adds Madame de Sévigné, and her phrase is
+untranslatable, '_il n'est pas effleuré_.'
+
+All has passed away! the _Fronde_ has become a memory, not a realized
+idea. Old people shake their heads, and talk of Richelieu; of his
+gorgeous palace at Rueil, with its lake and its prison thereon, and its
+mysterious dungeons, and its avenues of chestnuts, and its fine statues;
+and of its cardinal, smiling, whilst the worm that never dieth is eating
+into his very heart; a seared conscience, and playing the fine gentleman
+to fine ladies in a rich stole, and with much garniture of costly lace:
+whilst beneath all is the hair shirt, that type of penitence and
+sanctity which he ever wore as a salvo against all that passion and
+ambition that almost burst the beating heart beneath that hair shirt.
+Richelieu has gone to his fathers. Mazarin comes on the scene; the wily,
+grasping Italian. He too vanishes; and forth, radiant in youth, and
+strong in power, comes Louis, and the reign of politeness and periwigs
+begins.
+
+The Duc de Saint-Simon, perhaps the greatest portrait-painter of any
+time, has familiarized us with the greatness, the littleness, the
+graces, the defects of that royal actor on the stage of Europe, whom his
+own age entitled Louis the Great. A wit, in his writings, of the first
+order--if we comprise under the head of wit the deepest discernment, the
+most penetrating satire--Saint-Simon was also a soldier, philosopher, a
+reformer, a Trappist, and, eventually, a devotee. Like all young men who
+wished for court favour, he began by fighting: Louis cared little for
+carpet knights. He entered, however, into a scene which he has
+chronicled with as much fidelity as our journalists do a police report,
+and sat quietly down to gather observations--not for his own fame, not
+even for the amusement of his children or grandchildren--but for the
+edification of posterity yet a century afar off his own time. The
+treasures were buried until 1829.
+
+A word or two about Saint-Simon and his youth. At nineteen he was
+destined by his mother to be married. Now every one knows how marriages
+are managed in France, not only in the time of Saint-Simon, but even to
+the present day. A mother or an aunt, or a grandmother, or an
+experienced friend, looks out; be it for son, be it for daughter, it is
+the business of her life. She looks and she finds: family, suitable;
+fortune, convenient; person, _pas mal_; principles, Catholic, with a due
+abhorrence of heretics, especially English ones. After a time, the lady
+is to be looked at by the unhappy _prétendû_; a church, a mass, or
+vespers, being very often the opportunity agreed. The victim thinks she
+will do. The proposal is discussed by the two mammas; relatives are
+called in; all goes well; the contract is signed; then, a measured
+acquaintance is allowed: but no _tête-à-têtes;_ no idea of love. 'What!
+so indelicate a sentiment before marriage! Let me not hear of it,' cries
+mamma, in a sanctimonious panic. 'Love! _Quelle bêtise!_' adds _mon
+pére_.
+
+But Saint-Simon, it seems, had the folly to wish to make a marriage of
+inclination. Rich, _pair de France_, his father--an old _roué_, who had
+been page to Louis XIII.--dead, he felt extremely alone in the world. He
+cast about to see whom he could select. The Duc de Beauvilliers had
+eight daughters; a misfortune, it may be thought, in France or anywhere
+else. Not at all: three of the young ladies were kept at home, to be
+married; the other five were at once disposed of, as they passed the
+unconscious age of infancy, in convents. Saint-Simon was, however,
+disappointed. He offered, indeed; first for the eldest, who was not then
+fifteen years old; and finding that she had a vocation for a conventual
+life, went on to the third, and was going through the whole family, when
+he was convinced that his suit was impossible. The eldest daughter
+happened to be a disciple of Fénélon's, and was on the very eve of being
+vowed to heaven.
+
+Saint-Simon went off to La Trappe, to console himself for his
+disappointment. There had been an old intimacy between Monsieur La
+Trappe and the father of Saint-Simon; and this friendship had induced
+him to buy an estate close to the ancient abbey where La Trappe still
+existed. The friendship became hereditary; and Saint-Simon, though still
+a youth, revered and loved the penitent recluse of _Ferté au Vidame_, of
+which Lamartine has written so grand and so poetical a description.
+
+Let us hasten over his marriage with Mademoiselle de Lorges, who proved
+a good wife. It was this time a grandmother, the Maréchale de Lorges,
+who managed the treaty; and Saint-Simon became the happy husband of an
+innocent blonde, with a majestic air, though only fifteen years of age.
+Let us hasten on, passing over his presents; his six hundred louis,
+given in a corbeille full of what he styles 'gallantries;' his mother's
+donation of jewellery; the midnight mass, by which he was linked to the
+child who scarcely knew him; let us lay all that aside, and turn to his
+court life.
+
+At this juncture Louis XIV., who had hitherto dressed with great
+simplicity, indicated that he desired his court should appear in all
+possible magnificence. Instantly the shops were emptied. Even gold and
+silver appeared scarcely rich enough. Louis himself planned many of the
+dresses for any public occasion. Afterwards he repented of the extent to
+which he had permitted magnificence to go, but it was then impossible to
+check the excess.
+
+Versailles, henceforth in all its grandeur, contains an apartment which
+is called, from its situation, and the opportunities it presents of
+looking down upon the actors of the scene around, _L'OEil de Boeuf_.
+The revelations of the OEil de Boeuf, during the reign of Louis XV.,
+form one of the most amazing pictures of wickedness, venality, power
+misapplied, genius polluted, that was ever drawn. No one that reads that
+infamous book can wonder at the revolution of 1789. Let us conceive
+Saint-Simon to have taken his stand here, in this region, pure in the
+time of Louis XIV., comparatively, and note we down his comments on men
+and women.
+
+He has journeyed up to court from La Trappe, which has fallen into
+confusion and quarrels, to which the most saintly precincts are
+peculiarly liable.
+
+The history of Mademoiselle de la Vallière was not, as he tells us, of
+his time. He hears of her death, and so indeed does the king, with
+emotion. She expired in 1710, in the Rue St. Jacques, at the Carmelite
+convent, where, though she was in the heart of Paris, her seclusion from
+the world had long been complete. Amongst the nuns of the convent none
+was so humble, so penitent, so chastened as this once lovely Louise de
+la Vallière, now, during a weary term of thirty-five years, 'Marie de la
+Miséricorde.' She had fled from the scene of her fall at one-and-thirty
+years of age. Twice had she taken refuge among the 'blameless vestals,'
+whom she envied as the broken-spirited envy the passive. First, she
+escaped from the torture of witnessing the king's passion for Madame de
+Montespan, by hiding herself among the Benedictine sisters at St. Cloud.
+Thence the king fetched her in person, threatening to order the cloister
+to be burnt. Next, Lauzun, by the command of Louis, sought her, and
+brought her _avec main forte_. The next time she fled no more; but took
+a public farewell of all she had too fondly loved, and throwing herself
+at the feet of the queen, humbly entreated her pardon. Never since that
+voluntary sepulture had she ceased, during those long and weary years,
+to lament--as the heart-stricken can alone lament--her sins. In deep
+contrition she learned the death of her son by the king, and bent her
+head meekly beneath the chastisement.
+
+Three years before her death the triumphant Athénée de Montespan had
+breathed her last at Bourbon. If Louis XIV. had nothing else to repent
+of, the remorse of these two women ought to have wrung his heart.
+Athénée de Montespan was a youthful, innocent beauty, fresh from the
+seclusion of provincial life, when she attracted the blighting regards
+of royalty. A _fête_ was to be given; she saw, she heard that she was
+its object. She entreated her husband to take her back to his estate in
+Guyenne, and to leave her there till the king had forgotten her. Her
+husband, in fatal confidence, trusted her resistance, and refused her
+petition. It was a life-long sorrow; and he soon found his mistake. He
+lived and died passionately attached to his wife, but never saw her
+after her fall.
+
+When she retired from court, to make room for the empire of the subtle
+De Maintenon, it was her son, the Duc de Maine, who induced her, not
+from love, but from ambition, to withdraw. She preserved, even in her
+seclusion in the country, the style of a queen, which she had assumed.
+Even her natural children by the king were never allowed to sit in her
+presence, on a _fauteuil_, but were only permitted to have small chairs.
+Every one went to pay her court, and she spoke to them as if doing them
+an honour; neither did she ever return a visit, even from the royal
+family. Her fatal beauty endured to the last: nothing could exceed her
+grace, her tact, her good sense in conversation, her kindness to every
+one.
+
+But it was long before her restless spirit could find real peace. She
+threw herself on the guidance of the Abbé de la Tour; for the dread of
+death was ever upon her. He suggested a terrible test of her penitence.
+It was, that she should entreat her husband's pardon, and return to him.
+It was a fearful struggle with herself, for she was naturally haughty
+and high spirited; but she consented. After long agonies of hesitation,
+she wrote to the injured man. Her letter was couched in the most humble
+language; but it received no reply. The Marquis de Montespan, through a
+third person, intimated to her that he would neither receive her, nor
+see her, nor hear her name pronounced. At his death she wore widow's
+weeds; but never assumed his arms, nor adopted his liveries.
+
+Henceforth, all she had was given to the poor. When Louis meanly cut
+down her pension, she sent word that she was sorry for the poor, not for
+herself; they would be the losers. She then humbled herself to the very
+dust: wore the hardest cloth next her fair skin; had iron bracelets; and
+an iron girdle, which made wounds on her body. Moreover, she punished
+the most unruly members of her frame: she kept her tongue in bounds;
+she ceased to slander; she learned to bless. The fear of death still
+haunted her; she lay in bed with every curtain drawn, the room lighted
+up with wax candles; whilst she hired watchers to sit up all night, and
+insisted that they should never cease talking or laughing, lest, when
+she woke, the fear of _death_ might come over her affrighted spirit.
+
+She died at last after a few hours' illness, having just time to order
+all her household to be summoned, and before them to make a public
+confession of her sins. As she lay expiring, blessing God that she died
+far away from the children of her adulterous connection, the Comte
+d'Antin, her only child by the Marquis de Montespan, arrived. Peace and
+trust had then come at last to the agonized woman. She spoke to him
+about her state of mind, and expired.
+
+To Madame de Maintenon the event would, it was thought, be a relief: yet
+she wept bitterly on hearing of it. The king showed, on the contrary,
+the utmost indifference, on learning that one whom he had once loved so
+much was gone for ever.
+
+All has passed away! The _OEil de Boeuf_ is now important only as
+being pointed out to strangers; Versailles is a show-place, not a
+habitation. Saint-Simon, who lived until 1775, was truly said to have
+turned his back on the new age, and to live in the memories of a former
+world of wit and fashion. He survived until the era of the
+'Encyclopédie' of Voltaire, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He lived, indeed,
+to hear that Montesquieu was no more. How the spirit of Louis XIV. spoke
+in his contemptuous remarks on Voltaire, whom he would only call Arouet;
+'The son of my father's and my own notary.'
+
+At length, after attaining his eightieth year, the chronicler, who knew
+the weaknesses, the vices, the peculiarities of mankind, even to a
+hair's breadth, expired; having long given up the court and occupied
+himself, whilst secluded in his country seat, solely with the revising
+and amplification of his wonderful Memoirs.
+
+No works, it has been remarked, since those of Sir Walter Scott, have
+excited so much sensation as the Memoirs of his own time, by the
+soldier, ambassador, and _Trappist_, Duc de Saint-Simon.
+
+
+
+
+                   Transcriber's Notes.
+
+     1. The following typos were corrected:
+        narative//narrative
+        Rochoucault's//Rochefoucault's
+        Ormonde's//Ormond's
+        Gramont//Grammont
+        Warmistre//Warmestre
+        Frederic//Frederick
+     2. The various spellings of Shakespeare//Shakespere//Shakspeare
+        and Dutchess//Duchess in the original text were retained.
+     3. The year Mary Fairfax and George Villiers, the
+        2nd Duke of Buckingham, were married is transposed
+        from 1657 to 1675 in the original text. The day also
+        appears to be in error (6th->15th).
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Wits and Beaux of Society, by 
+Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
+
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