THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 COMMODORE BYRON MCCANDLESS
 
 niOl DEGREE 
 
 BEING PORTRAITS AFTER ENGLUH 
 MA5TER5. N^ITH DECORATION 
 AND blOGRAPMICAL NOTE3 
 
 5Y TMOMJON 
 
 bQSTON-THE JQ5EPM KINIGMT 
 COMPANY- MDCCCXCV1
 
 Copyright, 1895, by 
 JOSEPH KNIGHT COMPANY
 
 DA 
 
 HER GRACE OF MARLBOROUGH . . 
 Portrait after Sir Godfrey Kneller. 
 
 PAGE 
 3 
 
 "MY GOOD HOWARD," COUNTESS OF SUFFOLK ... 17 
 
 Portrait after a picture in the collection at Strawberry 
 Hill. 
 
 LADY SARAH LENNOX 
 
 Portrait after Sir Joshua Reynolds. 
 
 29 
 
 HER GRACE OF GLOUCESTER, COUNTESS WALDEGRAVE 43 
 Portrait after Sir Joshua Reynolds. 
 
 HER GRACE OF CUMBERLAND 57 
 
 Portrait after Catharine Read. 
 
 "TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE" 
 
 Portrait after Sir Joshua Reynolds. 
 
 69
 
 VI 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 HER GRACE OF GORDON 
 
 Portrait after Sir Joshua Reynolds. 
 
 PAGE 
 87 
 
 THE MARGRAVINE OF ANSPACH, LADY CRAVEN ... 99 
 Portrait after George Romney. 
 
 " SWEET LASS OF RICHMOND HILL," MRS. FITZHERBERT 1 13 
 Portrait after Thomas Cosway. 
 
 THE COUNTESS OF ASHBURNHAM 127 
 
 Portrait after John Hoppner.
 
 JAKAtl 
 
 DUOO or 
 
 flARLDOROUGH
 
 * 
 
 TIER GI^ACE Or 
 DARLbOROUGI 
 
 No woman of modern times has displayed a 
 career of such emphasis as Sarah Jennings, 
 has exhibited the incisive personality in shaping 
 plans, the virile energy in pushing her projects, 
 and the large grasp of public affairs, the fore- 
 sight and the sanity. With all her beauty and 
 her ability, " shrewd " is the epithet that thus clung 
 to her name. " Queen Sarah," " the Viceroy," 
 and " La Belle Jennings " are the epithets used 
 in sketches of her career, but references in his- 
 tory to her character are most often made to the 
 harsher, the unlovely, the contentious phases of 
 her composite character. Contentious she was, 
 but not until she had been intrigued against 
 by those at court who should have been most 
 grateful to her ; uncharitable she was when the
 
 4 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 great glory wrought for his country by her hus- 
 band was made of no account by those who 
 shared most in the glory ; and shrewish she be- 
 came when contemned by court, when persecuted 
 by opponents, and left alone by relatives. Not 
 a lovely personality was hers, but a powerful one, 
 one that, with a little more charity of heart, a 
 trifle more suavity of manner, and a little more 
 maintenance of majesty might have made for 
 the betterment of Britain, and wrought for her- 
 self a sweet and fair renown. Her career was 
 indeed splendid. Making her debut in the Caro 
 lan court, a vivacious beauty when the court was 
 famed for the beauties assembling there, she 
 rose to shape the affairs of the nation. Sarah, the 
 third daughter of Richard Jennings, was born 
 at Holy well, near St. Albans, in May, 1660. Her 
 father was a country gentleman of moderate 
 income, who had married Frances Thornhurst, 
 daughter and heiress of Sir Giffard Thornhurst 
 of Agnes Court, in Kent. Jennings was a Prot- 
 estant, but a zealous Stuart adherent. To the 
 court, two of his daughters were sent. The 
 eldest, Frances, was a lovely girl of blond com-
 
 HER GRACE OF MARLBOROUGH. 5 
 
 plexion, with wit and vivacity as well as beauty. 
 She is " La Belle Jennings " we meet in the 
 pages of Grammont. In that iniquitous envi- 
 ronment she preserved her respectability, repuls- 
 ing all gallants, even the Duke of York, and 
 became Duchess of Tyrconnel. Her portrait 
 by Lely graced the gallery at Whitehall in that 
 splendid collection there of the surpassing beau- 
 ties of the time. The second sister, Barbara, did 
 not go to court, but married Edward Griffith. 
 The third sister, our Sarah, at twelve years of 
 age, entered the service of Anne Hyde, Duchess 
 of York. Besides wishing to surround herself 
 with youth and beauty, the Duchess wished a 
 playmate to the Princess Anne, afterwards Queen. 
 This youthful companionship of the staid and 
 sedate princess with the lovely, impetuous girl 
 continued long after the death of Anne Hyde 
 1671 and long after James had married Mary 
 Beatrix d'Este. The new Duchess was of the 
 same age as the young maid of honor. She, 
 too, was a beauty, of dark hair and eyes, a con- 
 trast to Sarah, to whom she was kind and affec- 
 tionate. In her service, and under her influence,
 
 6 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Sarah developed into a well-conducted and pru- 
 dent woman, a woman of great intelligence, and 
 her lively wit sparkled and her splendid beauty 
 shone. Hers was a beauty that lasted. She had 
 soft, deep blue eyes ; a delicate rosy mouth, of 
 much sweetness of expression, a clear skin and 
 blond hair, long and glossy, glorious in its 
 effect. Her figure was most perfectly propor- 
 tioned. When the Duke of York was married 
 to Mary of Modena, one of the appointments 
 to gentlemen of the bedchamber was that of 
 the son of Sir Winston Churchill, of Ashe, in 
 Dorsetshire, Colonel John Churchill, who after 
 being page to the Duke had attained, at the age 
 of sixteen, a commission in the army. He was 
 an extremely handsome young man, with clear- 
 cut, regular features, high forehead, and thought- 
 ful eyes, with a figure above the average ; he was 
 called "the handsome Englishman." His manners 
 were as fine as his appearance. His sister Ara- 
 bella had been the mistress of James II. during 
 his first marriage, and Lady Castlemaine was 
 his cousin ; and it was to the latter he was 
 indebted for means to appear at court, and for
 
 HER GRACE OF MARLBOROUGH. 7 
 
 a powerful influence in his favor. When hand- 
 some Colonel Churchill was twenty-four years 
 of age he was attracted by the pretty Sarah 
 Jennings. They were engaged for three years, 
 a period of alternation in the intensity of 
 their attachment. They were married in pri- 
 vacy at last, Mary Beatrix being their only 
 confidante. The soldier's duty called him to 
 the continent, From Antwerp he wrote to his 
 wife a letter characteristic of the many he sent 
 throughout his career when he had to be away 
 from her. " My soul's soul, I do with all my 
 heart and soul long to be with you, you being 
 dearer to me than my own life." 
 
 Preferment soon came to the young soldier. 
 He was favored of his royal master. He had 
 been made Master of the Robes before James 
 was King, and after was created Baron Churchill 
 of Eyemouth in Scotland. Lady Churchill 
 increased in favor with her girl playmate Anne. 
 When the latter, a placid, respectable lady of 
 commonplace mind, married the more sedate 
 Prince George of Denmark, Sarah became more 
 necessary for Anne as an antidote. With these
 
 8 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 two, intimacy ripened into familiarity, and familiar- 
 ity at last? bred contempt. The Princess wished 
 forms of address put aside ; so proposed to her 
 lady in waiting to adopt familiar names. The lady 
 became to the Princess " Mrs. Freeman," and the 
 Princess to her lady was " Morley." For long 
 years they never addressed each other by any 
 other title than these. She was the friend 
 of Anne throughout that troublesome period 
 when James had to flee, and Anne's sister Mary, 
 and her husband from Holland became joint 
 monarchs. Though an adherent of the Stuarts, 
 Churchill wisely withdrew from the court and 
 service of James long before his flight. In the 
 new reign the Baron was at once raised to an 
 earldom. But he had no part in affairs. The 
 sisters Mary and Anne did not live in great 
 amity, and as the Countess of Marlborough was 
 the close companion of the heir to the throne, 
 and not the Queen, her and her husband's in- 
 fluence was small. At this period was the 
 greatest glory of Countess Sarah as a leader of 
 society. With her bright intelligence, sparkling 
 wit, and great good sense, she attracted to
 
 HER GRACE OF MARLBOROUGH. 9 
 
 Anne's court at Whitehall all the able and bril- 
 liant men of the day. Some came from interested 
 motives, in being friendly with the adviser of the 
 successor to the throne, others came for her own 
 sake.; and chief among these was the noble Sidney 
 Godolphin, who had been Lord Treasurer under 
 James II. and who retained the office under 
 William. He was an admirer of the shrewd 
 sense of Sarah, and became a life-long friend. 
 But all through her career this brilliant woman 
 had no admirer like unto her husband. Loyal and 
 loving when at home and abroad, his affection 
 for her is a great tribute to her worth ; and that 
 affection was reciprocal. Never did he leave her 
 but he sent most tender messages of love. He 
 who knew her best complained not of that violent 
 temper or hasty speech. When he was away in the 
 midst of his battles he wrote to her: " Put your 
 trust in God, and be assured that I think I can't 
 be unhappy as long as you are kind ;" and again, 
 when he was a man of fifty-two, and his wife a 
 decade younger, he wrote, on leaving her for 
 a time : " It is impossible to express with what a 
 heavy heart I parted from you when I was by the
 
 JO DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 water's side. I could have given my life to have 
 come back, though I knew my own weakness so 
 much that I durst not, for I know I should have 
 exposed myself to the company. I did for a 
 great while with a perspective glass look out 
 upon the cliffs, in hopes I might have had one 
 sight of you." 
 
 Lady Marlborough was of a most intense 
 nature. She liked heartily, and she disliked just 
 as heartily. Queen Mary was one of those she 
 disliked. The royal sisters disagreed much, and 
 these disagreements were attributed by the Queen 
 to the influence of Lady Sarah on Anne. Her 
 Majesty determined to have her dismissed, and 
 commanded Anne to have her leave Whitehall. 
 She left, but the Princess went with her. Marl- 
 borough had been expelled the court by the King 
 for carrying on a correspondence with his late 
 monarch. The Queen was attacked with the 
 small-pox and died, and after this the King was 
 reconciled to his sister-in-law. At her residence 
 in Berkeley House she again held court, and 
 with her Lady Sarah the dictatress was as im- 
 portant as ever. Marlborough somewhat recov-
 
 HER GRACE OF MARLBOROUGH. I I 
 
 ered the confidence of the court, and was made 
 governor to Anne's son, the young Duke of 
 Gloucester. When William III. died, in 1702, 
 Lady Marlborough was forty-three years of age, 
 and now was the period of her greatest power, - 
 the period preceding her downfall. Her husband 
 had full command of the army, and gained such 
 glory on the continent as raised the prestige of 
 England and gained a lasting renown for the 
 General. Honors were showered on him, in 
 which his consort shared. He was made a Prince 
 of the Roman Empire abroad, and a Duke at 
 home. A ducal seat at Woodstock was given 
 him by the nation, and Blenheim was built. His 
 consort, during his career abroad, looked after 
 his interests at court. He was not without ene- 
 mies who belittled his conquests. What great 
 man is not attacked and aspersed by those who 
 have not the largeness of view to comprehend the 
 motives and principles of the great ? " Queen 
 Sarah," termed now " the Viceroy " by reason of 
 her influence with the Queen Anne, confounded 
 his enemies. But she, who had foiled many a 
 minister, fell a victim to the intrigue of a humble
 
 12 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 relative, Abigail Hill, whom she had introduced 
 at court, and who was bedchamber woman to 
 the Queen. As honors were heaped upon the 
 Duchess, she became haughty and dictatorial. 
 The taciturn Queen came at last to resent her 
 dictation in politics. The question was in regard 
 to Church and State, Anne being a strict, even 
 a narrow church-woman, and the Duchess being 
 wise enough to see the trend of thought was 
 against intolerant laws. The political differ- 
 ence soon became a personal difference, and 
 " Mrs. Freeman " and " Morley " were friends no 
 more, for Abigail Hill had treacherously intrigued 
 against the Duchess, being guilty of backbiting 
 and deceit. From the time of the disfavor of 
 the Marlboroughs, Queen Anne's prestige abroad 
 waned and she had no prosperity at home. In 
 1722, the Duke died. His widow was sought in 
 marriage by Lord Coningsby and by the Duke of 
 Somerset; but she replied, " The widow of Marl- 
 borough shall never become the wife of any other 
 man." 
 
 The family of the Duchess was five daughters 
 and one son, Lord Blandford, who died in his
 
 HER GRACE OF MARLBOROUGH. 13 
 
 youth. The daughters were all beautiful like 
 their mother, and, like her, intelligent and virtu- 
 ous. The eldest, Lady Henrietta Churchill, in 
 her eighteenth year was married to Lord Rial- 
 ton, eldest son of her mother's friend Godolphin. 
 She afterwards became Duchess of Marlborough 
 in her own right. The second daughter, Lady 
 Anne, was married to Lord Sunderland, and 
 through her descendant the titles and estates 
 of the Churchills have been enjoyed by the 
 Spencers. This union was not a felicitous one. 
 The third daughter, Lady Elizabeth, married 
 the Earl of Bridgewater. The fourth, Lady Mary, 
 became Duchess of Montagu. The latter was 
 of a hasty temper and disagreed sadly with her 
 mother. The later life of the Duchess was not 
 placid. Her acerbity of temper increased with 
 age, and brought her into many a turmoil. Many 
 are instances given of her imprudent and caustic 
 speech, and many the anecdotes told of her keen 
 wit, and her uncharitable conduct. She wrote 
 the defence of her course with the Queen ; she 
 was attacked severely by Pope and by Swift, and 
 was defended by Fielding. Indeed, such a strong
 
 14 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 personality as hers must needs stir up strife. 
 She made many enemies, and her enemies did 
 not fail to magnify her failings. She died at 
 eighty-four years of age, and was buried beside 
 her husband at Blenheim. 
 
 Lord Bolingbroke was once spoken to of 
 Marlborough's penuriousness. He stopped the 
 comment by saying, " He was so very great a 
 man that I forgot he had that vice." We would 
 that the chroniclers had treated his Duchess in 
 the same spirit. She had several blemishes of 
 character, but she was a very great woman.
 
 HENRIETTA, 
 COUNTE.15 
 
 or 
 JurroiK
 
 MY GOOD 
 h OWARD" 
 
 IN Thackeray's ever interesting and keen com- 
 ments on the Courts of the Georges, he says, 
 " Of all the Court of George and Caroline I find 
 no one but Lady Suffolk with whom it seems 
 pleasant and kindly to hold converse. Even the 
 misogynist Croker, who edited her letters, loves 
 her, and has that regard for her with which her 
 sweet graciousness seems to have inspired almost 
 all men and some women who came near her." 
 Strange language this. In searching for the 
 most honest, the most sane talker, and the least 
 vainglorious, least lacquered of the world, among 
 the women of that age, we come upon one who 
 was chronicled for a century as mistress of the 
 Kinar. The edition of her letters combats this
 
 1 8 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 established repute of her position. But beyond 
 the general esteem of her associates and the adu- 
 lation of her admirers, he adduces no evidence to 
 controvert the grave asseverations of history. 
 
 In a letter to her, Mr. Hobart says, " You 
 have hardly yet ever received a letter but sil- 
 ver-tongued praise sweetened every line. Pope 
 and Swift for you laid by satire, and joined for 
 once in panegyric." How grateful we are they 
 did preserve to us in these panegyrics the sweet 
 character of one whose position at Court would 
 lead to cruel comment and adverse estimate ! 
 
 " I know a thing that 's most uncommon, 
 
 (Envy, be silent and attend ! ) 
 I know a reasonable woman, 
 
 Handsome and witty, yet a friend. 
 
 " Not warp'd by passion, awed by rumor, 
 
 Not grave through pride, or gay through folly, 
 An equal mixture of good-humor, 
 And sensible soft melancholy. 
 
 " ' Has she no faults then (Envy says), sir? ' 
 
 Yes, she has one, I must aver ; 
 When all the world conspires to praise her, 
 The woman 's deaf, and does not hear ! "
 
 "MY GOOD HOWARD. 19 
 
 This is the compliment paid by little Mr. Pope, 
 " To a Certain Lady at Court." Swift's char- 
 acter sketch is in prose, and is prefaced to the 
 collection of Lady Suffolk's letters. After pass- 
 ing by the subject of her wit and beauty as being 
 freely conceded and also being apart from her 
 character, the Dean sketches very lightly her 
 career, and then proceeds to a recital of her char- 
 acteristics. Supreme tact and diplomacy, mod- 
 esty and kindliness, are her attributes. " If she 
 had never seen a court, it is possible she might 
 have been a friend," and " She is upon the whole 
 an excellent companion for men of the best ac- 
 complishments who have nothing to ask," are the 
 comments of the satiric churchman; and he con- 
 cludes with the opinion that " her talents as a 
 courtier will spread, enlarge, and multiply to such 
 a degree that her private virtues, for want of 
 room and time to operate, must be folded and 
 laid up clean, like clothes in a chest, never to be 
 put on till satiety or some reverse of fortune 
 shall dispose her to retirement." Beyond the 
 compliments of Pope and Swift in adulation 
 and incense is the poem of Lord Peterborough 
 addressed to Mrs. Howard :
 
 2O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 " I said to my heart, between sleeping and waking, 
 Thou wild thing, that always art leaping or aching, 
 What black, brown, or fair, in what clime, in what nation, 
 By turns has not taught thee a pit-a-patation? " 
 
 The heart is not affected by Celia, by Sappho, 
 or Prudentia, but by another finer than these. 
 
 " But Chloe, so lively, so easy, so fair, 
 Her wit so genteel, without art, without care ; 
 When she comes in my way the motion, the pain, 
 The leapings, the achings, return all again. 
 
 " O wonderful creature ! a woman of reason ! 
 Never grave out of pride, never gay out of season ; 
 When so easy to guess who this angel should be, 
 Would one think Mrs. Howard ne'er dreamt it was she ? " 
 
 This sweet lady, who drew men unto her, was 
 Henrietta, eldest daughter of Sir Henry Hobart, 
 fourth Baronet of his family. She was born about 
 1688, and married, in her twentieth year, the 
 Honorable Charles Howard, third son of Henry, 
 fifth Earl of Suffolk, who in 1731 became, by 
 the deaths of his nephews and two elder brothers, 
 ninth Earl of Suffolk. The union was not feli- 
 citous from the first. Howard was without
 
 "MY GOOD HOWARD. 21 
 
 income ; his wife's was but small. His tastes 
 and temperament were reprehensible. About 
 the close of Queen Anne's reign, the couple 
 went to Hanover with the view of conciliating 
 the favor of their future sovereign. The lady 
 gained much favor with the Electress Sophia, and 
 on her son's accession to the throne was ap- 
 pointed woman of the bedchamber to the Princess 
 of Wales. It was long after this, however, that 
 the Prince became at all enamoured of her. Mrs. 
 Howard found it expedient to give a dinner to 
 the Hanoverian ministers, but in order to do so 
 made the sacrifice of selling her beautiful head of 
 hair to procure the wherewithal. On the trans- 
 ference of the Court to England, the apartment 
 of the bedchamber woman of the Princess be- 
 came the rendezvous of all the beauties, gallants, 
 and wits of the day. Here Molly Lepel was 
 gracious to all, but loving to one, Lord Hervey, 
 especial friend of the Princess; here Mary 
 Bellenden, the vivacious, and Margaret her sister, 
 added gayety to the court. Among all the ladies 
 Mrs. Howard was the favorite. She was a good 
 friend to all, and kept her friends long after her
 
 22 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Court days. Many of them became her corre- 
 spondents; and in their letters we find a loyalty, 
 a happy spirit of comradeship, and withal a sin- 
 cerity which was rare in those days. Mary 
 Bellenden, become Mrs. Campbell, wrote to her 
 in 1722: "I wish you might leave that life of 
 hurry, and be able to enjoy those that love you, 
 and be a little at rest ; and I really do believe you 
 have as many people that love and value you as 
 ever came to one woman's share." This is the 
 burden of all the letters sent her, good wishes 
 for her welfare, and expressions of affection. The 
 Prince of Wales, accustomed to having his wishes 
 gratified, desired for himself her who was the 
 admired of all the court. Not that he was of an 
 amorous disposition, did he desire her, so much 
 as to disprove the rumors that he was ruled by 
 his wife, and from a silly idea that gallantry was 
 becoming. While Mrs. Howard submitted to 
 the position of favorite to the Prince, this did not 
 alter her pleasant relations with the Princess. 
 The lady's husband of course became acquainted 
 with the intrigue, and helped to publish it by 
 vociferously demanding her before the guards
 
 " MY GOOD HOWARD. 23 
 
 and congregated auditors in the quadrangle of 
 St. James' Palace. He had a letter delivered to 
 her by the Archbishop of Canterbury. But all 
 this was in the nature of blackmail, for he was 
 quieted with a pension of twelve hundred a year. 
 Never was royal mistress less avaricious or sel- 
 fish than she. In her career she was not able 
 to aggrandize more than the cost of a small villa 
 at Twickenham, known as Marble Hill, the cost 
 of which was but ten or twelve thousand pounds. 
 Gay writes of the building of it: 
 
 " My house was only built for show, 
 My lady's empty pockets know ; 
 And now she will not have a shilling 
 To raise the stairs or build the ceiling. 
 'T is come to what I always thought, 
 My dame is hardly worth a groat." 
 
 The place was comfortable and tasteful rather 
 than magnificent. Her friends had aided its 
 accomplishing. Lords Burlington and Pem- 
 broke designed the house ; Lord Bathurst and 
 Mr. Pope laid out the gardens ; and Gay, Swift, 
 and Arbuthnot had constituted themselves super- 
 intendents of the household. Here were spent
 
 24 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 her happiest hours. In 1731, Mr. Howard suc- 
 ceeded to the Earldom of Suffolk, and as a 
 countess could not hold the subordinate posi- 
 tion of bedchamber woman, the Queen trans- 
 ferred her to the office of Mistress of the Robes. 
 This gave my lady less exacting duties and more 
 leisure to enjoy her villa on the Thames. Her 
 husband died in 1733, which increased her in- 
 come, so in the following year she retired from 
 Court. She lived not long in widowhood, but 
 married, in 1735, the Hon. George Berkeley, the 
 youngest son of the second Earl of Berkeley. 
 They lived a happy life, as appears from their 
 correspondence and as testified to by Lady Suf- 
 folk after her husband's death in 1 746. Lady 
 Suffolk had one child by her first husband, a 
 son, who became tenth Earl, and died without 
 issue in 1745 at the age of thirty-five. By her 
 second husband she had no children, but adopted 
 and educated her niece, Lady Dorothy Hobart, 
 and her grand-niece, Lady Dorothy's daughter 
 by Colonel Hotham. From the time of her 
 retirement from Court until her death in 1767, 
 she lived a life of tranquillity, the object of
 
 " MY GOOD HOWARD. 25 
 
 affection from many loyal friends. Her neighbor 
 at Twickenham, Mr. Walpole, used to spend his 
 autumn evenings in her gardens, enjoying her 
 Court reminiscences and unmalicious gossip. Her 
 memory was wonderful, and all her comment sen- 
 sible. Her hearing had always been defective ; 
 but even this did not detract from the charm of 
 reconnoitring her memories of early days in 
 high circles, and listening to their interesting 
 recital. Her appearance, as described by Wal- 
 pole, is what one would imagine to be consonant 
 with her character: "She was of a just height, 
 well made, extremely fair, with the finest light 
 brown hair, and features regular and agreeable, 
 rather than beautiful. She was remarkably gen- 
 teel, and always dressed with taste and simpli- 
 city. Her personal charms had suffered but little 
 diminution up to the period of her death, at the 
 advanced age of seventy-nine. Her mental quali- 
 fications were by no means shining ; her eyes 
 and countenance showed her character, which 
 was grave and mild. She preserved uncommon 
 respect to the end of her life, and, from the pro- 
 priety and decency of her behavior, was always
 
 26 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 treated as if her virtue had never been ques- 
 tioned, her friends even affecting to suppose 
 that her connection with the King had been 
 confined to pure friendship." The Queen, though 
 professing great fondness for Mrs. Howard, took 
 a malicious delight in employing her in menial 
 duties, and subjecting her to mortifications. 
 " My good Howard " is the phrase she became 
 accustomed to use when addressing her, and this 
 is the phrase we like to recall her by. The 
 frailty, weaknesses, and ill in her character have 
 nigh vanished as her career is empurpled by time, 
 and that character's tone and tint is best sketched 
 by the simple phrase, " My good Howard."
 
 
 
 

 
 IN the collection of Carolan Court beauties 
 painted by Lely, the most interesting portrait, 
 next to that of the graceful Countess of Gram- 
 mont, is of Louise de Keroualle, the patrician 
 mistress brought from France by the Merry Mon- 
 arch. The lovely olive flesh-tones of this were 
 a characteristic of her descendants for many a 
 generation. Her grandson, Charles Lennox, 
 second Duke of Richmond, born 1701, only son 
 of the first Duke, who during the lifetime of his 
 father was Earl of March, on the death of his 
 grandmother Louise succeeded to the Dukedom 
 of Aubigny in France. When but eighteen, 
 he was married, to cancel a gambling debt, to 
 Lady Sarah, eldest daughter of William, first
 
 3<D DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Earl of Cadogan. The youth objected to hav- 
 ing his matrimony arranged in this manner, and 
 especially to such a dowdy. He left her and 
 England for several years. On returning to 
 London, he went to the theatre and there saw 
 a lady whose splendid beauty attracted him. He 
 asked her name. It was Lady March. The 
 deserted wife now became the object of the 
 adoration of the Earl. By her he became the 
 father of twelve children, the eldest of whom was 
 Lady Georgina Caroline Lennox, born in 1723. 
 In the days of her great-grandfather the King, 
 a prudent faithful adherent was Sir Stephen Fox. 
 He had been a chorister boy in Salisbury Cathe- 
 dral, but was ambitious and able. He rose fast, 
 but one of the stages of his career was that of 
 footman. He followed the fortunes of his royal 
 patron, and was the first to announce the death 
 of Cromwell to Charles, as he was playing tennis 
 with Archduke Leopold and Don John. At 
 the Restoration he became Clerk of the Green 
 Cloth, afterwards Paymaster - General of the 
 Forces and a Lord of the Treasury. His 
 second wife was Christian, daughter of the Rev-
 
 LADY SARAH LENNOX. 31 
 
 erend Charles Hope, whom he married when in 
 his seventy-seventh year. By her he became 
 the father of Stephen, created Earl of Ilchester, 
 and of Henry, born in 1705, who was somewhat 
 of a man about town in his youthful days, but 
 entered Parliament in 1735, and in 1743, like 
 his father, became a Lord of the Treasury. 
 Now, Henry, son of the footman, came courting 
 Lady Caroline, great-granddaughter of the King, 
 but the haughty Duke, her father, would have 
 none of it. He looked higher ; and once when 
 a suitor whom he favored called, the rebellious 
 Caroline cut off her eyebrows so her appearance 
 would not permit her being seen. In 1744, the 
 lady flew to her lover, and was married at the 
 house of his friend and schoolfellow at Eton, 
 Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, the Duke of 
 Marlborough, a friend of the Richmonds, giving 
 her away. Sir Charles addressed some lines to 
 Fox shortly afterwards: 
 
 " When Winnington and Fox with flow of soul, 
 With sense and wit, drove round the bowl, 
 Our hearts we opened and our converse free. 
 But now they both are lost, quite lost to me :
 
 32 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 One to a mistress gives up all his life, 
 And one from me flies wisely to his wife ; 
 This proves the highest joys that men can prove, 
 The joys of truth and of alternate love." 
 
 The match made a tumult in town, and even 
 affected politics. It took four years for forgive- 
 ness to come to the couple. Fox was able and of 
 agreeable manners. Chesterfield said he had no 
 fixed principles of religion or morality. He 
 was a power in the Government. Again, like 
 unto his father, he became Paymaster-General 
 of the Forces, in which position he was ac- 
 cused of having much money stick to his 
 fingers, and on his death his executors had to 
 refund ,200,000. Lady Caroline had a face 
 firm and strong in its features and with much 
 character. She was painted by Hogarth as 
 Cydria in the Conquest of Mexico, performed 
 before the Duke of Cumberland and Prin- 
 cesses Mary and Louisa, and is in the Hol- 
 land House collection. She was also painted by 
 Ramsay and Reynolds, and in miniature by Col- 
 lins. Lady Caroline acted as a mother to her 
 brothers and sisters. Lady Emily was, like her-
 
 LADY SARAH LENNOX. 33 
 
 self, a beauty, and married James, twentieth Earl 
 of Kildare, in 1746; but the flower of the family 
 was the seventh and youngest daughter and 
 eleventh child, Lady Sarah, born in 1745. We 
 first hear of her taking part in private theatricals, 
 in 1761, a favorite form of diversion among 
 the patricians in those days. Walpole's account 
 of it is very interesting : " There was a play at 
 Holland House acted by children ; not all chil- 
 dren, for Lady Sarah Lennox and Lady Susan 
 Strangways played the women. It was Jane 
 Shore ; the two girls were delightful, and acted 
 with so much nature and simplicity that they 
 appeared the very things they represented. Lady 
 Sarah was more beautiful than you can conceive ; 
 and her very awkwardness gave an air of truth 
 to the shame of the part, and the antiquity of the 
 time, which was kept up by her dress, taken out 
 of Montfaucon. Lady Susan was dressed from 
 Jane Seymour ; and all the parts were clothed in 
 ancient habits and with the most minute pro- 
 priety. I was infinitely more struck with the 
 last scene between the two women than ever I 
 was when I have seen it on the stage. When 
 
 3
 
 34 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Lady Sarah was in white, with her hair about 
 her ears and on the ground, no Magdalen by 
 Correggio was half so lovely and expressive. You 
 would have been charmed, too, with seeing Mr. 
 Fox's little boy, Henry Edward, of six years old, 
 who is beautiful, and acted the Bishop of Ely, 
 dressed in lawn sleeves and with a square cap." 
 
 At this time George III. had been but a few 
 months a king. He was a young man of twenty- 
 three, and had made a good impression on the 
 country. 
 
 Lady Hervey writes : " I have the best opinion 
 imaginable of him ; not from anything he does 
 or says just now, but because I have a moral cer- 
 tainty that he was in the nursery the honestest, 
 true, and good-natured child that ever lived, and 
 you know my old maxim that qualities never 
 change." In person he was tall and dignified, 
 with a good-natured, florid countenance. There 
 was decency and an effort at dignity in his char- 
 acter. Rumor had it that in 1754 he had become 
 enamoured of a young Quakeress, Hannah Light- 
 foot, and had been married to her in Curzan 
 St. Chapel, Mayfair, his confidante in the
 
 LADY SARAH LENNOX. 35 
 
 intrigue being the notorious Miss Chudleigh, his 
 mother's maid of honor, afterwards Duchess of 
 Kingston. This may have been an escapade of 
 his youth, but it ill accords with what we know 
 of his later, well-regulated, phlegmatic, formal life. 
 St. James' Palace is anigh to Holland House, 
 and the young monarch often saw and was 
 smitten with his lovely subject. On the fourth 
 of June, 1761, was the first anniversary of 
 the King's birthday since his accession, and 
 the occasion was observed with magnificence. 
 At St. James', Lady Sarah was observed of 
 all. She exceeded the splendor of Haroun Al- 
 raschid and the " Arabian Nights." The King's 
 confidante of his passion was Lady Susan Strang- 
 ways. He asked her if she did not know some- 
 body who would grace a wedding ceremony in 
 the properest manner. At this she was much 
 embarrassed, thinking he meant herself; but he 
 went on and said, " I mean your friend, Lady 
 Sarah Lennox. Tell her I say so ; and let me 
 have her answer by next Drawing-Room day." 
 Lady Sarah used to meet the King in his rides 
 early in the morning, driving a little chaise with
 
 36 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Lady Susan; and once it is said that, wanting 
 to speak to him, she went dressed like a servant- 
 maid, and stood amid the crowd in the guard- 
 room to say a few words to him as he passed 
 by. Lord Bute was under orders to interrupt 
 tete-a-letes ; while Lady Sarah's family, especially 
 her ambitious brother-in-law, Fox, favored the 
 meetings. In front of Holland House, on the 
 fine summer mornings, in the broad meadows of 
 that interesting old mansion, Lady Sarah, attired 
 in a half-fancy costume resembling a peasant's, 
 was to be seen gracefully taking her share in the 
 labors of the haymakers. She was said to have 
 been at the time in love with Lord Newbottle, 
 afterwards Marquis of Lothian. It was now 
 that Reynolds painted the picture of which we 
 give a fragment, one of the most noted pic- 
 tures of the century and remaining in the 
 Holland House collection. As Thackeray puts 
 it, the dove that Lady Susan was trying to 
 hand to Lady Sarah flew away. The King had 
 her assist his German bride, Charlotte of Meck- 
 lenburg, as train-bearer, instead of being chief 
 personage at the ceremony. She found herself
 
 LADY SARAH LENNOX. 37 
 
 deprived of a crown and of her lover, Lord New- 
 bottle, together, for he complained as much of 
 her as she did of the King. Gone was her 
 chance of the great position of queen, and gone 
 the gladness, the glamour, and the glory of her 
 dream. Of the ten unmarried daughters of 
 dukes and earls who were bridesmaids, their heads 
 crowned with diamonds, and in robes of white 
 and silver, Lady Sarah was the chief angel. 
 Walpole's comment is : " Lady Caroline Russell 
 is extremely handsome ; Lady Elizabeth Keppel 
 very pretty, but with neither features nor air. 
 Nothing ever looked so charming as Lady Sarah ; 
 she has all the glow of beauty peculiar to her 
 family, has better white and red than if she 
 were made of pearls and rubies." Many years 
 after the King at the theatre saw Mrs. Pope, 
 who resembled Lady Sarah, and was heard to 
 murmur, " She is like my Lady Sarah still." A 
 few months after the coronation she whom the 
 King failed to marry refused Lord Errol, whose 
 father, Kilmarnoch, was beheaded for his adher- 
 ence to the Pretender ; but the following year, 
 in June, she was married to Sir Thomas Charles
 
 38 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Bunbury, Bart., who was known as the beau-ideal 
 of an English sportsman, was the patron and 
 father of the turf, also well known as a Whig 
 politician, and was said to look like Sheridan. 
 He represented the County of Suffolk for forty- 
 five years. The union was not a happy one. 
 They were divorced by Act of Parliament in 
 1776. Bunbury died in 1821, in his eighty-first 
 year. 
 
 Lady Caroline Fox who had been created, in 
 1762, Baroness Holland in her own right, her 
 husband being made a peer as Baron Holland of 
 Foxley the following year died of a cancer in 
 1774, but twenty-three days after the death of 
 her husband. She was thought much of by 
 Walpole, who speaks well of her, who never said 
 a good word of the Foxes when he could help it. 
 The second Baron Holland died six months later 
 than his parents. His wife, Lady Mary Fitz- 
 patrick, who was of a most amiable and femi- 
 nine softness of disposition, a beautiful character, 
 died at the age of thirty-two. 
 
 In 1764, Lady Susannah Sarah Fox-Strang- 
 ways, then twenty-three years of age the eldest
 
 LADY SARAH LENNOX. 39 
 
 daughter of Lord Ilchester married, unknown 
 to her family, at St. Paul's Church, Covent 
 Garden, the actor, William O'Brien. She is 
 described as a very pleasing girl, though not 
 handsome, having the finest complexion, most 
 beautiful hair, and prettiest person that was ever 
 seen, a pretty mouth and remarkably fine teeth, 
 and excess of bloom in her cheeks. Her lover 
 carried on his courting by counterfeiting Lady 
 Sarah Lennox's handwriting. Walpole's com- 
 ment on the match was, " Marrying O'Brien was 
 the completion of disgrace, even a footman 
 were preferable ; the publicity of the hero's pro- 
 fession perpetuates the mortification." The 
 couple went to New York on their way to Ohio, 
 where they had a grant of forty thousand acres. 
 They soon drifted back to England, where her 
 relatives secured a government position for her 
 husband. She died at Stinsford in Dorset in 
 1827. 
 
 Reynolds painted Lady Sarah Bunbury half 
 kneeling before a tripod altar with a group of 
 Graces above. In 1779, we find a note in a letter, 
 " Lady Sarah still looks prettier and fresher than
 
 40 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 an angel of Correggio; " and in 1781 the Prince 
 of Wales said he did not wonder at his father's 
 admiring her, and was persuaded she had not 
 been more beautiful then. In 1782, she married 
 George Napier, sixth son of Francis, fifth Lord 
 Napier, and by him became the mother of five 
 sons known as " the fighting Napiers," one of 
 whom was General Sir Charles James Napier, 
 the conqueror of Scinde, and the third was Sir 
 William, historian of the Peninsular War. She 
 died in 1826, aged eighty-two. During her last 
 years she was completely blind, at which time 
 her early lover, the King, was blind also, and 
 sorrowful with many burdens. Her influence on 
 her time was not powerful, nor her personality 
 pervasive ; nevertheless her story appeals to stu- 
 dents of the period, and she will always be referred 
 to as " lovely Lady Sarah."
 
 MARIA, 
 DUCHESS T 
 GIOUCE5TER
 
 t t 
 
 HER GPACE 
 
 or GLOUCESTER 
 
 t t t 
 
 THE unconventional marriage of Maria Walpole 
 to William Henry, Duke of Gloucester, was not 
 unique in its manner in the Walpole family. 
 Old Sir Robert had a daughter by Miss Sherret, 
 a French refugee stay-maker, whom he after- 
 wards married, and who died in 1 783, at the age 
 of eighty-seven. His second son, Sir Edward, 
 had four children by Dorothy Clement of Dur- 
 ham, a milliner's apprentice. A son, Edward, 
 died in 1771. The three daughters became ex- 
 tremely beautiful women ; and of these three 
 Graces, Maria, the second, was the supreme 
 beauty. The eldest, Laura, married Dr. Fred- 
 erick Keppel, Bishop of Exeter and Dean of 
 Windsor, fourth son of William Anne, second
 
 44 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Earl of Albemarle. The youngest, Charlotte, 
 whose mother died at her birth, became the wife 
 of Lionel Tolmache, Lord Huntingtower, Earl 
 of Dysart, in 1771. She was a sweet character. 
 Indeed, her uncle Horace said that a more fault- 
 less being existed not within his knowledge ; and 
 the worldly gossiper was moved to write a most 
 tender epitaph, recalling her virtues and graces. 
 James, the second Earl of Waldegrave, was a 
 worthy man, of high standing at Court. He was 
 firm in the King's favor, and easy in circum- 
 stances. He had been selected as tutor to the 
 Prince of Wales (George III.). He is quoted as 
 saying at that time, " If I dared, I would make 
 this excuse to the King, ' Sir, I am too young to 
 govern and too old to be governed.' ' A man of 
 stricter honor and more reasonable sense could 
 not have been selected for the employment. It 
 was said of him that he did just what was wise, 
 and nothing more. In 1759, his wisdom led him 
 to marry Maria Walpole. Horace claimed the 
 credit of the match. We have his own claim to 
 it. " I am marrying my niece Maria to Lord 
 Waldegrave. What say you? A month ago I
 
 HER GRACE OF GLOUCESTER. 45 
 
 was told he liked her does he? I jumbled 
 them together, and he has already proposed. 
 For character and credit he is the first match 
 in England ; for beauty I think she is. ... My 
 brother has luckily been tractable, and left the 
 whole management to me. My family don't lose 
 any rank or advantage when they let me dispose 
 of them, a Knight of the Garter for my niece." 
 Of that beauty we cull many accounts from the 
 pages of the admiring Horace. She had a 
 warm complexion tending to brown, fine eyes, 
 brown hair, fine teeth, and a person that was 
 perfect. Her only defect was that her face was 
 rather round. And with all her charms of feat- 
 ure she had the greater ones of manner, of 
 wi-t, of vivacity, and withal perfect modesty, al- 
 beit she was ambitious. Of the wedding of 
 Maria to the Earl, we have sketches by Horace. 
 A sensible wedding it was, without form or in- 
 decency. The bride was in a white-and-silver 
 gown, with a hat very much pulled over her face ; 
 what one could see of it being handsomer than 
 ever, a cold maiden blush giving her the 
 sweetest delicacy in the world. Her married
 
 46 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 happiness was not for long. In April, 1763, the 
 good Earl died of the small-pox. Besides the 
 memory of an unblemished character and three 
 lovely children, he left but little to his widow. 
 The earldom went to his brother, who was kept 
 out of it for several months by the widow on the 
 possibility of an heir by her appearing. 
 
 In her widowhood, Maria was the most capti- 
 vating and commanding beauty of the day, with all 
 the bloom of freshness and youth. She suffered 
 not for lack of suitors, of whom a most persistent 
 was the Duke of Portland, the best match in 
 England. 
 
 In 1764, William Henry, Duke of Gloucester, 
 the third son of Frederick, Prince of Wales, was 
 nineteen years of age. He was, like his brothers, 
 illy educated, and was least tenderly treated by 
 his mother, whom he reproached for her un- 
 kind treatment, but he was fond of his brother 
 the King. At this time he became enamoured 
 of Waldegrave's widow. Her uncle Horace, 
 with the approbation of her father, advised Maria 
 to write her royal lover, pointing out the indif- 
 ferent repute which his attentions were calculated 
 to entail on her, and renouncing his friendship
 
 HER GRACE OF GLOUCESTER. 47 
 
 on the double plea that she was too considerable 
 a person to become his mistress, and of too little 
 consideration to become his wife. The loyal 
 lover would not give her up. He married her. 
 Yes! On the sixth of September, 1766, at her 
 own house, by her own chaplain. But the 
 couple kept it quiet. At a masquerade in 1770, 
 
 " Waldegrave's fair widow looked buxom as ever ; 
 Full many a lover, who longed to accost her, 
 Was kept at a distance by Humphry of Gloster." 
 
 They seemed desirous of proclaiming the nature 
 of their connection to the world, by the Duke 
 appearing in the character of Edward IV. and 
 our Lady as Elizabeth Woodville, the latter 
 being habited in gray and pearls, with a black 
 veil. 
 
 In May, 1772, she thought well to advise her 
 father of her marriage. Sir Edward was not 
 fond of high society, and was without parade, so 
 was not jubilant at having a prince for a son-in- 
 law. In the course of the year her brother- 
 in-law, the King, was advised, and he was 
 exceeding wrathful. Her royalty was established
 
 48 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 shortly before the birth of the Princess Sophia 
 Matilda, in May, 1773. The King deputed the 
 Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lord Chancellor, 
 and the Bishop of London, to examine proofs 
 of the marriage. They reported on its regularity. 
 The King set his face against the favorite 
 brother, and would not see his Duchess, nor make 
 
 r* 
 
 provision for his children. Of her at this time 
 Uncle Horace writes: "Her prudence has been 
 perfect. Her character is invulnerable, and it 
 gives me more pleasure she has preserved the 
 honor she had, than that she has obtained this 
 great honor, which does not dazzle me at all." 
 And again, " Her spirits, like her uncle's, do not 
 sink under difficulties ; her beauty, I think they 
 augment." In June, 1774, Princess Caroline was 
 born, who died in March, 1775. These were days 
 of darkness and difficulties. The couple travelled 
 on the Continent, staying a considerable time in 
 Florence and Rome. The Duke was extremely 
 ill and worried. The estrangement of the King 
 pained him exceedingly. In 1775, Horace 
 writes : " His heart is broken, and yet his firm- 
 ness and coolness are amazing. I pity her be-
 
 HER GRACE OF GLOUCESTER. 49 
 
 yond measure ; and it is not a time to blame her 
 having accepted an honor which so few women 
 could have resisted, and scarce one ever has 
 resisted." Blame her? No, indeed! not if she 
 loved him and not his coronet, and she appears 
 to have done so most truly. The Duke's marry- 
 ing her is one of the few, bright, noble, natural 
 spots in the picture of that whole ignominious 
 family of Teuton-English chuckle-heads to which 
 he belonged. 
 
 At Venice nothing ever exceeded the distinc- 
 tion paid to them, though they were both warm 
 and hurt at the indignation they received from 
 the English. 
 
 In Rome, in 1776, the Pope was a perfect 
 knight-errant in courtesy and gallantry to them, 
 and enjoined all attention from his college and 
 nobility. 
 
 In January, 1776, a son had been born, and 
 yet the King made no sign. 
 
 The following year the Duchess writes touch- 
 ingly to her father : " A broken heart cannot 
 stand an Italian climate in the summer. I find 
 the great comfort of religion now. Fred, my
 
 5O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 little boy, has grown thin. I cannot bear to part 
 with him, although he has little chance of ever 
 having anything to live upon but a commission 
 in the Austrian service." The Duke went to 
 Switzerland, and was extremely ill there, and 
 distressed because of continued neglect and 
 repulse. 
 
 " There was once a King of the Hanover race 
 Who had more sense within than appeared on his face, 
 And yet though his headpiece was not his best part, 
 It was excellent good if compared with his heart." 
 
 At last, word came from the King, but, oh, so 
 guarded a letter of endearment ! But even this 
 was some balm for a loyal brother. In June, 
 1 780, the King and his royal brother of Glouces- 
 ter and Cumberland were finally reconciled. 
 From this on, the days of the Duchess were more 
 fraught with comfort. She had been a good 
 mother to her Waldegrave daughters, and now 
 they had bloomed into beauties fair as herself. 
 
 The eldest, Lady Elizabeth Laura, married in 
 May, 1782, her cousin George, Viscount Chewton, 
 afterwards fourth Earl Waldegrave, by whom she
 
 HER GRACE OF GLOUCESTER. 51 
 
 was mother of the fifth and sixth Earls. She 
 died at Strawberry Hill in 1816. Uncle Horace 
 wrote her a certificate of character, as he did also 
 of her sisters. 
 
 Of Elizabeth, in 1771, he says, "A person who 
 has rank, beauty, the best education, and most 
 charming character, with uncommon sense and 
 prudence." Of the second daughter, Charlotte 
 Marian, " I do not know so perfect a young 
 woman ; she has all her father's sense and temper 
 and the utmost discretion." This discretion did 
 not restrain her from indulging in the uncon- 
 ventional form of marriage ; it ran in the blood. 
 In 1784, she eloped with George Henry Fitzroy, 
 Earl of Euston, who became Duke of Grafton in 
 1811. " It is not the style of our Court to have 
 long negotiations ; we don't fatigue the town 
 with exhibiting the betrothed for six months 
 together in public places," is the comment of 
 Horace. " If sense and sweetness of temper can 
 constitute the chief felicity of a husband, Lord 
 Euston will not be unhappy." " The Duke of 
 Grafton has sent word to Lord Euston that he 
 will continue his allowance. That he will be
 
 52 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 satisfied with Lady Euston, if she ever has the 
 happiness of being known to him, I am per- 
 suaded." The Countess died in 1808. The third 
 daughter, Anne Horatia, " a beautiful girl like 
 her mother, though not of so sublime a style of 
 beauty," was unfortunate enough to lose her 
 betrothed, the Duke of Ancaster, who died ; 
 but she married in 1786, Lord Hugh Convvay 
 Seymour, M. P., fifth son of Francis, first Mar- 
 quis of Hertford, K. G., and died in 1801. Sir 
 Joshua's portrait-piece of these ladies has made 
 them forever famous. 
 
 The Duke of Gloucester died in 1805. He 
 was buried in military uniform, and on his finger 
 a ring, an early love-gift from his Princess. He 
 had been true to her all his life. Almost 
 unique among the royalties of those days ! His 
 common understanding had nothing shining, yet 
 he never said a weak thing. He was succeeded 
 by his son, a good, amiable, and honest man, with 
 intellect not as strong as his virtues. He mar- 
 ried, in 1816, Princess Mary, youngest daughter 
 of George III., who died in 1857. He was char- 
 itable, yet careful of his money. He died in 
 1834.
 
 HER GRACE OF GLOUCESTER. 53 
 
 The Duchess of Gloucester did not regret her 
 marriage to royalty. We find no evidence that 
 she made other than a good wife, except in the 
 satires of Duke Walcott, who speaks of 
 
 " A certain high and mighty Duchess 
 Hugging her husband in her catlike clutches, 
 Longing to shine a first-rate star at court, 
 For satire's pen a subject of rare sport, 
 Longing to purify a luckless brood 
 Deep-stained and smelling of its native mud." 
 
 This is surely unjust, though from the circum- 
 stances of her marriage she laid herself open to 
 comment. Sir Joshua painted her often ; indeed, 
 it was said that the artist himself had a tender 
 sentiment toward her, for Leslie tells that in a side- 
 pocket of Sir Joshua's pocket-book for 1759 was 
 found a delicate golden-brown tress in a paper 
 inscribed " Lady Waldegrave." A full-length 
 picture of her in her robes as a peeress was the 
 first painted. A well-known one of her in a 
 gauze turban was exhibited in 1761. This went 
 to the Strawberry Hill collection. In 1762, the 
 picture we give was exhibited under the title 
 " Dido embracing Cupid," the child being the
 
 54 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE 
 
 infantine Lady Laura. In 1764, a picture of the 
 then Dowager Countess of Waldegrave was 
 shown. Of this Leslie writes : " The painting is 
 indeed worthy of its lovely original, whom Sir 
 Joshua seems to have painted with peculiar en- 
 joyment. The fair widow leans her head upon 
 her hand, and looks upwards, as if for consola- 
 tion and strength ; her arm is supported on her 
 knee ; she is in mourning, with a black veil over 
 her head."
 
 CUMBERLAND 
 i 
 
 READ
 
 HER Gfc\CE OF / 
 CUMBERLAND. 
 
 THE Luttrells were an Irish family whose 
 reputation for dignity of character was not high. 
 They had been attached to and had deserted 
 James II. Through several generations they 
 had acquired repute for contention, eccentricity, 
 and general arrogance and oddity of conduct, 
 though they were far from lacking in ability. 
 Simon Luttrell, Lord Irenham, who was raised 
 to the peerage as Earl of Carhampton, about 
 1770, had a family of five, three sons and two 
 daughters, Anne and Elizabeth. Col. Henry 
 Louis Luttrell, who succeeded to the earldom 
 in 1787, acted a conspicuous part in politics, 
 when he, on behalf of the King's party, opposed 
 the radical Wilkes at Brentford in the notable 
 contest for Middlesex. He was a man of great
 
 58 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 activity and aggressiveness, with high spirit, 
 though socially agreeable and tactful. At one 
 time he quarrelled with, and was challenged by, 
 his father, but refused to fight, because his 
 father was no gentleman. At another time 
 of family bickering, he shut his father and 
 mother out of his mansion in Ireland. Col. 
 Temple Luttrell was another son, who had some 
 repute as a writer of verses. 
 
 Lady Anne was a great beauty, whose amor- 
 ous eyes raised her to a higher rank than was 
 attained by the coronet-hunting Gunnings even. 
 She married, first, Mr. Christopher Horton of 
 Derbyshire, and in June, 1769, a son was born to 
 her. Shortly afterwards, she lost this only child 
 and her husband within a fortnight. A com- 
 plete inventory of her charms has been preserved 
 to us, and clever she was in the use of them. 
 Coquettish, artful as Cleopatra, coolly calculating, 
 and completely mistress of her passions and 
 projects, the main coloring of the picture of her 
 character is high. Considerable Irish wit, and an 
 ability to dance divinely, were accessories in the 
 composition. Of her appearance, prettiness was
 
 HER GRACE OF CUMBERLAND. 59 
 
 the keynote rather than positive beauty. Her 
 figure was well-formed and her carriage graceful, 
 yet her chief glory was in her eyes. Large, 
 lustrous, and lovely they were, and she knew it. 
 
 The sons of that unfilial, inconsequent heir to 
 the throne, Frederick, Prince of Wales, seem to 
 have let their attachments drift towards widows. 
 The second son, Edward, Duke of York, had his 
 affection for the eccentric daughter of the second 
 Duke of Argyll, Lady Mary Coke. This lady's 
 husband had been an unprincipled character, dis- 
 sipated, and a gambler, and Lady Mary left him 
 several years before his death. She travelled 
 much on the Continent, having a weakness al- 
 ways for the company of royalties, became inti- 
 mate with the Duke of York, and on his death 
 at Monaco, in 1767, went into mourning for six 
 months as his widow. She is best remembered 
 by the lines on her by Lady Temple : 
 
 " She sometimes laughs, but never loud ; 
 She 's handsome too, but somewhat proud ; 
 At court she bears away the bell ; 
 She dresses fine and figures well ; 
 With decency she 's gay and airy ; 
 Who can this be but T-ady Mary? "
 
 6O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 The third son of Frederick was William Henry, 
 Duke of Gloucester, and he, too, fell a victim 
 to a widow, the lovely Lady Waldegrave. The 
 fourth son, Henry Frederick, born October, 1745, 
 more inconsequent even than his father, except 
 for the evil he could do, made an early record for 
 himself, not for attachments to widows, but to mar- 
 ried women. His first public appearance was in 
 a position which no prince of the blood had ever 
 before occupied, that of co-respondent in a 
 divorce court. Henrietta, daughter of Henry 
 Vernon, was married to Lord Grosvenor in 1764, 
 a romantic marriage. Being caught in a rain- 
 storm while she was walking in Kensington Gar- 
 dens, Lord Grosvenor, struck with her beauty, 
 offered her, and a young lady who was .with her, 
 seats in his carriage. The offer was accepted, and 
 his Lordship accompanied them home. An inti- 
 macy ensued, ending in the marriage, and she 
 became the mother of Robert, second Earl of 
 Grosvenor. About 1770, the Duke of Cumber- 
 land, characterized by Walpole as " a pert, chat- 
 tering, dissipated, and frivolous youth," began 
 to idolize her. At one time he followed her to
 
 HER GRACE OF CUMBERLAND. 6 1 
 
 Eaton Hall near Chester, where he frequently 
 met her in the fields. In " The Gentleman's 
 Magazine " of that time will be found complete 
 accounts of the intrigues brought out by the 
 testimony. His devices and subterfuges were 
 laughable ; and the exposition of ignorance, vul- 
 garity, and vice made in his letters to her was 
 deplorable. The King was greatly incensed by 
 the affair ; and the people attempted to make 
 another point against the Dowager- Princess, by 
 attributing the Duke's lack of training to the 
 methods of his mother. The plaintiff in the 
 suit was awarded ,10,000 damages. After the 
 action, the Duke abandoned her. Thirty years 
 afterwards she remarried, becoming the wife of 
 Gen. George Porter, M.P. The public depre- 
 cation of the Duke's vices did not make him 
 more circumspect in his amours. He soon in- 
 trigued with another married woman, the hand- 
 some wife of a timber merchant; and it was 
 uncertain who was most proud of the honor, 
 the husband or the wife. After this he became 
 infatuated with the Widow Horton, she being 
 twenty-four at the time and he some years
 
 62 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 younger, and attempted to insinuate himself into 
 her good graces, but she knew a thing or two. 
 She would have no trifling. She saw her chance 
 to play for rank and royalty. Glory was her pas- 
 sion, and she sacrificed her lover to it, as she had 
 never sacrificed her virtue to her lover. It had 
 to be straight marriage or nothing. The swain 
 succumbed, and they were married in October, 
 1771, at the lady's residence in Hertford Street, 
 Mayfair. They left to travel on the Continent, 
 and the King was apprised by an off-hand letter 
 from the Duke at Calais. His displeasure at the 
 divorce proceedings was greatly intensified by 
 this latest escapade of his weak-witted brother. 
 Orders were given that they should not be re- 
 ceived at foreign courts. The King exerted 
 himself to have the Royal Marriage Bill passed, 
 providing that no member of the royal family 
 could enter in a marriage relation before he or 
 she was twenty-four years of age without con- 
 sent of the King, and after that age only after 
 a year's notice of such intention had been given 
 to Parliament. The support of this measure be- 
 came a test of personal loyalty to the King,
 
 HER GRACE OF CUMBERLAND. 63 
 
 and it was passed in 1772. After spending some 
 years on the Continent, principally at Avignon, 
 economizing their expenses, the pair returned to 
 London and established themselves at Cumber- 
 land House in Pall Mall. Here they attempted 
 to institute a small court, but there were condi- 
 tions that nullified their projects. Their mar- 
 ried life was not a happy one. As Walpole puts 
 it, " The honeymoon had waned to half a moon 
 even before they left England." The King held 
 his sister-in-law in strict alienation, and the 
 Duke was avoided by all his royal relatives and 
 society, his friends being confined to kinspeople 
 of the Duchess. His manners and vulgarity 
 repelled people of refinement. On the other 
 hand, the Duchess was a woman who did the 
 honors of hostess with consummate tact and 
 dignity. The avoidance of them by society had 
 its effect, however, on her temper and spirit. 
 She was always haughty, and after her rise in 
 rank made undue insistence on the recognition 
 of her position. Carlton and Cumberland houses 
 communicated behind by their gardens. Rumor 
 had it that the Duchess lent herself to help on,
 
 64 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 or to gratify, the Prince of Wales' inclination 
 on some points beyond the limits of propriety. 
 The Duke had early exercised an evil influence 
 on his nephew's character by leading him into 
 places of debauchery, and now the Duchess car- 
 ried on the evil by facilitating intrigues. Her 
 sister, Lady Elizabeth Luttrell, lived with her, 
 and was more a match in manners and tastes 
 for the Duke than the Duchess. She was far 
 from beautiful, was coarse in her manners, un- 
 principled in her conduct, and developed a pas- 
 sion for gaming that soon brought her to penury. 
 Then came the tragical end, suicide by poison. 
 The Duke ended his inglorious career in 1790, 
 dying of a scrofulous malady in his forty-fifth 
 year. His Duchess lived until 1803. Several 
 portraits of her were painted which justify the 
 descriptions of her beauty. Gainsborough painted 
 one which was engraved by Valentine Green, 
 and again one in conjunction with Cosway. A 
 whole-length, by Reynolds, representing her 
 standing by a column, is extremely pleasing. 
 The picture by Catharine Read is one of the 
 few portraits known to us by that painter which
 
 HER GRACE OF CUMBERLAND. 65 
 
 establish her ability. Little is known of this 
 artist. Fanny Burney describes her as " the 
 Rosalba of Britain, whose works and whose 
 fame were so at variance with each other, the 
 works all loveliness, their author saturnine, cold, 
 taciturn, absent to an extreme, awkward, and full 
 of mischarms in every motion ; ill accoutred, even 
 beyond negligence, in her dress ; and plain enough 
 to produce grotesquely an effect that was almost 
 ludicrously picturesque. Heart, kind ; temper, 
 humane ; friendship, zealous. Misfortunes in 
 early life embittered her existence and kept it 
 wavering in a miserable balance between heart- 
 less apathy and pining discontent." She went 
 to the East Indies to live, but returned to Eng- 
 land, and died in London.
 
 FRANCES ANNE. 
 LADY CREV/E
 
 SIR FULKE GREVILLE, Lord Brooke, of old 
 Elizabethan days, to whom Warwick Castle was 
 given by James I., erected his own tomb in 
 Warwick Church, and inscribed thereon, " The 
 friend of Sir Philip Sidney." A descendant of 
 his, Fulke Greville, second son of Fulke, fifth 
 Baron Brooke, is known to posterity chiefly as 
 the friend and first patron of a person scarcely 
 less noble and chivalrous than Sidney, Dr. 
 Charles Burney, the composer, but also as the 
 father of her, the peerless beauty, who was high 
 favorite among the Whigs of Fox's time. Carry- 
 ing himself with great dignity and distinction 
 of manner, he was regarded as one of the finest 
 gentlemen of his time. His appearance was
 
 7O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 impressive. He was tall and well-proportioned, 
 with face, features, and complexion firm and clear. 
 He had an athlete's form and all an athlete's 
 zest for action and sport, which conserved the 
 commanding force of that figure, and a splendid 
 fortune gave him a consequence about town. 
 
 Though having a liking for music, letters, and 
 all the fine things of culture, and making friends 
 among the thoughtful and learned, his character 
 was so ill-commensurate with his appearance 
 that he drifted into circles of modish dissipation 
 at the clubs of St. James Street, at the gaming 
 resorts of Bath. He was a determined devotee 
 of pleasure. In the gay, the reckless society of 
 Bath, he became a conspicuous figure and a partici- 
 pant in the fashionable vices. Gaming became a 
 passion, and this habit afterwards depleted his 
 fortune. Though of this fast set, he wedded, 
 not one of the giddy daughters of fashion, but a 
 deeply thoughtful woman as well as a beautiful 
 one. This was Fanny Macartney, third daughter 
 of General James Macartney, an Irishman of 
 ancient family and large fortunes. She was 
 unconventional in manner, with an understand-
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 71 
 
 ing masculine in its depth, soundness, and 
 capacity ; was a veritable treasure-house of wit, 
 and evidenced an uncommon indifference to 
 high rank, if placed in opposition to superior 
 merit. Her features were small and fine, and the 
 whole style of her beauty was delicate and 
 feminine. She is the Flora in Walpole's " Beau- 
 ties," and has some claim to literary fame as the 
 author of an " Ode to Indifference." The wed- 
 ding was a stolen one, no one knew why. Ma- 
 cartney remarked, " Mr. Greville has chosen to 
 take a wife out of the window whom he might 
 as well have taken out of the door." Young 
 Burney was an accomplice in his patron's plot, 
 and the bride's sisters were present. The couple 
 retired to Wilbury house, the family seat near 
 Andover, in Wiltshire, and here they lived in 
 princely style. It was a home of much comfort 
 as well as pleasure. Charles Burney remained as 
 friend and companion to Mr. Greville until he 
 himself was married. Amateur theatricals was 
 a frequent form of diversion, and in this the bride 
 was a proficient. But Burney had ere long, in 
 1744, to personate the part of godfather to a
 
 72 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 daughter, standing as the representative of the 
 Duke of Beaufort at the baptism of Frances 
 Anne, afterward the all-admired and indescribably 
 beautiful Mrs. Crewe. Shortly after this the 
 Grevilles left for the Continent, and spent five 
 years there, during which time Mr. Greville 
 published " Maxims, Characters, and Reflections, 
 Moral, Serious, and Entertaining," a book in the 
 Rochefoucauld manner. 
 
 In time a daughter came to Dr. Burney, and 
 she too was named Frances ; and it is from her 
 writings that we obtain so many pleasant re- 
 cords of eighteenth-century life. On his return 
 to England, Mr. Greville indulged his insatiable 
 love of gaming. The pace soon told. Frequent 
 losses and ill-luck in investments became irritat- 
 ing. He was on the high-road from a man of 
 pleasure to a man of spleen. The superb Mr. 
 Greville, magnificent in mien and manner, grew 
 fastidious and cavilling in general society. He 
 secured an appointment as Envoy Extraordinary 
 to the Elector of Bavaria and Minister Plenipo- 
 tentiary to the Diet of Ratisbon in 1765, which 
 he held for four years. His daughter had grown
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 73 
 
 up, inheriting all her mother's wit, and more than 
 her mother's moiety of beauty. It was radiant, 
 matchless bloom of beauty, a roseate freshness 
 which was prolonged to nearly the end of her 
 life. With the fineness of coloring, was also a 
 chaste modelling of feature, and withal her " ways 
 were engirt with grace divine." 
 
 Miss Greville was several times a sitter to Sir 
 Joshua. Though the painter wrought his great 
 renown by his portrayal chiefly of the Tory 
 nobility, yet his intimates were of the intel- 
 lectual radicals among whom Mrs. Crewe com- 
 panioned as colleague and reigned as queen. 
 Our artist was a worshipper at the throne of 
 our " Lady of Beauty," and took pleasure in avow- 
 ing it in converse as well as on canvas. She 
 first sat to him in 1760 with her brother, for 
 the picture entitled " Cupid and Psyche," two 
 whole-length portraits. The figure of Cupid 
 was afterwards cut out by Mr. Greville and 
 replaced by a tripod, in consequence of a quarrel 
 with his son. In another picture she is seated 
 at the base of a tree, her chin resting in her hand 
 as she, rather pensively, reads a book. A poodle
 
 74 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 dog lies at her feet, while lambs are grouped near 
 by. In the background there is a meadow land- 
 scape. The best-known portrait of her is the 
 one in the picture of which we give a fragment, 
 and which we learn from Reynolds' pocket-book 
 was painted in 1767. In the complete picture 
 is a sarcophagus, towards which a Mrs. Bouverie 
 is extending her hand, and this is the reason for 
 the almost sad serenity of the face. " The Gen- 
 tleman's Magazine " records the marriage of 
 John Crewe with Miss Fawkener on the i7th 
 of May, 1764. This marriage of Crewe to a 
 sister of Mrs. Bouverie has been overlooked by 
 the Peerage compilers. The recent death of that 
 sister, who had been married the same year as 
 herself, is supposed to have been the motive for 
 the artist depicting her drawing the thoughts 
 of her dearest friend, Miss Greville, to medita- 
 tions on the tomb. Henrietta or Harriet Bou- 
 verie was a daughter of Sir Everard Fawkener, 
 who was many years Ambassador at the Porte, 
 and died in 1758. His widow, daughter of 
 General Churchill, afterwards married Governor 
 Pownall. Her husband, Edward Bouverie, was
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 75 
 
 younger brother to the Earl of Radnor. Mrs. 
 Bouverie and her son Edward, born 1767 and 
 died 1858, were painted in 1769 by Reynolds, 
 who also painted a son of Mrs. Crewe Master 
 John Crewe in 1775. This, a whole-length, 
 in costume of Henry VIII., is one of his most 
 noted children's portraits. In a Walpole letter 
 of 1782 is this sentence, "Mrs. Bouverie is a 
 great politician too. The trade will grow more 
 entertaining if the ladies make it the fashion." 
 They did make it the vogue, and it became much 
 more entertaining for a time than ever in these 
 latter days, days of the Primrose League and 
 the "new woman." Mrs. Bouverie was married 
 a second time, when over sixty years of age, to 
 Lord Robert Spencer, youngest son of the sec- 
 ond Duke of Marlborough, and she died in 1825, 
 at Woolbeding, Sussex, in her seventy-sixth year. 
 Miss Greville was married in 1768 to John 
 Crewe, Esq., of Crewe Hall, Cheshire (born in 
 1742), Sheriff of Cheshire in 1764, and M. P. for 
 Stafford in 1765, and for the County of Chester 
 from 1768 to 1800. He was raised to the peerage 
 as Baron Crewe by his friend Fox in 1806, and
 
 76 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 died in 1829. As her husband was of the Whig 
 party, she, through the entertainment of and 
 association with his friends, became active in ex- 
 ploiting the principles and policies of that party. 
 Her conversational powers, her wit and her 
 beauty, gave her a prestige only equalled by that 
 of the Duchess of Devonshire. 
 
 In the exultation following the election of 
 Fox, from Westminster, the festivities of the fete 
 at Carlton House were continued in the evening 
 at Mrs. Crewe's townhouse. It is best described 
 by a paragraph from Wraxall's " Memoirs " : 
 
 " The scene of festivity became transferred on 
 the same night to Lower Grosvenor Street, where 
 Mrs. Crewe, the lady of Mr. Crewe, gave a splen- 
 did entertainment, in commemoration of the vic- 
 tory obtained over ministers in Covent Garden. 
 Though necessarily conducted on a more limited 
 scale than that of the morning, it exhibited not less 
 its own appropriate features, and was composed of 
 nearly the same company. Mrs. Crewe, the inti- 
 mate friend of Fox, one of the most accomplished 
 and charming women of her time, had exerted her- 
 self in securing his election, if not as efficaciously,
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 77 
 
 yet as enthusiastically, as the Duchess of Devon- 
 shire. On this occasion the ladies, no less than 
 the men, were all habited in blue and buff. The 
 Prince of Wales was present in that dress. After 
 supper a toast having been given by his Royal 
 Highness, consisting of the words ' True Blue, 
 and Mrs. Crewe,' which was received with rap- 
 ture, she rose and proposed another health, 
 expressive of her gratitude, and not less laconic ; 
 namely, ' True Blue, and all of you.' ' 
 
 Fox was always an ardent admirer, and in 1775 
 wrote some adulatory lines to her which Walpole 
 printed for him on the Strawberry Hill Press, 
 love-lines without being amatory. He begins, 
 
 " Where the loveliest expression to feature is joined, 
 By Nature's most delicate pencil design'd, 
 Where blushes unbidden and smiles without art 
 Speak the sweetness and feeling that dwell in the heart ; 
 Where in manners enchanting no blemish we trace, 
 But the soul keeps the promise we had from the face, 
 Sure philosophy, reason and coldness must prove 
 Defences unequal to shield us from love." 
 
 And he then goes on to further laud her loveli- 
 ness, but also to say why, for all this, he is not a
 
 78 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 captive of love. They are lines written with ease 
 and taste, though without imagination. 
 
 More excellent in phrasing, in subtle compli- 
 ment, and impulsive in feeling are Sheridan's 
 lines in his dedication to her of his comedy 
 " The School for Scandal." They are interesting 
 to us, too, for their analysis of the constituent 
 charms and attractive attributes of her beauty 
 and manner. A long quotation only will suffice : 
 
 " Vain Muse ! Couldst thou the humblest sketch create 
 Of her, or slightest charm couldst imitate ; 
 Could thy blest strain in kindred colors trace 
 The faintest wonder of her form and face, 
 Poets would study the immortal line, 
 And Reynolds own his art subdued by thine ; 
 That art which well might added lustre give 
 To Nature's best, and Heaven's superlative : 
 On Granby's cheek might bid new glories rise, 
 Or point a purer beam from Devon's eyes ! 
 
 Adorning fashion, unadorned by dress, 
 
 Simple from taste and not from carelessness ; 
 
 Discreet in gesture, in deportment mild, 
 
 Not stiff with prudence, nor uncouthly wild ; 
 
 No state has Amoret ; no studied mien ; 
 
 She frowns no goddess, and she moves no queen.
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 79 
 
 The softer charm that in her manner lies, 
 
 Is framed to captivate, yet not surprise ; 
 
 It justly suits the expression of her face, 
 
 T is less than dignity and more than grace ! 
 
 On her pure cheek the native hue is such, 
 
 That formed by Heaven to be admired so much, 
 
 The hand divine, with a less partial care, 
 
 Might well have fixed a further crimson there, 
 
 And bade the gentle inmate of her breast 
 
 Inshrined modesty supply the rest. 
 
 But who the peril of her lips shall paint ? 
 
 Strip them of smiles, still, still all words are faint ! 
 
 Clothed with such grace, with such expression fraught, 
 
 They move in meaning, and they pause in thought ! 
 
 But dost thou farther watch, with charmed surprise, 
 
 The mild irresolution of her eyes, 
 
 Curious to mark how frequent they repose, 
 
 In brief eclipse and momentary close, 
 
 Ah ! seest thou not an ambushed Cupid there, 
 
 Too tim'rous of his charge, with jealous care 
 
 Veils and unveils those beams of heavenly light, 
 
 Too full, too fatal else, for mortal sight? 
 
 Nor yet, such pleasing vengeance fond to meet, 
 
 In pardoning dimples hope a safe retreat. 
 
 Thus lovely, thus adorned, possessing all 
 
 Of bright or fair that can to woman fall. 
 
 . . . half mistrustful of her beauty's store, 
 
 She barbs with wit those darts too keen before ;
 
 8O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Read in all knowledge that her sex should reach, 
 Though Greville, or the Muse, should deign to teach. 
 
 A taste for mirth, by contemplation schooled, 
 
 A turn for ridicule, by candor ruled, 
 
 A scorn of folly which she tries to hide ; 
 
 An awe of talent, which she owns with pride ! " 
 
 She entertained much at her villa at Hamp- 
 stead, where Lord Lough borough was a neighbor, 
 and also the egotistic Erskine. Fanny Burney 
 has recorded a visit to her fair godmother there: 
 
 " We were received by Mrs. Crewe with much 
 kindness. The room was rather dark, and she 
 had a veil to her bonnet, half-down, and with 
 this aid she looked still in a full blaze of beauty. 
 I was wholly astonished. Her bloom, perfectly 
 natural, is as high as that of Augusta Locke 
 when in her best looks, and the form of her 
 face is so exquisitely perfect that my eye never 
 met it without fresh admiration. She is cer- 
 tainly, in my eyes, the most completely a beauty 
 of any woman I ever saw. I know not. even 
 now, any female in her first youth who could 
 bear the comparison. She uglifies everything 
 near her." Here, as in town, a radical company
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 8 1 
 
 assembled. Burke and his brother Richard, 
 Elliot, Dr. Burney, and others were there at this 
 special time, and active were the discussions of 
 radical principles. A remark by Burke apart 
 from politics is worthy our notice. He said of 
 Mrs. Delany, " She was a pattern of a perfect 
 fine lady, a real fine lady, of other days ! Her 
 manners were faultless ; her deportment was all 
 elegance, her speech was all sweetness, and her 
 air and address all dignity." This must have 
 warmed the heart of Miss Fanny, to whom the 
 gentle lady of an earlier generation was most 
 dear. At this villa the Sheridans were always 
 welcome. Here came too, as frequent visitors, 
 Tickell, General Burgoyne, and later Canning 
 and Lawrence. 
 
 Though her greatest repute has been as a 
 political and fashionable leader at the Capital, 
 that is not the finest phase of her character. 
 She knew the obligations of her position as mis- 
 tress of a great country house. Crewe Hall, built 
 in the reign of James I., was a great, half-Gothic 
 half-Grecian building, and her husband was one 
 of the politest of men in his own house. As a 
 
 6
 
 82 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 landlord, he was considerate and wise. His 
 lady was markedly beloved of her people. She 
 established and taught in schools, and for her 
 many good works she was styled " The Abbess." 
 Her family, too, she ruled well. Her daughter 
 became the Honorable Mrs. Cunliffe Offley. 
 Though a welcome visitor at the houses of the 
 nobility, and being at her pleasure domiciliated at 
 the various mansions of the Duke of Portland, 
 from the marriage of one of her brothers with 
 Lady Charlotte Bentinck, a daughter of his Grace, 
 Mrs. Crewe showed to greatest advantage as 
 hostess rather than guest. In the high-ceiled 
 Jacobean dining-hall, seated at the head of her 
 table, around which was gathered a noble com- 
 pany, a company selected for their high ability 
 in statesmanship, letters, or art, "Our Lady of 
 Beauty " was at her best : only to look, to speak, 
 to smile, to give pleasure and win homage, yet 
 eager for whatever was original in thought or 
 speech ; sportively loquacious, yet regally digni- 
 fied, peerless, supreme. 
 
 She died in 1818, and was interred in the 
 family vault at Barthomley, Cheshire. She had
 
 TRUE BLUE AND MRS. CREWE. 83 
 
 two sons and two daughters, her eldest son suc- 
 ceeding to his father's peerage. 
 
 Viewed through the atmosphere and mist of 
 a dozen decades, whose " hand compassionate 
 guards our restless sight against how many a 
 harshness, many an ill," hers was an altogether 
 lovely character. Though associated with the 
 shameless set of the Regent, she had no part 
 in their dissoluteness. She did kindness upon 
 kindness unto her friends and dependents. Her 
 dower of beauty gave largess of delight to 
 high and low. She felt the full force of noblesse 
 oblige.
 
 HER GRACE 
 OF. GORDON 
 
 HER Grace was a woman of incisive personal- 
 ity, who contemned conventionality and eti- 
 quette ; but who in her own person was regarded 
 as the arbiter of social affairs, and was termed 
 " the Empress of Fashion." Jane, known in 
 song as " Jenny of Monreith " and " The Flower 
 of Galloway," was the second daughter of Sir 
 William Maxwell, third Baronet of Monreith, 
 Wigtownshire, by his wife, Magdalen Blair of 
 Blair, and was born in 1749 in Hyndford's Close, 
 Edinburgh, where her mother occupied a large 
 second-floor flat. As a young girl, she was a bois- 
 terous hoiden. Lord Erskine, whose home was 
 at the head of Gray's Close, used to tell of her 
 being sent to the fountain-well in front of John
 
 88 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Knox's house for a kettle of water, and of her 
 riding home on the back of a pig turned out of 
 a neighboring wynd in the High Street, while 
 her sister Eglintoun, commonly called Betty, 
 thumped the pig with a stick. 
 
 But the romping girl ripened into a comely 
 young gentlewoman, albeit one of high spirit. In 
 1767, Alexander, the fourth Duke of Gordon, 
 came wooing the beautiful Jenny. He was 
 twenty-four years of age, tall and extremely hand- 
 some. He had succeeded his father to the duke- 
 dom in 1752, and in 1761 was made one of the 
 sixteen representative peers of Scotland. Lord 
 Kames described him as the greatest subject in 
 Britain, not only in the extent of his rent-roll, 
 but also in the number of persons depending on 
 his rule and protection. The allurement of posi- 
 tion and the urging of her own family led Miss 
 Maxwell to accept the Duke. She was married 
 from the house of her brother-in-law, Mr. Fordyce. 
 who had married her sister Catharine in Argyll 
 Street, Edinburgh. 
 
 As a girl,' she had been strongly attached to a 
 young officer, who reciprocated her affection.
 
 HER GRACE OF GORDON. 89 
 
 The soldier was ordered abroad with his regi- 
 ment, and shortly afterwards was reported dead. 
 After the first burst of grief had spent itself, she 
 sank into a state of listlessness and apathy that 
 seemed immovable. " The dead pass quickly." 
 She married the Duke ; but when on their wed- 
 ding tour they visited Ay ton House in Berwick- 
 shire, and there the Duchess received a letter 
 addressed to her in her maiden name and in the 
 hand of her early lover. He was, he said, on his 
 way home to complete their happiness by mar- 
 riage. She fled from the house, and was found 
 after long search by the side of a burn, nearly 
 crazed. She plunged into all sorts of gayety and 
 excitement, and though she afterwards became 
 an excellent mother, never evinced any attach- 
 ment for the Duke. In 1770, her eldest son was 
 born, and for him, who developed into one of the 
 most popular of the young nobility of the period, 
 she always had an extreme fondness. Her hus- 
 band was an easy-going man, caring for rural pur- 
 suits and sports; his son George was a man of 
 stronger personality and greater spirit. He was 
 trained to a military career. He commanded
 
 9O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 the grenadier company of the Forty-second 
 Highlanders ; afterwards was appointed lieuten- 
 ant-colonel in the Third Footguards, and went to 
 Flanders with his regiment in the Duke of York's 
 army. On his return he raised a regiment of 
 Highlanders on the paternal estates, in which he 
 was assisted by his father and his mother; the latter 
 arrayed herself in the regimental colors, and by 
 many feminine arts won recruits. She would place 
 a shilling between her teeth, and the young yokels 
 were privileged to sample " the silk and savor of 
 her lips " in accepting it. The regiment was in- 
 spected at Aberdeen in 1794, and passed into 
 the line as the One-Hundredth Gordon Highland- 
 ers of foot. Five years later it was called the 
 Ninety-Second Foot, and became famous as the 
 Second Gordon Highlanders. 
 
 Our Duchess became even more famed in 
 securing recruits for the Pitt ministry than for 
 the regiment. She was whipper-in for the Tory 
 party, and long held sway in the political as well 
 as the social world. She had an assertiveness 
 which, backed by her beauty, was not to be 
 withstood ; and her energy was equal to her
 
 HER GRACE OF GORDON. 91 
 
 ambition. The portrait by Reynolds, painted 
 in 1775, shows beauty of feature, but not her 
 impressive presence. Her speech was bright, 
 though at times marred by coarseness, and her 
 wit too often had a tang. Walpole gives a 
 glimpse of her energy in the pursuit of pleasure : 
 " She first went to Handel's music in the Abbey ; 
 she then clambered over the benches and went 
 to Hastings's trial in the Hall ; after dinner to 
 the play ; then to Lady Lucan's assembly ; after 
 that, to Ranelagh ; and then returned to Mrs. 
 Hobart's faro-table ; gave a ball herself in the 
 evening of that morning into which she must 
 have got a good way, and set out for Scotland 
 the next day. Hercules could not have achieved 
 half her labors in the same space of time." 
 
 Her sister Betty, also noted for her beauty, 
 was a person of unconventional behavior, and be- 
 came a woman with a career. She married Sir 
 Thomas Wallace of Craigie, a Scotch baronet, but 
 it was an unhappy union. She prosecuted him 
 for adultery before the Court of Session, but the 
 case was dismissed. She never lived with him 
 again, became eccentric in her manners and
 
 92 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 speech, habited herself as a man, and was " the 
 new woman " of her day. She produced a 
 comedy called " The Ton." Lady Wallace ter- 
 minated her remarkable career at Munich, cen- 
 sured for the irregularities of her deportment and 
 little lamented by her own family. 
 
 Because of the connection of Lord George 
 Gordon, the Duke's youngest brother, with the 
 Gordon riots, the Duchess lost her prestige in 
 society for a time. She was in Scotland when 
 the troubles occurred, and remained there for 
 some time, devoting her abilities to the care of 
 the Duke's tenantry, and to supervising and ag- 
 grandizing his possessions. Gordon Castle was 
 rebuilt, and the grounds improved. N. P.Willis, 
 in his " Famous Persons and Places," gives an 
 interesting description of the place under the last 
 Duke. 
 
 As leader of society in Edinburgh, her Grace 
 held much the same position she had in London. 
 Her friend Erskine was a neighbor in George 
 Square. On the removal of the Duchess to the 
 more fashionable New Town, her Grace said 
 she regretted having to leave the house which 
 
 o o
 
 HER GRACE OF GORDON. 93 
 
 had been her home so long; but that really the 
 Old Town was intolerably dull. " Madam," re- 
 plied Erskine, " that is as if the sun were to say, 
 ' It seems vastly dull weather ; I think I shall not 
 rise this morning.' " 
 
 But in Scotland she was more than a social 
 and a political leader ; she was a patron of letters 
 and enjoyed intellectual society. She received 
 Burns graciously, and introduced him to the fes- 
 tivities of the New Assembly Rooms and to high 
 society. Perhaps her greatest virtue was her 
 beneficent friendship for Dr. Beattie and his ill- 
 fated wife. Lord Kames and Lord Monboddo 
 were two learned men who were among her dear- 
 est friends. 
 
 Her family had grown. Five daughters and 
 a second son, Alexander, fifteen years younger 
 than his brother, the Marquis of Huntly, com- 
 posed it. All the daughters married well. The 
 eldest, Charlotte, became Duchess of Richmond, 
 and through her the present Duke, born in 1818, 
 bears the double title of Duke of Richmond and 
 Gordon, the latter title being revived in 1876. 
 Susan, the third daughter, married the Duke of
 
 94 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Manchester; and Georgiana, the youngest, be- 
 came the wife of John, Duke of Bedford. Her 
 son Alexander never married. The Marquis of 
 Huntly married Elizabeth Brodie, who, as the 
 last Duchess of Gordon, achieved a fame in Scot- 
 land for her graciousness, goodness, and piety. 
 
 " Great, fair, rich, wise, all in superlatives," 
 she devoted herself to the betterment of the peo- 
 ple. Hers was a career the very antipodes of 
 that of Duchess Jane. The latter devoted most 
 of her energy to the gayety of assemblies and 
 routs ; but while thus engaged, " the vanward 
 clouds of evil days " blew her way. She became 
 estranged from her husband and from most of 
 her family, and led a wandering, almost a home- 
 less, life. Her friend, Henry Erskine, and Sir 
 James Montgomery endeavored to arrange her 
 differences with the Duke, but it was of no avail. 
 Though a Pittite, she was friendly with the Re- 
 gent, and took part in the festivities of Carlton 
 House. In 1812, she was on her way thither, 
 when she was taken ill at Pulteney's Hotel in 
 Piccadilly, and there, surrounded by all her chil- 
 dren, she died in her sixty-fourth year. Her
 
 HER GRACE OF GORDON. 95 
 
 body lay in gorgeous state for three days, and 
 was buried, by her own request, at Kinrara, In- 
 vernesshire. In 1820, the Duke married Mrs. 
 Jane Christie of Fochabers, by whom he had 
 previously had a large family. She died without 
 further issue in 1824. 
 
 In 1865, an autobiographical sketch of Jane 
 Maxwell was privately printed in Glasgow ; and 
 this reveals the ambitious and real sentiments of 
 
 
 
 the pleasure-loving Duchess. We shall always 
 know her as the lady of lovely and noble feature 
 depicted by Reynolds, and this record will long 
 outlast the written one of her vagaries, her gaye- 
 ties, and her sorrows.
 
 ELIZABETH 
 LADY CRAVEN
 
 TriC 
 Or AN5PAO1 
 
 IN so many instances when Reynolds and 
 Romney painted portraits of the same person, the 
 work of the latter painter has become the stand- 
 ard 'presentment of the sitter, rather than that 
 by the more illustrious artist. This is noticeably 
 so in the cases of those ill-starred ladies of 
 beauty, Mrs. Robinson, the actress, and Lady 
 Craven.. 
 
 In the memoirs of the Margravine of Anspach 
 is a frontispiece engraving after Reynolds' por- 
 trait of her with her son, Keppel, standing at her 
 knee. She tells a story relative to this picture. 
 Johnson inquired of Reynolds why he had not 
 finished the picture, for which Lady Craven had
 
 IOO DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 sat six times. Reynolds replied, " There is some- 
 thing so comical in the lady's face that all my 
 art cannot describe it." Johnson repeated the 
 word " comical " ten times, in every different tone, 
 and finished in that of anger. Angelica Kauff- 
 mann painted a portrait of her shortly before she 
 became Lady Craven. Madame Le Brun painted 
 a three-quarters length which the sitter expressed 
 dissatisfaction with. The oval by Romney, which 
 was possessed by Walpole, and hung in the blue 
 room at Strawberry Hill, is the portrait Lady 
 Craven will be known by to all interested in her 
 brilliant, wilful, and much maligned career. In 
 this is the seductively timid look that suggests 
 the fascinating eye of the fawn and that peculiar 
 bend of the neck which gave to the lady the name 
 of " the Swan." Her hair was auburn, long, and 
 soft as silk. The eyes that cast their glory in so 
 many a court were lustrous hazel, while her skin 
 was delicately white, tinted with tenderest of car- 
 nations. Tall and slight of figure, she was the 
 ideal type of the patrician Plantagenet. 
 
 Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Drax, of Shar- 
 borough, in the county of Dorset, became the
 
 THE MARGRAVINE OF ANSPACH. IOI 
 
 Countess of Augustus, fourth Earl of Berkeley. 
 There were eight children from this union, three 
 of whom died infants, and the youngest of all 
 was Elizabeth, Lady Berkeley, born in 1750. 
 When she was but five years old, her father died, 
 a father of a generous and gentle disposition. 
 His widow married Robert Nugent, created Earl 
 Nugent, by whom she had two daughters, the 
 younger of whom was disavowed by Nugent. The 
 tempers of the lady and the Earl, who was much 
 older than she, were so impatient that they 
 disagreed, and they separated after they had been 
 married two years. Countess Berkeley, who was 
 handsome and worldly, had been lady of the bed- 
 chamber to the Princess of Wales, and was much 
 in favor with her when the Princess became Dow- 
 ager, and was the object of the distrust and 
 calumny of the people. The Countess, who was 
 not an affectionate mother, always had some aver- 
 sion to her youngest child. The girl was excel- 
 lently trained, however, by a devoted governess, 
 and though extremely delicate showed much intel- 
 lectual strength and mental ability. The Coun- 
 tess of Suffolk was her godmother, and between
 
 IO2 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 them a great affection existed. At the age of 
 thirteen, " Bessy " and her sister, Lady Georgiana, 
 went to pass six months at Paris, and even at 
 this early day her attractiveness of manner and 
 vivacity of converse became apparent. At sixteen 
 her sister eloped with Lord Forbes, and this cir- 
 cumstance made the Countess active to arrange a 
 suitable match for Lady Elizabeth. The latter 
 was presented at Court, where she received excess 
 of caresses and homage. Many were the suitors 
 for her hand, but none were encouraged, and she 
 was reproached for this by her mother. Finally 
 a marriage with Mr. Craven, heir to Lord Craven, 
 was arranged, though the lady protested she had 
 no love for him, and the wedding took place in 
 1767, the bride's brother, Lord Berkeley, and the 
 Duke of Richmond, giving her away. This gay 
 and apparently thoughtless girl, sensitive and 
 timid, vivacious and a trifle vain, retired to Ash- 
 down Park, where she became the mother of two 
 daughters in two years. Her husband, who had 
 now inherited the estates and title of Lord Craven, 
 was affectionate and devoted, giving his wife those 
 luxuries and that adulation which her tastes and
 
 THE MARGRAVINE OF ANSPACH. IO3 
 
 self-complacency craved. Her lord, though, was 
 not possessed of the mentality or the culture and 
 refinement for this to be a true union of minds. 
 For thirteen years they lived together, when the 
 rift came that made the music mute. 
 
 Long ere this, Lady Craven made some bril- 
 liant successes in literature. She was highly 
 esteemed by Dr. Johnson, by Mrs. Montague, 
 and by Walpole. The latter has written some 
 pleasing comments on her early efforts, com- 
 mending the nature, character, simplicity, and 
 observation therein. He printed, at the Straw- 
 berry Hill Press, a translation from the French 
 called " The Sleep- Walker," which is now very 
 rare. In 1780, he writes to his friend Mason a 
 capital report of her appearance as a dramatist. 
 " There has been such an uncommon event that 
 I must give you an account of it, as it relates to 
 the republic of poetry, of which you are priest, 
 and to the aristocracy of noble authors, of which 
 I am Gentleman Usher. Lady Craven's comedy, 
 called * The Miniature Picture,' which she acted 
 herself, with a genteel set, at her own house in 
 the country, has been played at Drury Lane.
 
 IO4 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 The chief singularity of it was, that she went 
 to it herself the second night in form, sat in the 
 middle of the front row of the stage-box, much 
 dressed, with a profusion of white bugles and 
 plumes, to receive the public homage due to her 
 sex and loveliness. ... It is amazing to see so 
 young a woman entirely possess herself ; but 
 there is such an integrity and freshness in her 
 consciousness of her own beauty and talents that 
 she speaks of them with a naivete as if she had 
 no property in them, but only wore them as gifts 
 of the gods. Lord Craven, on the contrary, was 
 quite agitated by his fondness for her, and with 
 impatience at the bad performance of the actors, 
 which was wretched indeed ; yet the address of 
 the plot, which is the chief merit of the piece, 
 and some pencilling, carried it off very well, 
 though Parsons murdered the Scotch Lord, and 
 Mrs. Robinson (who is supposed to be the favor 
 ite of the Prince of Wales) thought on nothing 
 but her own charms or him. There is a very 
 good, though endless, prologue, written by Sheri- 
 dan and spoken in perfection by King, which 
 was encored (an entire novelty) the first night;
 
 THE MARGRAVINE OF ANSPACH. 1 05 
 
 and an epilogue that I liked still better, and 
 which was full as well delivered by Mrs. Abing- 
 ton, written by Mr. Jekyll. The audience, though 
 very civil, missed a fair opportunity of being gal- 
 lant; for in one of those ogues, I forget which, 
 the noble authoress was mentioned, and they did 
 not applaud, as they ought to have done exceed- 
 ingly, when she condescended to avow her pretty 
 child, and was there looking so very pretty herself. 
 . . . Lady Craven's tranquillity had nothing dis- 
 pleasing; it was only the ease that conscious 
 pre-eminence bestows on sovereigns, whether their 
 empire consists in beauty or power." 
 
 This was in the year of the separation from 
 her husband. He was discovered to devote his 
 time and attentions to a mistress, so his lady left 
 him. She went to the Continent, taking with her 
 Keppel, the youngest son. Her four daughters 
 and two other sons remained with their father. 
 After a stay in Paris, where her manners and 
 abilities gained her many friends among the old 
 nobility and the especial attention of the queen, 
 Marie Antoinette, she proceeded through Lyons, 
 Avignon, and Marseilles. Thence she went to
 
 IO6 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Genoa, Pisa, Venice, and Florence, and at the 
 latter place met Sir Horace Mann, to whom she 
 was commended by Walpole. He writes: "She 
 has, I fear, been infinitamente indiscreet. She is 
 very pretty, has parts, and is good-natured to the 
 highest degree, has not a grain of malice or mis- 
 chief, almost always the associates in women 
 of tender hearts, and never has been an enemy 
 but to herself." She went on to Vienna, and 
 there the Emperor was attentive ; from there to 
 Poland, where the King became a devotee. On 
 to St. Petersburg she went, and at this Court 
 captivated Catharine. She then went south- 
 ward to Constantinople. A narrative of this 
 trip was published in 1789, entitled, "A Journey 
 through the Crimea to Constantinople." She 
 returned to England to make arrangements for 
 living at Anspach, and to receive her mother's 
 approbation of the plan. Here she resided un- 
 der the protection of Christian Frederick Charles 
 Alexander, Margrave of Brandenburg, Anspach, 
 and Baruth, Duke of Prussia, Count of Sayn, born 
 in 1736, a nephew of Frederick the Great. His 
 father's sister was the good Queen Caroline, wife
 
 THE MARGRAVINE OF ANSPACH. 1 07 
 
 of George II. of England. The Margravine was 
 a weak, delicate, inconsequential person, and Lady 
 Craven's strong personality soon dominated the 
 Court. She wrote to her husband that she was 
 to be treated as the Margrave's sister. Certain 
 it is that the Prussian royal family, and all other 
 Courts, received her with every mark of esteem 
 and respect. She was travelling in Spain in 
 1791, with the Margrave, when she received 
 news of the death of Lord Craven. She almost 
 immediately married the Prussian prince, his 
 consort having died some time before this. In 
 Anspach she was not in great favor with the 
 people ; and a sinister influence on affairs, in favor 
 of what was English, was imputed to her. The 
 Margrave disposed of his possessions to the King 
 of Prussia and removed to England, taking up 
 his residence at Brandenburg House. Neither 
 his wife's relatives nor the English Court received 
 them graciously. Thereafter, it was as a dramatist 
 and a patron of the arts that her career excited 
 interest. Indeed, in our day, it is only as a dram- 
 atist, and not as a lady of high rank or social 
 import, that the biographical dictionaries record
 
 IO8 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 her. Were it not for Romney, we would say 
 with Waller, 
 
 " How small a part of time they share 
 That are so wondrous sweet and fair." 
 
 Her beauty faded, but her art remained. 
 
 In 1778 had appeared a comedy called " Som- 
 nambule," and in 1781, at the Haymarket, a musi- 
 cal farce entitled "A Silver Tankard." In 1794 
 appeared " A Yorkshire Ghost ; " two years later 
 a comedy, " The Provoked Wife, "to the perform- 
 ance of which Mrs. Abington lent her services, 
 and the Margravine herself acted. Following 
 these came " The Princess of Georgia," at Cov- 
 ent Garden," and a pantomime, " Puss in Boots." 
 The Margrave died in 1806. His widow re- 
 turned to the Continent, and with her son Keppel 
 lived at Naples, where she died in 1828. Her 
 memoirs, written by herself, were published two 
 years before her death. Her eldest son, William, 
 seventh Baron and first Earl Craven, married an 
 actress, Louisa Brunton, who was born 1785, in 
 a low station. She appeared on the stage in 
 " The Provoked Husband," with Kemble, in 1803.
 
 THE MARGRAVINE OF ANSPACH. 
 
 She had much beauty, with features expressive 
 of archness and vivacity. Keppel Craven, who 
 was the only one of her family who showed much 
 regard for their mother, travelled extensively, but 
 settled eventually at Salerno, where he bought 
 a convent and entertained his friends with great 
 hospitality. He was of a gentle and dignified, 
 yet genial, character ; the epitome of all the gra- 
 ciousness and culture of his lovely mother, and 
 without her indiscretion and self-complacency.
 
 MARIA ANNE: 
 
 NR3 FlTZHERbERT
 
 LA55 OF 
 RICHMOND HILL 
 
 OVER a century ago, before the then heir to 
 the British throne was three and twenty years of 
 age, he had been guilty of many a disreputable 
 brawl, many a shameless intrigue, and many a 
 cowardly desertion. All the influence of the pal- 
 ace of piety, of titled governors, of learned in- 
 structors, and of reverend prelates gave little 
 restraint as he sped 
 
 " Down pleasure's stream, with swelling sails." 
 
 Their goodly parts were offset by his uncle, the 
 Duke of Cumberland, termed by the news- 
 papers the royal idiot, who led the youth, 
 whom he called " Taffy," into all places of evil, 
 
 8
 
 114 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 until his conversation, so far from being princely, 
 became a compound of the slang of grooms and 
 the wanton vocabulary of a brothel. Already 
 had passed into history his liaison with Mrs, 
 Robinson. Infinite pathos attaches to this lady's 
 career A young wife of a deceiving, unworthy 
 husband, distressed in circumstances, she went 
 upon the stage, and by ability became a great 
 success. In 1780, the young Prince of Wales 
 was attracted by her beauty as she played Per- 
 dita in " A Winter's Tale." Signing his requests 
 Florizel, he asked a meeting. She denied and 
 repulsed him for some time, but yielded at last. 
 Mistress she became for two years, and then 
 was cast aside. The income of the stage and 
 its honorable profession she had given up for 
 the royal lover who now passed her by. The 
 notorious Mrs. Grace Elliott was her immediate 
 successor, one of the most shameless cour- 
 tesans of that century. Vice and vulgarity, fool- 
 ishness and frivolity, were the known record of 
 this prince as he "sailed the unmanageable 
 years." 
 
 About 1 785 there was living at Richmond Hill
 
 SWEET LASS OF RICHMOND HILL. 115 
 
 a young widow, with attractive manners, and, 
 unfortunately for herself, a pretty face. 
 
 " For beauty is a dangerous gift, 
 And apt to breed disorder." 
 
 This lady was Mary Anne Smythe, the daughter 
 of Walter Smythe, of Bambridge, in the county 
 of Hants, second son of Sir John Smythe, Bart. 
 She was born in 1756, and married, in 1775, 
 Edward Weld, of Lulworth Castle, in the county 
 of Dorset, who died in the course of the same 
 year. In 1778 she married, secondly, Thomas 
 Fitzherbert of Swynnerton Park, in the county 
 of Stafford, and lord of the manor of Norbury ; 
 but in three years she was widowed again, her 
 husband dying from over-exertion in endeavoring 
 to save Lord Mansfield's house from being burned 
 during the ravages of the Gordon riots. Mrs. Fitz- 
 herbert, who was a strict and devout Roman Cath- 
 olic, retired to the Continent for some years after 
 her second husband's death. She was introduced 
 at the Court of France, and the Duke of Orleans 
 rendered her homage. On her return to England 
 she went to reside near Richmond. Here the
 
 Il6 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Prince of Wales became acquainted with her, and 
 was at once enamoured. It has been asserted 
 that the song, " The Lass of Richmond Hill " 
 was inspired by her attractions, and it is even 
 said was written by the Prince, and that 
 
 " I would crowns resign to call her mine, 
 Sweet lass of Richmond Hill," 
 
 was literal declaration, and not metaphor. Leigh 
 Hunt suggests that Lady Sarah Lennox was the 
 lass, and that George the Third wrote the ballad. 
 No credible evidence has been adduced that 
 either father or son was the author. We know 
 it was beyond the wits of either. The lady 
 repulsed the amorous prince. She was possessed 
 of some dignity and a regard for the decencies of 
 life, was admired and caressed by all who were 
 acquainted with the singular attractions of her 
 character. She was in receipt of an income of a 
 couple of thousands of pounds, and in this she 
 differed from other inamoratas of the prince, as 
 she had not to resist the lure of a better style of 
 living. She resisted her suitor. His passion 
 and protestations availed not. He offered to
 
 SWEET LASS OF RICHMOND HILL. I I 7 
 
 cede his right of succession to his brother 
 Frederick, and to retire to America. Other ro- 
 mantic schemes were proposed and rejected, so 
 mock heroics were resorted to. One morning 
 Lord Onslow, Lord Southampton, and Edward 
 Bouverie called on the lady and told her the 
 Prince, in his despair, had stabbed himself, and 
 they asked her immediate presence with him. 
 On her way to Carlton House she called upon 
 her confidential friend, the Duchess of Devon- 
 shire, to accompany her. They found the royal 
 love-sick victim in bed ; a knife lay on a table 
 near by, and spots of blood were spattered around, 
 but also on that table was a glass of brandy and 
 water. The episode was a laughable admixture 
 of absurd sentimentality and seriousness. 
 
 Such agitation, entreaty, and tears as his were 
 a menace to the loved one's freedom. It is said 
 his manner was irresistible, was as graceful 
 as his actions were graceless. Mrs. Fitzherbert 
 
 O 
 
 wished not to be compromised, and deemed it 
 prudent to escape the impetuous lover, so re- 
 tired again to the Continent. His couriers 
 tracked her, and importuned return for the
 
 Il8 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Prince's sake. Her advisers thought it politic 
 for her to return ; but her religious scruples must 
 be satisfied before she surrendered. On Decem- 
 ber 21, 1785, at her house in Park Lane, in the 
 presence of some of her relatives, the nuptial 
 ceremony was performed according to the ritual 
 of the Church of Rome, and also the Protestant 
 service was performed by Rev. Samuel Johnes. 
 
 Of course, according to the Royal Marriage 
 Act, the marriage was null and void ; and but for 
 this the Prince would, by his marriage with a 
 Roman Catholic lady, under the provisions of the 
 Bill of Rights, have forfeited his right of succes- 
 sion to the throne. The fact of the marriage 
 did not trouble the Prince much. He denied it 
 to his friends. Information in regard to it was 
 asked for in the House. Fox, as the leader of 
 the Whigs and the friend of the Prince, denied 
 it in point of fact as well as law. Mr. Rolle 
 asked if he spoke from direct authority. Fox re- 
 plied that he had direct authority. Sheridan 
 extolled Mrs. Fitzherbert as a friend of the Prince, 
 having a good influence on him. 
 
 The Prince called the morning after the speech
 
 SWEET LASS OF RICHMOND HILL. I 1 9 
 
 in the House, went up to Mrs. Fitzherbert, and 
 taking hold of both her hands and caressing her, 
 said, " Only conceive, Maria, what Fox did yester- 
 day. He went down to the House and denied that 
 you and I were man and wife. Did you ever hear 
 of such a thing ? " The lady changed countenance, 
 turned pale, made no reply, but " with her eyes 
 made answer for her tongue." She never forgave 
 Fox for his repudiation of her marriage, and 
 asked her husband to disavow him. George, in 
 his cowardly duplicity, appealed to Grey to satisfy 
 her, but he would not be connected with the mat- 
 ter. The public was with her in its sympathy. 
 The day after Fox's speech the knocker of her 
 door was never still during the whole day. Her 
 royal husband made a confidante of his mother, 
 and begged that his wife be received at Court. 
 But this could not be, so dishonesty and dupli- 
 city had to be carried on to the end. Respect 
 was paid to her by the royal family generally. 
 She carried herself in society with a dignified 
 assertion of the rights of a wife, and with a great 
 self-respect in public demeanor, equally opposed 
 to and incompatible with the character of a mis-
 
 I2O DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 tress. The certificate of her marriage was depos- 
 ited in Coutts' Bank, and there remains. There 
 was no issue from the union. When the Prince 
 was married to Caroline of Brunswick in 1795, 
 he calling for a glass of brandy to brace him on 
 seeing his bride, Mrs. Fitzherbert was intensely 
 distressed, as it affected her reputation in the eyes 
 of the world. As a sort of challenge, she threw 
 open house, and all society was on her side. The 
 Duke of York was very friendly, but the light-of- 
 heart Prince was faithful to neither his Court 
 nor his real wife, for many were his amours. Mrs. 
 Crouch, Lady Hertford, and Lady Jersey were in 
 turn his favorites. His Queen, Caroline, was not 
 of a character to lead him into paths of virtue. 
 Miss Berry described her in 1809 as "an over- 
 dressed, bare-bosomed, painted, eye-browed figure. 
 She has not a grain of common-sense, not an 
 ounce of ballast to prevent high spirits, and a 
 coarse mind without any degree of moral taste." 
 She was accused of indulging in " the double- 
 pillowed morn," but made solemn denial of crime 
 before the House of Lords. Speaking of her, 
 Mary Lamb said, " They talk about the Queen's
 
 SWEET LASS OF RICHMOND HILL. 121 
 
 innocence ; I should not think the better of her 
 if I was sure she was what is called innocent." 
 This is wise judgment. Real innocence is a mat- 
 ter of the thought and heart, and not of actions. 
 After his separation from his consort the Prince 
 wished to renew his relations with Mrs. Fitzher- 
 bert. She sent a messenger to the Pope to find 
 out her status. A dispensation was granted, and 
 they lived together again. She had a stronger 
 hold over the Regent than any of the other ob- 
 jects of his admiration, and he always paid her 
 the respect her conduct commanded. She was 
 as faithful and honorable a woman as ever a 
 prince had the good fortune to be attached to, 
 and this not by interestedness or ambition, but out 
 of simple fidelity ; a fidelity which was met with 
 faithlessness. The Prince, now the King, be- 
 stowed his favors elsewhere. Lady Jersey, eldest 
 daughter of Lady Westmoreland, and inheritor 
 of her vast fortune, soothed his later years, that 
 lady whom Byron describes enthusiastically with, 
 
 " Each glance that wins us, and the life that throws 
 A spell which will not let our looks repose, 
 But turn to gaze again, and find anew 
 Some charm that well rewards another view."
 
 122 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 Mrs. Fitzherbert went on her way steadfastly, 
 not uttering complaint, though Peter Pindar put 
 into her mouth the lines 
 
 " Too long have I acted the Dove ; 
 
 I will soon play the part of the viper : 
 I will rant like the mistress of Jove ; 
 
 I shall dance, and the King pay the Piper." 
 
 At the time he was near his death, in 1830, she 
 addressed to him an affectionate letter, tendering 
 her services. The King seized it with eagerness 
 and placed it under his pillow, but sent no reply. 
 By his own wish her miniature portrait, taken in 
 early life, set round with brilliants, was buried 
 with him, reposing on the scar made by his early 
 foolish attempt at romantic suicide. 
 
 How varying the accounts of this monarch's 
 life ! Praise and panegyric were written with 
 great fulness. Hear what Wraxall says : " In him 
 are really blended the majesty of Louis XIV., 
 with the amenity of Charles II. George III. 
 was altogether destitute of these endowments. 
 George IV. is the finest model of grace, dig- 
 nity, ease, and affability which the world has 
 ever beheld in the same person."
 
 SWEET LASS OF RICHMOND HILL. 123 
 
 What a sermon Thackeray preached from this 
 text ! How he impaled the gilded butterfly ! 
 The most eloquent publication of his intrigues 
 and character was the fact of his great wardrobe, 
 left at his death, and the contents discovered of 
 his boxes and trunks. All coats for fifty years 
 were there. Three hundred whips, five hundred 
 pocket-books, in which were found ,10,000, trink- 
 ets and trash in profusion, for he never gave 
 anything away. There was a prodigious quantity 
 of ladies' hair, all colors and lengths, some locks 
 with powder and pomatum still sticking to them, 
 and with these were heaps of women's gloves. 
 How eloquent indeed of his lack of principle ! 
 Is there any character in society more despicable 
 than a male flirt? 
 
 Mrs. Fitzherbert died at Brighton in her eighty- 
 first year. She was an affectionate woman. Her 
 abilities were not shining, nor her charms daz- 
 zling, but her manners were most engaging. The 
 pathos and pity of her life was that she bestowed 
 the rich values of her years upon him who was 
 so unworthy of them. George was never gen- 
 erous to her, either in providing or in his
 
 124 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 confidence, for he was fearful though she 
 threatened not she would make use of some 
 of the documents in her possession to annoy or 
 injure him. 
 
 Gainsborough painted two very attractive por- 
 traits of Mrs. Fitzherbert. The one by Cosway 
 is but a part of a full-length figure seated on a 
 garden bench with a book in her hand. The minia- 
 turist had great facility in his work, completing a 
 portrait in a couple of sittings of two hours each. 
 He was the first among the artists to indulge in 
 the latter-day vogue of making his studio a rest- 
 ing-place for bric-a-brac, for beautiful objects of 
 art, and lovely draperies. His was an elegant 
 art, and he recognized the value to it of an envi- 
 ronment redolent of taste, culture, and elegance.
 
 CMARIPTTE, 
 Vl5COUNTO55TA5AFtl
 
 THE COUINTE55 
 OF A5hbURNhAM 
 
 THE Percys have always been a haughty fam- 
 ily, incontinently proud of their pedigree and 
 position. Lady Charlotte Percy, daughter of 
 Lord Algernon Percy, afterwards first Earl of 
 Beverly, was no exception to others of her fam- 
 ily: she was haughty; and yet with her patri- 
 cian sentiments was blended sweetness of mien, 
 with her hauteur and majesty was merged a mel- 
 low suavity of manner. She had no important 
 influence on the affairs of her time other than 
 the invaluable import of an honorable career, of 
 a well-poised character, with its emphatic denote- 
 ments of all that tends to conserve refinement and 
 culture. Her father was the second son of Hugh,
 
 128 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 first Duke of Northumberland of the present 
 creation ; and her brother George lived to succeed 
 to the Ducal title quite at the end of his long life, 
 being fifth of the line. She was therefore aunt 
 to the present Duke of Northumberland. The 
 first Duke, Sir Hugh Smithson, had attained to 
 his title through marrying the heiress of the 
 Percys and being raised to the dignity. 
 
 Sir Nathaniel Wraxall in his Memoirs gives 
 an extended account of the rise and of the various 
 fortunate connections made by his family. His 
 eldest son, Earl Percy, married Lady Anne Stuart, 
 daughter of the Earl of Bute. The union was 
 not happy and was without issue. The second 
 son, Lord Algernon, a delicate youth, travelling 
 in the south of France for his health, met at Aix 
 in Provence, in 1774, Isabella Susanna, second 
 daughter of Peter Burrell, Esq. They became 
 betrothed, and in the following year were married. 
 Lady Charlotte was the first issue of this mar- 
 riage, her grandmother, the Duchess, dying a 
 few months after this. She had been a woman 
 of much force, was sensible and good-natured. 
 She liked display and magnificence. The blood
 
 THE COUNTESS OF ASHBURNHAM. 1 29 
 
 of all the Percys and Seymours swelled in her 
 veins and in her fancy. When her husband was 
 Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, she revelled in cere- 
 monies, crowds, and show. From her Lady Char- 
 lotte inherited much of her character and tastes. 
 The sisters of her mother made good connections 
 by marriage ; the youngest wedded the Duke of 
 Hamilton, and after his death was united to the 
 Marquis of Exeter. In 1779, Earl Percy secured 
 a divorce from his Countess, and then married a 
 sister of his brother's wife. The father of these 
 amiable ladies was first knighted and then raised 
 to the rank of British Peer in 1796 with the title 
 of Lord Gvvydir; his son-in-law, Lord Algernon 
 Percy, had been elevated to the earldom of Bev- 
 erly by Pitt in 1790. 
 
 Lady Charlotte had become a lovely and win- 
 some lady. Her portrait by Hoppner, done 
 in his best period, was painted in 1 794, and 
 has become one of this painter's most famous 
 works. It was engraved by Charles Wilkin and 
 was issued in the series of plates entitled, " A 
 Select Series of Ladies of Rank and Fashion." 
 The painter had the reputation of investing his 
 
 9
 
 130 DAMES OF HIGH DEGREE. 
 
 sitters with an ideal grace and beauty without 
 losing likeness or character. He had a plausible 
 brush, yet his art was not akin to the emascu- 
 lated style of thirty years later. In none of his 
 subjects were elements of his style so marked as 
 in Lady Charlotte. In her was graciousness 
 allied with high-bred dignity ; and this was the 
 most marked characteristic of his manner. In 
 1795, Lady Charlotte became the second wife of 
 George, Viscount St. Asaph, only son of John, 
 Earl of Ashburnham. This nobleman was born 
 in 1760, and married in 1784 Lady Sophia 
 Thynne, third daughter of the first Marquis of 
 Bath. She was a beautiful lady, as is seen in the 
 picture of her by Reynolds, where she is por- 
 trayed with a lovely child. She died in 1791, 
 leaving two sons and a daughter. Charlotte, Vis- 
 countess St. Asaph, became the mother of six 
 sons and seven daughters. Her fourth daughter, 
 Jane Henrietta, married in 1836 Admiral Charles 
 H. Swinburne; and their son is Algernon Charles 
 Swinburne the poet, "great by fame and force 
 of song." Lord St. Asaph became third Earl of 
 Ashburnham on his father's death in 1812, and
 
 THE COUNTESS OF ASHBURNHAM. 13! 
 
 died in 1830. His eldest son, Bertram, succeeded 
 to the title and became known as the collector of 
 the Ashburnham manuscripts. The Countess 
 Charlotte lived until 1862. She was a woman of 
 fine presence and elevated character, and had the 
 hi^h regard of all those with whom she came in 
 
 O O 
 
 contact. Walpole remarked that " the Percys 
 were more remembered for having lost their 
 heads than for ever having had a head that was 
 a loss to lose." Here was a Percy who is remem- 
 bered by her finely preserved head as much as 
 by having had a fine head to preserve.
 
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