MARLBOROUGH.

399

arietta Duchess of Marl

Godolphin branch of the mained. This was Harave seen, in 1717, to the ninister, Pelham Holles, of the most liberal statesays. To his To his grace the already seen, addressed uke of St. Albans, and rk; and she could not st of any one more able The Duke had been a Hanoverian interests. ys was uncommon, and onours and places innuenriching himself by his o services at all, accord

she thought very ridiculous, unes be met by it "the ditch around the Castle. Some ept the royal family, or the ranger, had ever been allowed, during her experience of fifty res such a liberty before. But that was not all the f fence. The Duchess, in addressing her complaints to Pelham Holles, Duke of Newcastle, who had married her granddaughter, Lady Harris Godal phin, assured his grace that the Duke of S Albans had, to use a military phrase "besieged her in both parks, and been willing to forage in them at pleasure." Having got the better of him in some points, he had pursued her to the l park; and her only resource was to addres ber relative, then secretary of state, to intercede with the Queen that the intrusive warden might not be permitted to have a key. Which of the belligerent powers prevailed, does not apear. Such were some of the Duchess of Marl borough's annoyances, perhaps to her spirit ver pations only, in what may be called her cl life. In the next chapter we shall discuss the subject of her domestic and family troubles, after the Duke had left her the charge of numerous

fashion, the Duke reording to Lord Chesterndred thousand pounds began life; at any rate, reduced.*

amiable, and, in some rebleman, which gained, it her grace's affections, after

Register. Collins' Baronage.

she had with much pains and anxiety achieved that connexion which has been alluded to,-has been ably, but perhaps unfairly, drawn by his relation and contemporary, Lord Chesterfield. Satire was not only the natural propensity of Lord Chesterfield's mind, but the delight and practice of the day. The pungent remarks of Horace Walpole, as well as those of Chesterfield, must be taken with reservation. Neither friend nor foe was to be spared, when a sentence could be better turned, or a witticism improved, by a little delicate chastisement, all done in perfect good-humour, and with unspeakable goodbreeding, by these not dissimilar characters.

Lord Chesterfield depicts in the Duke of Newcastle an obsequious, industrious, and timorous man, whom the public put below his level, in not allowing him even mediocre talents, which Chesterfield graciously assigns to him; a minister who delighted in the insignia of office; in the hurry, and in the importance which that hurry gives, of business; as one jealous of power, and eager for display. "His levées," says the Earl,

66

were his pleasure and his triumph;" and, after keeping people waiting for hours, when he came into his levée-room, "he accosted, hugged, embraced, and promised everybody with a seeming cordiality, but at the same time with an illiberal

and degrading familiarity."* The world, however, forgot these weaknesses, in the generosity, the romantic sense of honour, and the private virtues of this respectable nobleman.

Anne Countess of Sunderland, the second daughter of the Duchess, left four sons and one daughter, with a paternal estate greatly impoverished. It was, amongst all his faults, a redeeming point in Lord Sunderland's character, that his patriotism aimed not at gain. We have already referred to a fact not to be forgotten: when, on being dismissed from the ministry in Queen's Anne's reign, he was offered a pension, he nobly refused it, with the reply, that "since he was no longer allowed to serve his country, he was resolved not to pillage it." His children were, however, amply provided for by the will of their grandfather. The eldest son, Robert Earl of Sunderland, the object of his mother's peculiar solicitude on her deathbed, perhaps from being more able to comprehend the characters of both of these distinguished parents before he lost them, displayed symptoms of the same aspiring mind that his father possessed. The aversion which George the Second had imbibed towards his father, prevented the spirited youth

*Chesterfield's Characters.

+ Note in Chesterfield's Characters, p. 50. VOL. II.

D D

from obtaining any employment. At last, in despair, and wishing to bring himself before the notice of men in power, the Earl entreated Sir Robert Walpole to give him an ensigncy in the guards. The minister was astonished at this humble request from the grandson of Marlborough, and inquired the reason. "It is because,' answered the young man, "I wish to ascertain whether it is determined that I shall never have anything." He died early in 1729,† and the Duchess appears, from a letter addressed to Lady Mary Wortley Montague, to have very deeply lamented the loss of this scion of the only branch she could "ever receive any comfort from in her own family." On this occasion the poor Duchess remarks," that she believes, having gone through so many misfortunes with unimpaired health, nothing now but distempers and physicians could kill her." She is said to have, indeed, loved Lord Sunderland above every other tie spared to her by death.

Two sons and a daughter now remained of this beloved stock. Charles, who succeeded his brother Robert, and became afterwards Duke of Marlborough, was never, according to Horace Walpole, a favourite of his grandmother, although

* Lord Wharncliffe, vol. i. p. 2.

+ Collins's Baronage.

+ Ibid.

he possessed many good qualities. He was not, however, endowed with the family attribute of economy; neither could he brook the control of one, who expected, probably, far more obedience from her grandchildren than young persons are generally disposed to yield from any motive but affection. Unhappily, the Duke's sister, Lady Anne Bateman, whom the Duchess had, in compliance with her mother's wishes, brought up, was but ill disposed to soothe those differences which often arose between her grandmother and the young Duke. She introduced her brother, unhappily for his morals, to Henry Fox, first Lord Holland, one of those unprincipled, but agreeable men, whose conversation soon banishes all thirst for honour, and sense of shame. By Fox, a Jacobite at heart, but an interested partisan of Sir Robert Walpole, the young Duke was won over to the court party; upon which occasion was uttered the Duchess's sarcasm," that is the Fox that has won over my goose;" a remark which, like every thing that she said, was industriously circulated. Fox considered public virtue in the light of a pretext in some, as an infatuation in others: self-interest was, in him, the all-prevailing principle; Sir Robert Walpole being, in that respect, his model.

*Chesterfield.