Marlborough's Offer to lend Money

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mention of his name terrified and threw her into hysterics. He was therefore told, "she resolved never to give her consent to his return.” In this way the Queen doubtlessly prevented the accomplishment of a wish that was nearest her heart.

Disappointed in his desire, resenting distrust of James Stuart, and the fears of the Queen, the duke who was a man of many resources, transferred his offers of zeal and duty to the House of Hanover, in a series of letters still preserved in the Hanoverian papers. In one of these written on November 30th, 1713, which with his usual caution "he beggs may be burnt when read," he charges the Tory ministry with "intentions to bring in the Pretender "; as instances of which he pointed out the closer union of the Court with France since the establishment of peace, giving all employments military and civil to notorious Jacobites; the putting the governments of Scotland and Ireland into the hands of two persons who are known friends to the Pretender; the choosing the sixteen lords to serve for Scotland, of whom two were with the Pretender last summer and most of the rest declared Jacobites."

"the

Finally came the strongest proof he was capable of giving of his loyalty to the House of Hanover, when he offered to lend money to the Elector "provided that the interest of five per cent should be regularly paid." It was suggested that this money should be spent in support of the Whigs and in harassing the Tory government and the Queen. As the Elector

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would give no security either for the principal or the interest, the money was never lent.

In speaking of the duke after his death, Alexander Pope, who was well acquainted with the leading men of the day, says his grace's inconsistency in corresponding with the Courts of Hanover and St. Germains at the same time, could be accounted for by his reigning passion, his absorbing love of money; for by currying favour by turns with the Stuarts or the Guelphs, he hoped to secure his vast riches, under whichever king came to the throne. "He was calm in the heat of battle," says the same authority who is quoted in Spence's Anecdotes, "and when he was so near being taken prisoner in his first campagne in Flanders, he was quite unmoved. It is true he was like to lose his life in the one, and his liberty in the other; but there was none of his money at stake in either. This mean passion of that great man, operated very strongly in him in the very beginning of his life, and continued to the very end of it."

Pope then tells a story supporting his statement. One day the Duke was looking over some papers in his escritoire with Lord Cadogan, when opening one of the little drawers he took out a green purse, and turned some broad pieces out of it which he looked at with great satisfaction, saying, "Cadogan, observe these pieces well, they deserve to be observed; there are just forty of them; 'tis the very first sum I ever got in my life, and I have kept it always unbroken from that time to this day."

CHAPTER VIII

Queen Anne suffers Unable to take ExerciseAnxiety regarding Her Brother-Refuses to sanction a Proclamation against Him-Will not allow the Elector of Hanover to reside in EnglandBaron Schutz is forbidden the Court-Writes to the Electress Sophia-The Queen's Letters to Hanover are published through the Agency of the Duchess of Marlborough-Tom D'Urfey is rewarded for His Doggerel Lines on the Princess-Sudden Death of the latter-The Duchess of Marlborough's Letter-Lady Masham taunts Lord Oxford-The Queen and Her Wrangling Ministers-Dismissed the Dragon-Her Majesty swoons at a Cabinet Council - Dreads another Meeting Is found gazing at a Clock-Taken ill-Lady Masham writes to Dean Swift-And Peter Wentworth to His Brother-The Sovereign raves about Her Brother-Cabinet Councils are held-Secret Conclaves in Lady Masham's Apartments-Dr. Radcliffe is sent for Queen Anne dies and George I. is peaceably proclaimed.

WHILS

CHAPTER VIII

HILST these events were taking place, Queen Anne was suffering keenly both in mind and body. From the age of thirty she had been attacked by gout in her hands and feet; and now when close upon her fiftieth year, that painful complaint continually threatened to attack a vital part and cause her death. Unable to take exercise and unwilling to deprive herself of the enormous quantities of food which her appetite demanded, she grew enormously stout and unwieldy, so that walking from one apartment to another became a task; whilst, when at Windsor, she was conveyed from one floor to another in a chair hoist by ropes and worked by pulleys, which had done the same service for Henry VIII., since whose time it had remained at the Castle.

But the pain which afflicted her body was less than that which racked her mind, threw her into fits of gloomy foreboding, filled her eyes with tears, and banished sleep from those tedious and melancholy nights whose horrors affrighted her. For knowing that her life was drawing to a close, she was distracted between