THE COURT OF THE FIRST GEORGE.
1714–1715.
Caroline’s duties as Princess of Wales began almost from the first
hour of her arrival in England. The Court of George the First lacked
a Queen, and all that the presence of a Queen implies. The King’s
unhappy consort, Sophie Dorothea, whose grace, beauty and incomparable
charm might have lent lustre to the Court of St. James’s, and whose
innate refinement would have toned down some of the grossness of the
early Hanoverian era, was locked up in Ahlden. Caroline had to fill
her place as best she could; she laboured under obvious disadvantages,
for no Princess of Wales, however beautiful and gifted, and Caroline
was both, could quite take the place of Queen, and in Caroline’s case
her difficulties were increased by the jealousy of the King, who
viewed with suspicion every act of the Prince and Princess of Wales
to win popularity as directed against himself. Caroline at first
managed by tact and diplomacy to avoid the royal displeasure, and she
would probably have continued to do so had it not been for the inept
blundering of the Prince of Wales, who, in his efforts to gain the
popular favour, was apt to overdo his part. But at first the Princess
kept him in check, and gave the King no tangible excuse for manifesting
his disapproval. “The Princess of Wales hath the genius,” quoth Lady
Mary Wortley Montagu, who hated her, “to fit her for the government of
a fool,” forgetting that she was really paying a tribute to Caroline’s
powers, for fools are proverbially difficult to govern, especially so
vain and choleric a fool as little George Augustus.
The Princess of Wales possessed that consummate art which enabled her
to govern without in the least appearing to do so, and so effectually
did she hoodwink even those admitted to the inner circle of the Court,
that many were disposed at first to treat her as a mere cypher, knowing
that she had no influence with the King, and thinking she had none with
her husband. But others, more shrewd, paid her their court, recognising
her abilities, and realising that in the future she might become the
dominant factor in the situation. Even now she was the first lady of
the land, and whatever brilliancy George the First’s Court possessed
during the first two or three years of his reign was due to her. From
the beginning she was the only popular member of the royal family. Her
early training at the Court of Berlin stood her in good stead at St.
James’s and she was well fitted by nature to maintain the position
to which she had been called. She still retained her beauty. She was
more than common tall, of majestic presence; she had an exquisitely
modelled neck and bust, and her hand was the delight of the sculptor.
Her smile was distinguished by its sweetness and her voice rich and
low. Her lofty brow, and clear, thoughtful gaze showed that she was a
woman of no ordinary mould. She had the royal memory, and, what must
have been a very useful attribute to her, the power of self-command;
she was an adept in the art of concealing her feelings, of suiting
herself to her company, and of occasionally appearing to be what she
was not. Her love of art, letters and science, her lively spirits,
quick apprehension of character and affability were all points in her
favour. She had, too, a love of state, and appeared magnificently
arrayed at Court ceremonials, evidently delighting in her exalted
position and fully alive to its dignity.
The Prince and the Princess of Wales had a great advantage over the
King in that they were able to speak English; not very well, it
is true, but they could make their meaning plain, and understood
everything that was said to them. In her immediate circle Caroline
talked French, though she spoke English when occasion served. When
she was excited she would pour forth a volley of polyglot sentences,
in which French, English and German were commingled. The Prince and
Princess of Wales loudly expressed their liking for England and things
English: “I have not a drop of blood in my veins dat is not English,”
exclaimed the Prince, and Lady Cowper relates how she went to dinner
at Mrs. Clayton’s, and found her hostess in raptures over all the
pleasant things the Prince had been saying about the English: “That
he thought them the best, handsomest, the best-shaped, best-natured
and lovingest people in the world, and that if anybody would make
their court to him, it must be by telling him that he was like an
Englishman”. And she adds, “This did not at all please the foreigners
at our table. They could not contain themselves, but fell into the
violentest, silliest, ill-mannered invective against the English that
was ever heard.”[55] Caroline, too, was full of England’s praises, and
on one occasion forcibly declared that she would “as soon live on a
dunghill as return to Hanover”. All these kind expressions were duly
repeated, and greatly pleased the people, and the popularity of the
Prince and Princess of Wales grew daily.
Places in the household of the Princess of Wales were greatly sought,
and as there was no Queen-Consort, they assumed unusual importance.
Among the earliest appointments to the Princess’s household were
those of the Duchesses of Bolton, St. Albans and Montagu to different
positions; the Countesses of Berkeley, Dorset and Cowper as ladies of
the bedchamber; and Mrs. Selwyn, Mrs. Pollexfen, Mrs. Howard and Mrs.
Clayton as bedchamber women. Some of these names call for more than
passing comment. The Duchess of Bolton was the natural daughter of the
unfortunate Duke of Monmouth, by Eleanor, daughter of Sir Richard
Needham, and all of Monmouth’s blood had good reason to hate James the
Second and his descendants. The Duchess of St. Albans was an heiress
in her own right, and the duchess of the Protestant Whig duke, who was
a natural son of Charles the Second, by Eleanor Gwynne; he also had
suffered many affronts from James the Second. The Duchess of Montagu
was a daughter of the Duke of Marlborough. The Countesses of Berkeley
and Dorset were both the ladies of great Whig lords. Lady Cowper was
the wife of the new Lord Chancellor; she came of a good Durham family,
the Claverings, and had married Lord Cowper with a suddenness and
secrecy that had never been satisfactorily explained. Rumour said
that as Molly Clavering her reputation had not been unblemished, and
she was spoken of familiarly by the rakish part of the town. We find
her denying this gossip with a vigour which tempts us to believe that
there must have been something in it. But it is certain that after her
marriage to Lord Cowper she was a virtuous matron of highly correct
principles, and devotedly attached to her husband and children. Like
her lord she had fixed her hopes upon the Hanoverian succession. She
tells us how “for four years past I had kept a constant correspondence
with the Princess, now my mistress. I had received many, and those the
kindest letters from her,” which shows not only the interest which
Caroline, while yet Electoral Princess, took in English affairs, but
also the astuteness of some of the Whig ladies, who were anxious to
take time by the forelock, and pay their court to the powers that might
be. Very soon after the Princess’s arrival, Lady Cowper was rewarded by
being given this post in her household, and for some years she stood
high in Caroline’s favour. If we may believe her, she also enjoyed the
favour of Bernstorff and of the King, for she tells us how she rejected
Bernstorff’s addresses, and of her virtuous discouragement of the
King’s overtures.
Among the Princess of Wales’s women of the bedchamber two names
stand out pre-eminent, those of Mrs. Howard and Mrs. Clayton. The
first came over from Hanover with her husband in the train of the
Princess of Wales as a _dame du palais_, and Caroline further showed
her complaisance to her husband’s favourite by consenting to her
appointment in her household. Howard was consoled by being made a
gentleman usher to the King. In England, as at Hanover, Mrs. Howard
behaved with great discretion, and was exceedingly popular at Court and
much liked by the other ladies of the household (except Mrs. Clayton),
who, however much they might quarrel among themselves, never quarrelled
with her. Mrs. Clayton, _née_ Dyves, was a lady of obscure origin.
She married Robert Clayton, a clerk of the Treasury and a manager of
the Duke of Marlborough’s estates. Clayton was a dull man and his
wife ruled him completely. He would never have risen in the world had
not his wife been a friend and correspondent of Sarah, Duchess of
Marlborough. The duchess, through Bothmar’s influence, procured a post
in the Princess’s household for Mrs. Clayton. She became a favourite
with the Princess, and gradually exercised influence over her,
especially agreeing with her mistress in her views on religion. She was
a woman of considerable ability, and of no ordinary share of cunning.
In addition to these ladies Caroline surrounded herself with a bevy
of maids of honour, most of them still in their teens, all well born,
witty and beautiful, who lent great brightness to her Court. Of these
beautiful girls Mary Bellenden came first. She was the daughter of
John, second Lord Bellenden, and was one of the most attractive women
of her day. She was celebrated for her beauty, and especially for her
wit and high spirits, which nothing could damp. She was the delight
and ornament of the Court; the palm, Horace Walpole tells us, was
given “above all for universal admiration to Miss Bellenden. Her face
and person were charming, lively she was even to _étourderie_, and so
agreeable that she was never afterwards mentioned by her contemporaries
but as the most perfect creature they had ever seen.”
With Mary Bellenden was her sister (or cousin), Margaret Bellenden, who
was only a little less lovely, but of a more pensive type of beauty.
Another maid of honour was Mary Lepel, the daughter of General Lepel,
and if we may believe not only courtiers like Chesterfield and Bath,
but independent critics like Gay, Pope and Voltaire, she was one of
the most charming of women. She was of a more stately style of beauty
than Mary Bellenden, her spirits were not so irrepressible, but she
had vivacity and great good sense, which, together with her rare
power of pleasing, won for her the admiration of all. Chesterfield
writes of her: “She has been bred all her life at Courts, of which she
has acquired all the easy good breeding and politeness without the
frivolousness. She has all the reading that a woman should have, and
more than any woman need have; for she understands Latin perfectly
well, though she wisely conceals it. No woman ever had more than
she has _le ton de la parfaitement bonne compagnie, les manières
engageantes et le je ne sçais quoi qui plaît_”.
Pretty Bridget Carteret, _petite_ and fair, a niece of Lord Carteret,
was another maid of honour. Prim, pale Margaret Meadows was the
oldest of them all, and did her best to keep her younger colleagues
in order. She had a difficult task with one of them, giddy Sophia
Howe. This young lady was the daughter of John Howe, by Ruperta, a
natural daughter of Prince Rupert, brother of the old Electress Sophia;
perhaps it was this relationship which led the Princess of Wales to
appoint Sophia as one of her maids of honour. She was exceedingly gay
and flighty, very fond of admiration, and so sprightly that she was
laughing all the time, even in church. Once the Duchess of St. Albans
chid her severely for giggling in the Chapel Royal, and told her “she
could not do a worse thing,” to which she saucily answered: “I beg
your Grace’s pardon, I can do a great many worse things”.
In these early days the Hanoverian family were especially anxious to
show their conformity to the Church of England, and the King and the
Prince and Princess of Wales made a point of regularly attending the
Sunday morning service at the Chapel Royal, St. James’s, attended by a
numerous following. The Princess of Wales brought in her train a whole
bevy of beauties, who were not so attentive to their devotions as they
ought to have been, for the Chapel Royal soon became the fashionable
resort of all the beaux of the town, and a great deal of ogling and
smiling and tittering went on, especially during the sermon. At last
Bishop Burnet complained to the Princess of the ill-behaviour of her
maids of honour. He dared not complain to the King, as his Majesty
was the most irreverent of all, habitually going to sleep through the
sermon, or carrying on a brisk conversation in an audible voice. In
justification he could have pleaded that Burnet’s prosy homilies were
exceptionally long, and he did not understand a word of them. The
Princess expressed her contrition to the Bishop and rebuked her ladies,
but as the gallants still continued to come and to gaze, she at last
consented to Burnet’s suggestion that the pew of the maids of honour
should be boarded up so high that they could not see over the top. This
excited great indignation on the part of the imprisoned fair and their
admirers, and in revenge one of the noblemen about the Court, it was
said Lord Peterborough, wrote the following lines:--
Bishop Burnet perceived that the beautiful dames
Who flocked to the Chapel of hilly St. James
On their lovers alone their kind looks did bestow,
And smiled not on him while he bellowed below.
To the Princess he went, with pious intent,
This dangerous ill to the Church to prevent.
“Oh, madam,” he said, “our religion is lost
If the ladies thus ogle the knights of the toast.
These practices, madam, my preaching disgrace:
Shall laymen enjoy the first rights of my place?
Then all may lament my condition so hard,
Who thrash in the pulpit without a reward.
Then pray condescend such disorders to end,
And to the ripe vineyard the labourers send
To build up the seats that the beauties may see
The face of no bawling pretender but me.”
The Princess by rude importunity press’d,
Though she laugh’d at his reasons, allow’d his request;
And now Britain’s nymphs in a Protestant reign
Are box’d up at prayers like the virgins of Spain.
Rhyming was the vogue in those days, and all fair ladies had poems
composed in their honour. Of course King George and the Prince and
Princess of Wales were not forgotten by the bards. The poet Young
hailed the King on his arrival as follows:--
Welcome, great stranger, to Britannia’s Throne,
And let thy country think thee all her own.
Of thy delay how oft did we complain;
Our hope reached out and met thee on the main.
With much more in the same strain. The Prince of Wales was celebrated
by Congreve in his song on the Battle of Oudenarde:--
Not so did behave young Hanover brave
On this bloody field, I assure ye;
When his war-horse was shot he valued it not,
But fought still on foot like a fury.
It was unfortunate that the Prince, on having this effusion quoted to
him, asked, “And who might Mr. Congreve be?” This ignorance gives us
the measure of the House of Hanover respecting everything English, for
Congreve was the most celebrated dramatist of his day. Addison summoned
his muse to extol the Princess of Wales. He assured her that
She was born to strengthen and grace our isle,
and speaks of her:--
With graceful ease
And native majesty is formed to please.
The Royal Family were very much in evidence at first. They were
anxious, no doubt, to impress their personalities upon the English
people, and they lost no opportunity of showing themselves in public.
In pursuance of this policy, soon after the coronation, the King and
the Prince and Princess of Wales, together with the young Princesses
Anne and Amelia, went to see the Lord Mayor’s Show, attended by the
great officers of state, many of the nobility and judges, and a retinue
of Hanoverians, including, no doubt, though they were not specified in
the official lists, Schulemburg and Kielmansegge. The royal family took
up their position in a balcony over against Bow Church, with a canopy
of crimson velvet above them; the Prince of Wales sat on the King’s
right hand, the Princess on his left, and the two young Princesses
were placed in front. The royal party and their Hanoverian suite were
highly delighted with the show, which far exceeded anything of the
kind they had seen before, and when it was over, the King offered
to knight the owner of the house from whose balcony he had looked
down upon the procession. But the worthy citizen was a Quaker, and
refused the honour, much to the astonishment of his Majesty. After the
procession the Sheriffs and Aldermen came to escort the royal family
to the Guildhall, where a magnificent feast was prepared. The Lord
Mayor, Sir William Humphreys, knelt at the entrance of the Guildhall
and presented the City sword to the King, who touched it, and gave it
back to his good keeping. The Lady Mayoress, arrayed in black velvet,
with a train many yards long, came forward to make obeisance to the
Princess of Wales. It was a moot point, and one which had occasioned
much discussion between the Princess and her ladies-in-waiting, whether
she should kiss the Lady Mayoress or not; but some one remembered that
Queen Anne had not done so, and so the Princess determined to be guided
by this recent precedent. The Lady Mayoress, however, fully expected to
be saluted by the Princess, and advanced towards her with this intent,
but finding the kiss withheld, she, to quote Lady Cowper, “did make
the most violent bawling to her page to hold up her train before the
Princess, being loath to lose the privilege of her Mayoralty. But the
greatest jest was that the King and the Princess both had been told
that my Lord Mayor had borrowed her for the day only, so I had much
ado to convince them of the contrary, though she by marriage was a sort
of relation of my Lord’s first wife. At last they did agree that if he
had borrowed a wife, it would have been another sort of one than she
was.”
The King soothed the Lady Mayoress’s wounded feelings by declaring that
she should sit at the same table with him, and harmony being restored,
the royal party proceeded to the banqueting hall, which was hung with
tapestry and decked with green boughs. The Lord Mayor, on bended knee,
presented to the King the first glass of wine, which, it was noted
with satisfaction, his Majesty drank at one gulp, and then again
asked if there was any one for him to knight. Apparently knighthoods
were not in the programme, but the King showed his appreciation of
the civic hospitality by making the Lord Mayor a baronet, an honour
that dignitary had striven hard to obtain, for he had been zealous in
suppressing Jacobite libels, and sending hawkers of ribald verses and
seditious ballad singers to prison. The King was also very gracious to
Sir Peter King, the Recorder, and told him to acquaint the citizens
of London with “these my principles. I never forsake a friend, and I
will endeavour to do justice to everybody.” When the banquet was ended
there was a concert, and late in the evening the royal party departed,
expressing themselves much pleased with their reception.
The Prince and Princess of Wales showed themselves continually in
the West End, and in places where the quality of the town most did
congregate. At first they walked in St. James’s Park every day,
attended by a numerous suite, and followed by a fashionable, and
would-be-fashionable, crowd. But after a time the Princess, who was as
fond of outdoor exercise and fresh air as the old Electress Sophia,
declared that St. James’s Park “stank of people,” and she migrated to
Kensington, driving thither by coach, and then walking in the gardens.
Kensington was at that time in the country, and separated from the town
by Hyde Park and open fields. The palace, a favourite residence of
William and Mary and Queen Anne, was the plainest and least pretending
of the royal palaces, though Wren was supposed to have built the south
front. But the air was reckoned very salubrious, and the grounds
were the finest near London. The gardens were intersected by long
straight gravel walks, and hedges of box and yew, many of them clipped
and twisted into quaint shapes. Pope made fun of them, and gave an
imaginary catalogue of the horticultural fashions of the day, such as:
“Adam and Eve in yew, Adam a little shattered by the fall of the Tree
of Knowledge in a great storm, Eve and the Serpent very flourishing”.
“St. George in box, his arm scarce long enough, but will be in
condition to stick the dragon by next April.” “An old Maid of Honour in
wormwood.” “A topping Ben Jonson in laurel,” and so forth.
As soon as the Princess of Wales took to walking at Kensington, the
gardens became a fashionable promenade. The general public was not
admitted except by ticket, but persons of fashion came in great throng.
The poets now began to sing of Kensington and its beauties. Tickell
gives a picture of these promenades in the following lines:--
Where Kensington, high o’er the neighb’ring lands,
’Midst greens and sweets, a regal fabrick stands,
And sees each spring, luxuriant in her bowers,
A snow of blossoms and a wild of flowers,
The dames of Britain oft in crowds repair
To groves and lands and unpolluted air.
Here, while the town in damps and darkness lies,
They breathe in sunshine and see azure skies;
Each walk, with robes of various dies bespread
Seems from afar a moving tulip-bed,
Where rich brocades and glossy damasks glow,
And chintz, the rival of the showery bow.
Here England’s Daughter,[56] darling of the land,
Sometimes, surrounded with her virgin band,
Gleams through the shades. She towering o’er the rest,
Stands fairest of the fairer kind confess’d;
Form’d to gain hearts that Brunswick cause denied
And charm a people to her father’s side.
The Kensington promenades were only a small part of the busy Court life
of the day. Almost every evening drawing-rooms were held at St. James’s
Palace, at which were music and cards. The latter became the rage in
season and out of season, and high play was the pastime of every one at
Court. On one occasion at the Princess’s court the Prince was “ill of a
surfeit” and obliged to keep his bed, so that the ordinary levée could
not be held. But he was not to be cheated of his game, and the ladies
in waiting were summoned, tables were placed, and they were all set to
play at ombre with the lords of the Prince’s bedchamber. And on another
occasion Lady Cowper writes of the King’s drawing-room at St. James’s:
“There was such a Court I never saw in my life. My mistress and the
Duchess of Montagu went halves at hazard and won six hundred pounds.
Mr. Archer came in great form to offer me a place at the table, but
I laughed and said he did not know me if he thought I was capable of
venturing two hundred guineas at play, for none sat down to the table
with less.” Deep drinking went with the high play. One George Mayo was
one night turned out of the royal presence “for being drunk and saucy.
He fell out with Sir James Baker, and in the fray pulled him by the
nose.”
[Illustration: KING GEORGE I.
_From the Painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller in the National Portrait
Gallery._]
The Court was no longer exclusive as in the days of Queen Anne, almost
every one of any station came who would, and in the crowded rooms there
was a good deal of pushing and hustling to get within sight of the
Royal Family. The Venetian ambassadress, Madame Tron, a very lively
lady, was so hustled one night that she kept crying, “Do not touch my
face,” and she cried so loud that the King heard her, and turning to a
courtier behind him said: “Don’t you hear the ambassadress? She offers
you all the rest of her body provided you don’t touch her face.” A
pleasantry truly Georgian. These crowded drawing-rooms were a great
change to what St. James’s was in Queen Anne’s time, where, according
to Dean Swift, who gives us an account of one of her receptions,
“the Queen looked at us with a fan in her mouth, and once a minute
said about three words to some one who was near her. Then she was told
dinner was ready and went out.” Now every event in the Royal Family was
made the pretext for further gaiety. “This day, 30th October” [1714],
writes Lady Cowper, “was the Prince’s birthday; I never saw the Court
so splendidly fine. The evening concluded with a ball, which the Prince
and Princess began. She danced in slippers very well; the Prince better
than anybody.”
The King and the Prince and Princess of Wales were very fond of the
theatres. In the gazettes of the time frequent mention is made of
their being present at the opera to hear Nicolina sing or witnessing
a play at Drury Lane. We find the Royal Family, together with a
great concourse of the nobility, at a masquerade and ball at the
Haymarket,[57] which was attended by all the town, and the company
was numerous rather than select. It was the pleasure of the royal
personages to don mask and domino and go down from their box and mingle
freely with the company. It was on this occasion, probably, that a fair
Jacobite accosted the King. “Here, sirrah, a bumper to King James.” “I
drink with all my heart to the health of any unfortunate prince,” said
his Majesty, and emptied his glass, without disclosing his identity.
Caroline said she liked to go to the play to improve her English, and
her taste was very catholic, ranging from Shakespeare to the broadest
farce. She rather scandalised the more sober part of her Court by
witnessing a comedy called “The Wanton Wife,” which was considered both
improper and immoral; it had been recommended to her by the chaste and
prudish Lady Cowper, of all matrons in the world. The Duchess of Bolton
often recommended plays to the King. She was very lively and free in
her conversation, making many droll slips of the tongue when she talked
French, either designedly or by accident. At one of the King’s parties
she was telling him how much she had enjoyed the play at Drury Lane
the night before; it was Colley Cibber’s “Love’s Last Shift”. The King
did not understand the title, so he said, “Put it into French”. “_La
dernière chemise de l’amour_,” she answered, quite gravely, whereat the
King burst out laughing.
The Royal Family were also assiduous in honouring with their presence
the entertainments of the great nobility, provided they were Whig
in politics. We hear of their being at a ball at the Duchess of
Somerset’s, a dinner at the Duchess of Shrewsbury’s, a supper at
my Lady Bristol’s, and so on. At Lady Bristol’s the King was never
in better humour, and said “a world of sprightly things”. Among
the rest, the Duchess of Shrewsbury said to him: “Sir, we have a
grievance against your Majesty because you will not have your portrait
painted, and lo! here is your medal which will hand your effigy down
to posterity with a nose as long as your arm”. “So much the better,”
said the King, “_c’est une tête de l’antique_”. But the virtuous Lady
Cowper adds: “Though I was greatly diverted, and there was a good deal
of music, yet I could not avoid being uneasy at the repetition of some
words in French which the Duchess of Bolton said by mistake, which
convinced me that the two foreign ladies” (presumably Schulemburg and
Kielmansegge) “were no better than they should be”. A good many ladies
“who were no better than they should be” attended the drawing-rooms
of George the First, and their conversation was very free. Old Lady
Dorchester, the mistress of James the Second, came one night, and
meeting the Duchess of Portsmouth, mistress of Charles the Second, and
Lady Orkney, mistress of William the Third, exclaimed, “Who would have
thought that we three whores should have met here!” It was certainly an
interesting meeting.
The Princess of Wales was in great request as godmother at the
christenings of children of the high nobility. Apparently this form
of royal condescension was somewhat expensive, for there was a lively
dispute among the Princess’s ladies as to the sum she ought to give
the nurses at christenings. When she stood godmother to the Duchess
of Ancaster’s child she and the Prince sent thirty guineas, which was
thought too little, though, on inquiry into precedent, it was found
that King Charles the Second never gave more on such occasions than
five guineas to an esquire’s nurse, ten to a baron’s, twenty to an
earl’s, and then raised five guineas for every degree in the peerage.
Sometimes the Royal Family acted as sponsors to the children of
humbler personages. On one occasion the King stood as godfather and
the Princess of Wales as godmother to the infant daughter of Madame
Darastauli, chief singer at the opera. Though they frequently attended
christenings, there is not a single record in the _Gazette_ of any of
the Royal Family having honoured a wedding, or having been present at
a funeral, even of the most distinguished personages in the realm.
Christenings and funerals were then the great occasions in family
life. If my lord died it was usual for his bereaved lady to receive
her friends sitting upright in the matrimonial bed under a canopy. The
widow, the bed and the bedchamber (which was lighted by a single taper)
were draped with crape, and the children of the deceased, clad in the
same sable garments, were ranged at the foot of the bed. The ceremony
passed in solemn silence, and after sitting for a while the guests
retired without having uttered a word.
The London to which Caroline came was a very different London to the
vast metropolis we know to-day. Its total population could not have
exceeded seven hundred thousand, and between the City of London proper
and Westminster were wide spaces, planted here and there with trees,
but for the most part waste lands. The City was then, as now, the heart
of London, and the centre of business lay between St. Paul’s and the
Exchange, while Westminster had a life apart, arising out of the Houses
of Parliament. The political and fashionable life of London collected
around St. James’s and the Mall. St. James’s Park was the fashionable
promenade; it was lined with avenues of trees, and ornamented with a
long canal and a duck-pond. St. James’s Palace was much as it is now,
and old Marlborough House occupied the site of the present one, but
on the site of Buckingham Palace stood Buckingham House, the seat of
the powerful Duke of Buckingham, a stately mansion which the duke had
built in a “little wilderness full of blackbirds and nightingales”.
In St. James’s Street were the most frequented and fashionable coffee
and chocolate houses, and also a few select “mug houses”. Quaint
signs, elaborately painted, carved and gilded, overhung the streets,
and largely took the place of numbers; houses were known as “The Blue
Boar,” “The Pig and Whistle,” “The Merry Maidens,” “The Red Bodice,”
and so forth.
It was easy in those days to walk out from London into the open country
on all sides. Marylebone was a village, Stepney a distant hamlet, and
London south of the river had hardly begun. Piccadilly was almost a
rural road, lined with shady trees, and here and there broken by large
houses with gardens. It terminated in Hyde Park, then a wild heath,
with fields to the north and Kensington to the west. Bloomsbury, Soho
and Seven Dials were fashionable districts (many old mansions in
Bloomsbury are relics of the Queen Anne and early Georgian era), though
the tide of fashion was already beginning to move westward. Grosvenor
Square was not begun until 1716, and Mayfair was chiefly known from
the six weeks’ fair which gave it its name. One feature of the London
of the early Georges might well be revived in these days of crowded
streets and increasing traffic. The Thames was then a fashionable
waterway, and a convenient means of getting from one part of London
to another. Boats and wherries on the Thames were as numerous and
as fashionable as gondolas at Venice, and the King, the Prince and
Princess of Wales, and many of the nobility, had their barges in the
same way that they had their coaches and sedan-chairs, and often “took
the air on the water”.
London, though quainter and more interesting then than now, had its
drawbacks. Fogs had scarcely made their appearance, but the ill-paved
streets, except for a few lamps which flickered here and there, were
in darkness, and link boys were largely employed. After dark the
streets were dangerous for law-abiding citizens. The “Mohocks,” who
were the aristocratic prototypes of the “Hooligans” of our day, had
been to some extent put down, but many wild young bloods still made it
their business at night to prowl about the streets molesting peaceable
citizens, insulting women and defying the Watch, who, drunken and
corrupt, often played into their hands. Conveyances were difficult to
procure; the old and dirty hackney coaches were few, and dear to hire.
There were sedan-chairs, but they had not yet come into general use,
and were the privilege of the few rather than of the many. The town
must have been very noisy in those days, a babel of cries went up
from itinerant musicians, ballad-singers, orange girls, flower girls,
beggars, itinerant vendors, rat-catchers, chair-menders, knife-grinders
and so forth. Idle and disreputable persons stood in the gutters,
and shook dice boxes at the passers-by and pestered them to gamble.
Drunkenness was common, and accounted for the many fights and brawls
that took place in the streets.
In the fashionable world dinner was taken in the middle of the day,
or from two to four o’clock, and supper was the pleasanter and more
informal meal. Card parties and supper parties generally went together.
There were lighter hospitalities also; and among the less wealthy many
pleasant little gatherings were held in the evening around coffee
and oranges. Ladies of quality passed most of their afternoons going
from house to house drinking tea, which at the high prices then asked
was a luxury. Men of fashion idled away many hours in the coffee
and chocolate houses, of which some of the most famous were White’s
Chocolate House (now the well-known club), the Cocoa Tree, also in St.
James’s Street, Squire’s near Gray’s Inn Gate, Garraway’s in ’Change
Alley and Lloyd’s in Lombard Street. Clubs were in their infancy when
George the First was king. A few had come into being, but they were
chiefly literary or political societies, such as the brief-lived
Kit-Cat Club, which was devoted to the House of Hanover, and flourished
in Queen Anne’s reign, or the October Club, chiefly formed of Jacobite
squires. There was also the Hellfire Club, a wild association of young
men, under the Duke of Wharton, which did its best to justify the name.
London lived more out of doors at the beginning of the eighteenth
century than it does now; we read of fêtes in the gardens and parks,
the ever popular fairs, pleasure parties on the Thames in the summer,
and bonfires in the squares and on the ice in winter, and many street
shows.
Any picture of social life of the period would lack colour which did
not give some idea of the quaint dress of the day. Men thought as much
about dress as women, and though it is impossible to follow all the
vagaries of fashion as shown in the waxing and waning of wigs, the
variations of cocked hats, coats, gold lace and sword hilts, yet we
may note that men of fashion began to wear the full-bottomed peruke in
the reign of George the First, and their ordinary attire consisted of
ample-skirted coats, long and richly embroidered waistcoats, breeches,
stockings, and shoes with buckles, and three-cornered hats. The beaux
or “pretty fellows” of the day blazed out into silks and velvets, reds
and greens, and a profusion of gold lace; they were distinguished not
only by the many-coloured splendour of their attire, but by their
scents of orange flower and civet, their jewelled snuff-boxes, their
gold or tortoise-shell rimmed perspective glasses, and especially for
their canes, which were often of amber, mounted with gold, the art of
carrying which bespoke the latest mode.
The ladies, naturally, were no whit behind the men in the variety and
novelty of their attire. They bedecked themselves with the brightest
hues, and their hair, piled up or flowing, with head-dresses high
or low, as fashion decreed, arranged in ringlets or worn plain or
powdered, went through as many fluctuations as their lords’ big-wigs,
periwigs and perukes. The fan played a large part in conversation and
flirtation, and patches and powder were arranged with due regard to
effect. Muffs were a prodigious size. It is impossible for the mere man
to give a particular description of the silks, velvets, jewels, laces,
ribbons and feathers which formed part of the equipment of a lady of
quality, or to follow the mysteries of commodes, sacks, _négligés_,
bedgowns and mob-caps. But the walking dresses, if we may judge from
the fashion plates, seem to have left an extraordinary amount of bosom
exposed, to have been very tight in the waist, and to have carried
an enormous number of flounces. The hoop, which gradually developed
through the Georgian era, was the most monstrous enormity that ever
appeared in the world of fashion. The lady who wore a hoop really
stood in a cage, and when she moved, she did not seem to walk, for her
steps were not visible, but she was rather wafted along. So stepped
fair ladies from their sedan-chairs, or floated down the avenues of
Kensington and Hampton Court. Servants wore clothes almost as fine as
their masters and mistresses, and aped their manners and their vices.
All great mansions supported throngs of idle servants in gorgeous
liveries, and my lady often had her negro boy, who waited on her, clad
in scarlet and gold, with a silver collar around his neck.
Society in the early Georgian era, though marred by excess in eating
and drinking and by coarseness in conversation, which the example
of the King had made fashionable, was characterised by a spirit of
robust enjoyment. Judging from the letters, journals, plays, poems
and caricatures of the period, social life was exceedingly lively
and varied, though too often disfigured by bitter party animosities,
scurrilous personal attacks and brutal practical jokes. The tone was
not high. The beaux and exquisites were given to drunkenness, vice
and gambling; the belles and ladies of quality to scandal, spite and
extravagance, to a degree unusual even among the rich and idle, and
the marriage vow seemed generally to be held in light estimation.
But we should not be too hasty in assuming that the early Georgian
era was necessarily much worse than the present day. If there was
more grossness there were fewer shams. Its sins were very much on the
surface; it indulged in greater freedom of manners and licence of
speech, and many leaders of society, from the King downwards, led lives
which were notoriously immoral; but there were plenty of honest men and
virtuous women in those days as now, probably more in proportion, only
we do not hear so much about them as the others. In many respects life
was purer, simpler and more honest than it is to-day, beliefs were more
vital, and the struggle for existence far less keen.
Such was the London to which Caroline came, and such was the society
which she, as the first lady in the land, might influence for good or
evil. Let it be recorded that in her own life and conduct she did what
she could to set a good example. She was a good wife and a good mother,
no word of scandal was ever whispered against her, and in her own
circle she strove to encourage the higher and intellectual life, and to
purify and refine some of the grosser elements around her. More than
that she could not do, for it must be remembered that the duty of moral
responsibility was not greatly accounted of in the days of the early
Georges.
FOOTNOTES TO BOOK II, CHAPTER II:
[55] Diary of Lady Cowper.
[56] The Princess of Wales.
[57] _The Flying Post_, 21st February, 1716.