AT HERRENHAUSEN AND ST. JAMES (1714-1716)
The Elector George Lewis not delighted at his accession to the British
throne--A greater man in Hanover than in London--Lady Mary modifies her
first impression of the King--She is in high favour at Court--An amusing
incident at St. James's--The early unpopularity of George I in England
generally, and especially in the capital--The Hanoverians in the Royal
Household--The Duchess of Kendal--The Countess of Darlington--Lady
Mary's description of the Hanoverian ladies--The Duchess of Kendal's
passion for money--Her influence with the King in political matters--Count
de Broglie--The scandal about Lady Darlington refuted--Lady Mary and the
Prince of Wales--The King and the Prince of Wales--The poets and wits of
the day--Gay's tribute to Lady Mary--Pope's verses on her--"Court Poems."
It is beyond question that the accession to the British throne gave no
thrill of pleasure to the King. He was fifty-four years of age, and had
no desire to change his state. It was necessary for him, as the present
writer has said elsewhere, now to go from a country where he was
absolute, to another where, so far from being supreme, when King and
people differed on a matter of vital importance, the monarch had to give
way--the price of resistance having been fixed, at worst at death, at
best exile or civil war. He had to go from a country where he was the
wealthiest and most important personage to another where he would be
merely regarded as a minor German princeling set up as a figurehead, and
where many of the gentry were wealthier than he. This point was
appreciated by Lady Mary when she went to Hanover in November, 1716, for
she wrote from there to the Countess of Bristol: "I have now made the
tour of Germany, and cannot help observing difference between
travelling here and in England. One sees none of those fine seats of
noblemen that are so common among us, nor anything like a country
gentleman's house, though they have many situations perfectly fine. But
the whole people are divided into absolute sovereignties, where all the
riches and magnificence are at Court, or communities of merchants, such
as Nuremberg and Frankfort, where they live always in town for the
convenience of trade."
Worse than all George must set forth by no means sure of his reception,
and with no love, nor even liking, for the people over whom he was
called to reign. That he did go at all is greatly to his credit, for he
was doubtful if he would be allowed to remain, and he never revisited
Hanover without some suspicion that he might not be able to return to
England. He would have been a much happier man if he could have remained
at his beloved Herrenhausen. He never felt he owed Britain anything, and
indeed he did not: the throne had been settled on his mother, not for
love of her, but simply because she was the only alternative to the
succession of the dreaded Roman Catholic heirs. So George came as a
visitor, rather submitting to be King of England, than anxious for the
honour, prepared to be forced by circumstances to return, little
dreaming that two hundred years later his descendants would be firmly
seated upon his throne.
It may be mentioned that Lady Mary, as she became better acquainted with
the King, grew to like him. In the letter from Hanover just quoted, she
says: "His Majesty dines and sups constantly in public. The Court is
very numerous, and his affability and goodness make it one of the most
agreeable places in the world to me." The King was indeed at his best
when in residence at Herrenhausen. Lord Peterborough said that George
was so happy there that he believed he had forgot _the accident that
occurred to him and his family on the 1st of August_, 1714.
It may be that, the King having taken a great fancy to Lady Mary,
modified that lady's earlier impression. When she and her husband went
to Hanover, the King, as she mentioned in one of her letters to Lady
Bristol, "has had the goodness to appoint us a lodging in one part of
the Palace, without which we should be very ill accommodated; for the
vast number of English crowds the town so much, it is very good luck to
be able to get one sorry room in a miserable tavern. I dined to-day with
the Portuguese ambassador, who thinks himself very happy to have two
wretched parlours in an inn."
Lady Mary was, indeed, in high favour at the Courts of Hanover and St.
James's. "Mr. Wortley and his lady are here," the British Minister at
Hanover, John Clavering, wrote in December, 1716, to Lady Cowper. "They
were so very impatient to see his Majesty that they travelled night and
day from Vienna here. Her Ladyship is mighty gay and airy, and occasions
a great deal of discourse. Since her arrival the King has took but
little notice of any other lady, not even of Madame Kielmansegg, which
the ladies of Hanover don't relish very much; for my part, I can't help
rejoicing to see his Majesty prefer us to the Germans."
It was evidently before that the following incident occurred. Lady Mary
often went to St. James's, but, as it was very dull there, was often
glad to go instead to some less august and more amusing assembly. One
evening Lady Mary particularly desired to leave early, and induced the
Duchess of Kendal to persuade the King to dismiss her. The King
reluctantly acquiesced, though, when Lady Mary made her bow, he declared
it was an act of perfidy to run away, but, in spite of that and other
complimentary remarks, she at last contrived to make her escape.
At the foot of the staircase she met Mr. Secretary Craggs, who, seeing
her leave so early, enquired if the King had retired, but she reassured
him on that point, and dwelt complacently on the King's reluctance to
let her go. Craggs made no remark, but took her in his arms, ran
upstairs, and deposited her in the ante-chamber, whereupon the pages at
once threw open the doors leading to the King's apartment.
"_Ah! la re-voilà_," cried his Majesty and the Duchess of Kendal, and
expressed their pleasure that she had changed her mind, but Lady Mary
was so flustered that, instead of maintaining a discreet silence she
burst out, "Oh, Lord, Sir, I have been so frightened!" and related her
adventure.
She had scarcely finished relating her adventure, when the door was
thrown open, and Mr. Secretary Craggs was announced. He entered calmly,
and made his bow as if nothing had happened, but the King strode up to
him, and said angrily: "_Mais, comment, donc, Monsieur Craggs, est ce
que c'est l'usage de ce pays de porter des belles dames comme un sac de
froment_?" ("Is it the custom of this country to carry about fair ladies
as if they were a sack of wheat?") The culprit was dumbfounded by the
unexpected attack, and glanced reproachfully at Lady Mary for having
betrayed him, but, soon finding his wits, parried with, "There is
nothing I would not do for your Majesty's satisfaction."
One of the reasons for the early unpopularity of George I was that he
brought with him a large suite from Hanover.
The household that accompanied him numbered sixty-three. There was Baron
von Kielmansegg, who was Master of the Horse; Count von Platen, son of
the late Prime Minister of Hanover; and Baron von Hardenburg, Marshal of
the Court. With them came the Lutheran clergyman, Braun; a group of
physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries; five body-servants, including
the Turks, Mahomet and Mustapha; four pages, two trumpeters, a carver,
twelve footmen, eighteen cooks, three cellarmen, two housemaids, and one
washerwoman. It may be mentioned that in 1696 there were only two
washerwomen for the three hundred and seven persons, exclusive of
royalty, that at this date made up the Court of Hanover.
The political staff that came included twenty-three persons. Baron von
Bothmer was already in England. Now arrived Baron von Bernstorff, Prime
Minister of Hanover; Baron von Schlitz-Goertz, Hanoverian Finance
Minister; Baron von Hattorf, Hanoverian Minister of War; and John
Robethon.
To these men, who advised the King in his capacity of Elector of
Hanover, there would have been no objection had they confined their
energies to administering that country. This, unfortunately, was not the
case. Some of them, at least, notably Bernstorff and Robethon, meddled
in English politics, and most of them desired high office, lucrative
appointments, peerages, and other grants. It is certain that they must
have known that they were barred from such delights by an Act of 1700
which carefully guarded against foreigners acquiring any share in the
government of this country. Nothing, in fact, could be more definite
than clause three of the "Act for the further limitation of the Crown":
"No person born out of the Kingdoms of England, Scotland, or Ireland, or
the dominions thereunto belonging (although he be naturalised or made a
denizen, except such as are born of English parents)," so runs clause
three of the above-mentioned Act, "shall be capable of the Privy
Council, or a Member of either House of Parliament, or to enjoy any
office or place of trust, either civil or military, or to have any grant
of lands, tenements, or hereditaments from the Crown to himself or to
any other or others in trust for him." Still, Acts of Parliament have
been repealed, and the invaders may well have hoped that, with the
King's support, their influence might increase until they were strong
enough to have the clause revoked.
As a matter of fact, nothing of the kind happened, and no Hanoverian
statesman or court officer was appointed to any place of profit under
the Crown or rewarded for his services in the Electorate by the grant of
a British peerage. It may be noted that the Hanoverian officials, fond
as all Germans were and are of wordy distinctions, styled themselves
"Koenigliche-Gross-britannische-Kurfuerstlich-Braunschweig-Lueneburgische"
(Royal-British-Electoral-Brunswick-Luenburg) councillors or magistrates.
The Hanoverians who were on the political side or held posts in the
Household might, by the exercise of a little tact, have lived down an
unpopularity that was the result of circumstances rather than arising
from any personal animosity. That they did not do so may be ascribed
partly, anyhow, to their own fault.
On the other hand, nothing probably would have overcome the prejudice
against the ladies who followed George to this country. These were the
Countess Ehrengard Melusina von der Schulenburg, who, in 1716, was
created Duchess of Munster in the Irish peerage, and three years after
Duchess of Kendal, by which latter title she is more generally known,
and the Baroness von Kielmansegg (_née_ Platen), who was presently
elevated to the dignity of Countess of Darlington. It was generally
assured that these ladies were the King's mistresses, and they were
accordingly disliked not only at Court but also by the mob. One of them
when driving in London was assailed by terms of abuse--as she understood
scarcely any English, she could only go by the tone of the voices--and
putting her head out of the coach said: "Good people, why abuse us? We
come for all your goods." "Yes, damn you," cried someone, "and for our
chattels, too." The man in the crowd only voiced the general opinion,
and, it must be said, the general opinion was not far removed from the
truth.
Of course, the Jacobites made the most of this, and, as Horace Walpole
has related, "the seraglio was food for all the venom of the Jacobites,
and, indeed, nothing could be grosser that was vomited out in lampoons,
libels, and every channel of abuse against the Sovereign and the new
Court and chanted even in their hearing in the public streets."
It is mentioned in _Walpoliana_ that "this couple of rabbits, the
favourites, as they were called, occasioned much jocularity on their
first importation." Some of the jocularity was aroused by their
appearance. The style of beauty, or what passed for beauty, in each
country was markedly different. Hear Lady Mary Wortley Montagu writing
from Hanover in December, 1716: "I have now got into the regions of
beauty," she told Lady Rich. "All the women have literally rosy cheeks,
snowy foreheads and bosoms, jet eye-brows, and scarlet lips, to which
they generally add coal-black hair. These perfections never leave them
till the hour of their death, and have a very fine effect by candle-light,
but I could wish they were handsome with a little more variety. They
resemble one another as much as Mrs. Salmon's Court of Great Britain,
and are in much danger of melting away by too near approaching the fire
which they for that reason carefully avoid, though it is now such
excessively cold weather, that I believe they suffer extremely by that
piece of self-denial."
The Duchess of Kendal at the time of the accession of George I was
forty-seven years of age. The King's mother, the Electress Sophia, had
commented on her to Mrs. Howard: "Look at that mawkin, and think of her
being my son's passion." If a family portrait, now in the possession of
Count Werner Schulenburg, may be trusted, she was what is called "a fine
figure of a woman"; she had blue eyes and fair hair. She was so tall
that she was nicknamed in England "the May-pole." She was certainly
determined to make the most of her opportunities, and the more eager
because at the beginning of the reign she was very doubtful whether
George I would not have hurriedly to retire to Hanover for good and all.
So doubtful of the likelihood of the duration of the Hanoverian line in
this country was she that at first she declined to accompany the
Elector, and she only changed her mind when she found the Baroness von
Kielmansegg had decided to go to England. She was in high favour with
George, and took every advantage of her influence. She left an immense
fortune, which was acquired in ways into which an eulogistic biographer
of the lady would not enquire. Certainly, she received for her good
offices large sums of money from the promoters of the South Sea Act, she
accepted bribes to secure peerages, and, it is said on the authority of
Sir Robert Walpole, that Bolingbroke presented her with £11,000 to
endeavour to secure his restoration to the royal favour. It may be
remarked, _en passant_, that Spence records that Lady Mary Wortley
Montagu said to him: "I would never be acquainted with Lord Bolingbroke,
because I always looked upon him as a vile man."
Duchess of Kendal was not content with indulging her passion for money;
she, in matters of politics, acted as the hidden hand behind the
throne--any services that she rendered were, it is certain, adequately
remunerated. Her ascendancy over the King was unquestionable, and
Walpole was compelled to admit that she "was in effect as much Queen of
England as ever any was, that he did everything by her." She not only
used her power in connection with home affairs, but also in matters of
foreign policy, and the Count de Broglie, French Minister of the Court
of St. James, was urgent in his endeavours to secure her support.
"As the Duchess of Kendal seemed to express a wish to see me often, I
have been very attentive to her, being convinced that it is highly
essential to the advantage of your Majesty's service to be on good terms
with her, for she is closely united with the three ministers who now
govern," the Count wrote to Louis XV on July 6, 1724, and four days
later returned to the subject: "The more I consider state affairs, the
more I am convinced that the Government is entirely in the hands of Mr.
Walpole, Lord Townshend, and the Duchess of Newcastle, who are on the
best terms with the Duchess of Kendal. The King visits her every
afternoon from five till eight, and it is there that she endeavours to
penetrate the sentiments of his Britannic majesty for the purpose of
consulting the three ministers, and pursuing the measures which may be
thought necessary for accomplishing their designs. She sent me word that
she was desirous of my friendship, and that I should place confidence in
her. I assured her that I would do everything in my power to merit her
esteem and friendship. I am convinced that she may be advantageously
employed in promoting your Majesty's service, and that it will be
necessary to employ her, though I will not trust her further than is
absolutely necessary." To these letters Louis replied on July 18: "There
is no doubt that the Duchess of Kendal, having a great ascendancy over
the King of Great Britain, and maintaining strict union with his
ministers, must materially influence their principal resolutions. You
will neglect nothing to acquire a share of her confidence, from a
conviction that nothing can be more conducive to my interests. There is,
however, a manner of giving additional value to the marks of confidence
you bestow on her in private, by avoiding in public all appearances
which might seem too pointed, by which means you will avoid falling into
the inconvenience of being suspected by those who are not friendly to
the Duchess, at the same time that a kind of mysteriousness in public on
the subject of your confidence, will give rise to a firm belief of your
having formed a friendship mutually sincere."
The case of Lady Darlington was different. It was assured generally that
she, too, was a mistress of the King, a view that Lady Mary Wortley
Montagu accepted, and one which was endorsed by the historians and
biographers for more than a century. The first English writer to
discover the truth was Carlyle, who in his _Life of Frederick the Great_
said: "Miss Kielmansegg, Countess of Darlington, was, and is, believed
by the gossiping English to have been a second simultaneous Mistress of
His Majesty's, but seems after all to have been his Half-Sister and
nothing more." She was, in fact, a daughter of the Countess of Platen
(_née_ Clara Elizabeth von Meysenbach), not, indeed, by that lady's
husband, but by Ernest Augustus, Duke (afterwards Elector) of Hanover,
the father of George I. Only Lady Cowper seems to have known this, and
to have accepted it as a fact. Yet there was no secrecy concerning the
paternity of the Countess, and it was, of course, well-known in the
German Courts. Further, it was overlooked that in the patent of nobility
in 1721 there is a reference to the royal blood of the recipient of the
title, and actually the patent, in addition to the Great Seal, had a
miniature of the King and the arms of the houses of Platen, Kielmansegg,
and Great Britain (Brunswick-Lueneburg) with the bar-sinister.[2]
[Footnote 2: Refutation of the scandal is to be found in a work
published in Hanover in 1902: "_Briefe des Hertzogs Ernst August zu
Braun schweig-Lüneburg an Johann Franz Diedrich von Wendt aus dem Jahren
1705 bis 1726_," edited by Erich Graf Kielmansegg.]
All this at this time must have been very distressing to Lady Darlington,
for she was very careful of her reputation, as the following amusing
incident, given in Lady Cowper's Diary (February 4, 1716) indicates:
"Madame Kielmansegg had been told that the Prince, afterwards George II,
had said that she intrigued with all the men at Hanover. She came to
complain of this to the Princess, who replied, she did not believe the
Prince had said so, it not being his custom to speak in that manner.
Madame Kielmansegg cried and said it had made her despised, and that
many of her acquaintance had left her upon that story, but that her
husband had taken all the care she could to vindicate her reputation,
and thereupon she drew forth a certificate under her husband's hand, in
which he certified, in all the due forms, that she had always been a
faithful wife to him, and that he had never had any cause to suspect her
honesty. The Princess smiled, and said she did not doubt it at all, and
that all the trouble was very unnecessary, and that it was a very bad
reputation that wanted such a support."
In appearance, Lady Darlington was a contrast to the Duchess of Kendal.
She was in her youth a good-looking woman, but as the years passed she
became immensely corpulent, and Horace Walpole, who saw her at his
mother's when he was a child, thus described her: "Two fierce black
eyes, large and rolling between two lofty arched eye-brows, two acres of
cheeks spread with crimson, an ocean of neck that overflowed, and was
not distinguished from the lower part of her body, and no part
restrained by stays." He christened her "Elephant and Castle."
For a while, Lady Mary was popular also with the Prince of Wales, who
was attracted by her looks and her vivacity. It is recorded that on one
occasion when Lady Mary appeared in a gown more than usually becoming
the Prince called his wife from the card table to admire her. The
Princess came, looked, and then said calmly, "Lady Mary always dresses
so well," and went on with her game.
It was impossible, however, even for the most tactful person in the
world to be on good terms with the King and the Prince of Wales. It is
said of George I that he was of an affectionate disposition and that
throughout his life he hated only three people in the world: his mother,
who was dead, his wife, who was imprisoned at Ahlden, and his son. It
has been said that the trouble began when in his early youth the Prince
expressed sympathy with his mother; it may be that it started from the
fact that the Prince was the son of a woman who had sullied the honour
of the Royal House. It is, however, unnecessary to look for reasons; to
hate the heir-apparent was a tradition with the Georges.
Matters did not improve after the accession of George I to the British
throne. He disliked his daughter-in-law, Caroline, daughter of John
Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Anspach, and spoke of her as "_Cette
diablesse Madame la Princesse."_ The opposition was not slow to take
advantage of the rift, and planted itself on the side of his Royal
Highness. It proposed, on the Civil List vote, a separate revenue of
£100,000 for the Prince--which infuriated the King, as it was intended
to do.
In 1716 George was anxious to visit his beloved Hanover, but he was torn
between the desire to do so and the dislike to leave his son in England
as Regent during his absence. Indeed, he almost decided not to go,
unless he could join others with the Prince in the administration and
limit his authority by the most rigorous restriction. To this, however,
the Government could not consent, and Townshend stated that "on a
careful persual of precedents, finding no instance of persons being
joined in commission with the Prince of Wales, and few, if any,
restrictions, they were of opinion that the constant tenour of ancient
practice could not conveniently be receded from."
Lady Mary, like the rest of the world, found the Court dull, and she
much preferred to spend her time in the more congenial society of men of
letters. Addison, she knew, and Steele, and Arbuthnot, and Jervas, and
Gay, who presently paid her a pretty compliment in _Mr. Pope's Welcome
from Greece,_ wherein he inserted tributes to the ladies of the Court:
"What lady's that to whom he gently bends?
Who knows her not? Ah, those are Wortley's eyes.
How art thou honour'd, number'd with her friends;
For she distinguishes the good and wise."
Pope, too, wrote of her with appreciation:
TO LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU
I
In beauty or wit,
No mortal as yet
To question your empire has dared.
But men of discerning
Have thought that in learning,
To yield to a lady was hard.
II
Impertinent schools,
With musty dull rules,
Have reading to females denied;
So Papists refuse
The Bible to use
Lest flocks should be wise as their guides.
III
Twas woman at first
(Indeed she was curst)
In knowledge that tasted delight,
And sages agree
The laws should decree
To the first possessor the right.
IV
Then bravely, fair dame,
Resume the old claim,
Which to your whole sex does belong;
And let men receive
From a second bright Eve
The knowledge of right and of wrong.
V
But if the first Eve
Hard doom did receive,
When only one apple had she,
What a punishment new
Shall be found out for you,
Who tasting, have robb'd the whole tree!
The acquaintance with Pope began shortly after Lady Mary came to town in
the autumn of 1714. It soon developed into friendship. "Lady Mary
Wortley," Jervas wrote to the poet, probably in 1715 or early in the
following year, "ordered me by express this morning, _cedente Gayo et
ridente Fortescuvio_, to send you a letter, or some other proper notice,
to come to her on Thursday about five, which I suppose she meant in the
evening."
There appeared in March, 1716, a volume bearing the title _Court Poems_,
the authorship being attributed to "A Lady of Quality," who, it soon
became known, was Lady Mary. The book was issued by Roberts, who had
received the three sets of verses contained in it from the notorious
piratical publisher, Edmund Curll. How the manuscript "fell" into the
hands of Curll it is not easy to imagine. Curll's account is that they
were found in a pocket-book taken up in Westminster Hall on the last day
of the trial of the Jacobite Lord Winton. Anyhow, however it came about,
the volume was published in 1716, when it was found to contain "The
Basset Table," "The Drawing Room," and "The Toilet."
Curll was an excellent publicity agent for his wares. He wrote, or
caused to be written, a most intriguing "advertisement" about the
authorship of the poems:
"Upon reading them over at St. James' Coffee House, they were attributed
by the general voice to be the productions of a lady of quality. When I
produced them at Button's, the poetical jury there brought in a
different verdict; and the foreman strenuously insisted upon it that Mr.
Gay was the man. Not content with these two decisions, I was resolved to
call in an umpire, and accordingly chose a gentleman of distinguished
merit, who lives not far from Chelsea. I sent him the papers, which he
returned next day, with this answer: "Sir, depend upon it these lines
could come from no other hand than the judicious translator of Homer."
Thus, having impartially given the sentiments of the Town, I hope I may
deserve thanks for the pains I have taken in endeavouring to find out
the author of these valuable performances, and everybody is at liberty
to bestow the laurel as they please."
Pope was furious, and there is a story that he invited Curll to drink
wine with him at a coffee-house, and put in his glass some poison that
acted as an emetic. What is certain is that the poet wrote a pamphlet
with the title, "A full and true Account of a horrid and barbarous
Revenge by Poison on the body of Edmund Curll."
The three pieces in _Court Poems_ were claimed by Lady Mary as her own,
but this claim was disputed. Pope declared himself the author of "The
Basset Table," and it was printed among his works, and he asserted that
"'The Toilet' is almost wholly Gay's," there being "only five or six
lines in it by that lady." "The Toilet" is included in his collected
edition of Gay's poems.
The whole matter is best explained by that sound student of the
eighteenth century, "George Paston," who suggests that the truth seems
to be that the verses were handed round in manuscript to be read and
corrected by the writer's literary friends, and therefore they owe
something to the different hands. "George Paston" goes on to say: "Lady
Mary was not unaware of the danger of this proceeding, for Richardson
the painter relates that on one occasion she showed Pope a copy of her
verses in which she intended to make some trifling alterations, but
refused his help, saying, 'No, Pope, no touching, for then whatever is
good for anything will pass for yours, and the rest for mine.'"