valuable services for his unfortunate master. It

may be remarked, that during the administration of Sir Robert Walpole, not a plot appears to have been hatched either at the Chevalier's Court, or among the Jacobites in England, of which that clear-sighted minister was not early informed, and thus was enabled to defeat them without clamour or expense.

Among other frivolities which distinguished the character of the Duchess of Buckingham, it was her custom, on the anniversary of the execution of her presumed grandfather, Charles the First, to hold a solemn fast-day, at Buckingham House. It was on one of these occasions that she received, in mournful state, and under peculiar circumstances, the celebrated John, Lord Hervey.

Ostensibly, her object in requiring Lord Hervey's attendance was to negotiate a marriage between his eldest daughter and her own grandson, Constantine, afterwards the first Lord Mulgrave: in reality, however, her motive appears to have been to convert Lord Hervey to her own political way of thinking, and by a theatrical display of mournful grandeur, to impress him with a favourable notion of the importance of the designs which she had in hand. Accordingly, when Lord Hervey entered the great drawing-room at Buckingham House, he found the Duchess seated in a chair of state in the deepest mourning, surrounded by her women as black and dismal-looking as herself. Of the result of the interview we have no record. The marriage, indeed, subsequently took

place; but as Lord Hervey continued stedfast in his political opinions, the parade and trappings of the fantastic Duchess seem to have failed in their intended effect. *

Ridiculous as appears to have been the ceremony to which we have just referred, it was not altogether inconsistent with the manners and customs of the period. It may be remarked, that as late as the reign of George the First, it was usual, on the death of a husband, for a lady of any consequence to receive company in solemn state. The apartments which she occupied, as well as the stair-case by which her guests ascended, were hung with black. The lady herself, shrouded with black crape, sat upright in bed under a canopy of the same sable hue; the apartment was lighted by a single taper; and, if the deceased happened to have left children, they were arranged, like the figures on an ancient monument, at the foot of the bed. No word was spoken, and the guests, after silently making their obeisance to the mourner, retired with the solemnity with which they came.

*Horace Walpole writes to Sir Horace Mann, March 3, 1743; "Lord Hervey has entertained the town with another piece of wisdom: on Sunday it was declared that he had married his eldest daughter the night before to a Mr. Phipps, grandson of the Duchess of Buckingham. They sent for the boy but the day before from Oxford, and bedded them at a day's notice. But after all this mystery, it does not turn out that there is anything great in this match, but the greatness of the secret. Poor Hervey, the brother, is in fear and trembling, for he apprehends being ravished to bed to some fortune or other with as little ceremony."-Walpole's Letters, vol. i. p. 263.

A love of display,-originating apparently in the notion that it rendered her connexion with royalty more evident, was a predominant feature in the character of the Duchess. Among other evidences which she gave of this weakness may be mentioned the princely magnificence with which she travelled when abroad, and the pomp with which she buried her husband and her son. When the remains of the latter were brought from Rome to be interred in Westminster Abbey, she wrote to the Duchess of Marlborough, requesting the loan of the triumphal car which had carried the body of the great Duke to the grave. "It carried my Lord Marlborough," was the caustic reply, "and shall never be used by anybody else."—" I have consulted the undertaker,” was the retort of the other Duchess, " and he tells me I can have a finer for twenty pounds." She herself dressed up a wax figure of her son, (which may still be seen in a glass case in Westminster Abbey,) and carefully superintended the ceremony of his lying in state. To her more intimate friends she sent word, that, for their better convenience, she was willing to introduce them to the show by a private door.

Horace Walpole, in a letter to Sir Horace Mann, dated 24th December, 1741, relates an amusing anecdote of the Duchess : "The Duchess of Buckingham," he says, "who is more mad with pride than any mercer's wife in Bedlam, came the other night to the opera en princesse, literally in robes, red velvet, and ermine.

He came, and she

I must tell you a story of her. Last week she sent for Cori,* to pay him for her opera ticket; he was not at home, but went in an hour afterwards. She said, did he treat her like a tradeswoman? She would teach him to respect women of her birth; said he was in league with Mr. Sheffield to abuse her, and bade him come the next morning at nine. made him wait till eight at night, only sending him an omelet and a bottle of wine. As it was Friday, and he a catholic, she supposed he did not eat meat. At last she received him in all the form of a princess giving audience to an ambassador. Now,' she said, she had punished him.'" It may be mentioned that, during her several visits to Rome, the Duchess was in the habit of having her opera box decorated in a similar manner to those set apart for crowned heads. When in France, too, she refused to pay her respects at Versailles, on the ground that the French Court refused her the rank of a princess of the blood.

The anecdotes which we have recorded of the Duchess of Buckingham render it unnecessary to offer any remarks on her character; yet the portrait which she has drawn of herself is too striking an exemplification of human vanity to be altogether omitted. "Her heart was as compassionate as it was great; her affections

* Angelo Maria Cori, prompter to the opera.

+ Natural son of her late husband, with whom she was at law and on bad terms.

warm, even to solicitude; her friendship not violent or jealous, but rational and persevering; her gratitude equal and constant to the living,— to the dead, boundless and heroical. As her thoughts were her own, so were her words, and she was as sincere in uttering her judgment, as she was impartial in forming it. She was a safe companion; many were served, none ever suffered by her acquaintance. Inoffensive when provoked, when unprovoked not stupid; but the moment her enemy ceased to be hurtful she could cease to act as an enemy, and, indeed, when forced to be so, the more a finished one for having been long a-making, and her proceeding with ill people was more in a calm and steady course, like justice, than in quick and passionate onsets, like revenge. As for those of whom she only thought ill, she considered them not so much as once to wish them ill; of such her contempt was great enough to put a stop to all other passions that could hurt them. Her love and aversion, her gratitude and resentment, her esteem and neglect, were equally open and strong, and alterable only from the alterations of the persons who created them. Her mind was too noble to be insincere, and her heart too honest to stand in need of it; so that she never found cause to repent her conduct either to a friend or an enemy.”

Of her person it is said in the same "Character," "The nicest eye could find no fault in the outward lineaments of her face, or proportion of her body. It was such as pleased wherever