A Georgian Pageant

by Frank Frankfort Moore

The Duchess had both taste and imagination, so that people called her an Irishwoman, although she was born in England. Then there was Mr. George Selwyn, who said witty things occasionally and never missed a hanging. He was fully qualified to prompt a wealthy companion as to the best means to become notorious for a day. There was also young Mr. Conway, the gentleman who originated the diverting spectacle when Mrs. Baddeley and Mrs. Abington were escorted to the Pantheon. Any one of these, to say nothing of Lady Betty herself, who had some love for display, might have been inclined to trust an English June so far as to believe an al fresco entertainment on a splendid scale quite possible.

On the whole, however, one is inclined to believe that it was Colonel Burgoyne who was responsible for the whole scheme at The Oaks. In addition to having become Lord Stanley's uncle by running away with his father's sister, he was a budding dramatist, and as such must have perceived his opportunity for exploiting himself at the expense of some one else—the dream of every budding dramatist. There is every likelihood that it was this highly accomplished and successful “gentleman-adventurer” who brought Lord Stanley up to the point of embarking upon his design for an entertainment such as had never been seen in England before—an entertainment that should include the production of a masque devised by Colonel Burgoyne and entitled The Maid of The Oaks. The fête came off, and it was pronounced the most brilliant success of the year 1774.

Lord Stanley was a very interesting young man; that is to say, he was a young man in whom no inconsiderable number of persons—mainly of the opposite sex—were greatly interested. Of this fact he seems to have been fully aware. A good many people—mainly of the opposite sex—felt very strongly on the subject of his marrying: it was quite time that he married, they said. His grandfather, the Earl of Derby, was eighty-four years of age, and it would be absurd to believe that he could live much longer. Lord Stanley being his heir, it was agreed that it was the young man's duty not to procrastinate in the matter of marriage. It is always understood that a patriarchal nobleman sings “Nunc dimittis” when he holds in his arms the second in direct succession to the title, and this happy consummation could, in the case of the aged Lord Derby, only be realised by the marriage of Lord Stanley.

He was small in stature, and extremely plain of countenance; still this did not prevent his name from being coupled with that of several notable—but not too notable—young women of his acquaintance. But as it was well known that he was greatly interested in the stage, it was thought that, perhaps, he might not be so complaisant as his best friends hoped to find him in regard to marrying. An ardent interest in the progress of the drama, especially in its lighter forms, has been known to turn a young man's attention from marriage, when it does not do what is far worse—turn his attention to it with too great zest. Before long, however, it became apparent that his lordship recognised in what direction his duty lay. There was a young lady connected with the Ducal House of Bedford—a niece of that old Duchess who played so conspicuous a part in the social and political history of the middle of the eighteenth century—and to her Lord Stanley became devoted. But just when every one assumed that the matter was settled, no one thinking it possible that the young lady would be mad enough to refuse such a parti, the news came that she had done so; and before people had done discussing how very eccentric were the Bedford connections, the announcement was made that Lord Stanley was to marry Lady Betty Hamilton, the beautiful daughter of a beautiful mother, the Duchess of Argyll.

There is in existence a letter written by the Duchess to Sir William Hamilton, in which she hints that Lord Stanley was an old suitor for the hand of her daughter. “Lady Betty might have taken the name of Stanley long ago if she had chose it,” she wrote, adding: “A very sincere attachment on his side has at last produced the same on hers.” This being so, it would perhaps be unsafe to assume that Lord Stanley proposed to Lady Betty out of pique at having been rejected by the other lady, though one might be disposed to take this view of the engagement.

The alternative view is that Lady Betty had been advised by her accomplished mother that if she played her cards well there was no reason why she should not so attract Lord Stanley as to lead him to be a suitor for her hand, and that the girl at last came to see that the idea was worth her consideration. Her portrait, painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds in the year of her marriage, shows her to have been a graceful, girlish young creature; but her beauty could never have been comparable with that of her mother at the same age, or with that of her aunt, Lady Coventry, whom it is certain she closely resembled in character. Her mother, in her letter to Sir William Hamilton, apologises in a way for her liveliness, assuring him that such a disposition was not incompatible with serious thought upon occasions; and this gives us a hint that the reputation for vivacity which she always enjoyed was closely akin to that which made the life of Lady Coventry so very serious.

This was the young lady in whose honour the first English fête champêtre was organised. To be more exact, or to get more into touch with the view of the Derby family, perhaps one should say that the fête was set on foot in consideration of the honour the young lady was doing herself in becoming a member of the great house of Stanley. Different people look at a question of honour from different standpoints. Probably Colonel Burgoyne, although a member of the Derby family by marriage, left honour out of the question altogether, and only thought of his masque being produced at his nephew's expense.

And produced the masque was, and on a scale as expensive as the most ambitious author could desire. It was described, with comments, by all the great letter-writers of the time. Walpole has his leer and his sneer at its expense (literally). It was to cost no less than £5000, he said, and he ventured to suppose that in order to account for this enormous outlay Lord Stanley had bought up all the orange trees near London—no particular extravagance one would fancy—and that the hay-cocks would be of straw-coloured riband. George Selwyn thought it far from diverting. The Dowager Lady Gower affirmed that “all the world was there,” only she makes an exception of her relations the Bedfords—she called them “the Bloomsbury lot”—and said that the Duchess would not let any of them go because Her Grace thought that Lord Stanley should have taken his recent rejection by Her Grace's niece more to heart. Lady Betty's stepfather, the Duke of Argyll, said that the whole day was so long and fatiguing that only Lady Betty could have stood it all.

But did Lady Betty stand it all? It was rumoured in the best-informed circles that she had broken off the match the next day; and when one becomes acquainted with the programme of the day's doings one cannot but acknowledge that the rumour was plausible. She probably made an attempt in this direction; but on her fiancé's promising never to repeat the offence, withdrew her resolution.

The famous brothers Adam, whose genius was equally ready to build an Adelphi or to design a fanlight, had been commissioned to plan an entertainment on the most approved French models and to carry it out on the noblest scale, taking care, of course, that the central idea should be the masque of The Maid of The Oaks, and these large-minded artists accepted the order without demur. The pseudo-classical feeling entered, largely through the influence of the Adams, into every form of art at this period, though the famous brothers cannot be accused of originating the movement. Sir Joshua Reynolds painted his most charming ladies in the costume of Greeks, and Angelica Kauffmann depicted many of her early English episodes with the personages clad in togas which seemed greatly beyond their control. But for that matter every battle piece up to the date of Benjamin West's “Death of Wolfe” showed the combatants in classical armour; and Dr. Johnson was more than usually loud in his protests against the suggestion that a sculptor should put his statues of modern men into modern clothing.