Lord Marlborough has written to me to put your Majesty in mind of Count Wrateslaw’s picture, and in the same letter desires me to ask for one that he sent Lord Treasurer, which came from Hanover, which I have seen, and which I know you would not have me trouble you with; and I have been so often discouraged in things of this nature that I believe nobody in the world but myself would attempt it; but I know Mrs. Morley’s intentions are good, and to let her run on in so many mistakes that must of necessity draw her into great misfortunes at last, is just as if one should see a friend’s house set on fire, and let them be burnt in their bed without endeavouring to wake them, only because they had taken laudanum, and had desired not to be disturbed. This is the very case of poor dear Mrs. Morley; nothing seems agreeable to her but what comes from the artifices of one that has always been reported to have a great talent that way. I heartily wish she may discover her true friends before she suffers for the want of that knowledge; but as to the business of calling for the Princess Sophia over, I don’t think that will be so easily prevented as she (perhaps) may flatter herself it will, though I can’t think there can be many, at least, that know how ridiculous a creature she is, that can in their hearts be for her. But we are a divided nation; some Jacobites that cover themselves with the name of Tory, and yet are against the crown. And whoever comes into the project of that sort must do it in hopes of confusion. Others there are that are so ignorant that they really believe the calling over any of the House of Hanover will secure the succession, and the Protestant religion. And some of those gentlemen that do know better, and that have so many years supported the true interest against the malice of all the inventions of the enemies to this government, I suppose will grow easy, and be pretty indifferent at least in what they think may be of no ill consequence, further than in displeasing the court, not only in this of the Princess Sophia, but in anything else that may happen; and as Mrs. Morley orders her affairs, she can’t expect much strength to oppose anything where she is most concerned. Finding Mrs. Morley has little time to spare, unless it be to speak to those that are more agreeable, or that say what she likes on these subjects, I have taken the liberty to write an answer to this, which you will say is sincere, and can be no great trouble only to sign it with Morley.
Extract from the Duchess’s Letter to Mr. Hutchinson. (This passage relates to the Duchess accepting two thousand pounds out of the privy purse: a sum, which she had formerly refused from the Queen. Taken from the Coxe Manuscripts, vol. xliii.)
But to return to my own case. When the Queen had turned me out of my places, the next thing I had to do was to make up my accounts for the robes and privy purse, with all the care and exactness I could. But in the mean time, while some of my friends persuaded me to let the Queen be asked whether she would not allow me to take out of the privy purse the two thousand pounds a year which she had so often pressed me to accept, since the reason of my refusing it now ceased, when she turned me out of my places, I must confess it went much against me to desire anything of her; but when I considered how great a sum of money I had saved her by the management of my offices, the real service I had done her in many respects, and the dear hours of my life I had spent upon her for many years together, without either asking or having anything of her, (except those few trifles I mentioned before,) after she came to the crown, which any one would think was the proper time for her to have rewarded her old servants, I thought I should not be in her debt though she should give me what I had so often refused, and therefore that I might very well suffer myself to be governed by my friends in letting her be asked about this matter; and accordingly I consented that a copy of one of her own letters, in which she pressed me so much to take that money out of the privy purse, should be shown to her, and that the person who carried it should tell her that I desired to know, before I made up my accounts, whether she still was willing that I should take the money out of the privy purse according as she had desired me in that letter. When this was proposed to her, she blushed and appeared to be very uneasy, and not disposed to allow of my putting that money into my accounts; but for want of good counsel or instructions to defend herself in refusing that which she had been so very earnest with me to accept before, she consented that I should do it. Then I sent in my accounts with that yearly sum charged in them from the time she had offered it to me. But I still used this further caution, of writing at the bottom of the accounts, before I charged the last sum, a copy of the letter I mentioned before, that when she signed them, she might at the same time attest her own letter, and the offer she had made me of her own accord, and pressed me to take in this manner—“Pray make no more words about it, and either own or conceal it, as you like best; since I think the richest crown could never repay the services I have received from you.” After this the Queen kept my accounts almost a fortnight by her, in which time I don’t doubt but they were well examined by Abigal and Mr. Harley; but there was no fault which they could pretend to find with them, and they were sent back to me, without the least objection being made against them, signed by the Queen’s own hand, who had writ under them that she allowed of them, and was satisfied they were right; so that the new ministers had nothing left them in this matter but to whisper about the town some scandalous storys of it, and to employ such of their agents as the Examiner in propagating them.
I don’t pretend to give you any particular account of these, or any other abusive storys that were industriously raised of me, but leave you to judge of them by the matters of fact which I have now given you a relation of, and which I have told in so full a manner as I think will give you a clear notion of my whole behaviour in all the concerns I had with the Queen, and particularly with respect to everything in which she seemed to show any uneasiness towards me.
Extract from a Letter written by the Duchess of Marlborough, vindicating herself from the charge of selling places; and touching also upon other matters.—Taken from the Coxe Manuscripts, vol. xliv. p. 2.
And upon the whole, I solemnly swear, as I hope for happiness here or hereafter, that besides the case of the pages to the Princess, which I have told you of, I never did receive the value of one shilling in money, jewells, or any such thing, either directly or indirectly, for the disposing of any employment, or doing any favour during my whole life, nor from any person whatsoever, upon any such account; and that if there is any man or woman upon earth that can give the least proof to the contrary, I am contented for the future to be looked upon both by friends and enemies, as one of the vilest of women, worse than Abigal herself, when I consider her as instrumental in doing the greatest mischief that a nation can suffer; the reducing it from the most flourishing to at least a dangerous condition; and as acting the most ungratefully and injuriously to a person to whom she owes her very bread.
I may be thought, perhaps, in this to put my own vindication upon too ticklish a bottom, when it is considered how far the malice of men will go, in these times especially, in maintaining the greatest falsity against others, when they can serve their own purposes by it. But as everybody ought to look upon all general reflections, where no proof is offered at, to be only mere aspersions; so I depend upon it that I shall be able to convict any man, to his own shame, that shall dare to produce any particular instance against me, of my having taken anything for the disposal of any employment. I am sensible my enemies have not wanted inclination to have done this long ago, if there had been any room for it; and it is no small vindication of me, that their own impudence, as great as it is in this respect, has not carried them so far as to offer at any proof against me of this nature.
There is another public vindication of me which I think I ought to take notice of, and that is, that soon after the Queen came to the crown, I was the cause of having the strictest orders made against taking of money for the disposing of places that were ever known at the court; which, how consistent it was with having any designs of my own of making money that way, I leave any one to judge. In the green cloth I found means of making it necessary, for every one that came into any employment there, to make an oath, in the strictest terms that could be, that he did not pay anything for it. And though I could not so easily procure any such effectual means to prevent the same practice with respect to the dispensing of other employments, yet I often pressed the Queen to do all that was possible in it; and upon this there was an order of council made, which everybody knows of, about it. All this, I hope, is sufficient to clear me from anything cast upon me with respect to the disposal of employments.
Extract from a work called “Sylva, or the Wood,” published in 1788; describing the limited education of the Duchess, and the manner in which she delivered the Vindication of her Conduct, so often referred to in this Volume, to Mr. Hooke.[[507]]
The “old Sarah,” as she was then called, published, in 1742, an Account of her Conduct under Queen Anne; which account, by the way, affords an excellent insight into the manœuvres of a court, and would greatly confirm the idea given of it in the two preceding numbers. She was assisted herein by Mr. Hooke, the historian, to whom, though oppressed with the infirmities of age, and almost bed-rid, she would continue speaking for six hours together. She delivered to him her account without any notes, in the most lively, as well as the most connected manner; and though the correction of the language is left to Hooke, yet the whole is plainly animated with her spirit; and as some philosophers have said of Saul with regard to body, she was tota in toto, et tota in qualibet parte. She was of a strong understanding and uncommon sagacity, which I premise to justify my wonder at the strange neglect of education among the females; for her woman would have written as well, and perhaps better.