The court suffered no diminution of gaiety on account of the haughty favourite’s absence; for she is said to have long before ceased to look upon any but her own family with respect. Lord Godolphin rejoiced at her remissness on his own account; “for when she was at court, she was always teasing him with womanish quarrels and altercations, or continually troubling him with interruptions in the business of the state; whereas, now the sole direction of the thing was in his own hands.”[[84]]
Mr. Harley, on the other hand, lost no opportunity of ingratiating himself into the favour of the Queen. Under pretence of business, he obtained access to her Majesty in the evening, and, disclosing matters which had been concealed from the royal ear, he discovered her real sentiments, and, with infinite address, generally contrived to bring her opinions round to his own views. But all his efforts would have been unsuccessful without the aid of female ingenuity. Well did Harley know the temper and peculiarities of the woman whom he desired to supplant. Well could he judge the more common-place character of the homely Anne, whose gentle nature could dispense with respect, but could not exist without a friend; and a friend to supply the void in the Queen’s heart was soon discovered.
Before the schemes of Harley were ripened, the Duke of Marlborough had returned from the victory of Ramillies, laden with honours. He had received addresses from both Houses of Parliament, who also petitioned the Queen to allow a bill to be brought in to settle the Duke’s honours on the male and female issue of his daughters. This favour was obtained; and the manor of Woodstock and Blenheim-house were, after the decease of the Duchess, upon whom they were settled in jointure, entailed in the same manner with the honours. The annuity of five thousand a year from the Post-office, formerly proposed by the Queen, was now granted; and the palace of Blenheim was ordered to be built at the public charge. Harley and St. John, to a profusion of flattery and of good offices, added their advice to the Duke that he would erect this great monument of his glory in a style of transcendent magnificence; but with what motives these counsels were given, afterwards appeared.[[85]]
The Queen had not only received Marlborough graciously, and ordered a triumphal procession for his trophies, but, to please her successful general, or his wife, had appointed a Whig professor, Dr. Potter, to the chair of divinity at Oxford. But this was an expedient, by yielding one small point, to cover a much greater design.[[86]]
To aid his schemes, Harley acquired an associate, humble, pliant, needy, and in every way adapted to perform that small work to which an intriguing politician is constrained sometimes to devote a mind professedly and solely embued with the spirit of patriotism, and racked with anxiety for his country’s welfare.[[87]]
Abigail Hill, a name rendered famous from the momentous changes which succeeded its introduction to the political world, was the appropriate designation of the lowly, supple, and artful being on whose secret offices Harley relied for the accomplishment of his plans. Mistress Hill at this time held the post of dresser and chamber-woman to her Majesty, an appointment which had been procured for her by the influence of the Duchess of Marlborough, to whom she was related. The world assigned certain causes for the pains which that proud favourite had manifested, to place her kinswoman in a post where she might have easy access to the Queen’s ear, and obtain her confidence. The Duchess, it was said, was weary of her arduous attendance upon a mistress whom she secretly despised. She had become too proud to perform the subordinate duties of her office, and proposed to relieve herself of some of her cares, by placing one on whom she could entirely depend, as an occasional substitute in the performance of those duties which even habit had not taught her to endure with patience. Since, after the elevation of the Duke, in consequence of the battle of Blenheim, she had become a princess of the empire,[[88]] she was supposed to consider herself too elevated to continue those services to which she had been enured, first in the court of the amiable Anne Hyde, then in that of the unhappy Mary of Modena, and since, near her too gracious sovereign, the meek, but dissembling Anne.
According to the Duchess herself, her inauspicious patronage of Mistress Abigail Hill, afterwards the noted Lady Masham, had a more amiable source than that which was ascribed to it by the writers of the day. Lord Bolingbroke says truly, that there are no materials for history that require to be more scrupulously and severely examined, “than those of the time when the events to be spoken of were in transaction.” “In matters of history,” he remarks, “we prefer very justly cotemporary authority; and yet cotemporary authors are the most liable to be warped from the straight line of truth, in writing on subjects which have affected them strongly.” “Criticism,” as he admirably observes, “separates the ore from the dross, and extracts from various authors a series of true history, which could not have been found entire in any one of them, and will command our assent, when it is formed with judgment, and represented with candour.”[[89]]
In following this rule, we must not only take into account the rumours of the day, but give due weight to those reasons which were assigned by the Duchess, for her endeavours to promote the interests of the humbled and unfortunate Abigail Hill.
The ungrateful kinswoman had been early acquainted with adversity, which was the remote cause of her ultimate greatness. She was the daughter of an eminent Turkey merchant, who became a bankrupt, with the encumbrance of a numerous and unprovided family. Abigail was at one time so reduced, as to enter into the service of Lady Rivers, wife of Sir John Rivers, Bart., of Chafford; and was rescued from her lowly situation by the charitable offices of the Duchess of Marlborough, to whom she had the good fortune to be related.
The Duchess has left a succinct account of the degree of kindred in which her rival stood to her, and of the manner in which she became acquainted with her destitute condition. It would be impossible to alter the Duchess’s narrative into any better language than her own. The unvarnished and uncontradicted statement which she put forth, years after the clamour against her had subsided, is prefaced with the following observations.[[90]]