The art of battering walls than building,
We might expect to see next year
A mouse-trap-man chief engineer.”
Such was the opinion entertained by a contemporary wit, of Vanburgh’s architecture. In heraldic science he is said to have been less skilled than the least of the pursuivants. His comedies, renowned for the well-sustained ease and spirit of the dialogue, are, to those who deem the gratification of curiosity cheaply bought by an acquaintance with all that is accounted most licentious, curious as pictures of the manners of the times in which they were written.
We have seen how successfully the Duchess of Marlborough contrived to connect her family, by alliances of her daughters, with several of the most exalted families in the kingdom. Her energetic mind now devoted itself with equal zeal and perseverance to the proper settlement of her eldest granddaughter, the Lady Harriot Godolphin, in whose matrimonial prospects she took a lively interest, notwithstanding that the Countess of Godolphin, the young lady’s mother, was still alive. The Duchess fixed her hopes, as a son-in-law, on Thomas Pelham Holles, maternal nephew of John Holles, Duke of Newcastle, whose title he obtained by creation. Pelham Holles, at the time when the Duchess’s speculations were first directed towards him, was Earl of Clare, under which designation we find, in the correspondence between her grace and her confidential agent, that the future Duke was mentioned.
It was in the beginning of 1714 that a marriage treaty between the house of Marlborough and that of Newcastle was first contemplated by the Duchess.[[236]] It is needless to specify, what is well known, that in those times, and in the rank which the Duchess filled, marriage was seldom an affair in which those mainly interested were allowed to judge, or to reject. It was usually a contract between relations, acting, as they considered, most effectually for the happiness of two individuals whom they wished to see betrothed; the condition being that the parties were well assorted in station, the portion of the lady competent, and the fortune of the gentleman equivalent to what she or her friends had a right to expect. The negociation which is unfolded in the correspondence of the Duchess and Sir J. Vanburgh, is a perfect specimen of this species of contract, in which the parties had not even seen each other, until matters had advanced somewhat too far to be withdrawn.
Lord Clare, or, to call him by his subsequent title, the Duke of Newcastle, appears, however, to have had higher and juster views of the state of matrimony than most of the noblemen of his day, who regarded it as a mere tie of convenience, or means of aggrandisement, and who troubled themselves very little about the disposition or sentiments of the family into which, for sundry reasons, they entered. The character of Pelham Holles, Duke of Newcastle, seems, at the period of the correspondence of which he was the subject, to have been singularly discreet and amiable. He was not, indeed, a man of high qualities, nor of such extensive and solid attainments as to justify the extraordinary success which afterwards, in attaining the highest posts in the government, he enjoyed. Devoted to politics, and to the party of Townshend and Walpole; a zealous promoter of the Protestant succession; he led a life of bustle, and was constantly in search of popularity; always in confusion, often promising what he could never grant, yet performing well the domestic duties of his station. Kind, though exact, as a master, and energetic in all his official duties, he might certainly be deemed highly respectable.
Not foreseeing the great eminence to which he was destined to rise, the young nobleman, at this period of his life, earnestly desired to connect himself in marriage with some family suitable to his own in wealth and influence. His views might not have been directed to the Marlborough family, had not the Duchess, to whom Vanburgh was at that time a willing agent, imparted from her grace some hints that a matrimonial connexion between her granddaughter and Lord Clare would not be unacceptable.[[237]] Vanburgh, like a true votary of the great, in those days of patronage, took his cue from the Duchess’s expressions; and as the dramatist had many opportunities of sharing Lord Clare’s leisure hours, the Duchess could not, in some respects, have employed any person more likely to promote her speculations.
Vanburgh thus described the commencement of those operations which were intended to unite the great houses of Churchill and Pelham Holles. Writing to the Duchess, he says—“I have brought into discourse the characters of several women, that I might have a natural occasion to bring in hers, (Lady Harriott’s,) which I have then dwelt a little upon, and, in the best manner I could, distinguished her from the rest. This I have taken three or four occasions to do, without the least appearance of having any view in it, thinking the rightest thing I could do would be to possess him with a good impression of her, before I hinted at anything more.”[[238]]
This skilful generalship for some time did not appear to meet with the success which it merited. Lady Harriott, unfortunately, was not handsome; the family stock of beauty which she inherited from her mother had been sadly amalgamated with the flat and homely features of Sidney Lord Godolphin, than whom a more ordinary individual, if one may judge from his portraits, seems not to have existed. Moreover, her portion was undecided, and the noble suitor whom her friends sought for her, at first but coldly allowed her merits; hinting, though “but very softly,” that whilst he admired the fine qualities which Sir John described, he could have wished her external charms had been equal to those of her heart and understanding.[[239]]