The Duchess had not, as she declared, sought an interview with Sir Robert, but Sir Robert had sent to speak to her. She found it was the old subject, the trust-money, and she listened to him patiently. Sir Robert wanted to borrow two hundred thousand pounds, which he owned would be of great service to him. But when he pretended that he requested this loan from the Duchess and her family in preference to others, for their advantage, the high-spirited lady was not to be deceived. Her anger rose at the attempt to delude her. Lord Godolphin, her son-in-law, had lost by lending to Sir Robert at such low interest, and the Duchess was aware, how “impossible it was for Sir Robert to have the appearance of sinking the public debt, if she had not consented to lend him the trust-money.”[[327]]
It is scarcely necessary to recal to the reader’s recollection, that before this period the formation of the sinking fund had taken place; and, as of this treasure the nation was to be relieved from the national debt, members of both houses were solicitous individually to raise large sums upon the people, not only on account of the credit they acquired by aiding a scheme then popular, but also because they exacted from government a large share of the dividend.[[328]]
The Duchess despised and distrusted Sir Robert Walpole; and his anxiety to obtain the sum, and his duplicity in pretending that it was for the advantage of those for whom the Duchess held the money in trust that his disinterested advice proceeded, irritated his shrewd, and irritable, and experienced listener; and after much formality and great coldness, a warm explanation between Sir Robert and the Duchess took place. The interview might have ended with the ceremony in which it began, but for one expression of the minister, namely, “that he should be always ready to serve her.” This was the first time, since he had been a great man, that Sir Robert had offended the Duchess by such condescension, and it produced, what possibly he desired, a scornful enumeration of all the favours which the Duchess had ever required from him, and of the manner in which those demands had been received. Sir Robert laughed—laughed either with anger or contempt, the Duchess knew not which; but she knew that his laugh was expressive of one or other of those passions. However, he would not allow that her grace had anything to complain of; and said that she had enumerated trifles, and provoked, of course, a burst of invective. “Great men,” retorted the Duchess, “seldom heard the truth, because those who spoke to them generally wanted their favour; and when anybody told them the truth, they always thought that person mad. Whenever,” added the Duchess, “Sir Robert should wish to hear the truth, she should be happy to see him again; that she had now vented her anger, and she could talk to him easily on other subjects.” Sir Robert proved to be patience itself; he had a little more discourse with his fiery friend; they parted civilly, and she lent him the money he desired, not so much in accordance with her own opinion, but in compliance with the desire of her grandson, Lord Godolphin, for whom she held it in trust, as the future Duke of Marlborough, and who particularly wished that it should be so applied.
Eventually the Duchess extremely regretted that she had been enticed into this compliance; and felt, perhaps, as enraged that Sir Robert had outwitted her, as she was vexed that her heir should lose, as he actually did, by so appropriating the sum; for Sir Robert, far from being grateful to the Duchess, gave Lord Godolphin a lower interest than he had done before, and saved the public money for once at the expense of a friend. With the ready wit of an unprincipled man, he played the Bank off against Godolphin, and Godolphin against the Bank. When his lordship demurred, and stipulated, through his grandmother, it may be presumed, for a larger interest, Sir Robert told him, if he hesitated, he could have the money from the Bank. When the governors of the Bank of England (established 1693) held back from granting the loan, demanding a higher rate of interest, the minister assured them he could have the money from Lord Godolphin.[[329]] Certainly one cannot pity the Duchess, nor any individual who, comprehending, as she undoubtedly did, the character of the minister with whom she dealt, could have any transactions with such a man. We must compassionate a dupe; but that title cannot be applied to one equally wary with the ensnarer, and conscious that he with whom she negociated possessed not one honourable sentiment, nor was capable of a single hour of remorse.
The “trifles” of which the Duchess also complained to Sir Robert, were trifles indeed; but they were such affairs as generally move the minds of women in no ordinary degree. It is observed, that women are much more tenacious of their rights than men; those who have fortunes, generally take better care of it than men, under the same circumstances, would employ. It is seldom that, amid the changes and chances of the world, one hears of a single lady of good fortune being ruined by her own extravagance; and it is remarkable that widows, from the habit of self-dependence, often become more careful after the decease of their husbands, than before they were left to move alone in society. Hence the opinion given by Dr. Johnson, that women of fortune, being accustomed to the management of money, are usually more exact, even to penuriousness, than those whose means are either very moderate, or who have no means at all to depend upon.
The Duchess of Marlborough defended her rights, and guarded her possessions, with the undaunted demeanour of an imperious, managing, clever woman. She generally had reason, and sometimes law, on her side. Litigation was not disagreeable to her.
One of the complaints which she addressed to Sir Robert was, that an attempt was made to compel her to pay taxes upon her house in Windsor Park, and that the officers were perpetually threatening to seize her goods, which she believed could not be done, as the lodge stood in the old park. Sir Robert had suggested her applying to the Treasury to be repaid such charges, and had complained of her not submitting to do business in the usual mode. But the Duchess resisted, and gained her point. “I make,” she writes to Dr. Hare, “no advantage of the park, but to eat sometimes a few little Welsh runts, and I have no more cows than I allow the under-keepers, which are to each six, but I have laid out a good deal of money, which is called being a great tenant, and I never was so mean as to bring any bills, like other great men on such occasions, for what I did for my own satisfaction.”[[330]] Subsequently the matter was settled by a proposal of her grace, which was accepted; this was, “that she should deposit such a sum of money as should be thought reasonable, in proper hands, for the benefit of the poor of the parish,” and so be exempted from all further claims for taxes.[[331]]
The more important of the “trifles” with which Sir Robert taunted the Duchess, is yet to be described. The Duchess of Buckingham, or, as the Duchess of Marlborough significantly calls her, “the Duke of Buckingham’s widow,” assumed and maintained the privilege of driving through St. James’s Park whenever and however she liked, whilst the Duke of Marlborough’s widow was prohibited even “from taking the air for her health,” though allowed, in former reigns, to drive through that privileged enclosure. This refusal, which the Duke of Marlborough’s widow traced, as she thought, to Walpole, was the more unjust, as the arrogant daughter of Catherine Sedley had written a very impertinent letter to the King, and ought to have been forbidden the park. The Princess of Wales, afterwards Queen Caroline, had proffered a request on the part of the Duchess of Marlborough to the King, and it had been refused. It was therefore urged by Sir Robert, that the Princess would be offended, if the boon were subsequently granted to another applicant.[[332]] How the matter ended, it does not appear; nor at what period Marlborough’s widow was enabled to pass Buckingham’s widow in her airings along the stately promenades.
Such were some of the altercations which disturbed the Duchess in her widowhood. She was likewise generally on indifferent terms with the court. Queen Caroline, though much commended by the Duchess as Princess of Wales, became, in process of time, everything that was disagreeable in the eyes of the Duchess; and as her grace “could not deny herself the pleasure of speaking her mind upon any occasion,” to use her own words, and as there are always a number of people who trade in retail upon the speeches of others, Queen Caroline, that pattern of prudence and forbearance, and her very uninteresting consort, were soon aware of the animosity, for to that it at last amounted, that the Duchess bore to them, and to their court and administration.
For this dislike there was, it must be allowed, considerable reason on the part of the Duchess; and in her letters to Mr. Scrope, secretary to the minister, Mr. Pelham, she unfolds her wrongs, and reflects great discredit on the character of the Princess.