The only difficulty in returning to his country was the objection made by his creditors to his leaving Holland until his debts were paid. But Newcastle was a resourceful debtor; and he surmounted the difficulty by the very simple expedient of pawning—not his wife’s clothes this time, but his wife herself! Being in another part of Holland, says that lady, “my Lord declared his intention of going for England, withal commanding me to stay in that city (Antwerp), as a Pawn for his debts, until he could compass money to discharge them”.
“Being in another part of Holland!” Yes! It is certainly pleasanter to express desires of such a nature to one’s wife by letter rather than in person.
Having left his wife in pawn at Antwerp, Newcastle started in excellent spirits for England.[143]
[143] A Cavalier in Exile, p. 83.
“My Lord (who was so transported with the joy of returning into his Native Countrey, that he regarded not the Vessel) having set Sail from Rotterdam, was so becalmed, that he was six dayes and six nights upon the Water, during which time he pleased himself with mirth, and pass’d his time away as well as he could; Provisions he wanted not, having them in great store and plenty. At last being come so far that he was able to discern the smoak of London, which he had not seen in a long time, he merrily was pleased to desire one that was near him, to jogg and awake him out of his dream, for surely, said he, I have been sixteen years asleep, and am not thoroughly awake yet. My Lord lay that night at Greenwich, where his Supper seem’d more savoury to him, than any meat he had hitherto tasted; and the noise of some scraping Fidlers, he thought the pleasantest harmony that ever he had heard.”
It is gratifying to learn that thoughts of his absent wife in dreary exile did not lessen the spirits, the merriness, or the transports of joy, of the Marquess.
Collins[144] gives us the following information about Newcastle after the Restoration. Newcastle, on his return to England, “finding his estate much entangled, was obliged to borrow £5,000 whereof his cousin, the Earl of Devonshire, lent him £1,000.... His Lordship lived at Dorset House, during his stay in London.”
[144] Historical Collections, etc., by Arthur Collins, ed. 1752, p. 41.