“He was the onely Person I ever was in love with;
Neither was I ashamed to own it, but gloried therein, for it was not Amorous Love, I never was infected therewith, it is a Disease, or a Passion, or both, I only know by relation, not by experience; neither could Title, Wealth, Power, or Person entice me to love; but my love was honest and honourable, being placed upon Merit, which Affection joy’d at the fame of his Worth, pleas’d with delight in his Wit, proud of the respects he used to me, and triumphing in the affections he profest for me.”
This sounds rather an arctic sort of love; but, be that as it may, the wedding took place, and, according to Evelyn, in the chapel of Evelyn’s father-in-law, Sir Richard Brown, the English Ambassador.
Although married to one who had been among the wealthiest of English noblemen, the bride found herself in poverty. Her husband was unable to obtain a penny from England; the Parliament had taken possession of his estates and he was living with money borrowed upon, what looked at that time, exceptionally bad security. The Duchess says that “the ordinary Use” was then “at Six in the Hundred,” i.e. that the usual interest on good securities was 6 per cent. Then what rate of interest were lenders in Holland and France likely to have charged an exile whose chance of ever regaining his property seemed very remote? The question summons up visions of something nearer sixty than “six in the hundred”.
The bride thus describes the financial position:—
“After My Lord was married, having no Estate or Means left him to maintain himself and his Family, he was necessitated to seek for Credit, and live upon the Courtesie of those that were pleased to Trust him; which although they did for somewhile, and shew’d themselves very civil to My Lord, yet they grew weary at length, insomuch that his Steward was forced one time to tell him, That he was not able to provide a Dinner for him, for his Creditors were resolved to trust him no longer. My Lord being always a great master of his Passions, was, at least shew’d himself not in any manner troubled at it, but in a pleasant humour told me, that I must of necessity pawn my Cloaths to make so much Money as would procure a Dinner. I answer’d That my Cloaths would be but of small value and therefore desired my Waiting-Maid to pawn some small toys, which I had formerly given her, which she willingly did.”
One cannot help admiring Newcastle for being so far “master of his Passions,” as to overcome any desire to pawn his own clothes in order to get a dinner, and for conceiving the happy idea of telling his wife to pawn hers. When he had fortified himself by eating the dinner provided by pawning the toys belonging to his wife’s maid, Newcastle paid his creditors a visit and, by “perswasive arguments,” induced them to lend him some more money, with which he got the toys out of pawn for his wife’s maid, and provided her with means to go to England with the object of endeavouring to obtain some money from his brother-in-law.
Soon afterwards, Newcastle had “proffers made him of rich matches in England for his two sons,” whom he dispatched there forthwith, “hoping by that means to provide for them and himself”—the italics are not in the original. Somehow these matches failed to come off; but at least one of his sons made a good marriage a little later.