"On Sunday, the 31st of October 1751," Mr Montagu records, "when it was near one in the morning, as I was undressed and going to bed, I heard a person enter my room; and upon turning round and seeing a man I did not know, I asked him calmly what he wanted? His answer was that I must put on my clothes. I began to expostulate upon the motive of his apparition, when a commissary instantly entered the room with a pretty numerous attendance, and told me with great gravity that he was come, by virtue of a warrant for my imprisonment, to carry me to the Grand Chatelêt. I requested him again and again to inform me of the crime laid to my charge; but all his answer was, that I must follow him. I begged him to give me leave to write to Lord Albemarle, the English Ambassador, promising to obey the warrant if his Excellency was not pleased to answer for my forthcoming. But the Commissary refused me the use of pen and ink, though he consented that I should send a verbal message to his Excellency, telling me at the same time that he would not wait the return of the messenger, because his orders were to carry me instantly to prison. As resistance under such circumstances must have been unavailable, and might have been blameable, I obeyed the warrant by following the Commissary, after ordering one of my domestics to inform my Lord Albemarle of the treatment I underwent.
"I was carried to the Chatelêt, where the jailors, hardened by their profession, and brutal for their profit, fastened upon me as upon one of those guilty objects whom they lock up to be reserved for public punishment; and though neither my looks nor my behaviour betrayed the least symptom of guilt, yet I was treated as a condemned criminal. I was thrown into prison, and committed to a set of wretches who bore no character of humanity but its form. My residence—to speak in the jail dialect—was in the SECRET, which is no other than the dungeon of the prison, where all the furniture was a wretched mattress and a crazy chair. The weather was cold, and I called for a fire; but I was told I could have none. I was thirsty, and called for some wine and water, or even a draught of water by itself, but was denied it. All the favour I could obtain was a promise to be waited on in the morning; and then was left by myself under a hundred locks and bolts, with a bit of candle, after finding that the words of my jailors were few, their orders peremptory, and their favours unattainable.
"I continued in this dismal dungeon till the 2nd of November, entirely ignorant of the crime I was accused of; but at nine in the morning of that day, I was carried before a magistrate, where I underwent an examination by which I understood the heads of the charge against me, and which I answered in a manner that ought to have cleared my own innocence."
The story of the charge and trial is a long one; but it can be briefly outlined as follows:—It seems that one, Abraham Paya, a Jew, who, disguised as "Mr Roberts," was staying with a Miss Rose who was not his wedded wife, accused Montagu and two of his friends, Mr Taafe and Lord Southwell, of making him drunk as a preliminary to inveigling him into play and winning 870 louis d'or from him.
As the Jew, whom his losses had sobered, refused to pay, Montagu and his associates had compelled him by violence and threats to give them drafts for the sums owing to them. Then, knowing that payment would be refused, "Roberts" shook the dust of Paris off his feet, turned his back on lady and creditors alike, and ran away to Lyons. Whereupon, so said the complainant, Montagu and his fellow-thieves had ransacked his baggage (which he had foolishly left behind him), and appropriated all his money and jewels, to the value of many thousands of livres.
To quote Mr Montagu again, the latter part of the charge was that Mr Taafe
"smashed all the trunks, portmanteaus and drawers belonging to the complainant, from whence he took out in one bag 400 louis d'or, and out of another, to the value of 300 louis d'or in French and Portuguese silver; from another bag, 1200 livres in crown pieces, a pair of brilliant diamond buckles, for which the complainant paid 8020 livres to the Sieur Piérre; his own picture set around with diamonds to the amount of 1200 livres ... laces to the amount of 3000 livres, seven or eight women's robes; two brilliant diamond rings, several gold snuff-boxes, a travelling-chest containing his plate and china, and divers other effects, all of which Mr Taafe (one of Montagu's co-defendants) packed up in one box, and, by the help of his footman, carried in a coach to his own apartment. That afterwards Mr Taafe carried Miss Rose and her sister in another coach to his lodgings, where they remained three days, and then sent them to London, under the care of one of his friends."
Fortunately for Montagu, the verdict of the Court was in his favour; and, after such an unpleasant experience, he was glad to return to England, where, such an adept at quick-changing was he, that we soon find him a full-blown Member of Parliament for Bossinery, lightening his legislative labours by writing a learned treatise on the rise and fall of ancient Republics. Was there ever such a man? Duke's grandson, fish-hawker, common sailor, peasant, roué, gambler, Member of Parliament, scholar—all rôles came equally easily to him; and many more just as varied were to follow. It was while thus wearing the halo of learning and high respectability that his father died, leaving him a substantial income, and a large estate in Yorkshire to his eldest son, if he should have one. And now we find him leaving his law-making and cultivating letters and science in Italy, further enriched by the guinea which was all his mother, Lady Mary, condescended to leave her vagrant son. The rest—an enormous property—went to his sister, the Countess of Bute.
From Italy he went on a long tour through the East, where he seems to have played the rôle of Lothario very effectually. At Alexandria (to give only one of his love adventures) he lost his fickle heart to the beautiful wife of the Danish Ambassador, whom, under various pretences, he induced to leave the coast clear by getting him to go to Holland. The husband thus safely out of the way, Montagu proceeded to dispose of him. He showed the lady a letter from Holland giving sad details of his sudden death, and consoled the bereaved "widow" so well that she consented to reward him with her hand and to accompany him to Syria.
By the time the dead husband had returned to life Montagu was already weary of honeymooning, and was thankful to make his escape to Italy, free to woo, and, if necessary, to wed again.