The King’s court became duller and duller after the departure of the Prince and Princess of Wales. Official personages were bound to attend, but the general circle of the nobility absented themselves, and all the youth, wit and beauty of the town migrated to Leicester House or Richmond. Sometimes not more than six ladies attended the royal drawing-rooms at St. James’s. The first year of the breach the King spent the summer at Hampton Court, accompanied by his mistresses Schulemburg and Keilmansegge, who had now, thanks to the complaisance of Stanhope and his “German Ministry,” been transformed into English peeresses, under the titles of Duchess of Kendal and Countess of Darlington respectively. No doubt they took their “nieces” with them, as they called their illegitimate daughters by the King. The Duchess of Kendal’s “niece,” Melusina, was now grown up, and some years later married Lord Chesterfield. Lady Darlington’s “niece,” Charlotte, was younger, and she, too, in time made an equally good match, marrying Lord Howe.[103] These ladies have left no trace of their occupation of Hampton Court, unless it be the “Frog Walk,” which is said to be a corruption of Frau or Frow walk, so called because the German mistresses used to pace up and down it with George the First. But they made their reign infamous by driving the eminent architect, Sir Christopher Wren, from the office of Surveyor-General, at the age of eighty-six, and after a lifetime spent in the public service. The King was instigated to this shameful act by the Duchess of Kendal. Wren had refused to allow her to mutilate Hampton Court with her execrable taste, and in revenge she sold his place to one William Benson.
MARY, COUNTESS COWPER.
From the Original Portrait by Sir Godfrey Kneller.
Under the unlovely auspices of the dull old King and his duller mistresses, Hampton Court was a very different place to what it had been during the summer of the Prince of Wales’s regency. “Our gallantry and gaiety,” writes Pope to Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, “have been great sufferers by the rupture of the two Courts, here: scarce any ball, assembly, basset-table or any place where two or three are gathered together. No lone house in Wales, with a rookery, is more contemplative than Hampton Court. I walked there the other day by the moon, and met no creature of quality but the King, who was giving audience all alone to the birds under the garden wall.”[104] The King tried to remedy this state of affairs by commanding the Drury Lane Company to come down to Hampton Court and give performances there. The magnificent Great Hall was fitted up as a theatre, and seven plays were performed, of which the favourite was King Henry the Eighth. Steele wrote a prologue, and Colley Cibber tells us that the King greatly enjoyed these plays, “as the actors could see from the frequent satisfaction in his looks at particular scenes and passages”.[105] In that case the King must have read translations beforehand, as he knew no English—certainly not Shakespeare’s English. The expenses of each representation amounted to only £50, but the King was so delighted that he gave the company £200 in addition, which the grovelling Cibber declares was “more than our utmost merit ought to have hoped for”.[106] Basking as he did in the sunshine of the royal favour, Colley Cibber was a stout upholder of the House of Hanover, and a contemner of the House of Stuart. In his comedy The Non-Juror, he roundly abused the Jacobites, and his dedication of it to the King will remain as one of the most fulsome dedications of a fulsome age. It began: “In a time when all communities congratulate your Majesty on the glories of your reign, which are continually arising from the prosperities of your people, be graciously pleased, dread Sire, to permit the loyal subjects of your theatre to take this occasion of humbly presenting their acknowledgements for your royal favour and protection”.
Apparently George liked this gross flattery, for he often went to see Cibber’s plays at Drury Lane. The King hated ceremony, so he dispensed with his coach when he went to the theatre, and set out from St. James’s Palace in a sedan-chair, with his guards and the beef-eaters marching alongside, and two other sedan-chairs carried behind him, which contained the Duchess of Kendal and Lady Darlington respectively. The King would not occupy the royal box, but would choose another in some less prominent position, and would sit far back, behind his two mistresses, taking a pinch of snuff now and then, and laughing at their jokes. None of the English officers of the household were admitted to this box, and the King entered and left the theatre by a private door. Once, when going to the theatre in his chair, the King was shot at by a youth named James Shepherd, but the bullet was very wide of the mark. The lad was condemned to be hanged. On account of his youth, Caroline interceded for him, but without success. He died declaring James to be his only King. Concerning this incident, the Duchess of Orleans writes: “The Princess of Wales has told me about the young man that the King has caused to be killed. The lad was only eighteen years of age, but the King is not in the least ashamed of what he has done; on the contrary, he seems to think that he has done a noble action. I fear the King will come to a bad end. His quarrel with the Prince of Wales gets worse every day. I always thought him harsh when he was in Germany, but English air has hardened him still more.”[107]
Domestic differences had prevented the King from seeing Hanover for nearly two years; but in May, 1719, his impatience could no longer be restrained, and, despite the remonstrances of his Ministers, he determined to pass the summer in his German dominions. He so far relented towards the Princess of Wales as to send her word that she might spend the summer at Hampton Court with her children. The Princess returned a spirited reply to the effect that unless her husband could go with her she would not go. On this occasion a Council of Regency was established, in which no mention whatever was made of the Prince. The Prince and Princess of Wales were not even allowed to hold levées and drawing-rooms during the King’s absence; and his Majesty, by a notice in the Gazette, decreed that these functions should be held by the three young princesses, his grandchildren. The Prince and Princess showed their indignation by leaving town at once for Richmond.
The King then set out for Hanover, taking with him Stanhope as Minister in attendance, and accompanied by the Duchess of Kendal. It was perhaps on this journey to Hanover that the following incident took place, which deserves to be quoted, as offering one of the few incidents George the First gave of good taste: “On one of his journeys to Hanover his coach broke down. At a distance in view was a château of a considerable German nobleman. The King sent to borrow assistance; the possessor came, conveyed the King to his house, and begged the honour of his Majesty accepting a dinner while his carriage was repairing; and in the interim asked leave to amuse his Majesty with a collection of pictures which he had formed in several tours to Italy. But what did the King see in one of the rooms but an unknown portrait of a person in the robes, and with the regalia, of a sovereign of Great Britain. George asked him whom it represented. The nobleman replied, with much diffident but decent respect, that in various journeys to Rome he had been acquainted with the Chevalier de St. George, who had done him the honour of sending him that picture. ‘Upon my word,’ said the King instantly, ‘’tis very like to the family’.”[108]
The hopes of James and his little Court at Rome now began to revive. The prolonged strife between George the First and his son helped to play the game of the Jacobites; and their agents throughout Europe did not hesitate to exaggerate the facts of the unseemly quarrel, and to declare that England was weary of the Hanoverian family (which it was) and eager for a Stuart restoration (which it was not). Mar had been urging Charles the Twelfth of Sweden to send an expedition to Scotland, and Charles was inclined to listen, when his sudden death put an end to James’s hopes. But Spain espoused his cause. Spain was then governed by Cardinal Alberoni. By birth the son of a working gardener, he had begun life as a village priest, and had gradually, by virtue of his many abilities and extraordinary knowledge of men, raised himself from poverty and obscurity to the proud position of a cardinal of the Church and first minister of Spain. Philip, the King, was old and feeble, and entirely ruled by his Queen, and the Queen was governed by Alberoni. The trust was not ill-placed, for the Cardinal’s administrative abilities were great. Under his direction trade revived, public credit was increased, a new navy was fitted out, and the army was reorganised. “Let your Majesty remain but five years at peace,” said he to the Spanish King, “and I will make you the most powerful monarch in Europe.” Unfortunately for his plans Alberoni was of a restless, intriguing disposition. He disliked the trend of England’s foreign policy, and therefore entered into correspondence with James at Rome, and employed agents to foment dissensions in England. The English Government met this with vigorous measures, and a new treaty was concluded with France and the Emperor, which, after the accession of the Dutch, was known as the Quadruple Alliance. Stanhope went to Madrid to see if he could smooth matters with Alberoni, but he did not succeed. The Spanish troops had landed in Sicily, and to prevent the loss of the island, Admiral Byng was despatched to the scene of action with twenty ships of the line. On July 31st, 1718, a naval fight took place between the English and the Spaniards, which resulted in the defeat of the latter. In revenge Alberoni fitted out an armament of five ships to support James. This little fleet was to land on the coast of Scotland, but in the Bay of Biscay it was overtaken by a tempest, and only two of the frigates reached Scotland, having on board the Earls Marischal and Seaforth and the Marquis of Tullibardine, with some arms and three hundred Spanish soldiers. They were joined by a few Highlanders, but, after an insignificant skirmish with the King’s troops, were dispersed.
Meantime James had arrived at Madrid, in response to a special invitation from Alberoni, where he was received with royal honours as King of England, and magnificently lodged in a palace set apart for him and his suite. But when the news of the complete failure of the expedition reached Madrid some months later, Alberoni realised that James was a very expensive guest, and his presence at Madrid was a hindrance to the peace with England that he already wished to make. James, too, was anxious to leave, and a pretext was afforded by the escape of the Princess Clementina, whom he had wedded by proxy. She had at last escaped from Innsbrück, where she had been detained nearly three years. She stole away by night in the disguise of a Scottish maid-servant, and after a long and perilous journey on horseback arrived safe in Venetian territory. On the receipt of this news James took his leave of the Court of Spain, and returned to Rome, where his long-deferred marriage was duly solemnised and consummated.