Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Lewis Melville
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The news that Lady Mary was coming to Florence came to the ears of
Horace Walpole, who was staying there. If he had not yet made her
acquaintance, he certainly knew much about her. "On Wednesday we expect
a third she-meteor," he wrote to Richard West, July 31, 1740. "Those
learned luminaries the Ladies Pomfret and Walpole[9] are to be joined by
the Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. You have not been witness to the rhapsody
of mystic nonsense which these two fair ones debate incessantly, and
consequently cannot figure what must be the issue of this triple
alliance: we have some idea of it. Only figure the coalition of prudery,
debauchery, sentiment, history, Greek, Latin, French, Italian and
metaphysics; all, except the second, understood by halves, by quarters,
or not at all. You shall have the journals of this notable academy."
Walpole sent, some seven weeks later, an account of the lady to the Hon.
Henry Seymour Conway: "Did I tell you Lady Mary Wortley is here? She
laughs at my Lady Walpole, scolds my Lady Pomfret, and is laughed at by
the whole town. Her dress, her avarice, and her impudence must amaze any
one that never heard her name. She wears a foul mob, that does not cover
her greasy black locks, that hang loose, never combed or curled,
mazarine blue wrapper, that gapes open and discovers a canvas petticoat.
Her face swollen violently on one side is partly covered with a
plaister, and partly with white paint, which for cheapness she has
bought so coarse, that you would not use it to wash a chimney."
[Footnote 9: The wife of the eldest son of Sir Robert Walpole, who in
1723 was created Baron Walpole. He later succeeded as (second) Earl of
Orford.]
In another letter, to Richard West (October 2, 1740), Walpole gives an
account of the "Academy." "But for the Academy, I am not of it; but
frequently in company with it," he wrote. "Tis all disjointed. Madame
----,[10] who, though a learned lady, has not lost her modesty and
character, is extremely scandalised with the two other dames, especially
with Moll Worthless,[11] who knows no bounds. She is at rivalry with
Lady W---- [12] for a certain Mr.----, whom perhaps you knew at
Oxford.... He fell into sentiments with my Lady W., and was happy to
catch her at platonic love; but as she seldom stops there, the poor man
will be frightened out of his senses when she shall break the matter to
him, for he never dreamt that her purposes were so naught. Lady Mary is
so far gone that to get him from the mouth of her antagonist, she
literally took him out to dance country dances at a formal ball, where
there was no measure kept in laughing at her.... She played at Pharaoh
two or three times at Princess Craon's, where she cheats horse and foot.
She is really entertaining: I have been reading her works, which she
lends out in manuscript; but they are too womanish: I like few of her
performances."
[Footnote 10: Lady Pomfret.]
[Footnote 11: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.]
[Footnote 12: Lady Walpole.]
Lady Mary was, of course, entirely ignorant of Horace Walpole's feelings
about her, of which naturally he showed no sign in social intercourse
with her. "I saw him often both at Florence and Genoa, and you may
believe I know him," she told her daughter. "I was well acquainted with
Mr. Walpole at Florence, and indeed he was particularly civil to me,"
she wrote on another occasion. "I have great encouragement to ask favour
of him, if I did not know that few people have so good memories to
remember so many years backwards as have passed since I have seen him.
If he has treated the character of Queen Elizabeth with disrespect [in
_A Catalogue of the Royal and Noble Authors of England_], all the women
should tear him to pieces, for abusing the glory of their sex. Neither
is it just to put her in the list of authors, having never published
anything, though we have Mr. Camden's authority that she wrote many
valuable pieces, chiefly Greek translations. I wish all monarchs would
bestow their leisure hours on such studies: perhaps they would not be
very useful to mankind; but it may be asserted, for a certain truth,
their own minds could be more improved than by the amusements of
quadrille or Cavagnole."
Lady Mary need not have feared that Walpole had forgotten her; he bore
her much in mind to his dying day, and found never a kind thing to say
about her. It may be presumed that his animosity arose from the fact
that Lady Mary had championed Molly Skerritt against his mother, when
Miss Skerritt was living openly as the mistress of Sir Robert Walpole.
Yet, though he wrote so abusively about her, he concerned himself with a
new edition of the _Court Poems_, though with what right has never
transpired. "I have lately had Lady Mary Wortley's Ecloques published;
but they don't please, though so excessively good," he wrote to Sir
Horace Mann, November 24, 1747. "I say so confidently, for Mr. Chute
agrees with me: he says, for the _Epistle from Arthur Grey_, scarce any
woman could have written it, and no man; for a man who had had
experience enough to paint such sentiments so well, would not have had
warmth enough left. Do you know anything of Lady Mary? Her adventurous
son is come in Parliament, but has not opened."
From Florence, Lady Mary repaired to Rome. There, she did not see the
Chevalier de St. George, but she did see his two sons, Charles Edward,
the Young Pretender, and Henry, Cardinal York. "The eldest seems
thoughtless enough, and is really not unlike Mr. Lyttelton in his shape
and air," she wrote to Montagu. "The youngest is very well made, dances
finely, and has an ingenuous countenance; he is but fourteen years of
age. The family live very splendidly, yet pay everybody, and (wherever
they get it) are certainly in no want of money."
Lady Mary seems to have had no prepared itinerary, but to have wandered
as the spirit moved her--Naples, Leghorn, Turin, Genoa. The cheapness of
Italy appealed to her frugal mind.
"The manners of Italy are so much altered since we were here last, the
alteration is scarce credible. They say it has been by the last war. The
French, being masters, introduced all their customs, which were eagerly
embraced by the ladies, and I believe will never be laid aside; yet the
different governments make different manners in every state. You know,
though the republic is not rich, here are many private families vastly
so, and live at a great superfluous expense: all the people of the first
quality keep coaches as fine as the Speaker's, and some of them two or
three, though the streets are too narrow to use them in the town; but
they take the air in them, and their chairs carry them to the gates. The
liveries are all plain: gold or silver being forbidden to be worn within
the walls, the habits are all obliged to be black, but they wear
exceeding fine lace and linen; and in their country-houses, which are
generally in the faubuurg, they dress very rich, and have extreme fine
jewels. Here is nothing cheap but houses. A palace fit for a prince may
be hired for fifty pounds per annum; I mean unfurnished. All games of
chance are strictly prohibited, and it seems to me the only law they do
not try to evade: they play at quadrille, piquet, &c., but not high.
Here are no regular public assemblies. I have been visited by all of the
first rank, and invited to several fine dinners, particularly to the
wedding of one of the house of Spinola, where there were ninety-six sat
down to table, and I think the entertainment one of the best I ever saw.
There was the night following a ball and supper for the same company,
with the same profusion. They tell me that all their great marriages are
kept in the same public manner. Nobody keeps more than two horses, all
their journeys being post; the expense of them, including the coachman,
is (I am told) fifty pounds per annum. A chair is very near as much; I
give eighteen francs a week for mine. The senators can converse with no
strangers during the time of their magistracy, which lasts two years.
The number of servants is regulated, and almost every lady has the same,
which is two footmen, a gentleman-usher, and a page, who follows her
chair.
Certainly the simple life appealed to Lady Mary, but much as she liked
Geneva the cost of living irked her. "Everything is as dear as it is at
London," she complained to her husband in November, 1741. "'Tis true, as
all equipages are forbidden, that expense is entirely retrenched.... The
way of living is absolutely the reverse of that in Italy. Here is no
show, and a great deal of eating; there is all the magnificence
imaginable, and no dinners but on particular occasions; yet the
difference of the prices renders the total expense very near equal....
The people here are very well to be liked, and this little republic has
an air of the simplicity of old Rome in its earliest age. The
magistrates toil with their own hands, and their wives literally dress
their dinners against their return from their little senate. Yet without
dress and equipage 'tis as dear living here for a stranger, as in places
where one is obliged to both, from the price of all sort of provision,
which they are forced to buy from their neighbours, having almost no
land of their own." How much more agreeable, from Lady Mary's point of
view, was Chambery: "Here is the most profound peace and unbounded
plenty that is to be found in any corner of the universe; but not one
rag of money. For my part, I think it amounts to the same thing, whether
one is obliged to give several pence for bread, or can have a great deal
of bread for a penny, since the Savoyard nobility here keep as good
tables, without money, as those in London, who spend in a week what
would be here a considerable yearly revenue. Wine, which is equal to the
best burgundy, is sold for a penny a quart, and I have a cook for very
small wages, that is capable of rivalling Chloe."
"My girl gives me great prospect of satisfaction, but my young rogue of
a son is the most ungovernable little rake that ever played truant,"
Lady Mary wrote to Lady Mar in July, 1727, when the boy was fourteen and
the girl nine years old.
It has already been mentioned that young Edward, who was placed at
Westminster School at the early age of five, ran away. In fact, he ran
away more than once. "My blessed offspring has already made a great
noise in the world," his mother told Lady Mar in July, 1726. "That young
rake, my son, took to his heels t'other day and transported his person
to Oxford; being in his own opinion thoroughly qualified for the
University. After a good deal of search we found and reduced him, much
against his will, to the humble condition of a schoolboy. It happens
very luckily that the sobriety and discretion is of my daughter's side;
I am sorry the ugliness is so too, for my son grows extremely handsome."
The lad was incorrigible. In the following year he disappeared for some
months, to be found selling fish at Blackwall.
"My cousin is going to Paris, and I will not let her go without a letter
for you, my dear sister, though I was never in a worse humour for
writing" (the anxious mother wrote to her sister). "I am vexed to the
blood by my young rogue of a son; who has contrived at his age to make
himself the talk of the whole nation. He is gone knight-erranting, God
knows where; and hitherto 'tis impossible to find him. You may judge of
my uneasiness by what your own would be if dear Lady Fanny was lost.
Nothing that ever happened to me has troubled me so much; I can hardly
speak or write of it with tolerable temper, and I own it has changed
mine to that degree I have a mind to cross the water, to try what effect
a new heaven and a new earth will have upon my spirit."
Later, Edward ran away again, joining the crew of a ship going to
Oporto, and was not discovered in that city until a considerable period
had elapsed since his flight.
He capped all his follies by marrying at the age of twenty a woman of no
social standing and much older than himself.
His parents were at their wits' end. It was hopeless to treat him as a
rational being. His wife was induced to accept a pension to leave him,
and he himself was put in charge of a keeper. Several times he had to be
kept in close confinement. He was, however, by no means devoid of
brains, and in the autumn of 1741 he had sufficiently recovered to be
entered as a student at the University of Leyden. His allowance was L300
a year, which he found so insufficient for the indulgence of his tastes
that he was soon considerably in debt.
In Lady Mary's correspondence there are many letters to her husband
about their son.
"Genoa, Aug. 15, 1741.
"I am sorry to trouble you on so disagreeable a subject as our son, but
I received a letter from him last post, in which he solicits your
dissolving his marriage, as if it was wholly in your power, and the
reason he gives for it, is so that he may marry more to your
satisfaction. It is very vexatious (though no more than I expected) that
time has no effect, and that it is impossible to convince him of his
true situation. He enclosed this letter in one to Mr. Birtles, and tells
me that he does not doubt that debt of L200 is paid. You may imagine
this silly proceeding occasioned me a dun from Mr. Birtles. I told him
the person that wrote the letter, was, to my knowledge, not worth a
groat, which was all I thought proper to say on the subject."
"Lyons, April 23, 1742.
"I am very glad you have been prevailed on to let our son take a
commission: if you had prevented it, he would have always said, and
perhaps thought, and persuaded other people, you had hindered his
rising in the world; though I am fully persuaded that he can never make
a tolerable figure in any station of life. When he was at Morins, on his
first leaving France, I then tried to prevail with him to serve the
Emperor as volunteer; and represented to him that a handsome behaviour
one campaign might go a great way in retrieving his character; and
offered to use my interest with you (which I said I did not doubt would
succeed) to furnish him with a handsome equipage. He then answered, he
supposed I wished him killed out of the way. I am afraid his pretended
reformation is not very sincere. I wish time may prove me in the wrong.
I here enclose the last letter I received from him; I answered it the
following post in these words:
"'I am very glad you resolve to continue obedient to your father, and
are sensible of his goodness towards you. Mr. Birtles showed me your
letter to him, in which you enclosed yours to me, where you speak to him
as your friend; subscribing yourself his faithful humble servant. He was
at Genoa in his uncle's house when you was there, and well acquainted
with you; though you seem ignorant of everything relating to him. I wish
you would make such sort of apologies for any errors you may commit. I
pray God your future behaviour may redeem the past, which will be a
great blessing to your affectionate mother.'
"I have not since heard from him; I suppose he knew not what to say to
so plain a detected falsehood. It is very disagreeable to me to converse
with one from whom I do not expect to hear a word of truth, and who, I
am very sure, will repeat many things that never passed in our
conversation. You see the most solemn assurances are not binding from
him, since he could come to London in opposition to your commands, after
having so frequently protested he would not move a step except by your
order. However, as you insist on my seeing him, I will do it, and think
Valence the properest town for that interview; it is but two days'
journey from this place; it is in Dauphine.
"I shall stay here till I have an answer to this letter. If you order
your son to go to Valence, I desire you would give him a strict command
of going by a feigned name. I do not doubt your returning me whatever
money I may give him; but as I believe, if he receives money from me, he
will be making me frequent visits, it is clearly my opinion I should
give him none. Whatever you may think proper for his journey, you may
remit to him."
"Lyons, April 25 [1742].
"On recollection (however inconvenient it may be to me on many
accounts), I am not sorry to converse with my son. I shall at least have
the satisfaction of making a clear judgment of his behaviour and temper:
which I shall deliver to you in the most sincere and unprejudiced
manner. You need not apprehend that I shall speak to him in passion. I
do not know that I ever did in my life. I am not apt to be over-heated
in discourse, and am so far prepared, even for the worst on his side,
that I think nothing he can say can alter the resolution I have taken of
treating him with calmness. Both nature and interest (were I inclined to
follow blindly the dictates of either) would determine me to wish him
your heir rather than a stranger; but I think myself obliged both by
honour, conscience and my regard for you, no way to deceive you; and I
confess, hitherto I see nothing but falsehood and weakness through his
whole conduct. It is possible this person may be altered since I saw
him, but his figure then was very agreeable and his manner insinuating.
I very well remember the professions he made to me, and do not doubt he
is as lavish of them to other people. Perhaps Lord Carteret may think
him no ill match for an ugly girl that sticks upon his hands. The
project of breaking his marriage shows at least his devotion
counterfeit, since I am sensible it cannot be done but by false witness.
His wife is not young enough to get gallants, nor rich enough to buy
them.
"I make choice of Valence for our interview as a town where we are not
likely to find any English, and he may if he pleases be quite unknown;
which it is hardly possible to be in any capital town either of France
or Italy.
"Lyons, May 2 [1742].
"I received this morning yours of April 12, and at the same time the
enclosed which I send you. Tis the first I have received since the
detection of that falsehood in regard to Mr. Birtles. I always send my
letters open, that Mr. Clifford (who has the character of sense and
honesty) might be witness of what I said; and he not left at liberty to
forge orders he never received. I am very glad I have done so, and am
persuaded that had his reformation been what you suppose it, Mr.
Clifford would have wrote to me in his favour. I confess I see no
appearance of it. His last letter to you, and this to me, seems to be no
more in that submissive style he has used, but like one that thinks
himself well protected. I will see him, since you desire it, at Valence;
which is a by-town, where I am less likely to meet with English than any
town in France; but I insist on his going by a feigned name, and coming
without a servant. People of superior fortunes to him (to my knowledge)
have often travelled from Paris to Lyons in the _diligence_; the expense
is but one hundred livres, L5 sterling, all things paid. It would not be
easy to me, at this time, to send him any considerable sum; and whatever
it is, I am persuaded, coming from me, he would not be satisfied with
it, and make his complaints to his companions. As to the alteration of
his temper, I see the same folly throughout. He now supposes (which is
at best downright childish) that one hour's conversation will convince
me of his sincerity. I have not answered his letter, nor will not, till
I have your orders what to say to him."
[Avignon] May 6 [1742].
"I here send you enclosed the letter I mentioned of your son's; the
packet in which it was put was mislaid in the journey; it will serve to
show you how little he is to be depended on. I saw a Savoyard man of
quality at Chambery, who knew him at Venice, and afterwards at Genoa,
who asked me (not suspecting him for my son) if he was related to my
family. I made answer he was some relation. He told me several tricks of
his. He said, that at Genoa he had told him that an uncle of his was
dead and had left him L5,000 or L6,000 per annum, and that he was
returning to England to take possession of his estate; in the meantime
he wanted money; and would have borrowed some of him, which he refused.
I made answer that he did very well. I have heard of this sort of
conduct in other places; and by the Dutch letters you have sent me I am
persuaded he continues the same method of lying which convinces me that
his pretended enthusiasm is only to cheat those that can be imposed on
by it. However, I think he should not be hindered accepting a
commission. I do not doubt it will be pawned or sold in a twelvemonth;
which will prove to those that now protect him how little he deserves
it. I am now at Avignon, which is within one day's journey of Valence."
"Avignon, May 23 [1742].
"I received this morning yours of April 12 and 29th, and at the same
time one from my son at Paris, dated the 4th instant. I have wrote to
him this day, that on his answer I will immediately set out to Valence,
and shall be glad to see him there. I suppose you are now convinced I
have never been mistaken in his character; which remains unchanged, and
what is yet worse, I think is unchangeable. I never saw such a
complication of folly and falsity as in his letter to Mr. Gibson.
Nothing is cheaper than living in an inn in a country town in France;
they being obliged to ask no more than twenty-five sous for dinner, and
thirty for supper and lodging, of those that eat at the public table;
which all the young men of quality I have met have always done. It is
true I am forced to pay double, because I think the decency of my sex
confines me to eat in my chamber. I will not trouble you with detecting
a number of other falsehoods that are in his letters. My opinion on the
whole (since you give me leave to tell it) is, that if I was to speak
in your place, I would tell him, 'That since he is obstinate in going
into the army, I will not oppose it; but as I do not approve, I will
advance no equipage till I know his behaviour to be such as shall
deserve my future favour. Hitherto he has always been directed, either
by his own humour, or the advice of those he thought better friends to
him than myself. If he renounces the army, I will continue to him his
former allowance; notwithstanding his repeated disobedience, under the
most solemn professions of duty. When I see him act like a sincere
honest man, I shall believe well of him; the opinion of others, who
either do not know him or are imposed on by his pretences, weighs
nothing with me."
On May 30 Lady Mary went from Avignon to Valence, where about a week
later her son visited her. She at once sent a full account to Montagu.
"Avignon, June 10 [1742.]
"I am just returned from passing two days with our son, of whom I will
give you the most exact account I am capable of. He is so much altered
in his person, I should scarcely have known him. He has entirely lost
his beauty, and looks at least seven years older than he is; and the
wildness that he always had in his eyes is so much increased it is
downright shocking, and I am afraid will end fatally. He is grown fat,
but is still genteel, and has an air of politeness that is agreeable. He
speaks French like a Frenchman, and has got all the fashionable
expressions of that language, and a volubility of words which he always
had, and which I do not wonder should pass for wit with inconsiderate
people. His behaviour is perfectly civil, and I found him very
submissive; but in the main, no way really improved in his
understanding, which is exceedingly weak; and I am convinced he will
always be led by the person he converses with either right or wrong, not
being capable of forming any fixed judgment of his own. As to his
enthusiasm, if he had it, I suppose he has already lost it; since I
could perceive no turn of it in all his conversation. But with his head
I believe it is possible to make him a monk one day and a Turk three
days after. He has a flattering, insinuating manner, which naturally
prejudices strangers in his favour. He began to talk to me in the usual
silly cant I have so often heard from him, which I shortened by telling
him I desired not to be troubled with it; that professions were of no
use where actions were expected; and that the only thing could give me
hopes of a good conduct was regularity and truth. He very readily agreed
to all I said (as indeed he has always done when he has not been
hot-headed). I endeavoured to convince him how favourably he has been
dealt with, his allowance being much more than, had I been his father, I
would have given in the same case. The Prince of Hesse, who is now
married to the Princess of England, lived some years at Geneva on L300
per annum. Lord Hervey sent his son at sixteen thither, and to travel
afterwards, on no larger pension than L200; and, though without a
governor, he had reason enough, not only to live within the compass of
it, but carried home little presents for his father and mother, which he
showed me at Turin. In short, I know there is no place so expensive, but
a prudent single man may live in it on L100 per annum, and an
extravagant one may run out ten thousand in the cheapest. Had you (said
I to him) thought rightly, or would have regarded the advice I gave you
in all my letters, while in the little town of Islestein, you would have
laid up L150 per annum; you would now have had L750 in your pocket;
which would have almost paid your debts, and such a management would
have gained you the esteem of the reasonable part of mankind. I
perceived this reflection, which he had never made himself, had a very
great weight with him. He would have excused part of his follies, by
saying Mr. G. had told him it became Mr. W.'s son to live handsomely. I
made answer, that whether Mr. G. had said so or no, the good sense of
the thing was noway altered by it; that the true figure of a man was
the opinion the world had of his sense and probity, and not the idle
expenses, which were only respected by foolish or ignorant people; that
his case was particular, he had but too publicly shown his inclination
to vanities, and the most becoming part he could now act would be owning
the ill use he had made of his father's indulgence, and professing to
endeavour to be no further expense to him, instead of scandalous
complaints, and being always at his last shirt and last guinea, which
any man of spirit would be ashamed to own. I prevailed so far with him
that he seemed very willing to follow this advice; and I gave him a
paragraph to write to G., which I suppose you will easily distinguish
from the rest of his letter. He asked me if you had settled your estate.
I made answer, that I did not doubt (like all other wise men) you always
had a will by you; but that you had certainly not put anything out of
your power to change. On that, he began to insinuate, that if I could
prevail on you to settle the estate on him, I might expect anything from
his gratitude. I made him a very clear and positive answer in these
words: 'I hope your father will outlive me, and if I should be so
unfortunate to have it otherwise, I do not believe he will leave me in
your power, But was I sure of the contrary, no interest nor no necessity
shall ever make me act against my honour or conscience; and I plainly
tell you, that I will never persuade your father to do anything for you
till I think you deserve it.' He answered by great promises of future
good behaviour, and economy. He is highly delighted with the prospect of
going into the army; and mightily pleased with the good reception he had
from Lord Stair, though I find it amounts to no more than telling him he
was sorry he had already named his aides-de-camp, and otherwise should
have been glad of him in that post. He says Lord Carteret has confirmed
to him his promise of a commission.