Notwithstanding the purity of morals enjoined by the court of George III., the early period of his reign presents a picture of dissolute manners as well as of furious party spirit. The most fashionable of our ladies of rank were immersed in play or devoted to politics; the same spirit carried them into both. The Sabbath was disregarded, spent often in cards or desecrated by the meetings of partisans of both factions; moral duties were neglected and decorum outraged.

The fact was that a minor court had become the centre of all the bad passions and reprehensible pursuits in vogue. Carlton House, in Pall Mall, which even the oldest of us can barely remember, with its elegant screen, open, with pillars in front, its low exterior, its many small rooms, the vulgar taste of its decorations, and, to crown the whole, the associations of a corrupting revelry with the whole place,—Canton House was, in the days of good King George, almost as great a scandal to the country as Whitehall in the time of improper King Charles II.

The influence which the example of a young prince, of manners eminently popular, produced upon the young nobility of the realm must be taken into account in the narrative of that life which was so brilliant and so misspent; so blessed at its onset, so dreary in its close—the life of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. Descended in the third degree from Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, Georgiana Spencer is said to have resembled her celebrated ancestress in the style of her beauty. She was born in 1757. Her father, John, created Earl of Spencer in 1765, was the son of the reprobate "Jack Spencer," as he was styled, the misery at once and the darling of his grandmother, Sarah, who idolised her Torrismond, as she called him, and left him a considerable portion of her property. Whilst the loveliness of Sarah descended to Georgiana Spencer, she certainly inherited somewhat of the talent, the reckless spirits, and the imprudence of her grandfather, "Jack;" neither could a careful education eradicate these hereditary characteristics.

Her mother was the daughter of a commoner, the Right Honourable Stephen Poyntz, of Midgham, in Berkshire. This lady was long remembered both by friends and neighbours with veneration. She was sensible and intelligent, polite, agreeable, and of unbounded charity; but Miss Burney, who knew her, depicts her as ostentatious in her exertions, and somewhat self-righteous and vainglorious. She was, however, fervently beloved by her daughter, who afterward made several pecuniary sacrifices to ensure her mother's comfort. The earliest years of Lady Georgiana (as she became after her father was created an earl) were passed in the large house at Holywell, close to St. Albans, built by the famous Duke of Marlborough on his wife's patrimonial estate. Aged people, some fifteen years ago, especially a certain neighbouring clergyman, remembered going to play at cards in this house; and the neighbourly qualities of Lady Spencer, as much as her benevolence to the poor, endeared her much to the gentry around. She exercised not only the duties of charity, but the scarcely minor ones of hospitality and courtesy to her neighbours. Before the opening of railroads, such duties were more especially requisite to keep together the scattered members of country society. Good feelings were engendered, good manners promoted, and the attachment then felt for old families had a deeper foundation than servility or even custom. As Lady Georgiana grew up, she displayed a warm impressionable nature, a passion for all that was beautiful in art, strong affections, and an early disposition to coquetry. Her character spoke out in her face, which was the most eloquent of all faces; yet it was by no means beautiful if we look upon beauty critically. There were persons who said that her face would have been ordinary but for its transcendent loveliness of expression. Unlike the fair Gunnings, she was neither regular in features nor faultless in form, yet theirs was baby-beauty compared with hers. True, her hair inclined to red, her mouth was wide, but her complexion was exquisite; and the lips, ever laughing, were parted over a splendid set of teeth, an attribute rare in those days when the teeth were often decayed in youth. She had, too, a charm of manner natural to her, and a playfulness of conversation, which, springing from a cultivated mind, rendered her society most fascinating. "Her heart, too," writes Wraxall, her cotemporary, "might be considered as the seat of those emotions which sweeten human life, adorn our nature, and diffuse a nameless charm over existence."

A younger sister, Henrietta Frances, afterward Lady Duncannon, and eventually Countess of Besborough, was also the object of Lady Georgiana's warm affection; and, although Lady Duncannon was very inferior to her in elegance of mind and personal attractions, she equalled her in sisterly love.

During the middle of the last century, literature was again the fashion among the higher classes. Doctor Johnson and the Thrales, Miss Gurney, Hannah More, still clustered at Streatham; many of our politicians were, if not poets, poetasters. It is true, if we except the heart-touching poems of Cowper, the Muses were silent. The verses which were the delight of polished drawing-rooms were of little value, and have been swept away from our memories of the present day as waste paper; but a taste for what is refined was thus prevalent, and thus affected the then rising generation favourably.

Lady Georgiana Spencer had, however, a very few years allotted her for improvement or for the enjoyment of her youth, for in her seventeenth year she married.

William, the fifth Duke of Devonshire, at the time when he was united to Lady Georgiana was twenty-seven years of age. He was one of the most apathetic of men. Tall, yet not even stately, calm to a fault, he had inherited from the Cavendish family a stern probity of character, which always has a certain influence in society. Weight he wanted not, for a heavier man never led to the altar a wife full of generous impulses and of sensibility. He was wholly incapable of strong emotion, and could only be roused by whist or faro from a sort of moral lethargy. He was, nevertheless, crammed with a learning that caused him to be a sort of oracle at Brookes's when disputes arose about passages from Roman poets or historians. With all these qualities, he was capable of being, in a certain sense, in love, though not always with his lovely and engaging first wife.

Miss Burney relates a characteristic trait of this nobleman; it was related to her by Miss Monckton. The duke was standing near a very fine glass lustre in a corner of a room in the house of people who were not possessed of means sufficient to consider expense as immaterial; by carelessly lolling back, he threw the lustre back, and it was broken. He was not, however, in the least disturbed by the accident, but coolly said: "I wonder how I did that!" He then removed to the opposite corner, and to show, it was supposed, that he had forgotten what he had done, leaned his head in the same manner, and down came the second lustre. He looked at it with philosophical composure, and merely said: "This is singular enough," and walked to another part of the room without either distress or apology. To this automaton was the young Lady Georgiana consigned; and the marriage was, in the estimation of society, a splendid alliance.

Her animal spirits were excessive, and enabled her to cope with the misfortune of being linked to a noble expletive. Her good humour was unceasing, and her countenance was as open as her heart. Fitted as she was by the sweetest of dispositions for domestic life, one can hardly wonder at her plunging into the excitements of politics when at home there was no sympathy. Hence her bitterest misfortunes originated; but one cannot, with all her indiscretions, suffer a comparison between her and the Duchesse de Longueville, which Wraxall has instituted. The Duchess of Devonshire scarcely merits the covert censure; except in beauty and talents there was no similarity.

Buoyant with health and happiness, the young duchess was introduced into the highest circles of London as a matter of course. Her husband represented one of the most influential families of the Whig aristocracy, and his name and fortune made him important.

Three West End palaces, as they might well be termed, Canton House, Devonshire House, and Burlington House, were open to every parliamentary adherent of the famous coalition,—the alliance between Lord North and Charles James Fox. Devonshire House, standing opposite to the Green Park, and placed upon an eminence, seemed to look down upon the Queen's House, as Buckingham Palace was then called. Piccadilly then, though no longer, as in Queen Anne's time, infested with highwaymen, was almost at the extremity of the West End.

In right of his descent, on his mother's side from the Boyle family, the Duke of Devonshire was also the owner of Burlington House, situated near Devonshire House, and inhabited by his brother-in-law, the Duke of Portland.

Thus a complete Whig colony existed in that part of London, the head and front of their party being no less a person than George, Prince of Wales. He was at this time in the very height of his short-lived health and youth, and still more short-lived popularity; a man who possessed all the exterior qualities in which his father was deficient,—grace as well as good nature, the attribute of George III., a certain degree of cultivation, as well as of natural talent, a tall, handsome person, with a face less German in type than those of his brothers, some generosity of character—witness his kindness to Prince Charles Stuart and his brother, whom he pensioned—an appearance, at all events, of an extremely good heart, and a great capacity for social enjoyments.

Doctor Burney states that he was surprised, on meeting the prince at Lord Melbourne's, to find him, amidst the constant dissipation of his life, possessed of "much learning, wit, knowledge of books in general, discrimination of character, and original humour." He spoke with Dr. Charles Burney, the distinguished scholar, quoting Homer in Greek with fluency; he was a first-rate critic in music, and a capital mimic. "Had we been in the dark," said Doctor Burney, "I should have sworn that Doctor Parr and Kemble were in the room." Hence, the same judge thought "he might be said to have as much wit as Charles II., with much more learning, for his merry Majesty could spell no better than the bourgeois gentilhomme." Such was the partial description of the prince by a flattered and grateful contemporary, who wrote in 1805. Twenty years later Sir Walter Scott, after dining with the then prince regent, paid all justice to manners; but pronounced his mind to be of no high order, and his taste, in so far as wit was concerned, to be condemned.

The prince was, however, just the man to be the centre of a spirited opposition. In his heart he was Conservative; but the Whigs were his partisans against a father who strongly, and perhaps not too sternly, disapproved of his mode of life and his politics.

The circle around him was as remarkable for their talents, and, in some respects, as infamous for their vices, as any Lord Rochester, or Sedley, or Etherege of the time of the second Charles. In that day, a Protestant Duke of Norfolk took an active part in political affairs, and formed one of the chief supporters of the Whigs. Carlton House, Devonshire House, often received in their state rooms "Jock of Norfolk," as he was called, whose large muscular person, more like that of a grazier or a butcher, was hailed there with delight, for his Grace commanded numerous boroughs. He was one of the most strenuous supporters of Fox, and had displayed in the House of Lords a sort of rude eloquence, characteristic of his mind and body. Nothing, however, but his rank, his wealth, his influences, his Whig opinions, could have rendered this profligate, revolting man endurable. Drunkenness is said to have been inherent in his constitution, and to have been inherited from the Plantagenets. He was known in his youth to have been found sleeping in the streets, intoxicated, on a block of wood; yet he is related to have been so capable of resisting the effects of wine, that, after laying his father, a drunkard like himself, under the table at the Thatched House, St. James's, he has been stated to have repaired to another party, there to finish the convivial rites. He was often under the influence of wine when, as Lord Surrey, he sat in the House of Commons; but was wise enough, on such occasions, to hold his tongue. He was so dirty in his person, that his servants used to take advantage of his fits of intoxication to wash him; when they stripped him as they would have done a corpse, and performed ablutions which were somewhat necessary, as he never made use of water. He was equally averse to a change of linen. One day, complaining to Dudley North that he was a prey to rheumatism, "Pray," cried North, "did your Grace ever try a clean shirt?"

This uncleanly form constituted a great feature of the Whig assemblies. At that time every man wore a queue, every man had his hair powdered; yet "Jack" renounced powder, which he never wore except at court, and cut his hair short. His appearance, therefore, must have been a strange contrast with that of the Prince of Wales, curled and powdered, with faultless ruffles, and an ample snow-white cravat, to say nothing of the coat which looked as if it were sewn on his back. It is to the Duke of Norfolk that the suggestion of putting a tax on hair powder has been ascribed. His life was one series of profligacy. Yet, such was the perverted judgment of the day, that this unworthy descendant of the Plantagenets was as popular as any peer of his time. When sober, he was accessible, conversable, and devoid of pride. When intoxicated, he used half to confess that he was still a Catholic at heart. His conversion to the reformed faith was held not to be very sincere; and his perpetual blue coat of a peculiar shade—a dress he never varied—was said to be a penance imposed on him by his confessor. He did no credit to any Christian church; and the Church of Rome is welcome to his memory.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan, at this period in his thirty-third year, was not then wholly degraded by drinking, debt, and, as far as money was concerned, dishonesty. His countenance at this age was full of intelligence, humour, and gaiety: all these characteristics played around his mouth, and aided the effect of his oratory to the ear. His voice was singularly melodious, and a sort of fascination attended all he did and said. His face, as Milton says of the form of the fallen angel,—

Yet he lived to be known by the name of "Bardolph,"—to have every fine expression lost in traces of drunkenness. No one could have perceived, in after days, the once joyous spirit of Sheridan in a face covered with eruptions, and beaming no longer with intelligence. He resembled, says Wraxall, at sixty, one of the companions of Ulysses, who, having tasted of Circe's "charmed cup"—

This extraordinary man was the husband of one of the most beautiful, and, in being his wife, one of the most unfortunate of women. Miss Linley, the daughter of a celebrated musical composer, and called, for her loveliness, the "Maid of Bath," had the calamity of being wooed and won by Sheridan. Never was there a more touching and instructive history than hers. Her beauty was rare, even amid the belles of a period rich in attractive women. Dark masses of hair, drawn back on her brow, fell in curls on a neck of alabaster. Her features were delicate and regular; the expression of her eyes was exquisitely soft and pensive. Her charms have been transmitted to her female descendants, Mrs. Norton, the Duchess of Somerset, and Lady Dufferin, whilst they have also inherited her musical talents, and the wit and ability of their grandfather. Mrs. Sheridan, after a life of alternate splendour and privation, died at Clifton, of consumption, before middle age. Her death was saddened, if not hastened, by her carriage, as she was preparing to drive out on the Downs, being seized for her husband's debts. Whilst united to this young and lovely wife, Sheridan was one of the brightest stars in the dissolute sphere of Carlton House; but for domestic life he had neither time nor disposition. His fame was at its climax, when, during the trial of Warren Hastings, he spoke for hours in Westminster Hall, with an eloquence never to be forgotten; then, going to the House of Commons, exhibited there powers of unrivalled oratory. Meantime the theatres were ringing with applause, and his name went from mouth to mouth whilst the "Duenna" was acted at one house, the "School for Scandal" at another. He was, in truth, the most highly gifted man of his time; and he died in the fear of bailiffs taking his bed from under him,—an awestruck, forlorn, despised drunkard!

But of all the party men to whom the young Duchess of Devonshire was introduced, the most able and the most dissolute was Fox. The colouring of political friends, which concealed his vices, or rather which gave them a false hue, has long since faded away. We now know Fox as he was. In the latest journals of Horace Walpole, his inveterate gambling, his open profligacy, his utter want of honour, is disclosed by one of his own opinions. Corrupted ere yet he had left his home, whilst in age a boy, there is, however, the comfort of reflecting that he outlived his vices. Fox, with a green apron tied around his waist, pruning and nailing up his fruit-trees at St. Ann's Hill, or amusing himself innocently with a few friends, is a pleasing object to remember, even whilst his early career recurs forcibly to the mind.

Unhappily, he formed one of the most intimate of those whom Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, admitted to her home. He was soon enthralled among her votaries, yet he was by no means a pleasing object to look at as he advanced in life. He had dark saturnine features, thought by some to resemble those of Charles II, from whom he was descended in the female line; when they relaxed into a smile, they were, it is said, irresistible. Black shaggy eyebrows concealed the workings of his mind, but gave immense expression to his countenance. His figure was broad, and only graceful when his wonderful intellect threw even over that the power of genius, and produced, when in declamation, the most impassioned gestures. Having been a coxcomb in his youth, Fox was now degenerating into the sloven. The blue frock coat and buff waistcoat with which he appeared in the House of Commons were worn and shabby. Like the white rose which distinguished the Stuarts, so were the blue and buff the badge of the American insurgents and of Washington, their chief.

Having ceased to be the head of the Maccaronis, as the beau monde were then called, Fox had devoted himself to play. Whist, quinze, and horse-racing were his passion, and he threw away a thousand pounds as if they had been a guinea; and he lost his whole fortune at the gaming-table. Before thirty he was reduced to distress, even in the common affairs of life. He could not pay the chairmen who carried him to the House. He was known to borrow money from the waiters at Brookes's, which was the rallying-point of the Opposition. There the night was spent in whist, faro, suppers, and political consultations. Dissolute as he was, there was a kindness, a generosity of disposition that made his influence over man or woman most perilous to both. Then he was one of the most accomplished of students in history and general letters; and to his studies he could even devote himself after irretrievable losses at play. Topham Beauclerk, after having passed the whole night with Fox at faro, saw him leave the club in desperation. He had lost enormously. Fearful of the consequences, Beauclerk followed him to his lodgings. Fox was in the drawing-room, intently engaged over a Greek "Herodotus." Beauclerk expressed his surprise. "What would you have me do? I have lost my last shilling," was the reply. So great was the elasticity of his disposition, sometimes, after losing all the money he could manage to borrow, at faro, he used to lay his head on the table, and, instead of railing at fortune, fall fast asleep. For some years after the Duchess of Devonshire's marriage Fox had continued to represent Westminster. So long as he retained that position, Pitt's triumph could not be considered as complete, nor the Tory party as firmly established in the administration. Three candidates appeared on the hustings in April, 1784,—Lord Hood, Sir Cecil Wray, and Fox. So late as the twenty-sixth of the month Wray, who had sat for some time for Westminster in Parliament, maintained a small numerical advantage over Fox. The election, which began on the first of the month, had now gone on more than three weeks: ten thousand voters had polled; and it was even expected that, since the voters were exhausted, the books would be closed, and Wray, who was second on the poll, Lord Hood being first, would carry the day.

Happily we have now no adequate notion of the terrors of such an election; it was a scene of fun and malice, spirit and baseness, alternately. Englishmen seemed hardly men; whilst they one hour blustered, the next they took the bribe, and were civil. Fox went down to Westminster in a carriage with Colonel North, Lord North's son, behind as a footman, and the well-known Colonel Hanger—one of the reprobate associates of George IV. (when prince regent), and long remembered on a white horse in the park, after being deserted by the prince and out of vogue—driving in the coat, hat, and wig of a coachman. When Queen Charlotte heard of this exploit of Colonel North's she dismissed him from his office of comptroller of her household, saying she did not covet another man's servant.

As the month drew to a close, every hour became precious, and Fox gained at this critical juncture two new and potent allies. Dressed in garter-blue and buff, in compliment to Fox and his principles, forth came the young Duchess of Devonshire and her sister, now Lady Duncannon, and solicited votes for their candidate. The mob were gratified by the aspect of so much rank, so great beauty, cringing for their support. Never, it was said, had two "such lovely portraits appeared before on a canvas."

It required, indeed, no ordinary courage to undertake collecting votes, for a strong disposition to rioting now manifested itself. Nevertheless, being provided with lists of the outlying voters, these two young women drove to their dwellings. In their enterprise they had to face butchers, tailors, every craft, low or high, and to pass through the lowest, the dirtiest, and the most degraded parts of London. But Fox was a hundred votes below Wray, and his fair friends were indefatigable; they forgot their dignity, their womanhood, and "party" was their watchword. They were opposed by the Marchioness of Salisbury, whom the Tories brought forward. She was beautiful, but haughty; and her age, for she was thirty-four, whereas the Duchess of Devonshire was only twenty-six, deteriorated from the effect of her appearance.

Forgetting her rank, which Lady Salisbury always remembered, and throwing all her powers of fascination into the scale, the young duchess alighted during one of her canvassing days at a butcher's shop. The owner, in his apron and sleeves, stoutly refused his vote, except on one condition,—"Would her Grace give him a kiss?" The request was granted. This was one of the votes which swelled the number of two hundred and thirty-five above Sir Cecil Wray, and Fox stood second on the poll. Of course much stupid poetry was written on the occasion.

Even the Prince of Wales took an active interest in this memorable election; and George III. is said to have also interfered. Never was political rancour so high, nor conscience so low, as at that period. The hustings resembled the stand at Newmarket. "An even bet that he comes in second," cried one; "five to four on this day's poll," screamed another. Amid all these shouts, gazed at by the lowest of all human beings, the low not only in rank but in feeling, the drunken, paid-for voters, stood the duchess and a band of fair titled friends supporting Fox, who was called the "Man of the People."

It was the 17th of May when Fox, over whose head a scrutiny hung on the part of Sir Cecil Wray, and who was not thought even then returned as member, was chaired. This procession took place as the poll closed. Fox was carried through the streets on a chair decorated with laurel, the ladies in blue and buff forming part of the cortege. Before him was displayed the prince's plume: those three ostrich feathers, the sight of which might bring back to our minds the field of Cressy, where they were won, and henceforth worn for four successive centuries. A flag, on which was inscribed, "Sacred to Female Patriotism," was waved by a horseman in the triumphant cavalcade. The carriages of the Duke of Devonshire and the Duke of Portland attracted even less attention than that of Fox, on the box of which were Colonel North and other friends, partisans of Lord North's, who now mingled with their former opponents. As the procession turned into Pall Mall, it was observed that the gates of Carlton House were open; it passed in, therefore, and saluted, in veering round, the Prince of Wales, who, with a number of ladies and gentlemen, stood in the balustrade in front. Fox then addressed the crowd, and attempted to disperse them; but at night the mob broke out into acts of fury, illuminated and attacked those houses which were in sullen darkness.

The next day the prince invited all the rank, beauty, and fashion of the coalition party to a fÊte on his lawn. It wad a bright day that 18th of May; and under the delicious shade of the trees the young and gay forgot, perhaps, in the enchantments of the scene, politics and elections. Lord North, dressed in blue and buff,—his new livery,—strutted about amid those who only fifteen months before had execrated and denounced him, until, by the coalition with Fox, he had made himself their idol. Every one, on this occasion, crowded around the minister, whose wit was as inexhaustible as his sang-froid, and whose conversation in its playfulness resembled that of our great premier of 1859. Blue and buff pervaded the garden. Colonel North (afterward Lord Guildford) and George Byng, hitherto bitter enemies, were seen, dressed alike, walking together familiarly. The prince was irresistibly fascinating, and nothing could be more splendid than the fÊte given by royalty overwhelmed by debt.

As the party were thus enjoying themselves, by a strange coincidence, the famous cream-coloured horses of George III. were beheld proceeding in solemn state down St. James's Park. His Majesty was going to Westminster to open Parliament. Nothing but a low wall separated Canton Gardens from the park, so that the king could not forbear seeing his former minister, his son, and the successful candidate disporting themselves in all the elation of success.

In the evening Lower Grosvenor Street was blocked up with carriages, out of which gentlemen and ladies, all in blue and buff, descended to visit the famous Mrs. Crewe, whose husband, then member for Chester, was created, in 1806, Lord Crewe. This lady was as remarkable for her accomplishments and her worth as for her beauty; nevertheless, she permitted the admiration of Fox, who was in the rank of her admirers. The lines he wrote on her were not exaggerated. They began thus:

Nearly eight years after the famous election at Westminster, Mrs. Crewe was still in perfection, with a son of one and twenty, who looked like her brother. The form of her face was exquisitely lovely, her complexion radiant. "I know not," Miss Burney writes, "any female in her first youth who could bear the comparison. She uglifies every one near her."

This charming partisan of Fox had been active in his cause; and her originality of character, her good humour, her recklessness of consequences, made her a capital canvasser.

The same company that had assembled in the morning at Carlton House now crowded into Grosvenor Street. Blue and buff were the order of the evening, the Prince of Wales wearing those colours. After supper he gave a toast,—"True blue and Mrs. Crewe." The room rang with applause. The hostess rose to return thanks. "True blue, and all of you," was her toast. Nor did the festivities end here. Canton House some days afterward received all the great world, the "true blues" of London. The fÊte, which was of the most varied kind, and of the most magnificent description, began at noon, went on all night, and was not ended till the next day. Nothing could exceed its splendour. A costly banquet was prepared for the ladies, on whom his Royal Highness and the gentlemen waited whilst they were seated at table. Nothing could exceed the grace, the courtesy, the tact of the prince on these occasions, when he forgot his two hundred thousand pounds of debt, and added to them. Louis XIV., said an eye-witness, could not have eclipsed him. This was probably the brightest era in the life of the Duchess of Devonshire. She was the lady paramount of the aristocratic Whig circles, in which rank and literature were blended with political characters. Slander soon coupled her name with that of Fox; and that name, though never wholly blighted, was sullied. Miss Burney, meeting her at Bath, some years afterward, describes her as no longer beautiful, but with manners exquisitely polite, and "with a gentle quiet" of demeanour. Yet there was an expression of melancholy. "I thought she looked oppressed within," was Miss Burney's remark. On another occasion she found her more lively, and consequently more lovely, vivacity being so much her characteristic that her style of beauty required it. "She was quite gay, easy, and charming; indeed, that last word might have been coined for her;" and Miss Burney soon perceived that it was the sweetness of her smile, her open, ingenuous countenance, that had won her the celebrity which had attended her career of fashion.

But even then there was a canker in the duchess's felicity. Lady Elizabeth Foster, the daughter of the Earl of Bristol, and a contrast to her in person,—large, dark, and handsome,—had attracted the duke, her husband, and the coldest of men had become, deeply enamoured of this woman, whom he eventually married. Gibbon said of Lady Elizabeth that she was the most alluring of women. Strange to say, a sort of friendship existed between the duchess and Lady Elizabeth, who was with her at Bath, when Miss Burney saw them together. Even then a cloud hung over—these two ladies of rank; and Mrs. Ord, Miss Gurney's cautious friend, reproved her for making their acquaintance.

Three children of rare promise were given to occupy the affections which were so little reciprocated by the duke. The elder of the three, Georgiana Dorothy, afterward married to the Earl of Carlisle, and the mother of the present Duchess of Sutherland, is described by Miss Gurney, at eight years of age, as having a fine, sweet, and handsome countenance, and with the form and figure of a girl of twelve. She, as well as her sister, was at that time under the care of Miss Trimmer, the daughter of Mrs. Trimmer, one of the most admirable writers for children that has ever delighted our infancy. Miss Trimmer is described as a "pleasing, not pretty" young lady, with great serenity of manner.

Lady Henrietta Elizabeth, married to the Earl of Granville, so long ambassador at Paris, was, at six years of age, by "no means handsome, but had an open and pleasing countenance, and a Look of the most happy disposition;" a tribute borne out by the many virtues of that admirable lady in after life. The Marquis of Hartington, afterward Duke of Devonshire, then only fourteen months old (this was in 1791), had already a house, and a carriage to himself, almost in the style of royalty. He lived near his father, whilst the duchess was staying with her mother, Lady Spencer. To persons of domestic notions this seems a singular arrangement.

This apparently happy family party had, however, some trials to obscure their supposed felicity. Scandal not only pointed at Lady Elizabeth Foster as possessing an undue influence over the duke, but attacked the duchess in the most sacred relations of her life. The little marquis was reputed to be illegitimate; the report assumed several shapes; of course rancorous political partisans pointed to the intimacy with Fox; others to the intimacy at Carlton House. Another story also obtained credit, and never died away. This was that at the time when the duchess was confined, Lady Elizabeth gave birth to a son, the duchess to a daughter, and that the children were changed; that the late duke entered into a contract with his uncle, the late Lord George Cavendish, never to marry, in order that his lordship's children might have an undisputed succession at his Grace's death.

There was another source of disquiet to Lady Spencer and the duchess at this time, in the deep depression of Lady Duncannon. This lady, the mother of Lady Caroline Lamb, so conspicuous for her eccentricity in our own time, seems to have been affectionately beloved by her brother, the Lord Spencer, the grandfather of the present earl. "He made up to her," says Miss Burney, "with every mark of pitying affection, she receiving him with the most expressive pleasure, though nearly silent." This afflicted woman lived, nevertheless, to a great age, and survived her gay, spirited sister, the Duchess of Devonshire.

Lady Spencer belonged to that class whom we now call evangelical; a class earnest in feeling, originating in a sincere desire to renovate the almost dead faith of the period; to set an example of piety and decorum; and also "to let their light shine before men." Miss Burney describes her as too desirous of a reputation for charity and devotion. Nevertheless, Lady Spencer could not detach her daughter from the gay world.

The duchess continued to take an active part in politics, and to mingle with the tumult of elections, faro, and party triumphs, Love, poetry, end the fine arts. Her son was born in the dawn of that Revolution in France which shook the foundations of all social life. At this very period a serious calamity befell their country in the first fit of insanity that attacked George III. Up to the very time when France was plunged into commotion, his Majesty, apparently in perfect health, had held his weekly levees at St. James's until the last week of October, 1788. Early in November the first paroxysms of his disordered intellect occurred at the Queen's Lodge, after dinner, her Majesty and the princesses being present. The gates of the Lodge were closed that night; no answers were given to persons making inquiries; and it was rumoured that his Majesty was dead.

The state of the public mind may readily be conceived. The capital exhibited a scene of confusion and excitement only exceeded by that displayed four years afterward, when the decapitation of Louis XVI. was announced in London.

A regency was proposed; and six physicians were called in to act in consultation. Doctor Warren was considered to hold the first place in this learned junto. Doctor Addington, the father of the late Lord Sidmouth, Sir Lucas Pepys, and Doctor Willis were amongst the rest. Warren was disposed to Whiggism, and thought the king's recovery doubtful. Willis was a Tory, and pronounced it possible, and indeed probable. His dictum was believed at St. James's and at Kew Palace; Warren was credited at Carlton House and Devonshire House. If the first was the oracle of White's, the second was trusted at Brookes's. The famous Duchess of Gordon, the partisan of Pitt and Dundas, supported Willis and his views, and was the whipper-in of the Tory party. The Duchess of Devonshire was the firm and powerful supporter of the prince, in his claims to the regency. The Tories were for the power not only over the royal household, but over the council, being vested in Queen Charlotte. A caricature was circulated representing the Lord Chancellor, Pitt, and Dundas, as the three "weird sisters" gazing at the full moon. Her orb was half enlightened, half eclipsed. The part in darkness contained the king's profile; on the other side was a head, resplendent in light, graciously gazing at the weird sisters; that was the queen. In the February of the ensuing year, nevertheless, to the great joy of the nation, the king showed signs of amendment. One day, Mr. Greville, brother to the Earl of Warwick, was standing near the king's bed, and relating to Doctor Willis that Lord North had made inquiries after the king's health. "Has he?" said the king. "Where did he make them, at St. James's, or here?" An answer being given, "Lord North," said his Majesty, "is a good man, unlike the others. He is a good man." The party at Carlton House, amongst whom the Duchess of Devonshire must ever be ranked, were disappointed at this timely recovery, whilst the honest-hearted middle and lower classes of England were unfeignedly rejoiced; but there was too much party rancour existing for any better spirit to arise and show itself. Even in society, the venom of party was suffered to intrude. Lord Mountnorris, being one evening at a ball given by the French ambassador, canvassed the whole room for a partner, but in vain. He begged Miss Vernon to interfere, and to procure him a partner for a country dance. She complied, and presented him to a very elegant young lady, with whom his lordship danced, and conversed some time. Soon afterward a gentleman said to him, "Pray, my lord, do you know with whom you have been dancing?" "No," he replied; "pray who is she?" "Coalitions," said the gentleman, "will never end; why, it is Miss Fox, the niece of Charles, and sister of Lord Holland." The noble lord was thunderstruck. Had Pitt seen him? If so, he was undone. He ran up to reproach Miss Vernon. "True," was the reply; "she is the niece of Fox, but since she has twenty thousand pounds to her fortune, I thought I had not acted improperly in introducing you."

In the famous quarrel between Burke and Fox, the Duchess of Devonshire took the office of mediator. Burke thus attacked Fox in the House of Commons.

"Mr. Fox," he said, "has treated me with harshness and malignity. After harassing with his light troops in the skirmishes of 'order,' he has brought the heavy artillery of his own great abilities to bear on me. There have," he added, "been many differences between Mr. Fox and myself, but there has been no loss of friendship between us. There is something in this cursed French constitution which envenoms everything."

Fox whispered, "There is no loss of friendship between us." Burke replied, "There is. I know the price of my conduct: our friendship is at an end."

Fox was overwhelmed with grief at these words. He rose to reply, but his feelings deprived him of utterance. Relieved by a burst of tears, whilst a deep silence pervaded the house, he at last spoke.

"However events," he said, in deep emotion, "may have altered the mind of my honourable friend,—for so I must still call him,—I cannot so easily consent to relinquish and dissolve that intimate connection which has for twenty-five years subsisted between us. I hope that Mr. Burke will think on past times, and whatever conduct of mine has caused the offence, he will at least believe that I did not intend to offend." But the quarrel was never reconciled, notwithstanding the good offices of the Duchess of Devonshire, the friend of both parties.

Soon after the commencement of the eighteenth century, this party spirit was, as it were, rebuked, first by the death of Pitt, and afterward by that of Fox, who was long in a declining state. When he heard that Pitt had expired, he said, "Pitt has died in January, perhaps I may go off in June. I feel my constitution dissolving." When asked by a friend, during the month of August, to make one of a party in the country at Christmas, he declined.

"It will be a new scene," said his friend. "I shall indeed be in a new scene by Christmas next," Mr. Fox replied. On that occasion he expressed his belief in the immortality of the soul; "but how," he added, "it acts as separated from the body, is beyond my capacity of judgment." Mr. Fox took his hand and wept. "I am happy," he added, "full of confidence; I may say of certainty."

One of his greatest desires was to be removed to St. Ann's Hill, near Chertsey, the scene of his later, his reformed, his happier life. His physicians hesitated, and recommended his being carried first to the Duke of Devonshire's house at Chiswick. Here, for a time, he seemed to recover health and spirits. Mrs. Fox, Lady Holland, his niece, and Lady Elizabeth Foster were around his death-bed. Many times did he take leave of those dearest to him; many times did death hover over him; yet we find no record that the Duchess of Devonshire was amongst those who received his last sigh. His last words to Mrs. Fox and Lord Holland were, "God bless you, bless you, and you all! I die happy—I pity you!"

"Oh! my country!" were Pitt's last words; those of Fox were equally characteristic. His nature was tender and sympathetic, and had he lived in other times he would have been probably as good as he was great.

His remains were removed from Chiswick to his own apartments in St. James's, and conveyed under a splendid canopy to Westminster Abbey. As the gorgeous procession passed Carlton House, a band of music, consisting of thirty, played the "Dead March in Saul." The Prince of Wales had wished to follow his friend on foot to the grave, but such a tribute was forbidden by etiquette.

It is to be regretted that princes must be exempted from so many of the scenes in this sublunary life calculated to touch the heart, to chasten and elevate the spirit. As the funeral entered the abbey, and those solemn words, "I am the Resurrection and the Life," were chanted, the deepest emotion affected those who had known and loved him whose pall they bore.

Among other tributes to the memory of Fox were the following lines from the pen of the Duchess of Devonshire. The visitor to Woburn Abbey will find them underneath the bust of the great statesman in a temple dedicated to Liberty by the late Duke of Bedford.

The duchess only survived Fox a year; she died in 1806, beloved, charitable, penitent. Her disease was an abscess of the liver, which was detected rather suddenly, and which proved fatal some months after it was first suspected. When the Prince of Wales heard of her death, he remarked: "Then the best-natured and best-bred woman in England is gone." Her remains were conveyed to the family vault of the Cavendish family in All Saints' Church, Derby; and over that sepulchre one fond heart, at all events, sorrowed. Her sister, Lady Duncannon, though far inferior to the duchess in elegance both of mind and person, had the same warm heart and strong affection for her family. During the month of July, 1811, a short time before the death of the Duke of Devonshire (the husband of the duchess), Sir Nathaniel Wraxall visited the vault of All Saints' Church. As he stood admiring the coffin in which the remains of the once lovely Georgiana lay mouldering, the woman who had accompanied him showed him the shreds of a bouquet which lay on the coffin. Like the mortal coil of that frame within, the bouquet was now reduced almost to dust. "That nosegay," said the woman, "was brought here by the Countess of Besborough, who had intended to place it herself upon the coffin of her sister; but as she approached the steps of the vault, her agony became too great to permit her to proceed. She knelt down on the stones of the church, as nearly over the place where the coffin stood in the vault below as I could direct, and there deposited the flowers, enjoining me to perform an office to which she was unequal. I fulfilled her wishes."

By others the poor duchess was not so faithfully remembered. Her friend Lady Elizabeth Foster had long since become her rival, yet one common secret, it was believed, kept them from a rupture. Both had, it was understood, much to conceal. The story of the late Duke of Devonshire's supposed birth has been referred to: he is supposed to have been the son of the duke, but not of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, but of her who afterward bore that title, Lady Elizabeth Foster. The inflexible determination of the late duke to remain single, according, it is said, to an agreement between him and his uncle, then Lord George Cavendish, always seemed to imply, in a man of such pure and domestic tastes, so affectionate a disposition, and so princely a fortune, some dire impediment.

In 1824, Lady Elizabeth Foster, then the second Duchess of Devonshire, expired at Rome, where she had lived many years in almost regal splendour. Amongst her most intimate friends were the Cardinal Consalvi and Madame RÉcamier, who were cognisant of the report, which was confirmed in their minds by the late duke's conduct at her death. Lady Elizabeth, as we shall still by way of distinction call her, was then so emaciated as to resemble a living spectre; but the lines of a rare and commanding beauty still remained. Her features were regular and noble, her eyes magnificent, and her attenuated figure was upright and dignified, with the step of an empress. Her complexion of marble paleness completed this portrait. Her beautiful arms and hands were still as white as ivory, though almost like a skeleton's from their thinness. She used in vain to attempt to disguise their emaciation by wearing bracelets and rings. Though surrounded by every object of art in which she delighted, by the society, both of the English, Italian, and French persons of distinction whom she preferred, there was a shade of sadness on this fascinating woman's brow, as if remembrance forbade her usual calm of life's decline.

Her stepson (so reported), the late duke, treated her with respect and even affection, but there was an evident reserve between them. At her death he carefully excluded all friends to whom she could in her last moments confide what might perhaps, at that hour, trouble her conscience. Her friends, Madame RÉcamier and the Duc de Laval, were only admitted to bid her farewell when she was speechless, and a few minutes before she breathed her last.

This circumstance struck them forcibly as confirmatory of the report alluded to; but it must in candour be stated that the duke's precautions may have originated in another source. His step-mother was disposed to Romanism, and he may have feared that the zeal of her Catholic friends should prompt them, if opportunity occurred, to speak to her on the subject of her faith, and to suggest the adoption of such consolations as their own notions would have thought indispensable at that awful moment. The point is one that cannot be settled. It may, however, be remarked, that in disposition, in his wide benevolence and courteous manners, the late duke greatly resembled the subject of this memoir,—the beautiful, the gifted, but the worldly Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire.