CHAPTER XIII.
To Mrs. W. Robinson.—“Sandleford, February 3, 1784.... The air-balloons, without a pun, may be said to rise higher and higher, by every experiment. Messrs. Roberts performed a journey of 150 miles in six hours. By this mode of travelling I might go hence to my house in Northumberland in twelve hours; but till the aerial navigation is more ascertained, I shall not attempt it; lest, instead of finding myself at the verge of my coal-pits, the end of my journey, I should alight on the summit of a Welsh mountain.
“Montagu had last night the pleasure of receiving a very kind and sensible letter from your son, and every stroke of his pen sets ye mark of a good heart. I think you will have great comfort in him. The most brilliant persons are not always the happiest or most esteem’d; more rarely still the best-beloved. Too much presumption in their own excellencies, too little indulgence to the defects of others, if it does not totally destroy our admiration, certainly eliminates our affection; and it is far better to be beloved than admired.
“... As to the new plantations (at Sandleford), their progress to perfection will be so much slower than mine to decay, I cannot expect to see much advance there; but the hope of their giving pleasure to those I love, when I am no more, will render themobjects of pleasant contemplation.... If you have seen the Recorder lately, he would perhaps tell you that we had an alarm of fire one night, but it was extinguished and all danger over in less than an hour. The fire began from my old dressing-room. It is the second time it has happened there. The first accident was many years ago. You may imagine we no longer hazard making a fire in a chimney which has such communication with timber. I assure you, on the cry of Fire! in the house at four in the morning, Montagu jump’d out of bed, rush’d into my room, and begg’d that he might immediately conduct me down stairs, with a tender zeal, equal to that of the pious Æneas to the old Anchises. The end of the passage, from the dressing-room to my bedchamber, appeared to be in flames, but we had one staircase at a distance, which promised a safe retreat; so that really I was not so much agitated, or he any way disordered. Montagu, by his alacrity, was of infinite use. The first water thrown on the flames boil’d up; but he and a blind man whom I have kept ever since he lost his sight, which is about fifteen years since, were more useful than all the rest of the family. I sent to Newtown to call up the workmen employ’d at my new offices, and they pull’d up the beams and rafters as soon as the flames were quench’d. My Newtown neighbours behav’d with great neighbourly kindness, but all the assistance had been in vain, if I had not been awake and rais’d the family at the first crackling of the fire; for it made very rapid advances. I was much complimented on my courage, from which my composure was suppos’d to arise, but I confess that composure had its rise in cowardice. I was so gladto find our lives were not in danger, that ye consequences threatened to my property made little impression. The coward’s declaration, ‘Spare my life and take all I have!’ seem’d to be the expression of my mind. Thank God! the damage has been in all respects very trifling. I am very glad that this alarm did not happen after my lord primate and Sir W. Robinson arrived. A fire is the worstfête champetreone can treat one’s friends with.
“... Business will detain me here for a fortnight longer.... I shall then go to Bath for about a month, to enjoy the primate’s society, who generally spends the evening with me. I have not any pretence to drink the waters, being perfectly well. I may take a little of them, perhaps, as I love to fall in with the customs of the place in which I reside.
“... My great piece of feather-work is not yet compleated; so, if you have an opportunity of getting me any feathers, they will be very acceptable. The brown tails of partridges are very useful, tho’ not so brilliant as some others.”
At sixty-five, Mrs. Montagu did not consider herself too old to figure at court. The poets had not ceased to take interest in her and to make her the subject of their rhymes. “Have you seen Mr. Jerningham’s lines on Mrs. Montagu falling down-stairs at the Drawing-room?” asks little Miss Port of her father, in a letter dated February, 1785, in the Delany correspondence. “In case you should not, I will send them to you.”
“Ye valiant Fair! ye Hebes of the day,Who heedless laugh your little hours away!Let caution be your guide, whene’er you sportWithin the splendid precincts of the Court.The event of yesterday for prudence calls—’Tis dangerous treading where Minerva falls!”
“Ye valiant Fair! ye Hebes of the day,Who heedless laugh your little hours away!Let caution be your guide, whene’er you sportWithin the splendid precincts of the Court.The event of yesterday for prudence calls—’Tis dangerous treading where Minerva falls!”
“Ye valiant Fair! ye Hebes of the day,Who heedless laugh your little hours away!Let caution be your guide, whene’er you sportWithin the splendid precincts of the Court.The event of yesterday for prudence calls—’Tis dangerous treading where Minerva falls!”
“Ye valiant Fair! ye Hebes of the day,
Who heedless laugh your little hours away!
Let caution be your guide, whene’er you sport
Within the splendid precincts of the Court.
The event of yesterday for prudence calls—
’Tis dangerous treading where Minerva falls!”
Minerva’s sympathies were now aroused by a family incident, thus narrated to Mrs. Robinson: “March ye 15, 1785.... I know my brother and you and your daughters will be glad to hear Montagu is going to be married, in a manner which is agreable to himself and to me. The young lady is so form’d and qualified as to please both the fancy and the judgment, and her fortune such as to content any reasonable wishes. She has £45,000 in present; £3,000 more is to remain in the funds to secure an annuity to a very old person during his life, and who has been sometime bedridden; so it will soon come into Miss Charlton. She has also an annuity of £300 a year on the life of a young prodigal; but the regular payment of this is not to be depended upon. She has also some other little contingencies; so that her fortune is not estimated at less than fifty thousand pounds by her guardians.
“From Montagu’s good character, those guardians and her relations are very desirous of the match, which will take place when the lawyers compleat the settlements—an affair which I fear will take up no small time, as they have no mercy on the impatience of lovers. She is a ward of Chancery, so many forms are necessary. You may imagine pretty large settlements in land, both present and future, will be required from me; but, as Montagu’s happiness and prosperity is my great object, I shall comply with every reasonable condition. Miss Charlton’s excellent understanding, and her gentle and unaffectedmanners, render her very agreable. She has a very pleasing countenance, and tho’ rather little, is finely made and remarkably genteel. She is an orphan, but is with her grandmother—a very sensible, well-bred woman, and who is almost as much in love with Montagu as her granddaughter is. It adds much to my satisfaction that those who were at Mrs. Terry’s boarding-school with Miss Charlton are very fond of her, and speak highly of her good temper; to which, indeed, her guardians and intimate acquaintance give ye strongest testimony. As good humour is the great ingredient of human happiness, it gives me much delight to find my dear Montagu will find it in his partner. His own temper is the happiest I ever knew. We dined yesterday at the Bishop of Salisbury’s. I was glad his lordship did not ask how many months in the year yourcaro sposospent at Burfield.... Mr. Pitt is thought to gain ground daily, and the opposition babble is little attended to in the House. The town is very gay. The balls are protracted to seven in the morning. Montagu danced till that hour the other night at the Duchess of Bolton’s, but he yawned so horribly the next morning, I think when he is Benedict ye married man, he will not caper at that hour to please ye young ladies. He din’d to-day at ye young lady’s guardians, and is not come home, or would send his duty.”
“July ye 12th, 1785.... You would know by various sources of intelligence how our matrimonial negotiations went forward, and the day on which they were happily compleated. So I will begin my history where your information ended,—our getting into our carriages at the door of Marybonne Church.
“Venus no longer sends her car and doves; but a post-chaise with four able horses and two brisk postillions do as well. At Salt Hill, we stopp’d to take some refreshment. I eat a good deal of cold ham and chicken. The lovers sigh’d and look’d, sigh’d and look’d, and sigh’d again, and piddled a little on a gooseberry tart. At Reading, we drunk tea, and there Lord Lansdowne, being also on the road, came to us and made his compliments, but with so much delicacy as not to bring ye maiden’s blush into ye cheeks of the bride. Indeed, for fear of distressing her, I did not present her to his lordship, so he only made her a low bow, accompanied by an emphatical look. To the bridegroom, he wished joy. At eight, we arrived at Sandleford. Our soup and bouillie had been ready for some hours; the rest was soon dress’d. We avoided passing through the town of Newbury; so the bells there, which were jangling on the happy occasion, did not give us any disturbance. The decent dignity of the bride’s behaviour and the delicacy of the bridegroom’s did them honour, and gave me great pleasure; and we are three as happy people as can be found in any part of the habitable globe.
“Mrs. Matthew Montagu is much pleased with Sandleford. It was always the favourite of her husband; and now he has got a fair Eve, it appears to him a Paradise. I am in perfect health and perfect content, which is enough for me. Joy and rapture are for youth.
“... The Bath is a dull place. Tunbridge has a pert character. The Pantile Walk in summer is pleasanter than the Pump Room at Bath in ye winter;and as anything original pleases more than a bad imitation, I must own I pass’d my time there with lessennuithan in the city of Bath, where the London life is awkwardly imitated.
“... It is believed that Lady Sutherland will marry Lord Trentham; and some suppose Miss Pulteney will be bestow’d on Lord Morton. I am glad, for the credit of our sex, neither of these ladies make a scamper to Gretna Green.
“... Our brother, the Recorder, has acted in a very friendly and generous manner towards us,—bestow’d without favour or reward much patience and skill on the voluminous settlements, which the mercenary spirit of the lawyers employ’d to draw them had extended over as many acres of parchment as, converted into green land, would make a pretty little farm; and for which, I suppose, they will charge as much as would purchase a tolerably good one. To effect this, they were so tedious in their proceedings; for my proposals were immediately and perfectly approved both by the Lord Chancellor and Master in Chancery.
“... The bride and bridegroom beg you all to accept their proper respect.”
The following descriptive letter, addressed to Mrs. Robinson, Castle Street, Reading, was franked by Mr. Matthew Montagu, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, September 22, 1786:
“... I arrived at Mrs. Garrick’s, at Hampton, the evening of the day on which I visited you at Reading, and spent five days with her; making, indeed, almost every day an excursion to London to visit my poor friend, Mrs. Vesey, whom I foundin a very declining state of health. From Hampton, I went to the Dowager Lady Spencer’s, at St. Albans, where I passed two days very agreably, and regretted that my business here would not allow me to prolong my visit. The history of La Fée Bienfaisante is not half so delightful as seeing the manner in which Lady Spencer spends her day. Every moment of it is employed in some act of benevolence and charity. Her ladyship carried me to see the remains of the seat of the great Lord Bacon, at Gorhambury, where remains, but is soon to be pulled down, the gallery in which he passed those hours of study which pointed out the road to science, and investigation of the works of nature. The estate is now in the possession of Lord Grimston, who has built a fine house there; but I could not help sighing at the reflection that the posterity of the ridiculous author of ‘Love in a Hollow Tree,’ should build on the ruins of Lord Bacon’s habitation.
“From St. Albans I struck into the highroad at Welling, not without paying the tribute of a sigh to the memory of my old friend Doctor Young. From that place till I got into Yorkshire, I did not see any interesting objects but the mile-stones.... Here, at my Gothick mansion near Newcastle, the naiads are dirty with the coal-keels, and the dryads’ tresses are torn and dishevelled with the rough blasts of Boreas. My lot has not fallen on a fair ground, but it would be ungrateful not to own it is a goodly heritage, and makes a decent figure when it arrives at ye shop of Hoare and Co., in Fleet Street. A week after me, arrived in perfect health my nephew and neice Montagu. We are always here plagued with highwinds, and this season they have raged with great violence; but as this house was built in 1620, I hope it will not now yield to storms it has braved for now two hundred years. The walls are of immense thickness, having been built of strength to resist our Scottish neighbours, who, before the Union, made frequent visits to this part of the world. My Gothick windows admit light, but exclude prospect; so that, when sitting down, I can see only the tops of the trees.
“... I observe with great pleasure that Montagu has a happy turn for business, and applies himself to learning the science of coal-mine-working, of which many coal-owners are ignorant entirely, but none ought to be so. Without working in the mines, the process may be, to a certain extent, understood by any one who possesses any mathematical knowledge. The late Duke of Northumberland was very able in all those matters. Lord Mount-Stewart is now at Newcastle attending the business of the collieries he acquired by his marriage with Lord Windsor’s daughter. Lord Carlisle never comes into Northumberland, but leaves his affairs entirely to his agents. Lord Ravensworth was very attentive to his collieries, but his heir, Sir Henry Liddell, is of a very different character. He amused himself and neighbours with the exhibition of two Lapland women whom he imported. He collects all sorts of wild beasts; and his ale-cellars make beasts of men. It is strange that Lord Ravensworth should prefer such a nephew to his grandsons.
“... I am obliged to you for your kind attention to my feather-work. The neck and breast feathersof the stubble goose are very useful, and I wish your cook would save those of the Michaelmas goose for us. Things homely and vulgar are sometimes more useful than the elegant, and the feathers of the goose may be better adapted to some occasions than the plumes of the phœnix.”
Mrs. Montagu was ever touching and reëmbellishing her famous “feather-hangings.” Cowper has told in song how—
“The birds put off their every hue,To dress a room for Montagu.”
“The birds put off their every hue,To dress a room for Montagu.”
“The birds put off their every hue,To dress a room for Montagu.”
“The birds put off their every hue,
To dress a room for Montagu.”
Peacock, pheasant, swan, and “all tribes beside of Indian name,” says the poet, contributed plumage of—
“... splendour ever new,Safe with protecting Montagu.”
“... splendour ever new,Safe with protecting Montagu.”
“... splendour ever new,Safe with protecting Montagu.”
“... splendour ever new,
Safe with protecting Montagu.”
To “her court,” thus decorated, resorted genius, wit, philosophy, learning, and fancy:
“All these to Montagu’s repair,Ambitious of a shelter there.She thus maintains divided sway,With yon bright regent of the day;The plume and poet both, we know,Their lustre to his influence owe;And she, the works of Phœbus aiding,Both poet saves, and plume, from fading.”
“All these to Montagu’s repair,Ambitious of a shelter there.She thus maintains divided sway,With yon bright regent of the day;The plume and poet both, we know,Their lustre to his influence owe;And she, the works of Phœbus aiding,Both poet saves, and plume, from fading.”
“All these to Montagu’s repair,Ambitious of a shelter there.She thus maintains divided sway,With yon bright regent of the day;The plume and poet both, we know,Their lustre to his influence owe;And she, the works of Phœbus aiding,Both poet saves, and plume, from fading.”
“All these to Montagu’s repair,
Ambitious of a shelter there.
She thus maintains divided sway,
With yon bright regent of the day;
The plume and poet both, we know,
Their lustre to his influence owe;
And she, the works of Phœbus aiding,
Both poet saves, and plume, from fading.”
To Mrs. Robinson. “Portman Square, February 8, 1787.... I have been in town almost three weeks, in all which time I have not had three hours of leisure. At my arrival in Portman Square, my porter presented me with an infinite number of cardsof invitation, letters, notes, and not a few books, presents from their authors. I flattered myself that in four or five days this bustle would begin to subside, but another cause of receiving visits and writing notes and letters began. The occasion was, indeed, such as gave me great pleasure, even that on which you so obligingly congratulated me. So good-natured was the world to the old aunt, that many members of the House of Commons who had heard his speech, and many of the House of Lords who had heard of it, called in the morning to congratulate me, and, indeed, for several mornings, I had a levée like a minister. Nothing ominous; I hope that ye young man who was the occasion, will never be in that situation which, I perfectly agree with my friend Soame Jenyns, is the most miserable of any, except that of king in a free country. Ladies wrote me congratulatory notes from all quarters of the town, and I have since had letters from my distant correspondents in the country, on the subject of the Drawing-room. I received many compliments, but those which most flattered my vanity were from the greatest lady there, the first minister, the Lord Chancellor, and some distinguished persons in the opposition. However, as these glories soon fade away, and such a kind of speech is forgotten in a few days, the most heartfelt joy I had, arose from the delight his brother express’d on his success. The wise man says, A brother is born for the day of adversity; and, indeed, there are few men so wicked as not to pity and assist a brother in misfortune. But the good and great mind alone takes delight in the success and fame of a brother. The envious think they can escape censure when theyneglect a friend or relative in prosperity, and indulge their malice safely in giving little hints to their disadvantage; but my nephew show’d a different kind of spirit. As soon as the House was up, he ran to Mrs. M. Montagu, to his mother, and to me, and with a most joyous countenance, and in a most expressive manner, told me in what manner our young orator’s speech had been received in the House. Montagu felt this instance of fraternal affection with the tenderness and gratitude it deserved, and I hope they will be through life an honour and happiness to each other. You rightly imagine the wife and aunt are not without anxiety, lest parliamentary exertions and attendance should hurt our young man’s health, but at present he is perfectly well.
“... The only thing that induces the primate to prolong his stay at Bath is that he is not lame. The dumb gout, as he calls it, which used to make him so, has for some months in a manner forsaken him, and he thinks it prudent to endeavour to bring it back.
“... I should have been very anxious if such a cargo as the virtues and amiabilities of dear Miss Arnold had been put on board the horrid mail-coach; so, I am obliged to her for complying with my entreaties to take a slower but safer conveyance.... I write in much hurry; the letter-bell tinkles.”
The speech referred to in the above letter was made by Mr. Matthew Montagu, when seconding the motion on the royal address with which Parliament was opened. The speech was warmly eulogistic of Mr. Eden’s commercial treaty. Fox praised the young speaker and tore his argument to pieces.
Wraxall, referring, in the “Memoirs of His Own Time,” to Mrs. Montagu’s nephew, Matthew Robinson, says: “The celebrated Mrs. Montagu, his aunt, who so long occupied the first place among thegens de lettres, in London, having adopted him as her heir, he received her husband’s name. At her feet he was brought up,—a school more adapted to form a man of taste and improvement than a statesman or a man of the world. After this gentleman entered the House of Commons, there was some difficulty in distinguishing between him (Matthew Montagu) and Montagu Matthew. General Matthew himself defined the distinction. ‘I wish it to be understood,’ said he, ‘that there is no more likeness between Montagu Matthew and Matthew Montagu than between a chesnut horse and a horse-chesnut.’”
On the Sea-wall at SouthamptonPhotogravure after the painting by Clairir
On the Sea-wall at SouthamptonPhotogravure after the painting by Clairir
On the Sea-wall at Southampton
Photogravure after the painting by Clairir
To Mrs. Robinson. “Sandleford, July 14, 1787.... That I was delighted at becoming a grandmother, for such I account myself to the dear babe, cannot be doubted; and surely it is the most agreable and becoming office of old age. I have always wonder’d at the wild and rash ambition which impell’d men to wish and seek for conditions and offices to which they were not by talents or circumstances well adapted; but I may say without vanity, I have the age, the experience, the wrinkles, the foibles which form the compleat character of grandmother; and I long to be in full office, but it will be above a fortnight before father, mother, child and cradle will be fix’d at Sandleford.... I should have been under dreadful anxieties if she had not been so well; for she is the most amiable, agreable, and valuable young woman I ever knew. She is a mere mortal, and, Isuppose, she must have some faults; but tho’ I have watched her continually, I have never been able to discover any in her.
“... I am not interested in the Christmas quarter. When one is too old to play at blind man’s buff and hunt the whistle, I think one cannot pass a merry Christmas in the country.
‘Tower’d cities pleased us then,And the busy haunts of men.’
‘Tower’d cities pleased us then,And the busy haunts of men.’
‘Tower’d cities pleased us then,And the busy haunts of men.’
‘Tower’d cities pleased us then,
And the busy haunts of men.’
Good society and the animated circle of a great town supply all that the winter season deprives us of.
“... I was much pleas’d with a work of Mr. Morgan’s, your son’s tutor, which he had the goodness to send me. I think it not only very ingenious and well written, but that it will have a very good effect upon the shallow wits and foolish pedants who affect to be infidels by way of showing their parts and learning.... I have visited and been visited by the Pocock family, settled here. They seem very good kind of people.”
“Friday, September ye 14th, 1787.To Mrs. Robinson at Mr. Baker’s Circulating Library, Southampton.—I think there is greater variety in the environs of Southampton than in any part of England perhaps; and all in the noble style,—the great ocean, the wide forest, and scenes of rural beauty are all within reach of our airing. So, as the humour points to theallegroor thepenseroso, you may direct your jaunts, and find the nereids, or the dryads, or Pomona receive you with their best graces and softest smiles.
“... The lord primate departs from Bristol to-day, and intends to come to Sandleford the beginning ofnext week. His grace had appointed a day for doing me that favour six weeks ago; but the journey caused a return of the gravel, and he was oblig’d to stop at Marlbro’, and sent a servant to tell us of the disappointment. So Mrs. Scott and I went to him and staid two days, at the end of which he was able to return to Bristol by gentle journeys, and return to the use of the Bristol waters, which, indeed, his physician was very loth he should quit; and, thank God, he has not since had any return of the complaint.
“... I have had a succession of company in my house; attention to them, and morning airings and domestick business have engross’d my time. In the present state of my house, I have only one spare room, which was first occupied by Doctor and Mrs. Wharton; then by Doctor Beattie; then by Mr. and Mrs. Smelt and their neices.
“... Montagu set out for Denton on Monday last, to give his attention to opening a new seam of coal. It gave me great pleasure to see him apply to the knowledge of collieries, which not above two or three of our gentlemen, interested in those valuable possessions, will take the trouble to do.
“... You will find Sandleford embellish’d since you saw it. I have now thirty men at work, making a piece of water down to ye river from ye water on the side of the wood. It will have a very beautiful effect.
“... Will you pardon my making a bold and impertinent petition. The trout season being now over, I shall be distress’d how to provide fish for the primate. If any day after Wednesday next, youwould let one of your servants purchase the finest dish of fish the sea produces and direct it, accompanied by a crab and a lobster, to me, to be left at the turnpike at Newtown, Hants, I will not grudge any price for it. I would not be thus troublesome for any guest I did not so much wish to indulge as the primate.... Mrs. M. Montagu desires her most respectful compliments to you.”
“Portman Square, January ye 10th, 1788.... I found London on my arrival, the 11th of November, according to the old song, ‘A fine town and a gallant city.’ I never knew it so full of the fine world at that season of the year. At Christmas it is theTonto go into the country for the holydays; but yet, on New Year’s Day, the Drawing-room was as much crowded as it used to be during the sitting of the parliament; but what adds most to the pleasure of society is the satisfaction all people express at our triumphs over the ungrateful Dutch and the insidious French. The Mynheers and the Mounseers bow before us, and all this obtain’d without any bloodshed, and at little expense.
“I cannot by the best information form any conjecture how the fermentations in France will end. I rather think the spirit of liberty they have imported from America will be beat up into the froth of remonstrances and satires, than have any solid effect. A nabob has purchas’d Mr. Sawbridge’s house, who, being as prudent in domestick as sagacious in publick affairs, is oblig’d to give it up to his creditors.”
In 1788, Mrs. Montagu adopted a fashion which had been introduced by the Duke of Dorset, of giving athé. The Duke had been our ambassadorin France, and had brought thence a fashion, reasonable enough, of offering a tea at eight to people who dined at two; but unreasonable in England, where the hour for dinner, in great houses, was six o’clock. Hannah More describes the teas as Mme. de Bocage, nearly forty years before, had described Mrs. Montagu’s breakfasts. From fifty to a hundred guests were seated at a long table or made up little parties at small ones. The cloth was laid as at breakfast, and the tea was made by the company. Every one had a napkin, as at a public breakfast. The table was covered with hot buttered-rolls, muffins, bread and butter, and wafers. Hannah More adds to her description, made in nearly the above words: “Of all nations under the sun, as I take it the English are the greatest fools.” At the breakfasts in Hill Street there was appetite with clear intellects; at the “Bluestocking” coteries there, a select circle, and not a fool among them; but what wit could there be among people eating buttered muffins two hours after a heavy dinner and strong port wine?
“December, 1788.My dear Neice:—As I was indebted to you for the favour of a letter, when I left Sandleford, I should have fulfill’d my promise of sending you whatever news I could collect in the great metropolis; but instead of finding this town the seat of gayety, I found it the abode of melancholly. Every countenance (except of the fox kind) looked dejected. The king’s illness and our country’s danger occupied every mind, and tinctured every conversation with melancholly and anxiety. The reports of his majesty’s condition for these three days have been much more favorable than any time since hewas first taken ill; so the hopes of being again under the government of a good king are revived, and the dread of a bad set of men who wanted to usurp his power, has, from the spirited conduct of the houses of parliament, much abated.
“Mr. Fox is in a very bad state of health. His rapid journeys to England, on the news of the king’s illness, have brought on him a violent complaint in the bowels, which will, it is imagined, prove mortal. However, if it should, it will vindicate his character from the general report that he has no bowels, as has been most strenuously asserted by his creditors.
“After I left Mrs. Boscawen’s, at Richmond, I passed a week very agreably with my dear friends at Shooter’s Hill; and should have prolonged my stay there if I had not been afraid to meet December in the country. The weather has justified my apprehensions. Weather makes small part of the comforts of a London life, and I have pass’d my time very comfortably. Twice or thrice a week, I invite seven or eight agreable persons to dine with me. On others days, I often prevail on some intimate friend to partake of my mutton and chicken, which, with the visits of such of my acquaintance as are in town, give me enough of society. I have not been out of my house above four times since I came to town, the first of December, for I am afraid to expose my weak eyes to the northern blast.
“My nephew Robinson set out for Horton on Christmas Day. Montagu and his family intend to continue at Shooter’s Hill till ye parliament meet daily.... He comes up in a morning to attend the House, and returns the next morning, but gives methe pleasure of seeing him when he comes to town; and a kind visit I had also from her yesterday. Few of the gentlemen of either House of Parliament have yet brought their ladies to London, so you will not wonder there is little news stirring but of the political kind. However, there is a marriage going forward, at which I am rejoyced, as it will add to the happiness of two persons whose paternal conduct well deserves that reward. Many in our town dissipate the estates they inherited from their ancestors, and suffer their noble mansions to fall to ruin; but Lord and Lady Mount Edgcumbe, by prudent conduct, have retrieved the family estates, which his lordship’s elder brother had embarrass’d; all which will now be secured by settlements and inherited by their posterity. Mr. Edgcumbe is going to be married to Lady Sophia Hobart. Lord Mount Edgcumbe behaves very generously in his settlements.... The joy those good parents express at seeing their son now out of danger of any imprudent choice or vicious connection is great. Indeed, a parent’s satisfaction in his son can never be compleat till the important point of his marriage is accomplish’d; for, if he marries a trumpery girl, she not only does not bring any addition to the family property, but the elevation of her situation so much above her birth, will probably make her extravagant and fall into absurd method that will ruin it.”
To her niece. “Portman Square, December 31, 1789.... The kind of life one leads at Bath, tho’ it offers but few amusements, allows no leisure. Sauntering is the business of the place. Beaux in boots, and misses in great coats, visit all the morning, and,having nothing better to do themselves, will not suffer others to do anything that is better. My evenings are always agreably engaged with my friends. The Bath is chiefly fill’d with Irish, but there were many persons there with whom I live in a great degree of intimacy when in London. I had the pleasure of finding and leaving the primate and Sir William Robinson in perfect health. I expect his grace will be in town in a few days. Sir William will remain at Bath and pursue the warm bathing, which he finds very beneficial.
“... My nephew Robinson was so good as to be with me at Bath.... I came to town yesterday sennight. The cold lodging-houses at Bath, and the chill journey, made me feel myself wonderfully comfortable in this good and substantial mansion. Ever since I first inhabited it, I have been sensible how much a good habitation softens the severity and enlivens the gloom of winter.
“Montagu is gone to Lord Harrowby’s to spend ye holydays. He acquitted himself admirably of all his devoirs at Bath. He danced as many minouets, caper’d as many cotillions, and skipp’d as many country-dances as any young gentleman at ye place. He usually open’d the ball, and danc’d to the last. Indeed, with a great deal of prudence and discretion, he has as lively, gay spirits as any one I ever knew; so, he is happy at all times and in all places, and makes those who are with him so.
“... We all imagine Mr. Pitt will have little to fear from the opposition. I do not hear any news. It would be doing too much honour to ye slanders of the newspapers to contradict them.
“... You did my letters undeserved honour in taking the trouble to copy them. As I am arrived at an age to look back on my past life with more pleasure, perhaps, than to future expectations, I have found some satisfaction in the recollection of former days, which letters then written present to the mind in a more distinct and lively manner than memory can do. Whatever gave one great joy or great grief, leaves strong marks on the mind, but the soft, gentle pleasures, like ye annual flowers in a garden, pass away with ye season, unless thus preserved.” These reflections denote the way whither this Lady of the Last Century was going. Hannah More, noted, in 1790, the change that had come over the old order of things. In April, she chronicles, indeed, “a pleasant party,” at Mrs. Montagu’s, including Burke, “a sufficiently pleasant party of himself,” and Mackenzie, “the man of feeling;” but she also adds, “the old little parties are not to be had in the usual style of comfort. Everything is great, and vast, and late, and magnificent, and dull.” Wilberforce, too, was one of the welcome guests, and so intimate, that Mrs. Montagu called him by a pseudonym “the Red Cross Knight.” But the splendid stage, the superb style, the pillars of verd antique, the room of feathers, these could not compensate for the less showy, but more real, delights of the old Bluestocking days in Hill Street. But the lady of the house had still the same inexhaustible spirits, the same taste for business and magnificence. Three or four great dinners in a week with Luxembourgs, Montmorencies, and Czartoriskis. “I had rather,” said the sage Hannah, “for my part, live in our cottage at Cheddar. She ismade for the great world, and is an ornament to it. It is an element she was born to breathe in.”
Hannah More’s duties were consistent with cottage life; but Mrs. Montagu held her fortune in trust, and spent it in gratifications, the cost of which made glad hearts in a hundred homes. At some of her assemblies, eccentric as well as intellectual people seem now to have been admitted. Miss Burney notes, in 1792, having encountered at Montagu House “a commonish, non-nothingish sort of a half good-humoured and sensibilish woman!” Soon, however, increasing infirmities weakened Mrs. Montagu’s powers and affected her spirits. But she who was, as Fanny Burney said, so “magnificently useful” in her generation, kept up her magnificence and tried to maintain her usefulness to the last. Her supreme effort to get together the little comfortable, intellectual parties that delighted Hannah More, was made in 1798. “I have been at one bit of Blue there,” wrote Doctor Burney to his daughter. “Mrs. Montagu is so broken down as not to go out. She is almost wholly blind and very feeble.”
In the succeeding year, Mrs. Carter wrote to Hannah More: “... She has totally changed her mode of life, from a conviction that she exerted herself too much last year, and that it brought on the long illness, by which she suffered so much.... She never goes out except to take the air of a morning; has no company to dinner (I do not call myself company); lets in nobody in the evening, which she passes in hearing her servant read, as her eyes will not suffer her to read herself.” Mrs. Carter hopes that “a taste for the comfort of living quietlywill, for the future, prevent her from mixing so much with the tumults of the world as to injure her health.”
Her interest in the education of girls was not affected by her decaying powers. After Mrs. Hannah More had published her celebrated work on that subject, and it had been read to Mrs. Montagu, the latter wrote to the author a letter, in which is the following passage: “Sandleford, May, 1799.You have most judiciously pointed out the errors of modern education, which seems calculated entirely to qualify young women for whatever their godfathers and godmothers had renounced for them at their baptism; and what is most shocking is, that a virtuous matron and tender mother values herself much on not having omitted anything that can fit her daughter for the world, the flesh, and the devil.” This was the final judgment of a lady who, in her own girlhood, had expressed herself in much the same terms, and who, later in life, had laid it down as a law for her own niece, that to dance a minuet well was of more importance than to have a knowledge of a foreign language. She had escaped perils herself, because she was always occupied. If, when a nymph, she so sported in the Mary-le-bone waters, that lords wrote sonnets on her, she forgot the homage in her higher enjoyments of native and foreign literature. If she went joyously any number of miles to a ball, danced with the very love of dancing, and shrieked with delight at being upset on her way home, the next day she had purer enjoyment in reading, analysing, and judging a translation of a Greek play or a volume of ancient or modern history. She did not despise being attractive, but she dressed her mindeven more carefully than she did her person. As she grew in years she was as ready for increasing duties as for increasing delights, and looked as fascinating among her Berkshire farm-servants and her Northumbrian pitmen as she did, blazing with diamonds and lively spirits, in the throne-room at St. James’s. She never had a fool for an acquaintance, nor ever an idle hour in the sense of idleness. Mistress of an ample fortune, she lived up to her income, and never beyond it. All around her profited by such stewardship. She is said to have done all things with a grace, and most things with ease. It was not more difficult for her to vanquish Voltaire than to make a grouse-pie for Garrick. When she passed to her rest, in 1800, she was prepared to go that way thankfully. Some few of her acquaintances dwelt, as such candid persons will, upon her little faults. But there was one good woman who remembered only her great merits. “With Mrs. Montagu’s faults,” wrote Hannah More to Doctor Whalley, in 1808, “I have nothing to do. Her fine qualities were many. From my first entrance into a London life till her death, I ever found her an affectionate, zealous, and constant friend, as well as a most instructive and pleasant companion. Her youth and beauty were gone long before I knew her.”
But even in the days of her maidenhood, when she was glad in her youth and in her beauty, and conscious of her intellect, yet unconscious of the pleasures, duties, and trials before her, yet when she feared she might live idle and die vain, she said, “If ever I have an inscription over me, it shall be without a name, and only,—Here lies one whom, havingdone no harm, no one should censure; and, having done no good, no one can commend; who, for past folly, only asks oblivion.” She lived, however, to do much good, to make great amends for small and venial follies, and by the magnificent usefulness, which Little Burney has recorded, to merit such pains as it may cost a poor chronicler to rescue her name and deeds from the oblivion which she asked in the pleasant days of her bright youth and her subduing beauty.
THE END.