Beaux and Belles of England by Mary Robinson

M >> Mary Robinson >> Beaux and Belles of England

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All her requests were strictly observed. Her remains were deposited,
according to her direction, in the churchyard of Old Windsor; the spot
was marked out by a friend to whom she had signified her wishes. The
funeral was attended only by two literary friends.

Respecting the circumstances of the preceding narrative, every reader
must be left to form his own reflections. To the humane mind, the errors
of the unfortunate subject of this memoir will appear to have been more
than expiated by her sufferings. Nor will the peculiar disadvantages, by
which her introduction into life was attended, be forgotten by the
candid,--disadvantages that, by converting into a snare the bounties
lavished on her by nature, proved not less fatal to her happiness than
to her conduct. On her unhappy marriage, and its still more unhappy
consequences, it is unnecessary to comment. Thus circumstanced, her
genius, her sensibility, and her beauty combined to her destruction,
while, by her exposed situation, her inexperience of life, her tender
youth, with the magnitude of the temptations which beset her, she could
scarcely fail of being betrayed.

"Say, ye severest ...
... what would you have done?"

The malady which seized her in the bloom of youth, and pursued her with
unmitigable severity through every stage of life, till, in the prune of
her powers, it laid her in a premature grave, exhibits, in the history
of its progress, a series of sufferings that might disarm the sternest,
soften the most rigid, and awaken pity in the hardest heart. Her mental
exertions through this depressing disease, the elasticity of her mind,
and the perseverance of her efforts amidst numberless sources of
vexation and distress, cannot fail, while they awaken sympathy, to
extort admiration. Had this lovely plant, now withered and low in the
dust, been in its early growth transplanted into a happier
soil--sheltered from the keen blasts of adversity, and the mildew of
detraction, it might have extended its roots, unfolded its blossoms,
diffused its sweetness, shed its perfumes, and still flourished,
beauteous to the eye, and grateful to the sense.

To represent the character of the individual in the circumstances of
life, his conduct under those circumstances and the consequences which
they ultimately produce, is the peculiar province of biography. Little
therefore remains to be added. The benevolent temper, the filial piety
and the maternal tenderness of Mrs. Robinson are exemplified in the
preceding pages, as her genius, her talents, the fertility of her
imagination, and the powers of her mind are displayed in her
productions, the popularity of which at least affords a presumption of
their merit. Her manners were polished and conciliating, her powers of
conversation rich and varied. The brilliancy of her wit and the sallies
of her fancy were ever tempered by kindness and chastened by delicacy.
Though accustomed to the society of the great, and paying to rank the
tribute which civil institutions have rendered its due, she reserved her
esteem and deference for these only whose talents or whose merits
claimed the homage of the mind.

With the unfortunate votaries of letters she sincerely sympathised, and
not unfrequently has been known to divide the profits of her genius with
the less successful or less favoured disciples of the muse.

The productions of Mrs. Robinson, both in prose and verse, are numerous,
and of various degrees of merit; but to poetry the native impulse of her
genius appears to have been more peculiarly directed. Of the glitter and
false taste exhibited in the Della Crusca correspondence[54] she became
early sensible; several of her poems breathe a spirit of just sentiment
and simple elegance.

JANE, DUCHESS OF GORDON

A PASTORAL ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF MRS. ROBINSON

BY PETER PINDAR

Farewell to the nymph of my heart!
Farewell to the cottage and vine!
From these, with a tear, I depart,
Where pleasure so often was mine.

Remembrance shall dwell on her smile,
And dwell on her lute and her song;
That sweetly my hours to beguile,
Oft echoed the valleys along.

Once more the fair scene let me view,
The grotto, the brook, and the grove.
Dear valleys, for ever adieu!
Adieu to the daughter of Love!

JANE, DUTCHESS OF GORDON

"Few women," says Sir Nathaniel Wraxall, "have performed a more
conspicuous part, or occupied a higher place on the public theatre of
fashion, politics, and dissipation, than the Duchess of Gordon."

Jane, afterward Duchess of Gordon, the rival in beauty and talent to
Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, was born in Wigtonshire, in Scotland.
Her father, Sir William Maxwell of Monreith (anciently Mureith),
represented one of the numerous families who branched off from the
original stock--Herbert of Caerlaverock, first Lord Maxwell, the
ancestor of the famous Earl of Nithsdale, whose countess, Winifred,
played so noble a part when her husband was in prison during the
Jacobite insurrection. From this honourable house descended, in our
time, the gallant Sir Murray Maxwell, whose daughter, Mrs. Carew, became
the wife of the too well-known Colonel Waugh; the events which followed
are still fresh in the public mind. Until that blemish, loyalty, honour,
and prosperity marked out the Maxwells of Monreith for "their own." In
1681, William Maxwell was created a baronet of Nova Scotia. Various
marriages and intermarriages with old and noble families kept the blood
pure, a circumstance as much prized by the Scotch as by the Germans. Sir
William, the father of the Duchess of Gordon, married Magdalene, the
daughter of William Blair, of Blair, and had by her six children,--three
sons and three daughters,--of whom the youngest but one was Jane, the
subject of this memoir.

This celebrated woman was a true Scotchwoman--staunch to her
principles, proud of her birth, energetic, and determined. Her energy
might have died away like a flash in the pan had it not been for her
determination. She carried through everything that she attempted; and
great personal charms accelerated her influence in that state of society
in which, as in the French capital, women had, at that period, an
astonishing though transient degree of ascendency.

The attractions of Jane Maxwell appeared to have been developed early,
for before she entered on the gay world, a song, "Jenny of Monreith,"
was composed in her honour, which her son, the Duke of Gordon, used to
sing, long after the charms, which were thus celebrated, had vanished.
Her features were regular; the contour of her face was truly noble; her
hair was dark, as well as her eyes and eyebrows; her face long and
beautifully oval; the chin somewhat too long; the upper lip was short,
and the mouth, notwithstanding a certain expression of determination,
sweet and well defined. Nothing can be more becoming to features of this
stamp, that require softening, than the mode of dressing the hair then
general. Sir Joshua Reynolds has painted the Duchess of Gordon with her
dark hair drawn back, in front, over a cushion, or some support that
gave it waviness; round and round the head, between each rich mass, were
two rows of large pearls, until, at the top, they were lost in the folds
of a ribbon; a double row of pearls round the fair neck; a ruff, opening
low in front, a tight bodice, and sleeves full to an extreme at the top,
tighter toward the wrists, seem to indicate that the dress of the period
of Charles I had even been selected for this most lovely portrait. The
head is turned aside--with great judgment--probably to mitigate the
decided expression of the face when in a front view.

As she grew up, however, the young lady was found to be deficient in one
especial grace--she was not feminine; her person, her mind, her manners,
all, in this respect, corresponded. "She might," says one who knew her,
"have aptly represented Homer's Juno." Always animated, with features
that were constantly in play, one great charm was wanting--that of
sensibility. Sometimes her beautiful face was overclouded with anger;
more frequently was it irradiated with smiles. Her conversation, too,
annihilated much of the impression made by her commanding beauty. She
despised the usages of the world, and, believing herself exempted from
them by her rank, after she became a duchess, she dispensed with them,
and sacrificed to her venal ambition some of the most lovable qualities
of her sex. One of her speeches, when honours became, as she thought,
too common at court, betrays her pride and her coarseness. "Upon my
word," she used to say, "one cannot look out of one's coach window
without spitting on a knight." Whatever were her defects, her beauty
captivated the fancy of Alexander, the fourth Duke of Gordon, a young
man of twenty-four years of age, whom she married on the 28th of
October, 1767. The family she entered, as well as the family whence she
sprang, were devoted adherents of the exiled Stuarts, and carried, to a
great extent, the hereditary Toryism of their exalted lineage. The
great-grandmother of the duke was that singular Duchess of Gordon who
sent a medal to the Faculty of Advocates in Edinburgh, with the head of
James Stuart the Chevalier on one side, and on the other the British
Isles, with the word "Reddite" inscribed underneath. The Faculty were
highly gratified by this present. After a debate, they accepted the
medal, and sent two of their body to thank the duchess, and to say that
they hoped she would soon be enabled to favour the society with a second
medal on the Restoration. Duke Alexander, the husband of Jane Maxwell,
showed in his calm and inert character no evidence of being descended
from this courageous partisan. He was a man of no energy, except in his
love of country pursuits, and left the advancement of the family
interests wholly to his spirited and ambitious wife. They were married
only six years after George III had succeeded to the throne. Never was a
court more destitute of amusements than that of the then youthful
sovereign of England. Until his latter days, George II. had enjoyed
revelries, though of a slow, formal, German character; but his grandson
confined himself, from the age of twenty-two, to his public and private
duties. He neither frequented masquerades nor joined in play. The
splendours of a court were reserved for birthdays, and for those alone;
neither did the king usually sit down to table with the nobility or with
his courtiers. Never was he known to be guilty of the slightest excess
at table, and his repasts were simple, if not frugal. At a levee, or on
the terrace at Windsor, or in the circle of Hyde Park, this model of a
worthy English gentleman might be seen, either with his plain-featured
queen on his arm, or driven in his well-known coach with his old and
famous cream-coloured horses. Junius derided the court, "where," he
said, "prayers are morality and kneeling is religion." But although
wanting in animation, it was far less reprehensible than that which
preceded or that which followed it. The Duchess of Gordon,
irreproachable in conduct, with her high Tory principles, was well
suited to a court over which Lord Bute exercised a strong influence. She
had naturally a calculating turn of mind. Fame, admiration, fashion,
were agreeable trifles, but wealth and rank were the solid aims to which
every effort was directed. Unlike her future rival, the Duchess of
Devonshire, who impoverished herself in her boundless charities, the
Duchess of Gordon kept in view the main chance, and resolved from her
early youth to aggrandise the family into which she had entered.

Her empire as a wit was undisputed, for the Duchess of Devonshire was
then a mere girl, at her mother's knee; but that for beauty was disputed
by Mary, Duchess of Rutland, so well remembered in our own time, as she
survived till 1831.

This exquisite specimen of English loveliness, compared by some to
Musidora, as described by Thomson, was the most beautiful woman of rank
in the kingdom. Every turn of her features, every form of her limbs, was
perfect, and grace accompanied every movement. She was tall, of the just
height; slender, but not thin; her features were delicate and noble; and
her ancestors, the Plantagenets, were in her represented by a faultless
sample of personal attributes. She was the daughter of a race which has
given to the world many heroes, one philosopher, and several celebrated
beauties--that of Somerset; and, as the descendant of the defenders of
Raglan Castle, might be expected to combine various noble qualities with
personal gifts. But she was cold, although a coquette. In the Duchess of
Devonshire it was the _besoin d'aimer_, the cordial nature recoiled into
itself from being linked to an expletive, that betrayed her into an
encouragement of what offered her the semblance of affection--into the
temptation of being beloved. To the Duchess of Gordon her conquests were
enhanced by the remembrance of what they might bring; but the Duchess of
Rutland viewed her admirers in the light of offering tributes to a
goddess. She was destitute of the smiles, the intelligence, and
sweetness of the Duchess of Devonshire; and conscious of charms,
received adoration as her due. "In truth," Sir Nathanial Wraxall, who
knew her well, writes, "I never contemplated her except as an enchanting
statue, formed to excite admiration rather than to awaken love, this
superb production of nature not being lighted up by corresponding mental
attractions."

This lady was united to one of the most attractive and popular of men,
but one of the most imprudent and convivial. The son of that celebrated
Marquis of Granby whom Junius attacked, the young Duke of Rutland was a
firm partisan of Pitt, whom he first brought into the House of Commons,
and at whose wish he accepted the government of Ireland in 1784. Never
was there such splendour at the vice-regal court as in his time. Vessels
laden with the expensive luxuries from England were seen in the Bay of
Dublin at short intervals; the banquets given were most costly; the
evenings at the castle were divided between play and drinking; and yet
the mornings found the young duke breakfasting on six or seven turkey's
eggs. He then, when on his progress, rode forty or fifty miles, returned
to dinner at seven, and sat up to a late hour, supping before he
retired to rest.

The duchess had little place in his heart, and the siren, Mrs.
Billington, held it in temporary thraldom; but constancy was to a man of
such a calibre impossible. Nevertheless, when the duke saw his wife
surrounded by admirers, whom her levity of manner encouraged, he became
jealous, and they parted, for the last time as it proved, on bad terms.
One evening, seeing him engaged in play, the duchess approached the
window of the room in which he sat, and tapped at it. He was highly
incensed by this interference with his amusements. She returned to
England, an invalid, in order to consult Doctor Warren, the father of
the late physician of that name. Whilst residing with her mother in
Berkeley Square, she heard that the duke was attacked with fever. She
sent off Doctor Warren to see him, and was preparing to follow him when
the physician returned. At Holyhead he had heard that the duke was no
more. He died at the early age of thirty-three, his blood having been
inflamed by his intemperance, which, however, never affected his reason,
and was, therefore, the more destructive to his health. His widow, in
spite of their alienation, mourned long and deeply. Never did she appear
more beautiful than when, in 1788, she reappeared after her seclusion.
Like Diana of Poictiers, she retained her wonderful loveliness to an
advanced age. Latterly, she covered her wrinkles with enamel, and when
she appeared in public always quitted a room in which the windows, which
might admit the dampness, were opened. She never married again,
notwithstanding the various suitors who desired to obtain her hand.

For a long time the Duchess of Gordon continued to reign over the Tory
party almost without a rival. When, at last, the Duchess of Devonshire
came forward as the female champion of the Foxites, Pitt and Dundas,
afterward Lord Melville, opposed to her the Duchess of Gordon. At that
time she lived in the splendid mansion of the then Marquis of Buckingham
in Pall Mall. Every evening, numerous assemblies of persons attached to
the administration gathered in those stately saloons, built upon or near
the terrace whereon Nell Gwyn used to chat with Charles II on the grass
below, as he was going to feed his birds in his gardens. Presuming on
her rank, her influence, her beauty, the Duchess of Gordon used to act
in the most determined manner as a government whipper-in. When a member
on whom she counted was wanting, she did not scruple to send for him, to
remonstrate, to persuade, to fix him by a thousand arts. Strange must
have been the scene--more strange than attractive. Everything was
forgotten but the one grand object of the evening, the theme of all
talk,--the next debate and its supporters. In the year 1780 events took
place which for some time appeared likely to shake the prosperity of the
Gordon family almost to its fall.

The duke had two brothers, the elder of whom, Lord William, was the
Ranger of Windsor Park, and survived to a great age. The younger, Lord
George, holds a very conspicuous but not a very creditable place in the
annals of his country. No event in our history bears any analogy with
that styled the "Gordon Riots," excepting the fire of London in the
reign of Charles II; and even that calamity did not exhibit the mournful
spectacle which attended the conflagrations of 1780. In the former
instance, the miserable sufferers had to contend only with a devouring
element; in the latter, they had to seek protection, and to seek it in
vain, from a populace of the lowest description, and the vilest
purposes, who carried with them destruction wherever they went. Even
during the French Revolution, revolting and degrading as it was, the
firebrand was not employed in the work of destruction; the public and
private buildings of Paris were spared.

The author of all these calamities, Lord George Gordon, was a young man
of gentle, agreeable manners, and delicate, high-bred appearance. His
features were regular and pleasing; he was thin and pale, but with a
cunning, sinister expression in his face that indicated
wrong-headedness. He was dependent on his elder brother, the duke, for
his maintenance, six hundred pounds a year being allowed him by his
Grace. Such was the exterior, such the circumstances of an incendiary
who has been classed with Wat Tyler and Jack Cade, or with Kett, the
delinquent in the time of Edward VI.

It was during the administration of Lord North that the Cordon Riots
took place, excited by the harangues and speeches of Lord George. On the
2d of June he harangued the people; on the 7th these memorable
disturbances broke out; Bloomsbury Square was the first point of attack.
In Pope's time this now neglected square was fashionable:

"In Palace Yard, at nine, you'll find me there;
At ten, for certain, sir, in Bloomsbury Square."

Baxter, the Nonconformist, and Sir Hans Sloane once inhabited what was,
in their time, called Southampton Square, from Southampton House, which
occupied one whole side of Bloomsbury Square, and was long the abode of
Lady Rachel Russell, after the execution of her lord. Like every other
part of what may be called "Old London," it is almost sanctified by the
memories of the lettered and the unfortunate. But the glory of
Bloomsbury Square was, in those days, the house of Lord Mansfield, at
the north end of the east side; in which that judge had collected many
valuables, among which his library was the dearest to his heart; it was
the finest legal library of his time. As soon as the long summer's day
had closed, and darkness permitted the acts of violence to be fully
recognised, Hart Street and Great Russell Street were illuminated by
large fires, composed of the furniture taken from the houses of certain
magistrates. Walking into Bloomsbury, the astounded observer of that
night's horrors saw, with consternation, the hall door of Lord
Mansfield's house broken open; and instantly all the contents of the
various apartments were thrown into the square, and set on fire. In vain
did a small body of foot-soldiers attempt to intimidate the rioters. The
whole of the house was consumed, and vengeance would have fallen on Lord
Mansfield and his lady had they not escaped by a back door a few minutes
before the hall was broken into; such was that memorable act of
destruction--so prompt, so complete. Let us follow the mob, in fancy,
and leaving the burning pile in Bloomsbury Square, track the steps of
the crowd into Holborn. We remember, as we are hurried along, with a
bitter feeling, that Holborn was the appointed road for criminals from
Newgate to Tyburn. It is now one blaze of light; in the hollow near
Fleet Market, the house and warehouses of Mr. Langdale, a Catholic--a
Christian like ourselves, though not one of our own blessed and reformed
church--is blazing; a pinnacle of flame, like a volcano, is sent up into
the air. St. Andrew's Church is almost scorched with the heat; whilst
the figures of the clock--that annalist which numbers, as it stands, the
hours of guilt--are plain as at noonday. The gutters beneath, catching
here and there gleams of the fiery heavens, run with spirituous liquors
from the plundered distilleries; the night is calm, as if no deeds of
persecution sullied its beauty; at times it is obscured by volumes of
smoke, but they pass away, and the appalled spectators of the street
below are plainly visible. Here stands a mother with an infant in her
arms looking on; there, a father, leading his boy to the safest point of
observation. We wonder at their boldness; but it is the direst sign of
affright--in their homes they are insecure--everywhere, anywhere, the
ruthless unseen hand may cast the brand, and all may perish. At this
early hour there seemed to be no ringleader--no pillage; it appeared
difficult to conceive who could be the wretch who instigated, who
directed this awful riot; but, at the windows, men were seen calmly
tearing away pictures from the walls; furniture, books, plate, from
their places, and throwing them into the flames. As midnight drew near,
the ferocious passions of the multitude were heightened by ardent
spirits; not a soldier, either horse or foot, is visible. "Whilst we
stood," says an eye-witness, "by the wall of St. Andrew's churchyard, a
watchman, with his lanthorn in his hand, passed on, calling the hour as
if in a time of profound security."

Meantime, the King's Bench Prison was enveloped in flames; the Mansion
House and the Bank were attacked. But the troops were killing and
dispersing the rioters on Blackfriars Bridge; a desperate conflict
between the horse and the mob was going on near the Bank. What a night!
The whole city seemed to be abandoned to pillage--to destruction.
Shouts, yells, the shrieks of women, the crackling of the burning
houses, the firing of platoons toward St. George's Fields, combined to
show that no horrors, no foes are equal to those of domestic treachery,
domestic persecution, domestic fury, and infatuation.

It was not alone the Roman Catholics who were threatened. Sir George
Savile's house in Leicester Square--once the peaceful locality in which
Dorothy Sydney, Waller's "Sacharissa," bloomed--was plundered and
burned. Then the Duchess of Devonshire took fright, and did not venture
to stay at Devonshire House for many nights after dusk, but took refuge
at Lord Clermont's in Berkeley Square, sleeping on a sofa in the
drawing-room. In Downing Street, Lord North was dining with a party his
brother, Colonel North, Mr. Eden, afterward Lord Auckland, the
Honourable John St. John, General Fraser, and Count Malzen, the Prussian
minister. The little square then surrounding Downing Street was filled
with the mob. "Who commands the upper story?" said Lord North. "I do,"
answered Colonel North; "and I have twenty or thirty grenadiers well
armed, who are ready to fire on the first notice."

"If your grenadiers fire," said Mr. Eden, calmly, "they will probably
fire into my house just opposite."

The mob was now threatening; every moment the peril was increasing. Mr.
St. John held a pistol in his hand; and Lord North, who never could
forbear cutting a joke, said, "I am not half so much afraid of the mob
as of Jack St. John's pistol." By degrees, however, the crowd, seeing
that the house was well guarded, dispersed, and the gentlemen quietly
sat down again to their wine until late in the evening, when they all
ascended to the top of the house, and beheld the capital blazing. It was
here that the first suggestion of a coalition between Lord North and
Fox, to save the country and themselves, was started, and afterward
perfected behind the scenes of the Opera House in the Haymarket. During
this memorable night George III, behaved with the courage which,
whatever their failings, has ever highly distinguished the Hanoverian
family. By the vigorous measures, late indeed, but not too late, which
he acceded to at the Council, London was saved. But the popular fury had
extended to other towns. Bath was in tumult; a new Roman Catholic chapel
there was burned. Mrs. Thrale, hearing that her house at Streatham had
been threatened, caused it to be emptied of its furniture. Three times
was Mrs. Thrale's town house attacked; her valuables and furniture were
removed thence also; and she deemed it prudent to leave Bath, into which
coaches, chalked over with "No Popery," were hourly driving. The
composure with which the rioters did their work seemed to render the
scene more fearful, as they performed these acts of violence as if they
were carrying out a religious duty rather than deeds of
execrable hatred.

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