Page:Every Woman's Encyclopedia Volume 1.djvu/619

 593 BKAUTV of them play'd different parts. I danc'd Country Dances with Mr. Coke, but as nobody was refus'd at the Door the Ball Room was quite full of the Daughters and Wives of all the Voters, in check'd Aprons, etc., etc." Her mother writes to her sometimes, warning her to be nice to the right people, and civil in the right places, and not to be too civil to all the men and put on that " frozen, cold look you have sometimes " to the women. Yet others have said that she never seemed conscious of her rank. A Devoted Mother She seems to have been one of those women whose looks vary greatly from day to day. In Gainsborough's picture she is very lovely, in one of Romney's passable, and in another quite plain. There is a sort of childlike wistfulness about her under Gainsborough's brush. She impressed people differently, too — Walpole said she was not a beauty, and Miss Bumey found her at the first meeting not so lovely as she had expected. Later, however, Miss Burney met her again, when she was in good spirits, and said she was indeed lovely, but required vivacity to show her at her best, as that was the distinguishing trait of her character. She was not a happy woman, for she was fornied for love and affection, and she was tied to a man who had no appreciation of her nature. When he was roused from sleep and told that Chatsworth was on fire, he simply said he hoped they would put it out, and went to sleep again. He was no husband for a brilliant young girl whose loveliness was in everybody's mouth. Dis- appointed in her married life, she tried to find other interests. She dabbled in chemistry, and had a laboratory fitted up, until the duke forbade her to visit Frederick Cavendish's laboratory at Clapham, on the grounds that "he is not a gentleman — he works ! " She wrote poetry, she painted, she played the harp, and was an adept in languages. She was a devoted mother in an age of great laxity, and set the fashion of nursing her babies herself. Her friendship with Lady Elizabeth Foster was such that for nearly twenty-five years they lived under the same roof, and when the duchess feared to lose her sight, the poems she wrote to her friend were touching in the extreme. Shining Light of the Salon Of course, she flirted ; that was a foregone conclusion when flirting was as much the fashion as drinking or card-playing. At the latter she got into many scrapes, fearing to tell her cold husband of her debts, and haunted by the fear of bailiffs. At one time she was in such sore straits that she had to make a hasty dash across the hall of Devonshire House every time she went out, for fear she should be arrested before she could reach her carriage. She interceded for the life of Marie Antoinette, but fruitlessly. D 27 She was the head of the party which wished the Prince of Wales made Regent, in opposition to the Duchess of Gordon and Pitt. All the world knows that her party succeeded. But her most famous exploit was the great Westminster election, when she canvassed for Fox. She sportel his emblem — a fox's brush in a wreath of laurel — she entered the lowest houses in Long Acre ; she cajoled, smrled, argued, even kissed, for votes. For forty days Co vent Garden, where the battle raged, was in a ferment and crowded with all the scum of London. The political squibsters wrote sarcastic- ally or admiringly of her, according to their party. Here are quotations from both sides : " E'en cobblers she canvass'd, they would not refuse. But huzza'd for Fox, and no wooden shoes ; She canvass'd the tailors, and ask'd for their votes. They all gave her plumpers, and cried, ' No turncoats ! ' " " Array 'd in matchless beauty, Devon's fair In Fox's favour takes a zealous part ; But oh, where'er the pilferer comes, beware ! She supplicates a vote and steals a heart." She and her sister Harriet were at this time said to be " the most lovely portraits that ever appeared on a canvass." The Press reviled the duchess for taking part in the election, till she longed to retire, but could not for her party's sake. She went on, and finally Fox was triumphantly returned with a majority of 250 votes. The duchess rode in a six-horse coach, and there were great scenes of rejoicing. She it was who led Mrs. Fitzherbert in to have the betrothal ring placed upon her finger by the Prince of Wales. She was the shining light of Mrs. Montagu's salon. Now and then she retired to Chiswick House to rest, where she built two new wings and decorated some of the rooms in the Italian style. "Generous, High-minded, Glorious" She died before she was forty, her beauty dimmed by worry over her debts — which, however, her husband at last settled for her two years before she died — and by the chill of her private life. She was a good friend and a splendid mother, and her faults were all on the surface. She had great courage ; during the Gordon Riots she wrote : "I was very much frighten'd yesterday, but kept quiet, and preached quiet to everybody." What a treasure of a woman in an emergency ! When she went into camp with the duke, she wore the Derbyshire regimental uniform, and roused great enthusiasm. Lord Ronald Leveson-Gower says of her that she was a " generous, high-minded, glorious woman." Of not every historic beauty can a tenth of that be said. I R