Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 2.djvu/458

 442 BUTE Treasury(*) and Prime Minister 29 May 1762 to 15 Apr. 1763, when he finally retired from public life.('') Vice Admiral of Bute 1764-76; Trustee of the Brit. Museum 1765 till his death ; Pres. of the Soc. of Antiquaries [S.] 1780 till his death; Hon. Fellow of the Royal Coll. of Physicians at Edinburgh, &'c.('=) He ?«., 13/24 Aug. 1736, Mary, only da. of Edward WoRTLEY-MoNTAGu, of Wortley, CO. York, by Mary,('') da. of Evelyn (Pierrepont), 1st Duke OF Kingston. Hea'. loMar. 1 792, in South Audley Str., Midx., in his 79th year. Will pr. Apr. 1792.0 His widow, who was b. at Pera, during her father's Embassy to Constantinople, Feb. 171 8, sue, on the death, in Feb. 1761, of her said father, to his extensive estates in Yorkshire and Cornwall, her only br. Edward (who d. s.p. 1776) having been disinherited for his eccentricity. On 3 Apr. 1761, she was cr. BARONESS MOUNT STUART OF WORTLEY, co. York, with rem. of that Barony to the heirs male of her body by her then husband. She d. (^) As to this office see Appendix D to this volume. C") Through the Dowager Princess of Wales he was supposed by the mob to control unduly and influence wrongly the young King, so that his short Ministry was, consequently, unpopular. A ]?ick-boot and a petticoat were burned (as emblems of the two) at some of the riotous meetings. He was a great patron of literature and the fine arts, and was himself a distinguished botanist. (') He had, under the Act of 1747 abolishing heritable jurisdictions, an annuity of {^) The well-known Lady Mary Wortley-Montagu, who, after a residence of 22 years on the Continent, d. 21 Aug. 1762, in England, aged 73. (') In 1763 he purchased the estate of Luton Hog, Beds,enlarging the park to 1, 200 acres, and beginning to rebuild the mansion with great magnificence after a design of the architect Adam. G.E.C. His unpopularity as a Scot and a King's friend still affects the general impression of his character and capacity, which is probably lower than his deserts. Carlyle's account of his dealings with Frederick the Great is very unfair, but his contem- porary political opponents thought well of him as a man. Fox said he " had never broken his word" to him; Warburton, "that he was indeed a remarkable man to be First Minister, since he was a Scot, a King's favourite, and an honest man." Mary Lepel, Lady Hervey, writes, "I know so much of him that he was always a good husband, an excellent father, a man of sincerity and good feeling. People say he is proud, but it is the same pride of which Mr. Pitt is accused, which keeps him always from narrow, false, and slippery ways." Horace Walpole says that he bought " the estate at Luton, in Bedfordshire, at the price of jTi 14,000," and insinuates, doubtless quite untruly, that he had got the money from the Dowager Princess of Wales. " He had honour, honesty, and good intentions. He was too proud to be respectable or respected. Too cold and silent to be amiable, too cunning to have great ability, and his inexperience made him too precipitately undertake what it disabled him from executing." (Philip, Earl of Chesterfield, 1763). Lecky, in his History (vol. iii, p. 55) describes him as " a man of very ordinary intellect . . . His honour, though it was probably unstained, was certainly not unsuspected ... A natural turn for tortuous methods and secret intrigues, combined with great moroseness and haughti- ness of manner, made him disliked and distrusted by all with whom he had to deal . . . Of administrative ability he had absolutely nothing." As to his love for "the Royal ear," see some satirical verse (1773) in vol. i, Appendix H. V.G.
 * ^2,i36 for the Shrievalty and Regality of Bute.