Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/296

286 of the ducheſs was inexpreſſible, nor is it eaſy to conceive what would have been the conſequence, if her unhappy circumſtances had not reached the ear of another exiled nobleman at Madrid, who could not hear of her ſufferings without relieving her. This generous exile, touched with her calamities, ſent her a hundred Spaniſh piſtoles, which relieved her grace from a kind of captivity, and enabled her to come to Madrid, where ſhe lived with her mother and grandmother, while the duke attended his regiment. Not long after this, the duke’s family had a great loſs in the death of his lady’s mother, by which they were deprived of a penſion they before enjoyed from the crown of Spain; but this was fortunately repaired by the intereſt of a nobleman at court, who procured the ducheſs’s two ſiſters to be minuted down for Maids of Honour to the Queen of Spain, whenever a vacancy ſhould happen, but to enter immediately upon the ſalary of theſe places. Her Majeſty likewiſe took the ducheſs to attend her perſon.

There have been many inſtances of people, who have ſuſtained the greateſt ſhocks which adverſity can inflict, through a whole life of ſuffering, and yet at laſt have yielded to the influence of a trifling evil: ſomething like this was the caſe of the duke of Wharton, which the following ſtory will illuſtrate.

He was in garriſon at Barcelona, and coming from a ball one night, in company with ſome ladies, a man in a maſque, whom he did not know, was guilty of ſome rudeneſs to him. The duke enquired who he was, and being informed that he was valet de chambre to the marquis de Riſbourg, governour of Catalonia, he ſuffered himſelf to be tranſported by the firſt motions of his paſſion, and caned him. The fellow complained of this uſage to his maſter, who at firſt took no notice