Places in the household of the Princess of Wales were greatly sought, and as there was no Queen-Consort, they assumed unusual importance. Among the earliest appointments to the Princess’s household were those of the Duchesses of Bolton, St. Albans and Montagu to different positions; the Countesses of Berkeley, Dorset and Cowper as ladies of the bedchamber; and Mrs. Selwyn, Mrs. Pollexfen, Mrs. Howard and Mrs. Clayton as bedchamber women. Some of these names call for more than passing comment. The Duchess of Bolton was the natural daughter of the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth, by Eleanor, daughter of Sir Richard Needham, and all of Monmouth’s blood had good reason to hate James the Second and his descendants. The Duchess of St. Albans was an heiress in her own right, and the duchess of the Protestant Whig duke, who was a natural son of Charles the Second, by Eleanor Gwynne; he also had suffered many affronts from James the Second. The Duchess of Montagu was a daughter of the Duke of Marlborough. The Countesses of Berkeley and Dorset were both the ladies of great Whig lords. Lady Cowper was the wife of the new Lord Chancellor; she came of a good Durham family, the Claverings, and had married Lord Cowper with a suddenness and secrecy that had never been satisfactorily explained. Rumour said that as Molly Clavering her reputation had not been unblemished, and she was spoken of familiarly by the rakish part of the town. We find her denying this gossip with a vigour which tempts us to believe that there must have been something in it. But it is certain that after her marriage to Lord Cowper she was a virtuous matron of highly correct principles, and devotedly attached to her husband and children. Like her lord she had fixed her hopes upon the Hanoverian succession. She tells us how “for four years past I had kept a constant correspondence with the Princess, now my mistress. I had received many, and those the kindest letters from her,” which shows not only the interest which Caroline, while yet Electoral Princess, took in English affairs, but also the astuteness of some of the Whig ladies, who were anxious to take time by the forelock, and pay their court to the powers that might be. Very soon after the Princess’s arrival, Lady Cowper was rewarded by being given this post in her household, and for some years she stood high in Caroline’s favour. If we may believe her, she also enjoyed the favour of Bernstorff and of the King, for she tells us how she rejected Bernstorff’s addresses, and of her virtuous discouragement of the King’s overtures.