"The Duke of Gloucester is following his [the Duke of York's] steps, and has supped at Lady Harrington's and trots about like anything," Lady Sarah Bunbury wrote to Lady Susan O'Brien on December 16, 1764; and, in due course, the Duke of Cumberland, emancipated from maternal control, entered upon his unedifying career as a man about town. There was, however, a marked difference between the brothers. The elder was, according to Walpole, who did not usually present an agreeable picture of a member of the royal family, "reserved, serious, pious, of the most decent and sober deportment, and possessing a plain understanding, though of no brilliance," and the same authority adds that "an honorable _amour_ which totally engrossed him preserved him from the irregularities into which his brothers Edward and Henry fell."[131] [131] Walpole: _Memoirs of George III_. The honourable _amour_ to which Walpole alludes was the Duke's attachment to Maria, the widow of James, second Earl of Waldegrave. Lady Waldegrave was a natural daughter of Sir Edward Walpole by Mrs. Clements, a milliner, and so was a niece of the famous letter-writer, who took the greatest interest in her welfare. After the death of her first husband in 1763, she was still a reigning beauty, and was besieged with offers of marriage including one from "the greatest match of the day," the Duke of Portland. She refused all her suitors, and her name began to be coupled with that of the Duke of Gloucester.[132] "The report of this week is that the King has forbid the Duke of Gloucester to speak to his pretty widow; the truth is that she is gone out of town, but more 'tis difficult to know," Lady Sarah Bunbury wrote on March 8, 1766. "He has given her five pearl bracelets that cost £500--that's not for nothing surely?"[133] [132] "The Duke of Gloucester has professed a passion for the Dowager Waldegrave. He is never from her elbow. This flatters Harry Walpole not a little, though he pretends to dislike it."--Gilly Williams to George Selwyn, December, 1764. [133] _Life and Letters of Lady Sarah Lennox._ [Illustration: MARIA, DUCHESS OF GLOUCESTER _To face p. 104, Vol. II_] Perturbed by the scandal that was being circulated, Lady Waldegrave consulted her uncle, who advised her not to see the Duke again, whereupon she wrote to the latter a touching letter, in which she stated that while she was too inconsiderable a person to aspire to his hand, she was of too much consequence to become his mistress, and that therefore the intercourse between them must cease. After the lapse of a fortnight the intimacy was renewed, and Walpole, who knew his niece's character, felt confident that a marriage took place. This, indeed, was the case, for the Duke and Lady Waldegrave were secretly married on September 6, 1766, although it was not publicly announced until June, 1772, and not even Sir Edward Walpole was informed until May 19.