Lady Mary Pierrepont, when she wrote to Mr. Wortley touching the death of his sister, said she had lost what she loved most, and could thenceforth only love those who were nearest and dearest to her departed friend. Out of this hint, it may be, came the marriage of Lady Mary and Mr. Wortley. It seemed a disinterested match on both sides, but it was not fruitful in happiness. Of this union were born a son and daughter; the mother reserved all her love for the latter. The son was born in May 1713. Within two months from that date Lady Mary had left her firstborn to mercenary, but perhaps efficient and kindly care. In July she wrote to her husband, ‘I heard from your little boy yesterday, who is in good health.’ In that phrase, so cold in its unmotherly temper, may perhaps be found the cause why that ‘little boy’ became so wayward, and why he developed into a man so wilful and so irreclaimable. In 1717 the boy was taken by his parents to Constantinople, where Mr. Wortley acted, for a few months, as English representative. On the return from this embassy, Lady Mary tarried for a while at Belgrade. At that time the small-pox was a deadly scourge in England. In Turkey it was less mortal. The infidel Turk anticipated and modified the disease by inoculation. Lady Mary had the courage to submit her child to the novel system of ‘engrafting,’ as it was called. In a letter written at Belgrade in March 1718 she says: ‘The boy was engrafted last Tuesday, and is at this time singing and playing, very impatient for his supper. I pray God my next may give as good an account of him.’ For society at large the step which Lady Mary took was most beneficial; but few mothers, however courageous, would have had the heart, in a foreign land too, to suffer such an experiment to be made on an only son, not yet five years of age. She had, however, full confidence in the efficacy of the proceeding: and she remarked that she would have imparted the matter to the doctors generally, only that they were too selfish to sanction a course which would diminish their incomes!