"Sophia and I have an immortal quarrel; which though I resolve never to forgive, I can hardly forbear laughing at. An acquaintance of mine is married, whom I wish very well to: Sophia has been pleased, on this occasion, to write the most infamous ballad that ever was written; where both the bride and bridegroom are intolerably mauled, especially the last, who is complimented with the hopes of cuckoldom, and forty other things equally obliging, and Sophia has distributed this ballad in such a manner as to make it pass for mine, on purpose to pique the poor innocent soul of the new-married man, whom I should be the last of creatures to abuse. I know not how to clear myself of this vile imputation, without a train of consequences I have no mind to fall into. In the mean time, Sophia enjoys the pleasure of heartily plaguing both me and that, person." Probably this "immortal quarrel" would have been made up, but at the beginning of July the Duke went abroad never to return. "Sophia is going to Aix-la-Chapelle, and thence to Paris," Lady Mary wrote to Lady Mar. "I dare swear she'll endeavour to get acquainted with you. We are broke to an iremediable degree. Various are the persecutions I have endured from her this winter, in all of which I remain neuter, and shall certainly go to heaven from the passive meekness of my temper." CHAPTER XII A FAMOUS QUARREL Pope and Lady Mary--He pays her compliments--His jealousy of her other admirers--The cause of his quarrel with her--His malicious attacks on her thereafter--Writes of her as "Sappho"--Lady Mary asks Arbuthnot to protect her--Molly Skerritt--Lady Stafford--Lady Mary's malicious tongue and pen--Mrs. Murray--"An Epistle from Arthur Grey"--Lady Mary, Lord Hervey, and Molly Lepell--Death of the Earl of Kingston--Lady Gower--Lady Mar--Marriage of Lady Mary's daughter. Of Pope, it is curious to relate, though he was a near neighbour, she saw less and less. It has been suggested that the first rift in the lute was her parody of his verses about the lovers struck by lightning; but even he, most sensitive of men, can scarcely have been seriously offended. So far as is known, only two letters passed between them after 1719. "I pass my time in a small snug set of dear intimates, and go very little into the _grand monde_, which has always had my hearty contempt" (she wrote to Lady Mar in the spring of 1722). "I see sometimes Mr. Congreve, and very seldom Mr. Pope, who continues to embellish his house at Twickenham. He has made a subterranean grotto, which he has furnished with looking-glass, and they tell me it has a very good effect. I here send you some verses addressed to Mr. Gay, who wrote him a congratulatory letter on the finishing his house. I stifled them here, and I beg they may die the same death at Paris, and never go further than your closet: