Whilst these sentiments secretly occupied the heart of Churchill, and of her who loved him, perhaps, less for his excellencies than for the effect which they produced upon others, several events took place at the court of Charles, in which Colonel Churchill, during the intervals of his military service, participated,—his office of master of the robes to the Duke of York, an appointment granted him in 1673, retaining him near the court; whilst Sarah, in the course of her attendance on the Princess Anne, must have taken a considerable interest in the events which immediately concerned the royal family. CHAPTER II. COURT OF CHARLES II.—1677 to 1681. Marriage of the Princess Mary—Marriage of Colonel Churchill and Miss Jennings—Characters of Anne and Mary—Friendship of Anne for Lady Churchill—Appointment of the latter to be Lady of the Bedchamber to the Princess—Death of Charles the Second. It was fortunate for the subject of this Memoir that her introduction into the great world took place under the auspices of a young and virtuous Princess, almost of the same age with herself. It is true, that to the charge of Katharine, the neglected wife of Charles the Second, no graver crime could be alleged than her subserviency to the King’s pleasures; for in her own conduct she was irreproachable. When first she became Queen of England, she endeavoured, with such judgment as she possessed, to reform the manners of her adopted country, and to introduce propriety of demeanour into the court. Unhappily Katharine was not endowed with those graces which are likely to recommend virtue. She is described by a contemporary as “a little ungraceful woman, so short-legged, that when she stood upon her feet you would have thought she was on her knees, and yet so long-waisted, that when she sat down she appeared like a well-sized woman.”[39] Brought up in a monastery, the simple-minded Katharine vainly hoped to reform her dissolute husband, whose inconstancy at first grieved and shocked her virtuous notions. Unlike her rival, Anne Duchess of York, a shrewd and worldly woman, who strove to fill her saloons with the young and the fair, Katharine was surrounded by her countrywomen, old, stiff, ungainly, repulsive Portuguese ladies, of birth and pride, who soon became the subjects of infinite merriment to King Charles’s court. These exemplary ladies came possessed with the notion that they should quickly bring the English to conform to their new customs; but Charles speedily undeceived them, and by his express order they were soon shipped off again for Portugal.[40] The injured Queen was, at the time that Sarah and Colonel Churchill became acquainted, sinking fast into the obscurity which was alone redeemed from oblivion, after Charles’s death, by her patronage of musical science, and by the concerts which she gave at Somerset House, whither she retired, to reside until she returned to Portugal.[41]