“Whatever I may have been told on your account, I think I have shown, on all occasions, the value I have for the services of the Duke, your husband; and I am always disposed to judge of him and you by the behaviour of each of you in regard to my service. Upon which I pray God, my Lady Marlborough, to preserve you in all happiness. “GEORGE R.” The Duchess was deeply disappointed upon the receipt of this letter. It was, she doubted not, dictated by the ministry at that time in power, of whom Horace Lord Walpole, Lord Sunderland, and Mr. Secretary Craggs, formed the most influential members. Lord Walpole, the younger brother of the great minister, to whom the dislike of the Duchess extended, had been the early friend and fellow collegian of her deceased son; and what, perhaps, occasioned a greater bond of union in a mind so constituted, during the whole course of his political career, a genuine Whig, and, in conjunction with Newcastle, Addison, Pulteney, Craggs, and others. He was, also, a member of the Hanover club, who had gone so far, in 1713, as to show their hatred of the Jacobite cause, by parading effigies of the Devil, the Pope, and the Pretender, in solemn procession from Charing Cross to the Exchange, and back to Charing Cross, where they were burnt.[278] But, notwithstanding the similarity of their political opinions, that administration from which the Duchess had once expected great results, had failed to secure her regard; probably from the little attention which they proffered to that vanity which, like some weeds, grew more vigorously in the shade. The Duchess was not only already at variance with Lord Sunderland, another ministerial friend, but Mr. Craggs had fallen under her severe displeasure. Upon this statesman of equivocal character the suspicions of the Duchess now rested,[279] of having some years previously sent her an anonymous letter of an offensive kind. She, therefore, in her reply to the King’s laconic letter, gave vent to her suspicions, that since there was only one person in all the world whom she knew capable of calumniating her, that person “who might, perhaps, have malice enough to her, and dishonour enough in himself to be guilty of it, is Mr. Secretary Craggs.”[280] Her charge, daring as it was, fell to the ground. No notice was taken of this epistle, except a brief answer referring to the King’s former reply; but the painful consequence of the Duchess’s surmises was a total alienation from her son-in-law, Lord Sunderland; an alienation which lasted nearly until his death, which took place in 1722. So singular was the fate of this extraordinary woman in private life, that scarcely did she possess a tie which was not severed, or embittered, by worldly or political considerations.