Wearied of the ill-temper of the haughty duchess, which broke out in most violent language even in the presence of the queen, Anne at last determined to rid herself of her overbearing companion, whose strong will had for so long a time awed her into submission; while the necessary military generalship of the illustrious duke had long kept the queen from daring to dismiss the insolent duchess, who at length forgot even her politic behavior in her fits of anger, and endeavored to scold back the favor of the queen which had been lost to her by her own impolitic arrogance, and through the wily cunning of her own relation, Mrs. Masham, whom she had herself recommended to the queen for the position of bedchamber-woman, never imagining that this poor ignorant relative would usurp her own place as royal favorite. Before Anne had ascended the throne, a little incident occurred which eventually led to the downfall of the duchess. The Princess Anne was one day alone in her private drawing-room at St. James. The Duchess of Marlborough entered the anteroom where the princess’ waiting-woman, afterwards Mrs. Masham, was in attendance. Observing a pair of gloves upon the table, the duchess, thinking they were her own, drew them upon her hands. Whereupon the attendant remarked that the gloves belonged to the princess, who had sent her to get them, as her mistress was about to enter her carriage. “What! have I touched anything that has been upon the hands of that odious woman!” exclaimed the duchess in a fury of ill-temper; and tearing them from her fingers she threw them on the floor and retired, little thinking that the insulting words had been overheard by the princess in the adjoining room. From that moment the ultimate disgrace of the imperious duchess was determined upon, although, owing to her husband’s victories and her own threats of publishing the confidential letters of her “loving Mrs. Morley,” her downfall was long delayed. Queen Anne had not ceased to be a loving wife, when she became a sovereign; and the death of her husband in 1708 was a terrible blow to her. As the queen sat by her dead, though she was the monarch of a vast realm, she was the slave of court etiquette; and as the Duchess of Marlborough still held her office as mistress of the robes, this tyrannical etiquette required that the hated duchess should invade even the sanctuary of Anne’s beloved dead, and lead the queen from the funereal chamber. But the days of the ascendency of the brilliant but terrible virago were nearly numbered. In 1710, the Whig ministry was deposed, and the Tories came into power.