The Duchess of St Albans, who, as Mrs Coutts, must have been a frequent visitor at No. 59 Strand, made her first appearance on the stage as Lydia Languish in _The Rivals_, on January 31, 1795, at Covent Garden, she being then twenty years of age. Her first husband died on February 24, 1822, and was buried at Wroxton Abbey, Oxfordshire, "his funeral being attended by many of the nobility and gentry of the district, while the carriages of their royal highnesses the Dukes of York, Clarence, and Sussex accompanied the procession." She was then importuned by William Aubrey de Vere, the ninth Duke of St Albans, to whom she was married on June 16, 1827. The story of this courtship has been told by Sir Walter Scott: "Mrs Coutts, with the Duke of St Albans and Lady Charlotte Beauclerk, called to take leave of us. When at Abbotsford his suit throve but coldly. She made me, I believe, a confidant in sincerity. She had refused him twice, and decidedly: he was merely on the footing of friendship. I urged it was akin to love. She allowed she might marry the Duke, only she had at present not the least intention that way. It is the fashion to attend Mrs Coutts' parties, and to abuse her. I have always found her a kind, friendly woman, without either affectation or insolence in the display of her wealth; most willing to do good if the means be shown her. She can be very entertaining too, and she speaks without scruple of her stage life. So much wealth can hardly be enjoyed without ostentation." In Lockhart's _Life of Scott_ there is a long account of a visit paid to Sir Walter by Mrs Coutts, who arrived at Abbotsford with a train of three carriages each drawn by four horses. Her retinue consisted of her future lord, the Duke of St Albans, one of his grace's sisters, a sort of lady-in-waiting, two physicians, and besides other menials of every grade, two bed-chamber women for Mrs Coutts' own person--she requiring to have this article also in duplicate, because in her widowed condition she was fearful of ghosts. There were already assembled at Abbotsford several ladies of high rank, who, witnessing this ostentation on the part of an actress who, when a girl, had been chased from her home by a vulgar virago of a mother, took it into their heads to snub her. "The good-natured Sir Walter, pained at the conduct of his noble guests, took the youngest and prettiest of them aside, and lectured her on her manners. The beautiful peeress thanked him for treating her as his daughter; and one by one the other ladies being made to run the gauntlet of Sir Walter's rebukes, Mrs Coutts was speedily set at ease. The narrative is curious as a typical illustration of the sentiments with which the society to which Harriet Mellon claimed to belong regarded her."[48]