Aristocrats Read Online Free PDF

irresistible to her. Here rolled up in one hirsute form was the personification of the forbidden; and Fox offered it all to her with such persuasive charm that she was overwhelmed.
    Caroline and Fox had met at Goodwood in the 1730s and on many occasions since in Whitehall drawing-rooms and at the theatre. By the beginning of the next decade Fox was looking for a way out of his bachelor life. His brother Stephen had recently got married (albeit to the thirteen-year-old daughter of one of Fox’s mistresses) and to everyone’s surprise had given up Hervey and settled down to an unimpeachable life as a father and country squire. Fox was mildly envious. He fell in love with Caroline, sensing that she could offer him companionship, devotion and a few good contacts besides.
    Caroline’s parents were happy to entertain Fox as a friend but adamant that he was impossible as a suitor. They recoiled from Fox’s naked ambition, his thirst for power and money and his reputation for atheism. They despised his fortune as too little and his presumption as too great. But Fox had made up his mind. Sometime in March 1744 he met Caroline at thetheatre and asked her to marry him. Caroline said neither yes nor no. She replied, true to the etiquette of such proposals, that Henry had her permission to approach her father and seek her hand. But it was an acceptance, however demurely given, and from that moment on Henry’s confidence rarely faltered. He went straight round to the Richmond family box and asked the Duke for an interview. The next day he went to Richmond House and claimed Caroline’s hand. Caroline, he told the Duke, had no objections if he could overcome any scruples her parents might have. And, Fox added triumphantly, ‘she wish’d me success’, which was as near a declaration of love and intent as propriety would allow a woman in her position.
    The Duke and Duchess were horrified and furious. Their own arranged marriage had turned out for the best and they planned to choose a suitable husband for their daughter. A paunchy, ex-Tory career politician, whose learning frightened them and whose brother had carried on a long affair with their friend Lord Hervey, was not their idea of an eligible man. The Duchess refused to entertain Fox’s proposal at all, and declared that in six month’s time he would thank her for her perspicacity. ‘What makes her Grace think so I don’t know,’ Fox snorted angrily in reply. The Duke, eager for propriety and dignity, decided to treat the affair as an unfortunate episode that would fade away quietly provided good behaviour was maintained by both sides. He wanted, he wrote to Fox after his visit, to retain his friend’s good opinion. But something suggested to the Duke that Fox was unlikely to retreat to lick his wounds with gentlemanly dignity. So he added a less than subtle threat as well. Fox, he said, should think no more of the affair. It was over and finished. But if he was foolish enough to persist he would be ruined.
    Fox was lashed to fury by the phrase. Hiding his anger under the cloak of his charm, he took up his pen against the Duke on 8 March. He was fairly certain that the contest was going to go his way; he was eloquent, determined and angry.He knew he had a fair amount to lose. The Duke could not ruin him politically, he was not a powerful enough figure in Court or Parliament for that, but he could make his life uncomfortable by cutting off his access to the monarch. On the other hand, Fox had a lot to gain. If the match came off and he could placate the Duke and Duchess, Fox would instantly rise up the social ladder, and if the Duke accepted the marriage he could smooth his way to lucrative offices with a word in the King’s ear. Most of all though, Fox wanted Caroline. It was unfortunate but inevitable that in his tussle with the Duke, Caroline was to be Henry’s main weapon. He knew that the worse he was painted to her, the more Caroline would love him, because it was the