That is himself, and his dangerous work is when he
... at the ear of Eve, familiar toad,
Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad."
This came out years later, and later still Hervey's feeble rejoinder. And meanwhile the peer was living on asses' milk and biscuits, a miserable life enough, of which almost the only pleasure was the honourable one of being of service to Queen Caroline. He lived till 1743; and six years before, the great Duchess of Marlborough, more bitter and more witty than ever in her old age, speaking of him as "always with the King and in vast favour," added "he has certainly parts and wit, but is the most wretched profligate man that ever was born, besides ridiculous; a painted face and not a tooth in his head." In 1740 he at last obtained political office, and in 1742 he was dismissed after Walpole's fall. A wretched career was his, which achieved nothing worthy, and only in its devotion to the Queen was above contempt. He began life a Whig and a Ministerialist: he died a "patriot" by the side of those young statesmen, Lord Lyttelton and Cornet Pitt, whom he had ridiculed.
And yet Lord Hervey was not the worst member of the court which resided at Hampton Court in the early years of George II.'s reign. One feels inclined to cry, like Matthew Arnold of the party, the Godwins and the sordid hangers-on, that surrounded Shelley, "What a set!"
The King, utterly brutal, licentious, coarse, unfeeling, passionate, and reckless; the Queen, cynical,
