Peter Cunningham

“ She and the Duchess frequently met at Whitehall, often in good humour, but oftener not in the best temper one with the other, for Nelly was a wit and loved to laugh at her Grace. The nature of these bickerings between them has been well but coarsely described in a single half-sheet of contemporary verses printed in 1682—"A Dialogue between the Duchess of Portsmouth and Madam Gwyn at parting." The Duchess was on her way to France, I believe for the first time since she landed at Dover, and the language employed by the rival ladies is at least characteristic. ”

“ The actress is as haughty as Mademoiselle; she insults her, she makes grimaces at her, she attacks her, she frequently steals the King from her, and boasts whenever he gives her the preference. She is young, indiscreet, confident, wild, and of an agreeable humour. ”

“ Tutty belonged to Nell Gwyn, and Snapshort to the Duchess, and the dialogue is supposed to allude to some real fray between the rival ladies. Tutty describes the mistress of Snapshort as one of Pharaoh's lean kine, and with a countenance so sharp as if she would devour him as she had devoured the nation, while Snapshort observes of Nelly that she hopes to see her once more upon a dunghill, or in her old calling of selling oranges and lemons. ”

“ The news of a second Dutch war might excite more, as it involved an expense likely to divert the King's money from his mistresses. Greater interest, we may be sure, was felt in the death of the Duchess of York and the speculations on the subject of her successor, in Blood's stealing the Crown, in the opening of a new theatre in Dorset Gardens, in the representation of "The Rehearsal," in the destruction by fire of the first Drury Lane, and in the marriage of the King's eldest child by the Duchess of Cleveland, to Thomas Lord Dacre afterwards Earl of Sussex. ”

“ Louise de Quérouaille abiding in England, became the mistress of the King, Duchess of Portsmouth, and the rival of Nell Gwyn. Her only child by the King was recognised by the royal name of Lennox, created Duke of Richmond, and was the lineal ancestor of the present noble family of that name and title.
On the return of the court to London, Nelly removed from Lincoln's Inn Fields to a house on the east end of the north side of Pall Mall, from whence in the following year she removed to a house on the south side, with a garden towards St. James's Park. ”

“ A feeling of antipathy between Protestants and Roman Catholics was at this time exciting the people to many ridiculous pageants and expressions of ill-will to those about the Court suspected of anti-Protestant principles. A True Blue Protestant poet was a name of honour, and a Protestant sock a favourite article of apparel. [15] When Nelly was insulted in her coach at Oxford by the mob, who mistook her for the Duchess of Portsmouth, she looked out of the window and said, with her usual good humour, "Pray, good people, be civil; I am the Protestant ———." ”

“ As to Mademoiselle she reasons thus: 'This lady,' says she, 'pretends to be a person of quality; she says she is related to the best families in France: whenever any person of distinction dies she puts herself into mourning. If she be a lady of such quality, why does she demean herself to be a courtezan? ”

“ Wornum, p. 464. ↑ Shadwell was called the True Blue Protestant poet; for the Protestant sock, see Scott's Dryden. ↑ The great Lord Peterborough, when mistaken for the Duke of Marlborough, made a similar escape. "Gentlemen, I can convince you by two reasons that I am not the Duke. In the first place, I have only five guineas in my pocket; and in the second they are heartily at your service." ”