Lavinia Fenton's history belongs to that of her time. In spite of Miss Churchill's entreaties, she continued on the stage: and her success in Polly, of the Beggars' Opera, is well known. She ended by becoming Duchess of Bolton; one of those strange instances of mere worldly prosperity, which set all ordinary calculation at defiance.
The conclusion of Lady Mary Wortley Montague's career is, also, matter of history; one of its grave, sad lessons. Clever—beautiful—with every advantage of nature and fortune, her youth was a vain search after happiness, under the mistaken name of pleasure. I do not know a moral picture more degrading than the weakness which, for years, made her shrink from the sight of a looking-glass; nor any thing more disconsolate than her long residence, during her advanced life, in a foreign country, remote alike from the sphere of her duties and her affections. Brilliant—witty —searching into human nature, as her letters undoubtedly are, there is a fearful deficiency in all higher feeling and nobler motive;
