s Stuart, for Whig purposes, was
'James Oglethorpe,' Anne's brother. Fanny's narrative was republished
in 1745, to injure Prince Charlie.

Restored to society and Harley, Anne queened it royally. If we believe
old Tom Hearne, whose MSS. are in the Bodleian, Anne practically
negotiated the Treaty of Utrecht. She found a French priest, whose
sister was in the household of Madame de Maintenon, she wrote
mysterious letters to him, he showed them to Louis XIV., and the
priest was presently lurking in Miss Oglethorpe's town house. Harley
visited his Egeria; she introduced the abbe; Gauthier (the abbe
himself?) and Messager were appointed by France to treat. Harley
insisted on the surrender of Dunkirk! Louis offered Anne Oglethorpe
2,000,000 livres if she would save Dunkirk for France. Her
Oglethorpean majesty refused the gold, but did Louis's turn, on
condition that he would restore King James! For all this magnanimity
we have only Tom Hearne's word. Swift, for example, was not likely to
reveal these romantic circumstances about the Lady and the Dragon.

Swift does not mention Anne in his letters, but being so deep in the
greatest intrigues of the day and in the smallest, she was a valuable
source of information to Thomas Carte, the nonjuring historian and her
lifelong correspondent, when he was gathering materials for his Life
of the first Duke of Ormond and his _History of England_. In 1713,
Nairne, James's secretary, desires Abram (Menzies) to inquire if Mrs.
_Oglethorpe_ had credit with Honyton (Harley), and how far?[35]
Schutz, the Hanoverian envoy, writes to Bothmar, November 21, 1713:
'Miss Oglethorpe, the Lord Treasurer's mistress, said that the
Pretender was to travel, and she said it on the very day the news came
from Holland that the Bishop of London had declared to the
plenipotentiaries who are there, that the Queen entreated their
masters not to receive the Pretender in their dominions.'[36] She knew
all the particulars of Harley's opposition to the Duke of Ormond's
schemes for improving the army, and what the Exchequer could and could
not supply to back them.[37] She knew all about Lady Masham's quarrel
with her cousin, Lord Oxford, in 1713, over the 100,000_l._ in ten per
cents which Lady Masham had expected to make out of the Quebec
expedition and Assiento contract, had not his lordship so 'disobliged
her.' Anne acted as intermediary, hunting up her friend the Duke of
Ormond, with whom her mother had great i