ny civil
or military office from the Government. She left also L20,000 to Lord
Chesterfield, together with her most valuable diamond; but only small
sums to most of her relatives or to charities. The residue of her
property she left to that other grandson who inherited the title and
estates of her husband. L60,000 a year, her estimated income, besides a
costly collection of jewels,--one of the most valuable in Europe,--were
a great property, when few noblemen at that time had over L30,000
a year.

The life of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, is a sad one to contemplate,
with all her riches and honors. Let those who envy wealth or rank learn
from her history how little worldly prosperity can secure happiness or
esteem, without the solid virtues of the heart. The richest and most
prosperous woman of her times was the object of blended derision,
contempt, and hatred throughout the land which she might have adorned.
Why, then, it may be asked, should I single out such a woman for a
lecture,--a woman who added neither to human happiness, national
prosperity, nor the civilization of her age? Why have I chosen her as
one of the Beacon Lights of history? Because I know of no woman who has
filled so exalted a position in society, and is so prominent a figure in
history, whose career is a more impressive warning of the dangers to be
shunned by those who embark on the perilous and troubled seas of mere
worldly ambition. God gave her that to which she aspired, and which so
many envy; but "He sent leanness into her soul."

AUTHORITIES.

Private Correspondence of the Duchess of Marlborough; Mrs. Thompson's
Life of the Duchess of Marlborough; "Conduct," by the Duchess of
Marlborough, Life of Dr. Tillotson, by Dr. Birch; Coxe's Life of the
Duke of Marlborough; Evelyn's Diary; Lord Mahon's History of England;
Macaulay's History of England; Lewis Jenkin's Memoirs of the Duke of
Gloucester; Burnet's History of his own Times; Lamberty's Memoirs;
Swift's Journal to Stella; Liddiard's Life of the Duke of Marlborough;
Boyer's Annals of Queen Anne; Swift's Memoir of the Queen's Ministry;
Cunningham's History of Great Britain; Walpole's Correspondence, edited
by Coxe; Sir Walter Scott's Life of Swift; Agnes Strickland's Queens of
England; Marlborough and the Times of Queen Anne; Westminster Review,
lvi. 26; Dublin University Review, lxxiv. 469; Temple Bar Magazine, lii.
333; Burton's Reign of Queen Anne; Stanhope's Queen Anne.

MADAME