e preceding year, July, 1714, he had
married, at Acton in Middlesex, the Lady Frances Pierrepoint, the second
daughter of Evelyn, first Duke of Kingston, and the sister of Lady Mary
Wortley. The Countess of Mar was, at the time of her marriage,
thirty-three years of age, being born in 1681. She does not appear to
have been endowed with the rare qualities of her sister's mind; but that
she was attached to her husband, her long exile from England on his
account, sufficiently proves. Her married life was embittered by his
career, and her latter days darkened by the direst of all maladies,
mental aberration.

It is singular that so recently before his final effort, Lord Mar should
have connected himself with a Whig family. The Marquis of Dorchester,
who was created, by George the First, Duke of Kingston, was a member of
the Kit Cat Club, and received early proofs of the good will of the
Hanoverian Sovereign. It is true that Lady Mary Wortley augured ill of
the match between her sister and Lord Mar, detesting as she did the
Jacobite party, and believing that her sister was "drawn in by the
persuasion of an officious female friend," Lord Mar's relation. But
there is no reason to conclude that the Duke of Kingston in any way
objected to a match apparently so dissonant with his political bias.[65]

Whilst Lord Mar remained near the court, the discoveries made by the
Earl of Stair in France, communicated the first surmise of an intended
invasion of England. Several seizures of suspected people warned one who
was deep in the intrigues of St. Germain, not long to delay the open
prosecution of his schemes. The melancholy instance of Mr. Harvey, who
was apprehended while he was hawking at Combe, in Surrey, alarmed the
Jacobite party. Mr. Harvey being shown a paper written in his own hand,
convicting him of guilt, stabbed himself, but not fatally, with a
pruning-knife which he had used in his garden. Upon some hope of his
confessing being hinted, it was answered that his Majesty and the
Council knew more of it than he did. The celebrated John Anstis, the
heraldic writer, was also apprehended, and warrants were issued for the
seizure of other suspected persons.

Notwithstanding his strong family interest, the Earl of Mar could
scarcely consider himself secure under the present state both of the
country and the metropolis. The events of the last year had succeeded
each other with an appalling rapidity. The flight of Bolingbroke had