For womankind there were Lady Morley the wit and Lady Cowper the humorist, and Lady Ashburton, who tamed Carlyle; Lady Jersey, the queen of fashion, and the two sister-queens of beauty, Lady Canning and Lady Waterford; Lady Tankerville, who as a girl had taken refuge in England from the matrimonial advances of the Comte d’Artois; the three fascinating Foresters, Mrs. Robert Smith, Mrs. Anson, and Lady Chesterfield; and Lady Molesworth and Lady Waldegrave, who had climbed by their cleverness from the lowest rung of the social ladder to a place not very far from the top.

Beyond this circle, again, there was a miscellaneous zone, where dwelt politicians ranging from John Bright to Arthur Balfour; poets and men of letters, such as Tennyson and Browning, Thackeray and Motley and Laurance Oliphant; Paxton the gardener-architect and Hudson the railway-king; stars of the musical world, such as Mario and Grisi and Rachel; blue-stockings like Lady Eastlake and Madame Mohl; Mademoiselle de Montijo, who captivated an Emperor, and Lola Montez, who ruled a kingdom.  No advantages of social education will convert a fool or a bore or a prig or a churl into an agreeable member of society; but, where Nature has bestowed a bright intelligence and a genial disposition, her gifts are cultivated to perfection by such surroundings as Frederick Leveson enjoyed in early life.  And so it came about that alike as a young man, in middle life (which was in his case unusually prolonged), and in old age, he enjoyed a universal and unbroken popularity.

It is impossible to connect the memory of Freddy Leveson with the idea of ambition, and it must therefore have been the praiseworthy desire to render unpaid service to the public which induced him to embark on the unquiet sea of politics.  At a bye-election in the summer of 1847 he was returned, through the interest of his uncle the Duke of Devonshire, for Derby.  A General Election immediately ensued; he was returned again, but was unseated, with his colleague, for a technical irregularity.  In 1852 he was returned for Stoke-upon-Trent, this time by the aid of his cousin the Duke of Sutherland (for the “Sacred Circle” retained a good deal of what was termed “legitimate influence").  In 1854, having been chosen to second the Address at the opening of Parliament, he was directed to call on Lord John Russell, who would instruct him in his duties.  Lord John was the shyest of human beings, and the interview was brief:  “I am glad you are going to second the Address.  You will know what to say.  Good-morning.”

At the General Election of 1857 he lost his seat for Stoke.  “Poor Freddy,” writes his brother, Lord Granville, “is dreadfully disappointed by his failure in the Potteries.  He was out-jockeyed by Ricardo.”  All who knew “poor Freddy” will easily realize that in a jockeying contest he stood no chance.  In 1859 he was returned for Bodmin, this time by the good offices, not of relations, but