Everything Is Possible For An Eccentric, Especially When He Is English – Part Twenty
Mary Boyle, Countess of Cork and Orrery (1746 –1840)
Mary Monckton – she became Mary Boyle when she married the seventh Earl of Cork in 1786 – was one of, if not the, pre-eminent society hostesses of the 18th century. She had a phenomenal memory and an outstanding wit and invitations to her soirees were the hottest tickets in town. She even charmed the curmudgeon that was Doctor Johnson; Boswell records “her vivacity enchanted the Sage, and they used to talk together with all imaginable ease.”
Mary was not a society beauty, although she became an oil painting, Sir Joshua Reynolds committing her image to paint in 1778-9. Fanny Burney described her as being “very short, very fat but handsome, splendidly and fantastically dressed, rouged not unbecomingly yet evidently and palpably desirous of gaining notice and admiration.” Among those who came to her dinners and receptions were the likes of Lord Byron, Sir Walter Scott, Richard Sheridan, and the Prince Regent. So famous did Mary become that in Georgette Heyer’s Venetia, a character is described as seeing herself as a “second Lady Cork, to whose salons it is an honour to be invited.” The context, though, shows that the remark is not intended to be flattering.
Mary’s drawing rooms were rather Spartan affairs, without anything in the way of ornaments or decorations. Around the walls of the room were dozens of large, comfortable armchairs, fixed in a way that they could not be moved. The reason for this may be connected with the fact that no matter how splendid her soirees were, she rarely received invitations to dine elsewhere.
The reason was simple – she was an incorrigible kleptomaniac.
So notorious was Mary that if she was to be entertained, the hosts would remove all their best silver and make do with ordinary pewter cutlery. This did not put Mary off. She would simply scoop the lot up, put them in her muff which she carried for the purpose and take them home. One of her maid’s duties after one of Mary’s excursions was to make out an inventory of what did not belong to her mistress and return them to their rightful owners with a note of apology.
In those days, it was the custom for tradesmen to take their goods out of their shops to the waiting carriages of the great and good so that they could peruse their wares without having to rub shoulders with the hoi polloi. This courtesy was not extended to Mary. When her carriage pulled up, the unfortunate tradesman had to insist that she descended and enter their humble shop, doubtless making sure that everything moveable was securely fastened or nailed down.
On one occasion Mary drove off in a carriage belonging to a fellow guest. When the rather irate chap called to remonstrate and recover his property, Mary was unabashed, refusing to apologise and even having the audacity to complain that the steps were rather high for her short legs.
A hotel that she stayed in had a pet hedgehog which ran about the entrance hall. This was too much of a temptation for Mary to resist. She scooped it up into her muff, later exchanging at a baker’s for a sponge cake. It seems that the creature had been too prickly a character for her to endure. One wag noted that heaven would be too boring for Mary – there would be nothing to pinch.
She lived to the ripe old age of ninety-four, still entertaining well into her nineties. She had no conscience and her approach to life was summed up rather well by her niece in this little ditty; “Look at me/ I’m ninety three/ and all my faculties I keep/ Eat, drink and laugh and soundly sleep.”
But in a time when stealing property could get you hung or, worse still, transported to Australia, there was clearly another law for the rich and well connected.
