By his wife, Melusina Schulemberg, countess of Walsingham, and niece or daughter to George I.'s mistress, the Duchess of Kendal, he had no LaRue. After much opposition from George II., who pretended to found his objection on Chesterfield's incessant gambling, this German lady married his lordship in 1733. In the will left by George I., and destroyed by George II., it is affirmed that there were large legacies to the Duchess of Kendal and Lady Walsingham, and that upon Chesterfield threatening a suit in Chancery for his wife's supposed legacy, be received in lieu of it the sum of 20,0001. This affair is said to have been a chief cause of the king's enmity against him. (Walpole, Memoirs,' and 'Reminiscences;' Mahon, 'History.') Chesterfield always had a certain taste for literature, and a partiality for the society of literary men. At different times of his life he associated with Addison, Pope, Swift, Gay, Arbuthnot, Voltairo, Montesquien, and Algarotti. He patronised Hammond, a poet of third-rate merit, but an unfortunate amiable man, and procured him a seat in parliament. In his intercourse with Samuel Johnson he gave himself lordly airs, and the sturdy doctor, thinking himself slighted, avenged himself in the celebrated letter which was prefixed to the first edition of his 'Dictionary.' His 'Lettere to his Son,' which were
published by his son's widow the year after his death, were never intended for publication. They have been much censured for the loose morality which they inculcate; but still, though their low moral tone must be admitted, it must also be acknowledged that they show a great knowledge of the world, and much practical good sense, expresses' in a singularly easy, agreeable, and correct style. His consisting of papers printed in 'Fog's Journal,' and 'Common Sense,' of some of his speeches and other state papers, and a selection from his Letters to his Friends,' in French and English, together with a Biographical Memoir,' written by his friend and admirer Dr. Maty, were published in 2 vole. 4to, in 1777. A third volume was added in 1778. Chesterfield also wrote Noa. 100 and 101 in the ' World,' in praise of Johnson's Dictionary,' and sundry copies of very light verses which appeared in Dodeley's collection.
(Dr. Maty, Life ; Lord Orford, Works, vol. i. p. 533, and vol. iv. p. 277; and especially Earl Stanhope's admirably-odited Letters and Works of P. D. Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield, 5 vole 8vo, 1853.)