h the same opinion with regard
to all customs which prevail among the Turks."

It was during this interview that Mr Montagu declared: "I have never
once been guilty of a small folly in the whole course of my
life"--probably making the mental reservation that all his follies had
been great ones. Thus this singular sprig of nobility drifted through
his kaleidoscopic life, changing his religion as lightly as he changed
from priest to ploughman, or from debauchee to Armenian storyteller.

Perhaps the most remarkable thing he ever did was the publication of the
following advertisement, the object of which was evidently to secure the
large Yorkshire estate devised by his father to any son he might have:

"MATRIMONY.--A gentleman who hath filled two succeeding
seats in Parliament, is near sixty years of age, lives in
great splendour and hospitality, and from whom a
considerable estate must pass if he dies without issue,
hath no objection to marry any lady, provided the party
be of genteel birth, polished manners, and about to
become a mother. Letters directed to ---- Brecknock,
Esq., at Wills's Coffeehouse, facing the Admiralty, will
be honoured with due attention, secrecy, and every
possible mark of respect."

At this time Montagu was the father of three children--two sons (one a
black boy of thirteen, who was his favourite companion) and a daughter;
but they all lacked the sanction of the altar.

A lady answering these delicate requirements was actually found, and
Montagu would probably have graduated as a respectable husband and
father of another man's child had not his vagabond career been cut
tragically short. One day, when he was dining at Padua with Romney, the
famous artist, a partridge-bone lodged in the old man's throat, and
refused to budge. He was suffocating; his face grew purple--almost
black. In terrified haste a priest was summoned to administer the last
consolations of religion; but the dying man would have none of him. When
he was asked in what faith he wished to leave the world, he gasped, "A
good Mussulman, I hope." A few moments later Edward Wortley Montagu, who
had played more parts on the world's stage than almost any other man who
ever lived, was a corpse. This grandson of a Duke had begun his life of
adventure as a fish-hawker, and ended it as "a good Mussulman."

CHAPTER XIX

FOOTLIGHTS AND CORONETS

Ever since that tough old sol