Hamilton incidentally mentions her as being "as good a woman as any in England."[1]
On the other hand, if we believe the Princess Anne and her uncle, the Earl of Clarendon, she must have been an accomplished hypocrite; and, to use her own phrase, as great a jade as ever lived.[2] The former, in writing to her sister, the Princess of Orange, describes her as a fit partner for one of "the subtleist workinest villains that is on the face of the earth."
- ↑ "The Duchess of Hamilton, although a staunch Presbyterian and hearty revolutionist, at all times contradicted the story of the Queen's false big belly on the authority of the Countess of Sunderland, whom she reckoned as good a woman as any in England."—Additional Note to Burnet's Hist.
- ↑ "I then went," says Lord Clarendon, "to the Princess, my wife having told me she wondered she did not see me. I found
of which we have no idea in modern days. "I went" he says, "to Althorpe, in Northamptonshire, 70 miles. A coach and four horses took me and my son at Whitehall, and carried us to Dunstable, where we arrived and dined at noon; and from thence another coach and six horses carried us to Althorpe, six miles beyond Northampton, where we arrived by seven in the evening. Both these coaches were hired for me by that noble Countess of Sunderland, who invited me to her house at Althorpe, where she entertained me and my son with extraordinary kindness. I stayed there till Thursday." When Thursday came, he says, "I left this noble place and conversation, my Lady having provided carriages to convey us back in the same manner as we came, and a dinner being prepared at Dunstable against our arrival."—i. 653.
