Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley], daughter of Evelyn Pierrepont, first duke of Kingston, was born in the summer of 1713. In 1716 he was taken by his parents to Constantinople, and at Pera in March 1716-17 was inoculated for the small-pox, being the first native of the United Kingdom to undergo the operation. On the return of his parents to England in 1718 he was placed at Westminster School, from which he ran away more than once. On the first occasion, July 1726, he was traced to Oxford, and was with difficulty 'reduced to the humble condition of a school-boy.' He decamped again in August 1727, and was not recovered for some months. Two similar escapades are mentioned by his tutor, Forster, chaplain to the Duchess of Kingston, but without dates. The first ended in his discovery, after a year's absence, crying fish in Blackwall; on the second occasion he worked his passage out to Oporto, deserted, went up country, and found employment in the vineyards, but returning to Oporto in charge of some asses, was arrested at the instance of the British consul, brought back to his ship, identified and restored to his parents by the master. After some time spent with a tutor in the West Indies, Montagu came home about 1733, and in a freak married a woman much his senior, and of no social position. His parents now treated him as deranged, induced the wife by a small pension to forego her rights, and packed him off to Holland in charge of a keeper, in time to prevent the birth of a child. At first the keeper's office was no sinecure, and Montagu was several times put in confinement. Nevertheless he studied Arabic to purpose under Schultens of Leyden, and became proficient in French and other European languages. On 6 Sept. 1741 his name was entered as a student on the register of Leyden University. His allowance was small (300l. a year), and his gambling and other debts exorbitant. His mother, who saw him from time to time on the continent, describes him as an excellent linguist, a thorough liar, and so weak-minded as to be capable of turning 'monk one day, and a Turk three days after.' Nevertheless Montagu held for a time a commission in the army of the allies, served without discredit at the battle of Fontenoy on 11 May (N.S.) 1745, was returned to parliament for the borough of Huntingdon in 1747, and in July 1748 was appointed one of the commissioners to execute the office of secretary at the congress of Aix-la-Chapelle. He returned to London in January 1750-1, and astonished the town by the height of his play and the extravagance of his dress. With his diamond shoe-buckles and snuff-boxes, and a wig of iron wire marvellously contrived to look like hair, he was 'computed to walk 2,500l.,' and was forthwith elected fellow of the Royal Society. In the autumn of 1751 he made a jaunt to Paris in company with a certain Miss Ashe (a lady of doubtful reputation, commonly known as 'The Pollard Ashe,' with whom he had previously gone through the ceremony of marriage), Theobald Taaffe, M.P. for Arundel, and Lord Southwell, and on 31 Oct. was committed to the Chatelet prison on a charge of cheating a Jew at faro and extorting payment by force. Taaffe and Lord Southwell were also incriminated, but were not arrested. Montagu pleaded not guilty, and by the interest of the British ambassador, Lord Albemarle, obtained his liberty after eleven days' incarceration. He then brought an action of false imprisonment against his accuser, and obtained judgment on 25 Jan. 1751-2, which, however, was reversed on appeal. He published the same year his own version of this episode in both French and English (see infra).
From 1754 to 1762 Montagu sat in parliament, a silent member, for the borough of Bossiney, Cornwall. In 1759 he published a sort of historico-didactical essay, entitled 'Reflections on the Rise and Fall of the Antient Republics. Adapted to the Present State of Great Britain,' London, 8 vo; later editions in 1769 and 1778. The composition of this work has been attributed, on insufficient grounds, to his former tutor, Forster. On his father's death, 22 Jan. 1761, Montagu found himself cut off with an annuity of 1,000l., to be raised to 2,000l. on the death of his mother. Leaving England soon afterwards he re-entered himself (19 Feb. 1761) at Leyden, being described in the university register as 'Linguarum Orientalium Cultor.' He started early in 1762 for the East, and was in Italy when Lady Mary died, having bequeathed him a guinea. The family estates went to his sister, Lady Bute, but provision was made for his son, if he should leave one. At Turin Montagu inspected the recently discovered bust upon which John Turberville Needham [q. v.] had founded his fantastic theory of the Egyptian origin of the Chinese, which he examined in a letter to the Earl of Macclesfield, read before the Royal Society on 25 Nov. 1762. The letter does not appear in the 'Philosophical Transactions,' but, with a rejoinder to Needham 's reply, was published in pamphlet form in 1763, under the title 'Observations upon a supposed Antique Bust at Turin,' London, 4to.
At Rome Montagu became intimate with Winckelmann, whom he at first dazzled by his various accomplishments. He left Italy
