“The following sums have been rec’d since the year 1701: 

“Receiv’d on Accompt of Bread and Bread-waggons L63,319 3 7
Receiv’d 10,000,_l_. by Annual Contingencies 100,000 0 0
Receiv’d by 2 and 1/2 per cent, from the
payment of Troops 460,062 6 7-3/4
          
                                         -----------------
                                                   623,381 10 2-3/4”
          
                                         -----------------]

[Footnote 7:  In the tenth number of “The Medley” (December 4th, 1710) occurs the following:  “‘The Examiner,’ having it in his thoughts to publish the falsest, as well as the most impudent paper that ever was printed, writ a previous discourse about lying, as a necessary introduction to what was to follow.  The first paper was the precept, and the second was the example.  By the falsest paper that ever was printed, I mean the ‘Examiner’ Numb. 17, in which he pretends to give an account of what the Duke of Marlborough has got by his services.”  The writer in the “Medley,” admitting even the correctness of the “Examiner’s” sum of L540,000, sets off against this the value of the several battles won by the Duke, and “twenty seven towns taken, which being reckoned at 300,000_l_. a town (the price that Dunkirk was sold at before it was fortified) amounts in all, throwing in the battles and the fortifications, to 8,100,000_l_.”  The balance in favour of the Duke, and presumably in justification of the gifts made him, gave a net result of L7,560,000. [T.S.]]

[Footnote 8:  The Duchess of Marlborough, who admitted that the comparison was intended for herself, explained the matter thus:  “At the Queen’s accession to the government, she ... desired me to take out of the privy-purse 2,000_l_. a year, in order to some purchase for my advantage ...  I constantly declined it; until the time, that, notwithstanding the uncommon regard I had shown to Her Majesty’s interest and honour in the execution of my trusts, she was pleased to dismiss me from her service ...  By the advice of my friends, I sent the Queen one of her own letters, in which she had pressed me to take the 2,00_l_. a year; and I wrote at the same time to ask Her Majesty whether she would allow me to charge in the privy-purse accounts, which I was to send her, that yearly sum from the time of the offer, amounting to 18,000_l_.  Her Majesty was pleased to answer, that I might charge it.  This therefore I did” ("An Account of the Conduct of ...  Duchess of Marlborough,” 1742, pp. 293-5).  The Duchess of Somerset and Mrs. Masham superseded the Duchess of Marlborough in January, 1710/1. [T.S.]]

NUMB. 18.[1]

FROM THURSDAY NOVEMBER 23, TO THURSDAY NOVEMBER 30, 1710.

Quas res luxuries in flagitus,... avaritia in rapinis, superbia in contumeliis efficere potuisset; eas omnes sese hoc uno praetore per triennium pertulisse aiebant.[2]