Note 24f — JOURNAL TO STELLA

Sir Paul Methuen (1672–1757), son of John Methuen, diplomatist and Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Methuen was Envoy and Ambassador to Portugal from 1697 to 1708, and was M.P. for Devizes from 1708 to 1710, and a Lord of the Admiralty. Under George I. he was Ambassador to Spain, and held other offices. Gay speaks of “Methuen of sincerest mind, as Arthur grave, as soft as womankind,” and Steele dedicated to him the seventh volume of the Spectator. In his Notes on Macky’s Characters, Swift calls him “a profligate rogue . . . without abilities of any kind.”