tea, which was brought her on a silver waiter by brother John, who delivered it to the lady-in-waiting, and she presented it kneeling. The leave they took of us was such as we might expect from our equals; full of apologies for our trouble for their entertainment-which they were so anxious to have explained, that the Queen came up to us, as we stood on one side of the door, and had every word interpreted. My brothers had the honour of assisting the Queen into her coach. Some of us sat up to see them return, and the King and Queen took especial notice of us as they passed. The King ordered twenty-four of his guard to be placed opposite our door all night, lest any of the canopy should be pulled down by the mob, in which there were one hundred yards of silk damask."

From the hospitable Quakers the royal party went to the Guildhall, where a banquet had been provided for them at a cost of £8,000, and both King and Queen observed "that for elegance of entertainment the City beat the Court end of the town." "It was a feast," said a foreign minister, "such as only one king could give to another," The Lord Mayor and Aldermen had evidently determined to give the royal bride a right hearty welcome to her new domains, and succeeded brilliantly.

CHAPTER III.

Changes at the Court-A Royal Ball-Harsh Conduct of Augusta -Her Influence over the King-Public Hatred of Lord Bute -Unpopularity of the Princess--Fête given by Lady Northumberland-Illness of the King-Birth of the Prince of Wales-Marriage of the Lady Augusta-The Regency BillMarriage of the Princess Caroline Matilda-Her Letter to the Duke of York-Marriage of the Duke of GloucesterHis Children-Marriage of the Duke of Cumberland-The Royal Marriage Act-Death of the Duke of York-Letter of Caroline Matilda to her Mother-Death of the Princess Louisa-The Royal Children-Rash Conduct of the Queen of Denmark-Augusta's Visit to Germany and DenmarkHer illness-Arrest of Caroline Matilda-Grief of AugustaHer death-Her character-Elegy upon her-Her Children.

THE Court, under the new régime, was strikingly different to what it had been. Virtue was imperative, and vice rigidly discountenanced-no small innovation on the more than easy morals of the last reign-and economy and prudence were practised to an excessive degree. The gaieties at the Palace were, contrary to general expectation, of the very mildest description. With a King of twenty-two, and a Queen of seventeen, people naturally looked for a fair amount of feasts and festivals, balls and banquets, and other species of merry-making; but George and Charlotte had ideas on the subject that their warmest admirers were forced to regard as limited. On November 26th the young sovereigns gave their first party, the invitations being confined to about half-a-dozen strangers, and the whole company being comprised in twelve or fourteen couples. The invited guests were Lady Caroline Russell, Lady Jane Stewart, Lord Suffolk, Lord Mandeville, Lord Northampton, and Lord Grey. The rest of the party consisted of the lords

and ladies of the Court-the Duchesses of Ancaster and Hamilton, who danced very little; Lady Effingham and Lady Egremont, who danced much; Lady Bolingbroke, who was unable to dance because she wore black gloves-a regulation the occult reason of which history explaineth not; six maids of honour, Lady Susan Stewart, in attendance on the Lady Augusta, the Duchess of Bedford, Lady Bute, and the lords in waiting-Lord March, Lord Eglingtoun, Lord Cantilupe, and Lord Huntingdon. These, with the Royal personages themselves -the King and Queen, the Princess Dowager, Lady Augusta and her four brothers-made the whole of the assemblage; and it is recorded that none sat out save the Princess of Wales, the Duchess of Bedford, and Lady Bute.

"At this select party, which commenced between half-past six and seven, the King danced the whole time with the Queen; and the Lady Augusta, future mother of the next Queen of England, with her four younger brothers. The dancing went on uninterruptedly till one in the morning; the hungry guests separated without supper; and so ended the young couple's first and not very hilarious party."*

It will be remembered how the Princess of Wales, when herself a young bride, had attempted to exercise her own opinion, and had received the sacrament at a Lutheran chapel. She had argued and protested vehemently, and with tears, in support of her own predilections, but had been resolutely overruled. Such a reminiscence should have made her careful not to encroach in like manner on the feelings of her own young daughter-in-law, Queen Charlotte; but that the very reverse was the case, is proved by her conduct soon after her son's

* Dr. Doran.

marriage. He had given his bride many presents of magnificent jewels; "and," says Walpole, "as if diamonds were empire, she was never allowed to appear in public without them. The first time she received the sacrament she begged not to wear them; one pious command of her mother having been not to use jewels at her first communion. The King indulged her, but Lady Augusta carrying this tale to her mother, the Princess obliged the King to insist on the jewels, and the poor young Queen's tears and terrors could not dispense with her obedience."

The influence possessed by his mother over George III. was indeed one of the strongest guides of his life. With, as Green says, "a smaller mind than any English King before him save James II.," he had a dogged tenacity of purpose, and strove to follow out the counsels she gave, and he implicitly trusted in, to the utmost.

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George, be a King," she reiterated; "and,” says Thackeray, "a King the simple, stubborn, affectionate, bigoted man tried to be."

In all her political advice to her son, she was coinciding with, if not ruled by, Lord Bute, a man whom fortune had placed in a position for which his abilities but little fitted him. He rose to be Prime Minister.

"Now, indeed, my son is King!" said Augusta; but the popular dislike grew to such a height that, in 1763, he was forced to resign; and his unpopularity affected the public estimate of the Princess. Malignant and utterly false reports, scandalous and unworthy of credence, were spread concerning her; and she and the Premier were alike included in the storm of detestation rained by the public.

"Bute," says Thackeray, "was hated with a rage of which there have been few examples in English

history. He was the butt for everybody's abuse; for Wilkes' devilish mischief, for Churchill's slashing satire, for the hooting of the mob that roasted his boot, his emblem, in a thousand bonfires; that hated him because he was a favourite and a Scotchman, calling him Mortimer,' Lothario,' and I know not what names, and accusing his royal mistress of all kinds of crimes the grave, lean, demure, elderly woman, who, I dare say, was quite as good as her neighbours. Chatham lent the aid of his great malice to influence the popular sentiment against her. He assailed, in the House of Lords, the secret influence, more mighty than the throne itself, which betrayed and dogged every administration.' The most furious pamphlets echoed the cry. 6 Impeach the King's mother,' was scribbled over every wall at the Court end of the town, Walpole tells us."

In spite, however, of her unpopularity, the Princess continued to receive a fair share of homage.

"I was yesterday," writes Mrs. Harris to her son at Oxford (afterwards the first Lord Malmesbury) in June, 1763, "at Leicester House, where there were more people than I thought had been in town."

Augusta, however, now chiefly lived in Carlton House," which," says Thackeray, "contemporary prints represent as a perfect paradise of a garden, with trim lawns, green arcades, and vistas of classic statues. She admired these in company with my Lord Bute, who had a fine classic taste, and sometimes council took, and sometimes tea, in the pleasant green arbours along with that polite nobleman."

During the first year of her married life, Queen Charlotte was visited by one of her brothers, in whose honour Lady Northumberland gave a