ILL, UNSETTLED, AND UNHAPPY.
November.—This month will be very brief of annals; I was so ill, so unsettled, so unhappy during every day, that I kept not a memorandum. All the short benefit I had received from the bark was now at an end: languor, feverish nights, and restless days were incessant. My memorial was always in my mind; my courage never rose to bringing it from my letter-case. Yet the war was over, the hope of a ship for my brother demolished, and my health required a change of life equally with my spirits and my happiness.
The queen was all graciousness; and her favour and confidence and smiles redoubled my difficulties. I saw she had no suspicion but that I was hers for life; and, unimportant as I felt myself to her, in any comparison with those for whom I quitted her, I yet knew not how to give her the unpleasant surprise of a resignation for which I saw her wholly unprepared..
It is true, my depression of spirits and extreme alteration of person might have operated as a preface; for I saw no one, except my royal mistress and Mrs. Schwellenberg, who noticed not the change, or who failed to pity and question me upon my health and my fatigues; but as they alone saw it not, or mentioned it not, that afforded me no resource. And thus, with daily intention to present my petition and conclude this struggle, night always returned with the effort unmade, and the watchful morning arose fresh to new purposes that seemed only formed for demolition. And the month expired as it began, with a desire the most strenuous of liberty and peace, combated by reluctance unconquerable to give pain, displeasure, or distress to my very gracious royal mistress.
December.-My loss of health was now so notorious, that no part of the house could wholly avoid acknowledging it; yet was the terrible picquet the catastrophe of every evening, though frequent pains in my side forced me, three or four times in a game, to creep to my own room for hartshorn and for rest. And so weak and faint I was become, that I was compelled to put my head out into the air, at all hours, and in all weathers, from time to time, to recover the power of breathing, which seemed not seldom almost withdrawn.
Her majesty was very kind during this time, and the princesses interested themselves about me with a sweetness very grateful to me; indeed, the whole household showed compassion and regard, and a general opinion that I was falling into a decline ran through the establishment.... Thus there seemed about my little person a universal commotion; and it spread much farther, amongst those I have never or slightly mentioned. There seemed, indeed, but one opinion, that resignation of place or of life was the only remaining alternative.
There seemed now no time to be lost when I saw my dear father he recommended to me to be speedy, and my mother was very kind in urgency for immediate measures. I could not, however, summon courage to present my memorial; my heart always failed me, from seeing the queen’s entire freedom from such an expectation: for though I was frequently so ill in her presence that I could hardly stand, I saw she concluded me, while life remained, inevitably hers.