If Caroline could not speak so harshly of the prelates, generally or individually, as her husband, she could reprove them, when occasion offered, with singular asperity. We may see an instance of this in the case of the episcopal opposition to the Mortmain and to the Quakers’ Relief Bills; but especially to the latter. This particular bill had for its object to render more easy the recovery of tithes from Quakers; the latter did not ask for exemption, but for less oppression in the method of levying. The court wished that the bill should pass into law. Sherlock, now Bishop of Salisbury, wrote a pamphlet against it; and the prelates generally, led by Gibson, Bishop of London, stirred up all the dioceses in the kingdom to oppose it, with a cry of The Church in danger. Sir Robert Walpole represented to the Queen that all the bishops were blameable; but that the chief blame rested upon Sherlock, whose opposition was described as being as little to be justified in point of understanding and policy as in integrity and gratitude. Sir Robert declared that he was at once the dupe and the willing follower of the Bishop of London, and that both were guilty of endeavouring to disturb the quiet of the kingdom.
The first time Dr. Sherlock appeared at court after this the Queen chid him extremely, and asked him if he was not ashamed to be overreached in this manner by the Bishop of London. She accused him of being a second time the dupe of the latter prelate, who was charged with having misled him in a matter concerning the advancement of Dr. Rundle to an episcopal see. ‘How,’ she asked him, ‘could he be blind and weak enough to be running his nose into another’s dirt again!’ As for the King, he spoke of the prelates on this occasion ‘with his usual softness.’ They were, according to the hereditary defender of the faith, ‘a parcel of black, canting, hypocritical rascals.’ They were ‘silly,’ ‘impertinent’ fellows, presuming to dictate to the Crown; as if it were not the duty of a bishop to exercise this boldness when emergency warranted and occasion suited.
Both bills were passed in the Commons. The Mortmain Bill (to prevent the further alienation of lands by will in mortmain) passed the Lords; but the Quakers’ Relief Bill was lost there by a majority of two.
The Queen was far from desiring that the bishops should be so treated as to make them in settled antagonism with the Crown. She one day ventured to say something in this spirit to the King. It was at a time when he was peevishly impatient to get away to Hanover, to the society of Madame Walmoden, and to the young son born there since his departure. He is reported to have exclaimed to Caroline, when she was gently urging a more courteous treatment of the bishops—‘I am sick to death of all this foolish stuff, and wish, with all my heart, that the devil may take all your bishops, and the devil take your minister, and the devil take the parliament, and the devil take the whole island, provided I can get out of it and go to Hanover.’[26]
What Caroline meant by moderation of behaviour towards the bishops it is hard to understand; for when Drs. Sherlock and Hare complained to her that, in spite of their loyalty to the Crown they were nightly treated with great coarseness and indignity by lords closely connected with the court, Caroline spoke immediately, in the harsh tone and strong terms ordinarily employed by her consort, and said, that she could more easily excuse Lord Hervey, who was chiefly complained of as speaking sharply against them in parliament—‘I can easier excuse him,’ exclaimed her Majesty, ‘for throwing some of the Bishop of London’s dirt upon you than I can excuse all you other fools (who love the Bishop of London no better than he does) for taking the Bishop of London’s dirt upon yourselves.’ She claimed a right to chide the prelates soundly, upon the ground that she loved them deeply; and she made very liberal use of the privilege she claimed. Bishop Hare, in replying, called Lord Hinton, one of Lord Hervey’s imitators, his ‘ape.’ The Queen told this to Lord Hervey, who answered, that his ape, if he came to know that such a term had been applied to him, would certainly knock down the Queen’s ‘baboon.’ Caroline, with a childish spirit of mischief, communicated to Hare what she had done, and what her vice-chancellor had said upon it. The terrified prelate immediately broke the third commandment, exclaiming, ‘Good God! madam, what have you done! As for Lord Hervey, he will satisfy himself, perhaps, with playing his wit off upon me, and calling me Old Baboon; but for my Lord Hinton, who has no wit, he will knock me down.’ The vice-chamberlain, who reports the scene, says—‘This tallied so ridiculously with what Lord Hervey had said to the Queen that she burst into a fit of laughter, which lasted some minutes before she could speak; and then she told the bishop, “That is just, my good lord, what Lord Hervey did do, and what he said the ape would do.”’ The Queen, however, promised that no harm should come to the prelate.
No inconsiderable amount of harm, however, was inflicted on many of the prelates, including Hare himself. Walpole was disposed to translate him when an advantageous opportunity offered; but Hervey showed him good reason for preferring pliant Potter, then of Oxford. Gibson, the Bishop of London, had been looking to be removed to Canterbury whenever Dr. Wake’s death there should cause a vacancy. He expected, however, that, in accordance with his wish, Sherlock would succeed him in London. The Queen was disposed to sanction the arrangement; but she was frightened out of it by Walpole and Hervey. She accordingly advised Sherlock ‘to go down to his diocese and live quietly; to let the spirit he had raised so foolishly against him here subside; and to reproach himself only if he had failed, or should fail, of what he wished should be done and she had wished to do for him.’
During the absence of the King, in 1736, in Hanover, the Queen Regent had but an uneasy time of it at home. First, there were corn riots in the west, which were caused by the attempts of the people to prevent the exportation of corn, and which could only be suppressed by aid of the military. Next, there were labour riots in the metropolis in consequence of the market being overstocked by Irish labourers, who offered to work at lower rates than the English; and which also the bayonet alone was able to suppress. Thirdly, the coasts were infested by smugglers, whom the prospect of the hangman could not deter from their exciting vocation, and who not only killed revenue officers in very pretty battles, but were heartily assisted by the country people, who looked upon the contrabandists as most gallant and useful gentlemen. Much sedition was mixed up with the confusion which arose from these tumultuary proceedings: for wherever the people were opposed in their inclinations, they immediately took to cursing the Queen especially; not, however, sparing the King, nor forgetting, in their street ovations, to invoke blessings upon James III. It was, indeed, the fashion for every aggrieved person to speak of George II., in his character of Elector of Hanover, as ‘a foreign prince.’ When this was done by a nonjuring clergyman named Dixon, who exploded an innocent infernal machine in Westminster Hall (to the great terror of judges and lawyers), which scattered papers over the hall denouncing various acts of parliament—first that against the sale of gin in unlicensed places, then the act for building Westminster Bridge, the one to suppress smuggling, and that which enabled ‘a foreign prince’ to borrow 600,000l. of money sacredly appropriated to the payment of our debts—the Lord Chancellor and the Chief Justice were so affrighted that they called the escapade ‘a treason.’ Caroline summoned a council thereon, and, having at last secured the half-mad and destitute offender, they consigned him to rot in a gaol; although, as Lord Hervey says, ‘the lawyers should have sent him to Bedlam, and would have sent him to Tyburn.’
The popular fury was sometimes so excited that it was found necessary, as in the Michaelmas of this year, to double the guards who had the care of her sacred Majesty at Kensington. The populace had determined upon being drunk, when, where, and how they liked. The government had resolved that they should not get drunk upon gin at any but licensed places; and thereupon the majesty of the people became so furious that even the person of Caroline was hardly considered safe in her own palace.
Nor were riots confined only to England. A formidable one broke out in Edinburgh, based upon admiration for a smuggler named Wilson, who had cleverly robbed a revenue officer, as well as defrauded the revenue. The mob thought it hard that the poor fellow should be hanged for such little foibles as these; and though they could not rescue him from the gallows, they raised a desperate tumult as he was swung from it. The town guard fired upon the rioters, by order of their captain, Porteous, and several individuals were slain. The captain was tried for this alleged unlawful slaying, and was condemned to die; but Caroline, who admired promptness of character, stayed the execution by sending down a reprieve. The result is well known; the mob broke open the prison, and inflicted Lynch law upon the captain, hanging him in the market-place, amid a shower of curses and jeers against Caroline and her reprieve.
The indignation of the Queen Regent was almost uncontrollable. She was especially indignant against General Moyle, commander of the troops, who had refused to interfere to suppress the riot. He was tolerably well justified in his refusal; for the magistrates of Edinburgh, ever ready to invoke assistance, were addicted to betray them who rendered it to the gallows if the riot was suppressed by shedding the blood of the rioters. His conduct on this occasion was further regulated by orders from his commander-in-chief. Caroline had no regard for any of the considerations which governed the discreet general; and, in the vexation of her chafed spirit, she declared that Moyle deserved to be shot by order of a court-martial. It was with great difficulty that her ministers and friends succeeded in softening the asperity of her temper. Even Sir Robert Walpole, who joined in representing that it were better to hold Moyle harmless, maintained in private that the general was fool, knave, or coward. Lord Hervey says that the Queen resented the conduct of the Scotch on this occasion, as showing ‘a tendency to shake off all government; and I believe was a little more irritated, from considering it in some degree as a personal affront to her, who had sent down Captain Porteous’s reprieve; and had she been told half what was reported to have been said of her by the Scotch mob on this occasion, no one could think that she had not ample cause to be provoked.’