Previous to his return to England, he expressed a wish to the Queen that she would remove from Kensington to St. James’s, on the ground that it would be better for her health, and she would be easier of access to the ministers. The road between London and the suburban locality, which may now be said to be a part of it, was at the period alluded to in so wretched a condition, that Kensington Palace was more remote from the metropolis than Windsor Castle is now. Caroline understood her husband too well to obey. She continued, as regent, to live in retirement, and this affectation of disregard for the outward splendour of her office was not unfavourably looked upon by the King.
The Queen’s rule of conduct was not, however, that which best pleased her son. Frederick declared his intention of leaving the suburban palace for London. Caroline was vexed at the announcement of an intention which amounted, in other words, to the setting up of a rival court; particularly after the orders which had been communicated from the King to the Prince of Wales, through the Duke of Grafton. Frederick wrote a note in reply, like that of his mother’s, in French, in which he intimated his willingness to remain at Kensington as long as the Queen Regent made it her residence. The note was probably written for the prince by Lord Chesterfield. Caroline inflicted considerable annoyance on her son by refusing to consider him as the author of the note; which, by the way, Lord Hervey thought might have been written by ‘young Pitt,’ but certainly not by Lord Chesterfield. The note itself is only quoted from memory by Lord Hervey, who says that Lord Chesterfield would have written better French, as well as with more turns and points. It closely resembles the character of Lord Chesterfield’s letters in French, which were never so purely French but there could be detected in them phrases which were mere translations of English idioms; and it was precisely because of such a fault that Caroline had suspected that the note was written by an Englishman born. The fact remains to be noticed that, in spite of the promise made by the prince to remain at Kensington, he really removed to London; but, as his suite was left in the suburbs, he considered that his pledge was honourably maintained.
Frederick’s conduct seems to have arisen from a fear of its being supposed that he was governed by others. Had it been the Queen’s interest to rule him by letting him suppose that he was free from the influence of others, she would have done it as readily and as easily as in the case of the King. The Queen considered him so far unambitious that he did not long for his father’s death; but Lord Hervey showed her that if he did not, the creditors who had lent him money, payable with interest at the King’s decease, were less delicate in this matter; and that the demise of the King might be so profitable to many as to make the monarch’s speedy death a consummation devoutly to be wished. The life of the Sovereign was thus put in present peril, and Lord Hervey suggested to the Queen that it would be well were a bill brought into parliament, making it a capital offence for any man to lend money for a premium at the King’s death. ‘To be sure,’ replied the Queen, ‘it ought to be so; and pray talk a little with Sir Robert Walpole about it.’ Meanwhile, Frederick Prince of Wales exhibited a liberality which charmed the public generally, rather than his creditors in particular, by forwarding 500l. to the Lord Mayor for the purpose of releasing poor freemen of the City from prison. The act placed the prince in strong contrast with his father, who had been squandering large sums in Germany.
The King’s departure from Hanover for England took place in the night of the 7th to the 8th of December, after one of those brilliant and festive farewell suppers which were now given on such occasions by the Circe or the Cynthia of the hour. Wine and tears, no doubt, flowed abundantly; but, as soon as the scene could be decently brought to an end, the royal lover departed, and arrived on the 11th at Helvoetsluys. His daughter Anne was lying sick, almost to death, at the Hague, where her life had with difficulty been purchased by the sacrifice of that of the little daughter she had borne. The King, however, had not leisure for the demonstration of any parental affection, and he hurried on without even enquiring after the condition of his child. Matter-of-fact people are usually tender, and, if not tender, courteously decent people. The King was a matter-of-fact person enough, but even in this he acted like those highly refined and sentimental persons in whom affection is ever on their lips and venom in their hearts.
The wind was fair, and all London was in expectation, but without eagerness, of seeing once more their gaillard of a King, with his grave look, among them. But the wind veered, and a hurricane blew from the west with such violence that every one concluded, if the King had embarked, he must necessarily have gone down, and the royal convoy of ships perished with him. Bets were laid upon the event, and speculation was busy in every corner. The excitement was naturally great, for the country had never been in such uncertainty about their monarch. Wagers increased. Walpole began to discuss the prospects of the royal family, the probable conduct of the possible new sovereign, the little regard he would have for his mother, the faithless guardian he would be over his brother and sisters, and the bully and dupe he would prove, by turns, of all with whom he came in contact. Lord Hervey and Queen Caroline discussed the same delicate question; and the latter, fancying that her son already assumed, in public and in her presence, the swagger of a new greatness, and that he was bidding for popularity, would not listen to Lord Hervey’s assurances that she would be able to rule him as easily as she had done his father. She ridiculed his conduct, called him fool and ass, and averred that while the thought of some things he did ‘made her feel sick,’ the idea of the popularity of Fritz made her ‘vomit.’ As hour was added to hour, amid all this speculation and trouble, and ‘still Cæsar came not,’ reports of loss of life at sea became rife. At Harwich, guns had been heard at night booming over the waters; people had come to the conclusion that they were guns of distress fired from the royal fleet—the funeral dirge of itself and the monarch. Communication of this gratifying conclusion was made to Caroline. Prince Frederick kindly prepared her for the worst; Lord Hervey added the expression of his fears that that worst was not very far off; and the Princess Caroline began meditating upon the hatred of her brother ‘for mamma,’ and the little chance there would be of her obtaining a liberal provision from the new king. The Queen was more concerned than she chose to acknowledge; but when gloomy uncertainty was at its highest, a courier, whose life had been risked, with those of the ship’s crew with whom he came over, in order to inform Caroline that her consort had not risked his own, was flung ashore ‘miraculously’ at Yarmouth; whence hastening to St. James’s, he relieved all apprehensions and crushed all expiring hopes, by the announcement that his Majesty had never embarked at all, and was still at Helvoetsluys, awaiting fine weather and favouring gales.
The fine weather came, and the wind was fair for bringing the royal wanderer home. It remained so just long enough to induce all the King’s anxious subjects to conclude that he had embarked, and then wind and weather became more tempestuous and adverse than they were before. And now people set aside speculation, and confessed to a conviction that his Majesty lived only in history. During the former season of doubt, Caroline had solaced herself, or wiled away her time, by reading ‘Rollin’ and affecting to make light of all the gloomy reports which were made in her hearing. There was now, however, more cause for alarm. By ones, and twos, and fours, the ships which had left Helvoetsluys with the King were flung upon the English coast, or succeeded in making separate harbours in a miserably wrecked condition. All the intelligence they brought was, that his Majesty had embarked, that they had set sail in company, that an awful hurricane had arisen, that Sir Charles Wager had made signal for every vessel to provide for its own safety, and that the last seen of the royal yacht was that she was tacking, and they only hoped that his Majesty might have succeeded in getting back to Helvoetsluys. Some in England echoed that loyally expressed hope; others only desired that the danger intimated by it might have been wrought out to its full end.
Christmas-day at St. James’s was the very gloomiest of festive times, and the evening was solemnly spent in round games of cards. The Queen, indeed, did not know of the disasters which had happened to the royal fleet; but there was uncertainty enough touching the fate of her royal husband to make even the reading of Rollin appear more decent than playing at basset and cribbage. Meanwhile, the ministers and court officials stood round the royal table, and discoursed on trivial subjects, while their thoughts were directed towards their storm-tost master. On the following morning, Sir Robert Walpole informed her Majesty of the real and graver aspect of affairs. The heart of the tender woman at once melted; and Caroline burst into tears, unrestrainedly. The household of the heir-apparent, on the other hand, began to wear an aspect as though the wished-for inheritance had at last fallen upon it.
The day was Sunday, and the Queen resolved upon attending chapel as usual. Lord Hervey thought her weak in determining to sit up to be stared at. He had no idea that a higher motive might influence a wife in dread uncertainty as to the fate of her husband. Caroline, it is true, was not influenced by any such high motive. She simply did not wish that people should conclude, from her absence, that the Sovereign had perished; and she would neglect no duty belonging to her position till she was relieved from it by law. She accordingly appeared at chapel as usual; and in the very midst of the service a letter was delivered to her from the King, in which the much-vexed monarch told her how he had set sail, how the fleet had been scattered, how he had been driven back to Helvoetsluys after beating about for some twenty hours, and how it was all the fault of Sir Charles Wager, who had hurried him on board, on assurance of wind and tide being favourable, and of there being no time to be lost.
The joy of Caroline was honest and unfeigned. She declared that her heart had been heavier that day than ever it had been before; that she was still, indeed, anxious touching the fate of one whose life was so precious, not merely to his family, but to all Europe; and that, but for the impatience and indiscretion of Sir Charles Wager, the past great peril would never have been incurred.
The admiral was entirely blameless. The King had deliberately misrepresented the circumstances. It was the royal impatience which had caused all the subsequent peril. The Sovereign, weary of waiting for a wind, declared that if the admiral would not sail, he would go over in a packet-boat. Sir Charles maintained he could not. ‘Be the weather what it may,’ said the King, ‘I am not afraid.’ ‘I am,’ was the laconic remark of the seaman. George remarked that he ‘wanted to see a storm, and would sooner be twelve hours in one than be shut up for twenty-four hours more at Helvoetsluys.’ ‘Twelve hours in a storm!’ cried Sir Charles; ‘four hours would do your business for you.’ The admiral would not sail till the wind was fair; and he remarked to the King that although his Majesty could compel him to go, ‘I,’ said Sir Charles, ‘can make you come back again.’ The storm which arose after they did set sail was most terrific in character, and the escape of the voyagers was of the narrowest. The run back to the Dutch coast was not effected without difficulty. On landing, Sir Charles observed, ‘Sir, you wished to see a storm; how does your Majesty like it?’ ‘So well,’ said the King, ‘that I never wish to see another.’ The admiral remarked, in one of his private letters, giving a description of the event, ‘that his Majesty was at present as tame as any about him;’ ‘an epithet,’ says Lord Hervey, ‘that his Majesty, had he known it, would, I fancy, have liked, next to the storm, the least of anything that happened to him.’