A circumstance occurred in 1767 which was not advantageous to the memory or reputation of Queen Caroline, and which did not raise her in the opinion of Queen Charlotte. The latter, however, was too much occupied in contemplating with delight the Indian presents brought over to her by Lord Clive to trouble herself much about the character of Caroline. These consisted of two diamond drops worth twelve thousand pounds. In the year just named the Duchess of Brunswick’s repositories were examined by her executors, and among other things discovered therein were not less than eight hundred letters addressed by the Duchess of Orleans, second wife of the brother of Louis XIV., to Caroline Wilhelmina Dorothea, Princess of Wales, and to Ulric, Duke of Brunswick. From this correspondence selections have been published, which have disgusted most persons who have read them. The portions suppressed must have been edifying indeed. But even if no more had come under the eyes of the wife of George Augustus than what publishers have ventured to print, there would still be evidence enough to show that, although Caroline conversed with philosophers, her mind could descend to be dragged through the filthiest pollution. There was not much refinement in the age, it is true; but, impure as it may have been, the fact that Caroline could submit to have such letters addressed to her, or to read a second, is proof that it was more radically rotten and profoundly unclean than has been generally supposed.
The most interesting domestic event of the following year was the juvenile drawing-room held by the Prince of Wales and the Princess Royal. The boy heir-apparent was, perhaps, too early initiated into the solemnities of festivals and gorgeous ceremonies. On this occasion he was attired in a crimson suit, his brother of York in one of blue and gold, while the Princess Royal and the younger branches of the family were grouped together on a sofa in Roman togas. The happy mother looked upon them with delight, and thought the scene worthy of a painter. The public did not share the enthusiasm nor approve of the royal taste for extensive displays; and when the youthful Prince of Wales gave a ball and supper this year at the Queen’s House the mob broke into the court-yard, drove a hearse round it, and saluted the revellers, old and young, with anything but shouts of compliment or congratulation.
But if the town life of the royal family was one of considerable display, private life at Kew was of the very simplest aspect. Their Majesties were early risers, an example which, forcible as the fashion is which royalty deigns to offer, was not followed very generally even by their own household, except such persons whose services were needed. A king and queen rising at six and spending the first two hours of the day emphatically as their own, undisturbed by business of state, afforded a singular spectacle to those who could remember the indolent habits of the late court, for it was only on rare occasions that George II. was an early riser. Caroline was never so by choice. At eight o’clock there was a joyous family breakfast, at which the Sovereigns were surrounded by the Prince of Wales, the Bishop of Osnaburgh, as the second son was called before he was created Duke of York, the Princes William and Edward, and the Princess Royal. At this morning festival the children were not bound to the silence which they always observed in presence of their parents in public. After breakfast the younger children were brought in, and with these the King and Queen spent an hour of amusement, while the elder princes were away at exercise of body or mind.
Queen Charlotte generally, and often in company with the King, presided at the children’s early dinner. Such attendance was the forerunner of the early dinners which the King subsequently took himself. A weekly holiday was passed by the whole family in Richmond Gardens. This was, in some sort, a continuation of a custom commenced by George II. His custom, however, had not so pure a motive as that observed by George III. and Queen Charlotte, who took innocent delight in witnessing innocent enjoyment. In the cottage there, erected from her own design, she would ply the needle (Queen Adelaide was not a more indefatigable worker) while the King read aloud to her, generally from Shakspeare. The Sovereign loved the poet as deeply as the great Duke of Marlborough did, who knew nothing of English history, save what he had gathered from the not altogether indisputable authority of the great poet. ‘Whatever charms,’ says an ‘observer,’ with more enthusiasm than elegance, ‘ambition or folly may conceive to surround so exalted a station, it is neither on the throne nor in the drawing-room, in the splendour or the joys of sovereignty, that the King and Queen place their felicity. It is in social and domestic gratifications, in breathing the free air, admiring the works of nature, tasting and encouraging the elegances of art, and in living without dissipation. In the evening all the children pay their duty at Kew House before retiring to bed; after which the King reads to her Majesty; and having closed the day with a joint act of devotion, they retire to rest. This is the order of each revolving day, with such exceptions as are unavoidable in their high stations.
‘The Sovereign is the father of the family; not a grievance reaches his knowledge that remains unredressed, nor a character of merit or ingenuity disregarded; his private conduct, therefore, is as exemplary as it is amiable.’
Alexander Young, referring to the period when the Prince of Wales was not above twelve years old, furnishes us with a picture that represents the Queen’s sons as so many Cincinnati at the plough, or rather like Diocletian cultivating cabbages; only that he did not take to the healthy pursuit until he had lost a throne, whereas the English heir-apparent had not yet gained one. The young princes were, perhaps, more like the royalty of Cathay, whose greatest glory was to cultivate the soil, and delude itself into the idea that it was being useful to mankind. Nevertheless the royal pursuits of the Prince of Wales and his brother of York were harmless at least. ‘A spot of ground in the garden at Kew was dug by his royal highness the Prince of Wales and his brother the Duke of York, who sowed it with wheat, attended the growth of their little crop, weeded, reaped, and harvested it, solely by themselves. They thrashed out the corn and separated it from the chaff; and at this period of their labour were brought to reflect from their own experience upon the various labours and attention of the husbandman and farmer. The princes not only raised their own crop, but they also ground it; and, having parted the bran from the meal, attended the whole process of making it into bread, which it may well be imagined was eaten with no slight relish. The King and Queen partook of the philosophical repast, and beheld with pleasure the very amusements of their children rendered the source of useful knowledge.’
The second son of Charlotte was not very far advanced in his teens when he carried his love of rustic pursuits to rustic persons. He so especially admired one cottage beauty in the neighbourhood of Kew or Windsor that his absences from home became rather too numerous and too prolonged to escape notice. The royal truant was less narrowly watched than strictly looked after upon being missed. On one of these occasions something more powerful than conjecture took the enquirers to a certain cottage door, and on looking into the room upon which it opened there sat the second son of Queen Charlotte, Duke of York and Bishop of Osnaburgh, upon a wooden stool shelling peas!
Reference has been made to the patronage which both Queen Charlotte and King George extended to art. Their patronage of painters was not, generally speaking, on a liberal scale. They requested Paton to bring to the palace, for their inspection, the naval pictures intended for Saint Petersburgh. The artist obeyed, but at a cost of fifty pounds for carriage. He was repaid in thanks, but he received no pecuniary compensation. On another occasion twenty-five pounds was given to an artist for a picture worth four times the sum. The artist had a friend in Dr. Wolcot, and the satires of Peter Pindar avenged the disappointed painter.
It was the excuse of both King and Queen that their increasing family prevented them from exercising all the liberality they could wish. However the fact may or may not have influenced the plea, it could not be denied that the circle round the royal hearth was annually enlarging. In 1767 was born Edward, afterwards Duke of Kent; and in the following year the Princess Augusta Sophia. At this period the old custom was still observed of admitting the public to ‘cake and caudle.’ Among the loyal young ladies who flocked to the palace to see the infant princess were two who partook so plentifully of the caudle as to lose their discretion, and to walk away with the cup in their keeping. They were detected, and were pardoned after kneeling to ask for forgiveness. The inequality in the application of the law was as marked then as it is now. Petty larcenists of high birth, as these young ladies were, were permitted to escape; not so a poor Sarah Wilson, who, yielding to a strong temptation in the year 1771, filched one or two of the Queen’s jewels, and was condemned to be executed. It was considered almost a violation of justice that the thief should be saved from the halter, and be transported instead of hanged. She was sent to America, where she was allotted as slave or servant to a Mr. Dwale, Bud Creek, Frederick County. Queen Charlotte would have thought nothing more of her had her Majesty not heard, with some surprise, that her own sister, Susannah Caroline Matilda, was keeping her court in the plantations. Never was surprise more genuine than the Queen’s; it was exceeded only by her hilarity when it was discovered that the Princess Susannah was simply Sarah Wilson at large. That somewhat clever girl, having stolen a queen’s jewels, thought nothing, after escaping from the penal service to which she was condemned, of passing herself off as a queen’s sister. The Americans—so in love were some of them with the greatness they affected to despise—paid royal honours to the clever impostor. She passed the most joyous of seasons before she was consigned again to increase of penalty for daring to pretend relationship with the consort of King George. The story of the presuming girl, whose escapades, however, were not fully known in England at the time, served, as far as knowledge of them had reached the court, to amuse the ‘gossips’ who had assembled in 1770 about the cradle of the young Elizabeth, and still more those who, in the following year, greeted the new Prince Ernest, one of the three sons of Charlotte destined to wear a crown.
The fourth daughter of Caroline and George II. died on the 14th of June in this year, 1771. She was born on the 22nd of February, 48 years before. Before she had completed her eighteenth year she was married to Frederick, Prince of Hesse, a man whose naturally brutal temperament was rendered still more brutal after his passing over from Protestantism to Romanism. This aggravation of a naturally bad temper was not the immediate result of the change of religion, but of the political restrictions to which such change subjected him. Never had wife a more vicious and unfeeling husband than poor Mary; never had husband a more submissive and uncomplaining wife than Frederick of Hesse. His death relieved her of a most inhuman tyrant, and her last days were spent in a happy tranquillity.