“But what a situation for her! She would not let me leave her now; she ... frequently bid me listen, to hear what the King was saying or doing. I did, and carried the best accounts I could manage, without deviating from truth, except by some omissions. Nothing could be so afflicting as this task; even now, it brings fresh to my ear his poor exhausted voice. ‘I am nervous,’ he cried; ‘I am not ill, but I am nervous: if you would know what is the matter with me, I am nervous. But I love you both very well; if you would tell me truth: I love Dr. Heberden best, for he has not told me a lie: Sir George has told me a lie—a white lie, he says, but I hate a white lie! If you will tell me a lie, let it be a black lie!’
“This was what he kept saying almost constantly, mixed in with other matter, but always returning, and in a voice that truly will never cease vibrating in my recollection.”
In the course of the morning, a third physician—Dr. Warren[[93]]—arrived. His opinion was eagerly awaited by the Queen; but he did not come to her, though repeatedly summoned. At length, Lady Elizabeth brought news that he and the other two physicians were gone over to the Castle to the Prince of Wales.
“I think a deeper blow I had never witnessed. Already to become but second, even for the King! The tears were now wiped: indignation arose, with pain, the severest pain, of every species.
“In about a quarter of an hour Colonel Goldsworthy sent in to beg an audience. It was granted, a long cloak only being thrown over the Queen.
“He now brought the opinion of all the physicians in consultation, ‘That her Majesty would remove to a more distant apartment, since the King would undoubtedly be worse from the agitation of seeing her, and there could be no possibility to prevent it while she remained so near.’
“She instantly agreed, but with what bitter anguish! Lady Elizabeth, Miss Goldsworthy, and myself attended her; she went to an apartment in the same row, but to which there was no entrance except by its own door. It consisted of only two rooms, a bedchamber, and a dressing-room. They are appropriated to the lady-in-waiting when she is here.
“At the entrance into this new habitation the poor wretched Queen once more gave way to a perfect agony of grief and affliction; while the words, ‘What will become of me! What will become of me!’ uttered with the most piercing lamentation, struck deep and hard into all our hearts. Never can I forget their desponding sound; they implied such complicated apprehension.”
Of the scene in the King’s rooms that night, Miss Burney had only a momentary glimpse. Being sent on some commission for the Queen, “When I gently opened,” she writes, “the door of the apartment to which I was directed, I found it quite filled with gentlemen and attendants, arranged round it on chairs and sofas, in dead silence. It was a dreadful start with which I retreated; for anything more alarming and shocking could not be conceived—the poor King within another door, unconscious anyone was near him, and thus watched, by dread necessity, at such an hour of the night!” How the hours passed she heard the next day.
“7TH.—While I was yet with my poor royal sufferer this morning the Prince of Wales came hastily into the room. He apologized for his intrusion, and then gave a very energetic history of the preceding night. It had been indeed most affectingly dreadful! The King had risen in the middle of the night, and would take no denial to walking into the next room. There he saw the large congress I have mentioned: amazed and in consternation, he demanded what they did there? Much followed that I have heard since, particularly the warmest eloge on his dear son Frederick, his favourite, his friend. ‘Yes,’ he cried, ‘Frederick is my friend!’—and this son was then present amongst the rest, but not seen!