At the outset, a marked discourtesy was shown Christian; no royal carriages were in waiting at Dover to receive him, and he had to come to town in hired coaches. Walpole explains in this way. "Somehow or another, the Master of the Horse happened to be in Lincolnshire, and the king's horses having received no orders, were too good subjects to go and fetch a stranger king of their own heads. However, as his Danish Majesty travels to improve himself for the good of his people, he will go back extremely enlightened in the arts of government and morality, by having learned that crowned heads may be reduced to ride in hackney coaches." The official excuse for this neglect was, that Christian was so impatient to see the famed metropolis of Great Britain, that he declined the sumptuous state coaches, and travelled in a post-chaise.
Hearing that the clergy and corporation of Canterbury and Rochester intended to receive him with all possible pomp, the king was almost thrown into a passion, as he detested formalities of any sort, and was disposed to consider the clergy, as a body, with profligate contempt. He said to Count Bernstorff: "The last King of Denmark who entered Canterbury laid that city in ashes, and massacred its inhabitants. Would to Heaven they had recollected this, and let me pass quietly through their venerable town, where our ancestors committed so many crimes!" The count told Christian, with a smile, that the good citizens of Canterbury would find less difficulty in forgetting the outrages suffered by their forefathers, than in being deprived of the honour of making a speech and kissing his royal hand.[63]
The only mark of attention shown Christian by his brother-in-law, was in re-furnishing his suite of rooms in the Stable Yard of St. James's Palace, at an expense of £3,000. When Count Holck first saw the palace, he exclaimed: "By God, this will never do; it is not fit to lodge a Christian in." According to the official report of the "Annual Register," the royal suite consisted of,—Count von Bernstorff, his principal secretary of state; Baron von Schimmelmann, treasurer; Count von Moltke, grand marshal; Count von Holck, grand master of the wardrobe; Baron von Bülow, one of the lords of the bed-chamber; Mr. Schumacher, councillor of conferences, private secretary; Baron von Düring, aide-de-camp; MM. Temmler and Sturtz, councillors of embassy of the foreign office; Dr. Struensee, physician; and several officers and servants.
So soon as Christian arrived in London he was waited on by the Earl of Hertford and Lord Falmouth, who complimented him on his arrival. George III., however, displayed no empressement to greet his guest; on the contrary, he behaved with a sullenness which, though it might be justifiable, was certainly impolitic, considering the connection between France and Denmark, which England considered as of such vital importance to break off. As usual, Horace Walpole the indefatigable supplies the best account of this fresh piece of scandal:—
"By another mistake, King George happened to go to Richmond about an hour before King Christian arrived in London. An hour is exceedingly long, and the distance to Richmond still longer; so, with all the despatch which could possibly be made, King George could not get to his capital till next day at noon. Then, as the road from his closet at St. James's, to the King of Denmark's apartments on the other side of the palace, is about thirty miles (which posterity, having no conceptions of the prodigious extent and magnificence of St. James's, will never believe), it was half an hour after three before his Danish Majesty's cousin could go and return to let him know that his good brother and ally was leaving the palace (in which they both were) to receive him at the queen's palace, which, you know, is about a million of snail's paces from St. James's. Notwithstanding these difficulties and unavoidable delays, Woden, Thor, Frigga, and all the gods that watch over the kings of the north, did bring these two invincible monarchs to each other's embraces about half an hour after four on the same evening. They passed an hour in projecting a royal compact, that will regulate the destiny of Europe to latest posterity; and then, the fates so willing it, the British prince departed for Richmond, and the Danish potentate repaired to the widowed mansion of his royal mother-in-law, where he poured forth the fulness of his heart in praises of the lovely bride she had bestowed upon him, from whom nothing but the benefit of his subjects would have torn him." Another passage from the same letter is in Horace's finest vein of sarcasm:—
"And here let calumny blush, who has aspersed so chaste and faithful a monarch with low amours; pretending that he has raised to a seat in his sublime council an artisan of Hamburg, known only by repairing the soles of buskins, because that mechanic would on no other terms consent to his fair daughter's being honoured with majestic embraces.[64] So victorious over his passions is this Scipio from the pole, that though on Shooter's Hill he fell into an ambuscade, laid for him by an illustrious countess, of blood royal herself, his Majesty, after descending from his car and courteously greeting her, again mounted his vehicle, without being one moment eclipsed from the eyes of the surrounding multitude."[65]
The princess dowager so overwhelmed Christian with inquiries about her daughter, that her wearied son-in-law could not refrain from whispering to his favourite, Holck: "Cette chère maman m'embête terriblement." Finally, when she begged Christian to restore Frau von Plessen to the post of grande maîtresse, the king replied, that he would not oppose it, but would leave the court himself, as he was resolved never to live under the same roof with Frau von Plessen again. After leaving the Princess of Wales, the royal party attended Lady Hertford's assembly. Walpole, who was present, says: "He only takes the title of Altesse (an absurd mezzo termine), but acts king accordingly, struts in the circle like a cock sparrow, and does the honours of himself very civilly." But the thing that seems to have struck Walpole most, was the subserviency of Christian's ministers and attendants, who (as we shall see presently) bowed as low to him at every word as if he were a Sultan Amurath. Severest are his strictures on Bernstorff, of whom he says: "A grave old man, running round Europe after a chit, for the sake of domineering over a parcel of beggar Danes, when he himself is a Hanoverian, and might live at ease on an estate he has at Mecklenburg."
On the 19th, the king had a heavy day of it, visiting Westminster Abbey, the Tower, the Armoury, the Bank, the Mint, and St. Paul's Cathedral, where he ascended to the golden gallery. On the same evening, H.R.H. the Princess Amelia entertained the King of Denmark, the Duke of Gloucester, and upwards of three hundred of the nobility, with a grand supper, after which was a ball,[66] at Gunnersbury House. The supper consisted of one hundred and twenty dishes; a grand firework was played off; and the ball, which was very splendid, ended at about three o'clock A.M. The beautiful Lady Talbot, who was supposed to have made a great impression on Christian's susceptible heart, wore at this ball a diamond coronet which was estimated to be worth £80,000. It appears, from Walpole, that the Princess Amelia felt hurt at the treatment of her nephew, and determined to mark her sense of it by this entertainment. The king and the princess dowager were then, in courtesy, obliged to follow her example; but, to show how much they disliked the precedent, they left the Princess Amelia out of their entertainments. The King of England, however, did not behave so badly to his brother-in-law after all. He paid for his table at the rate of £84 a day, without wines,—and that bill, we may be sure, was a heavy one,—and supplied his sideboard with the original plate of Henry VIII., which was always deposited in the jewel office in the Tower, and never made use of but at a coronation. Though George disliked the man, he respected the king.
Walpole gives us a graphic account of Christian at this time, in a letter to George Montagu:—
"I came to town to see the Danish king. He is as diminutive as if he came out of a kernel in the fairy tales. He is not ill made, nor weakly made, though so small; and though his face is pale and delicate, it is not at all ugly. Still, he has more royalty than folly in his air; and considering he is not hearty, is as well as any one expects a king in a puppet-show to be."