APPENDIX.
DR. JOHNSON AND MRS. WILLIAMS.
In Croker’s Edition of Boswell’s Life of Johnson, chap, x., there is an extract from a letter addressed by Lady Knight to Mr. Hoole, referring to the incident narrated at pages 14-15 of the Autobiography:
“Dr. Johnson’s political principles ran high, both in Church and State: he wished power to the King and to the heads of the Church, as the laws of England have established; but I know he disliked absolute power: and I am very sure of his disapprobation of the doctrines of the Church of Rome, because, about three weeks before we came abroad, he said to my Cornelia, ‘You are going where the ostentatious pomp of Church ceremonies attracts the imagination; but if they want to persuade you to change, you must remember that by increasing your faith you may be persuaded to become Turk.’ If these were not the words, I have kept up to the express meaning.”
With reference to Dr. Johnson’s visit to a man-of-war, an account of which is given at pages 15-16, Mrs. Piozzi says, at p. 285 of her “Anecdotes,” &c., that “the roughness of the language used on board a man-of-war, where he passed a week on a visit to Captain Knight, disgusted him terribly. He asked an officer what some place was called, and received for answer that it was where the loplolly man kept his loplolly: a reply he considered, not unjustly, as disrespectful, gross, and ignorant.” On this Croker remarks: “Captain Knight, of the Belle Isle, 74, lay for a couple of months of 1762 in Plymouth Sound, and may have been visited by Reynolds and Johnson; but it is unlikely they passed a week on ship-board.” (Note to chap. liii. Boswell’s Johnson.) But it was the Ramilies off Portsmouth, not the Belle Isle off Plymouth, that was visited by the great lexicographer.
The following reminiscences of Mrs. Williams were sent by Lady Knight, from Rome, to Mr. John Hoole, and by him contributed to the European Magazine for October, 1799:
“Mrs. Williams was a person extremely interesting; she had an uncommon firmness of mind, a boundless curiosity, retentive memory, and strong judgment: she had various powers of pleasing; her personal afflictions and slender fortune she seemed to forget when she had the power of doing an act of kindness: she was social, cheerful, and active, in a state of body that was truly deplorable. Her regard to Dr. Johnson was formed with such strength of judgment and firm esteem that her voice never hesitated when she repeated his maxims or recited his good deeds, though upon many other occasions her want of sight had led to her making so much use of her ear as to affect her speech. Mrs. Williams was blind before she was acquainted with Dr. Johnson: her account of Mrs. Johnson was, that she had a good understanding and great sensibility, but inclined to be satirical. Her first husband died insolvent: her sons were much disgusted with her for her second marriage; perhaps because they, being struggling to get advanced in life, were mortified to think she had allied herself to a man who had not any visible means of being useful to them. However, she always retained her affection for them. While they resided in Grough-court, her son, the officer, knocked at the door and asked the maid if her mistress was at home. She answered, ‘Yes, sir; but she is sick in bed.’ ‘Oh,’ says he, ‘if it is so, tell her that her son Jervas called to know how she did,’ and was going away. The maid begged she might run up and tell her mistress, and, without attending his answer, left him. Mrs. Johnson enraptured to hear her son was below, desired the maid to tell him she longed to embrace him. When the maid descended the gentleman was gone, and poor Mrs. Johnson was much agitated by the adventure: it was the only time he ever made an effort to see her. Dr. Johnson did all he could to console his wife; but told Mrs. Williams, ‘Her son is uniformly undutiful; so I conclude, like many other sober men, he might once in his life be drunk, and in that fit nature got the better of his pride.’
“Mrs. Williams was never otherwise dependent on Dr. Johnson than in that sort of association which is little known in the great world. They both had much to struggle through, and I verily believe that whichever held the purse, the other partook what want required.
“She had many resources, though none very great: with the Miss Wilkinsons she generally passed a part of the year, and received from them presents, and from the first who died a legacy of clothes and linen. The last of them, Mrs. Jane, left her an annual rent; but from the blundering manner of the will, I fear she never reaped the benefit of it. That lady left money to erect an hospital for ancient maids; but the number she had allotted being too great for the donation, the Doctor said it would be better to expunge the word maintain, and put in, to starve such a number of old maids. They asked him what name should be given it. He replied, ‘Let it be called Jenny’s Whim’ [the name of a place of popular entertainment].
“Lady Phillips made her a small annual allowance, and some other Welsh ladies, to all of whom she was related. Mrs. Montagu, on the death of Mr. Montagu, settled on her ten pounds per annum. When the first ten were sent her, they were accompanied with a letter telling her that, before she sent her that sum, she had taken care that the future payments should not depend upon her own precarious life, for that it was fixed to her by deed. Mrs. Williams’s gratitude was great and sincere: and on showing the letter before the Doctor to the present writer, and my testifying my joy at it, ‘Ah!’ said he, ‘the good lady has given Willy a treasure here, and is laying up one for herself.’
“As to her poems, she many years attempted to publish them: the half-crowns she had got towards the publication, she confessed to me went for necessaries, and that the greatest pain she ever felt was from the appearance of defrauding her subscribers: ‘But what can I do? the Doctor always puts me off with, “Well, we’ll think about it;” and Goldsmith says, “Leave it to me.”’ However, two of her friends, under her directions, made a new subscription at a crown, the whole price of the work, and in a very little time raised sixty pounds. Mrs. Carter was applied to by Mrs. Williams’s desire, and she, with the utmost activity and kindness, procured a long list of names. At length the work was published, in which is a fine-written but gloomy tale of Dr. Johnson. The money Mrs. Williams had various uses for, and a part of it was funded. As near as I can calculate, Mrs. Williams had about thirty-five or forty pounds a year. The furniture she used was her own; her expenses were small; tea and bread-and-butter being at least half of her nourishment. Sometimes she had a servant, or charwoman, to do the ruder offices of the house; but she was herself active and industrious. I have frequently seen her at work. Upon remarking one day her facility in moving about the house, searching into drawers, and finding books without the help of sight, ‘Believe me,’ said she, ‘persons who cannot do these common offices without sight, did but little while they enjoyed that blessing.’ Scanty circumstances, bad health, and blindness, are surely a sufficient apology for her being sometimes impatient; her natural disposition was good, friendly, and humane. She was in respect to morals more rigid than modern politeness admits; for she abhorred vice, and was not sparing of anger against those who threw young folks into temptation. Her ideas were very just in respect to the improvement of the mind, and her own was well stored. I have several of her letters; they are all written with great good sense and simplicity, and with a tenderness and affection that far excel all that is called politeness and elegance. I have been favoured with her company some weeks at different times, and always found her temper equal, and her conversation lively. I never passed hours with more pleasure than when I heard her and Dr. Johnson talk of the persons they valued, or on subjects in which they were much interested. One night, I remember, Mrs. Williams was giving an account of the Wilkinsons being at Paris, and having had consigned to their care the letters of Lady Wortley Montagu, on which they had bestowed great praise. The Doctor said, ‘Why, Madam, there might be great charms to them in being entrusted with honourable letters; but those who know better the world, would have rather possessed two pages of true history.’[182]
“One day that he came to my house to meet many others, we told him that we had arranged our party to go to Westminster Abbey, would not he go with us? ‘No,’ he replied, ‘not while I can keep out.’ Upon our saying that the friends of a lady had been in great fear lest she should make a certain match for herself, he said, ‘We that are his friends have had great fears for him.’
“He gave us an account of a lady, then lately dead, who had made a separate purse from her husband, and confessed to the sum in her last moments; but before she could tell where it was placed, a convulsion finished her. The poor man said he was more hurt by her want of confidence in him than the loss of his money. ‘I told him,’ said he, ‘that he must console himself, for perhaps the money might be found, and he was sure his wife was gone.’
“I talked to her (Mrs. Thrale) much of dear Mrs. Williams. She said she was highly born; that she was very nearly related to a Welsh Peer; but that though Dr. Johnson had always pressed her to be acquainted with her, yet she said she could not; she was afraid of her. I named her virtues: she seemed to hear me as if I had spoken of a new-discovered country.
“I think the character of Dr. Johnson can never be better summed up than in his own words in ‘Rasselas’, pp. 246, 247. He was master of an infinite deal of wit, which proceeded from depth of thought, and of a humour which he used sometimes to take off from the asperity of reproof. Though he did sometimes say very sportive things, which might be said to be playing upon the folly of some of his companions, and though he never said one that could disgrace him, yet I think, when the man is no more, the care should be to prove to steady uniformity in wisdom, virtue, and religion, and not to add those matters which could be of no force but as the occasion called them forth. His political principles ran high, both in Church and State: he wished power to the King and to the Heads of the Church, as the laws of England have established, but I know he disliked absolute power; and I am very sure of his disapprobation of the doctrines of the Church of Rome; because, about three weeks before we came abroad, he said to my Cornelia, ‘You are going where the ostentatious pomp of Church ceremonies attracts the imagination; but if they want to persuade you to change, you must remember that by increasing your faith you may be persuaded to become Turk.’ If these were not the words, I have kept up to the express meaning.
“I have no patience of the manner in which Mrs. Williams is mentioned, with insinuations of the great weight she was on Dr. Johnson. (By Mrs. Piozzi, in her ‘Anecdotes.’) She was of a very good family: her Welsh friends made her a constant allowance, and the Miss Wilkinsons were liberal to her. She got a hundred and fifty pounds by her poems. I well remember her saying one day that she would have bought some tea, but wanted the money. The Doctor replied, ‘Why did you not ask me?’ She replied, ‘I knew you had none.’ He answered, ‘But I could have borrowed it.’ She, who knew him better than any person living, once said that ‘He never denied his advice or his purse to any one that asked.’ She had strong sense, excellent principles, and a cheerful mind; but, oppressed with blindness, pain, and poverty, her temper might be soured. But who would have borne such heavy afflictions so well as she did, or have been so useful as she really was? But please to consider, when you come to narrate particulars, how, without intention, you lessen fame. You will find in some lines I have writ, that I expose the poverty of my friend, and the weaknesses that only proceeded from a state of mortality.”
LORD NELSON’S JOURNEY HOME.
[The following are the extracts from Miss Knight’s correspondence with Sir E. Berry, referred to at p. 151:]
“Dear Sir,—The very great, indeed, I may say, fraternal care you had the goodness to take of me while I was on board the Foudroyant, and the very sincere esteem I shall always have for Sir Edward Berry, induces me to trouble you with these few lines, as you will be desirous to hear of Lord Nelson, and the plan proposed for the party. The Queen wishes, if possible, to prosecute her journey. Lady Hamilton cannot bear the thought of going by sea; and, therefore, nothing but impracticability will prevent our going to Vienna. Lord Nelson is well, and keeps up his spirits amazingly. Sir William appears broken, distressed, and harassed.
“July 16th.—It is, at length, decided that we go by land; and I feel all the dangers and difficulties to which we shall be exposed. Think of our embarking on board small Austrian vessels at Ancona, for Trieste, as part of a land journey! to avoid the danger of being on board an English man-of-war, where everything is commodious, and equally well arranged for defence and comfort; but the die is cast, and go we must. Lord Nelson is going on an expedition he disapproves, and against his own convictions, because he has promised the Queen, and that others advise her. I pity the Queen. Prince Belmonte directs the march; and Lady Hamilton, though she does not like him, seconds his proposals, because she hates the sea, and wishes to visit the different Courts of Germany. Sir William says he shall die by the way, and he looks so ill, that I should not be surprised if he did. I am astonished that the Queen, who is a sensible woman, should consent to run so great a risk; but I can assure you that neither she nor the Princesses forget their great obligations to you. If I am not detained in a French prison, or do not die upon the road, you shall hear from me again.
“Ancona, July 24, 1800.—As I find delays succeed each other, and England still recedes from us, I will not omit at least informing you of our adventures. We left Leghorn the day after I wrote to you by Mr. Tyson, and owing more to good fortune than to prudence, arrived in twenty-six hours at Florence, after passing within two miles of the French advanced posts. After a short stay, we proceeded on our way to this place. At Castel San Giovanni, the coach, in which were Lord Nelson and Sir William and Lady Hamilton, was overturned; Sir William and Lady Hamilton were hurt, but not dangerously. The wheel was repaired, but broke again at Arezzo—the Queen two days’ journey before them, and news of the French army advancing rapidly, it was therefore decided that they should proceed, and Mrs. Cadogan and I remained with the broken carriage, as it was of less consequence we should be left behind, or taken, than they. We were obliged to stay three days to get the coach repaired; and, providentially, Arezzo was the place, as it is the most loyal city in Tuscany; and every care, attention, and kindness that humanity can dictate, and cordiality and good manners practise, were employed in our favour.... Just as we were going to set off, we received accounts of the French being very near the road where we had to pass, and of its being also infested with Neapolitan deserters; but at the same moment arrived a party of Austrians, and the officers gave us two soldiers as a guard. We travelled night and day; the roads are almost destroyed, and the misery of the inhabitants is beyond description. At length, however, we arrived at Ancona, and found that the Queen had given up the idea of going in the Bellona, an Austrian frigate, fitted up with silk hangings, carpets, and eighty beds for her reception, and now meant to go with a Russian squadron of three frigates and a brig. I believe she judged rightly; for there had been a mutiny on board the Bellona, and, for the sake of accommodation, she had reduced her guns to twenty-four, while the French, in possession of the coast, arm trabaccoli and other light vessels that could easily surround and take her. This Russian squadron is commanded by Count Voinovitsch, a Dalmatian, who, having seen his people ill-treated, and their colours destroyed by the Germans last year at the siege of Ancona, made a vow never to come ashore, and keeps it religiously, for he has not returned the Queen’s visit. I fancy we shall sail to-morrow night or the next morning. Mrs. Cadogan and I are to be on board one of the frigates, commanded by an old man named Messer, a native of England, who once served under Lord Howe, and has an excellent reputation. The rest of our party go with the Queen, and say they shall be very uncomfortable. Lord Nelson talks often of the Foudroyant, whatever is done to turn off the conversation; and last night he was talking with Captain Messer of the manœuvres he intended to make in case he accepted of another command. In short, I perceive that his thoughts turn towards England, and I hope and believe he will be happy there. The Queen and her daughters have been very kind to me, especially when I was ill; and poor Sir William suffered much when he left me at Arezzo. The Queen speaks of you often, and always with the highest esteem. Our party is very helpless; and though it is their own fault that they have brought themselves into these difficulties, I cannot help pitying them, and have the comfort to be of some use to them. Lord Nelson has been received with acclamations in all the towns of the Pope’s States. Success attend you. Where shall we be on the 1st of August? The Queen asked me for the christian and surname of all the captains of the Nile. I am ashamed of the length of this letter, but it is pleasant to forget oneself for some moments, and renew a quarter-deck conversation. Our cots are ready, and the carriages on board, or I should not have had spirits to write so much.
“Trieste, August 9th, 1800.—As I know you will be anxious to hear how Lord Nelson proceeds on his journey, and as new delays continually occur, I will not refuse an opportunity offered me by Mr. Anderson, the Vice-Consul. Perhaps I am a little interested in the affair; for, as I have small comfort in my present situation, my thoughts willingly recur to the Mediterranean, where there were always resources to be found. I told you we were become humble enough to rejoice at a Russian squadron conveying us across the Adriatic; but had we sailed, as was first intended, in the imperial frigate, we should have been taken by eight trabaccoli, which the French armed on purpose at Pisaro. Sir William and Lady Hamilton and Lord Nelson give a miserable account of their sufferings on board the Commodore’s ship (Count Voinovitsch). He was ill in his cot; but his First Lieutenant, a Neapolitan, named Capaci, was, it seems, the most insolent and ignorant of beings. Think what Lord Nelson must have felt! He says a gale of wind would have sunk the ship. I, with Mrs. Cadogan, came in another ship, commanded, as I believe I told you, by an Englishman, a Captain Messer, a plain, good man, who behaved with distinguished bravery last year at the siege of Ancona, and who was kind and attentive beyond description.... Poor Sir William Hamilton has been so ill that the physicians had almost given him up: he is now better, and I hope we shall be able to set off to-morrow night for Vienna. The Queen and thirty-four of her suite have had fevers: you can form no idea of the helplessness of the party. How we shall proceed on our long journey is to me a problem; but we shall certainly get on as fast as we can; for the very precarious state of Sir William’s health has convinced everybody that it is necessary he should arrange his affairs.... Poor Lord Nelson, whose only comfort was in talking of ships and harbours with Captain Messer, has had a bad cold, but is almost well, and, I think, anxious to be in England. He is followed by thousands when he goes out, and for the illumination that is to take place this evening, there are many ‘Viva Nelsons!’ prepared. He seems affected whenever he speaks of you, and often sighs out, ‘Where is the Foudroyant?’”
THE PRINCESS CHARLOTTE AND HER MOTHER.
[The following is the letter alluded to at page 216:]
“Sir,—It is with great reluctance that I presume to obtrude myself upon your Royal Highness, and to solicit your attention to matters which may, at first, appear rather of a personal than a public nature. If I could think them so—if they related merely to myself—I should abstain from a proceeding which might give uneasiness, or interrupt the more weighty occupations of your Royal Highness’s time. I should continue, in silence and retirement, to lead the life which has been prescribed to me, and console myself for the loss of that society and those domestic comforts to which I have so long been a stranger, by the reflection that it has been deemed proper I should be afflicted without any fault of my own—and that your Royal Highness knows it.
“But, Sir, there are considerations of a higher nature than any regard to my own happiness, which render this address a duty both to myself and my daughter. May I venture to say—a duty also to my husband, and the people committed to his care? There is a point beyond which a guiltless woman cannot with safety carry her forbearances. If her honour is invaded, the defence of her reputation is no longer a matter of choice; and it signifies not whether the attack be made openly, manfully, and directly, or by secret insinuation, and by holding such conduct towards her as countenances all the suspicions that malice can suggest. If these ought to be the feelings of every woman in England who is conscious that she deserves no reproach, your Royal Highness has too sound a judgment, and too nice a sense of honour, not to perceive how much more justly they belong to the mother of your daughter—the mother of her who is destined, I trust, at a very distant period to reign over the British empire.
“It may be known to your Royal Highness that, during the continuance of the restrictions upon your royal authority, I purposely refrained from making any representations which might then augment the painful difficulties of your exalted station. At the expiration of the restrictions I still was inclined to delay taking this step, in the hope that I might owe the redress I sought to your gracious and unsolicited condescension. I have waited, in the fond indulgence of this expectation, until, to my inexpressible mortification, I find that my unwillingness to complain has only produced fresh grounds of complaint; and I am at length compelled either to abandon all regard for the two dearest objects which I possess on earth—mine own honour and my beloved child—or to throw myself at the feet of your Royal Highness, the natural protector of both.
“I presume, Sir, to represent to your Royal Highness that the separation, which every succeeding month is making wider, of the mother and the daughter is equally injurious to my character and to her education. I say nothing of the deep wounds which so cruel an arrangement inflicts upon my feelings, although I would fain hope that few persons will be found of a disposition to think lightly of these. To see myself cut off from one of the very few domestic enjoyments left me—certainly the only one upon which I set any value, the society of my child—involves me in such misery as I well know your Royal Highness could never inflict upon me if you were aware of its bitterness. Our intercourse has been gradually diminished. A single interview weekly seemed sufficiently hard allowance for a mother’s affections. That, however, was reduced to our meeting once a fortnight; and I now learn that even this most rigorous interdiction is to be still more rigidly enforced.
“But while I do not venture to intrude my feelings as a mother upon your Royal Highness’s notice, I must be allowed to say that, in the eyes of an observing and jealous world, this separation of a daughter from her mother will only admit of one construction—a construction fatal to the mother’s reputation. Your Royal Highness will also pardon me for adding, that there is no less inconsistency than injustice in this treatment. He who dares advise your Royal Highness to overlook the evidence of my innocence, and disregard the sentence of complete acquittal which it produced, or is wicked and false enough still to whisper suspicions in your ear, betrays his duty to you, Sir, to your daughter, and to your people, if he counsels you to permit a day to pass without a further investigation of my conduct. I know that no such calumniator will venture to recommend a measure which must speedily end in his utter confusion. Then let me implore you to reflect on the situation in which I am placed without the shadow of a charge against me—without even an accuser—after an inquiry that led to my ample vindication—yet treated as if I were still more culpable than the perjuries of my suborned traducers represented me, and held up to the world as a mother who may not enjoy the society of her only child.
“The feelings, Sir, which are natural to my unexampled situation might justify me in the gracious judgment of your Royal Highness, had I no other motives for addressing you but such as relate to myself: but I will not disguise from your Royal Highness what I cannot for a moment conceal from myself—that the serious, and it soon may be, the irreparable injury which my daughter sustains from the plan at present pursued, has done more in overcoming my reluctance to intrude upon your Royal Highness than any sufferings of my own could accomplish; and if, for her sake, I presume to call away your Royal Highness from the other cares of your exalted station, I feel confident I am not claiming it for a matter of inferior importance either to yourself or your people.
“The powers with which the constitution of these realms vests your Royal Highness in the regulation of the Royal Family I know, because I am so advised, are ample and unquestionable. My appeal, Sir, is made to your excellent sense and liberality of mind in the exercise of those powers; and I willingly hope that your own parental feelings will lead you to excuse the anxiety of mine for impelling me to represent the unhappy consequences which the present system must entail upon our beloved child.
“Is it possible, Sir, that any one can have attempted to persuade your Royal Highness that her character will not be injured by the perpetual violence offered to her strongest affections—the studied care taken to estrange her from my society, and even to interrupt all communication between us? That her love for me, with whom, by his Majesty’s wise and gracious arrangements, she passed the years of her infancy and childhood, never can be extinguished, I well know; and the knowledge of it forms the greatest blessing of my existence. But let me implore your Royal Highness to reflect how inevitably all attempts to abate this attachment, by forcibly separating us, if they succeed, must injure my child’s principles; if they fail, must destroy her happiness.
“The plan of excluding my daughter from all intercourse with the world, appears to my humble judgment peculiarly unfortunate. She who is destined to be the Sovereign of this great country enjoys none of those advantages of society which are deemed necessary for imparting a knowledge of mankind to persons who have infinitely less occasion to learn that important lesson; and it may so happen, by a chance which I trust is very remote, that she should be called upon to exercise the powers of the Crown with an experience of the world more confined than that of the most private individual. To the extraordinary talents with which she is blessed, and which accompany a disposition as singularly amiable, frank, and decided, I willingly trust much; but beyond a certain point the greatest natural endowments cannot struggle against the disadvantages of circumstances and situation. It is my earnest prayer, for her own sake as well as her country’s, that your Royal Highness may be induced to pause before this point be reached.
“Those who have advised you, Sir, to delay so long the period of my daughter’s commencing her intercourse with the world, and for that purpose to make Windsor her residence, appear not to have regarded the interruptions to her education which this arrangement occasions; both by the impossibility of obtaining the attendance of proper teachers, and the time unavoidably consumed in the frequent journeys to town, which she must make, unless she is to be secluded from all intercourse, even with your Royal Highness and the rest of the Royal Family. To the same unfortunate counsel I ascribe a circumstance in every way so distressing both to my parental and religious feelings, that my daughter has never yet enjoyed the benefit of confirmation, although above a year older than the age at which all the other branches of the Royal Family have partaken of that solemnity. May I earnestly conjure you, Sir, to hear my entreaties upon this serious matter, even if you should listen to other advisers on things of less near concernment to the welfare of our child?
“The pain with which I have at length formed the resolution of addressing myself to your Royal Highness is such as I should in vain attempt to express. If I could adequately describe it, you might be enabled, Sir, to estimate the strength of the motives which have made me submit to it: they are the most powerful feelings of affection, and the deepest impressions of duty towards your Royal Highness, my beloved child, and the country, which I devoutly hope she may be preserved to govern, and to show by a new example the liberal affection of a free and generous people to a virtuous and constitutional monarch.
“I am, Sir, with profound respect, and an attachment which nothing can alter, your Royal Highness’s most devoted and most affectionate consort, cousin, and subject,
(Signed) “Caroline Louisa.
“Montague House, January 14, 1813.”
[The following is the text of the official report referred to at page 223:]
“The following members of his Majesty’s Most Honourable Privy Council, viz.:
“His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Right Hon. the Lord High Chancellor, his Grace the Archbishop of York, his Grace the Lord Primate of Ireland, the Lord President of the Council, the Lord Privy Seal, the Earl of Buckinghamshire, the Earl of Bathurst, the Earl of Liverpool, the Earl of Mulgrave, the Viscount Melville, the Viscount Sidmouth, the Viscount Castlereagh, the Right Hon. the Lord Bishop of London, the Right Hon. Lord Ellenborough, Lord Chief Justice of the Court of King’s Bench, the Right Hon. the Speaker of the House of Commons, the Right Hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Right Hon. the Chancellor of the Duchy, his Honour the Master of the Rolls, the Right Hon. the Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas,[183] the Right Hon. the Lord Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer, the Right Hon. the Judge of the High Court of Admiralty, the Right Hon. the Dean of the Arches;
“Having been summoned by command of your Royal Highness, on the 19th of February, to meet at the office of Viscount Sidmouth, Secretary of State for the Home Department, a communication was made by his Lordship to the Lords then present, in the following terms:
“‘My Lords,—I have it in command from his Royal Highness the Prince Regent to acquaint your Lordships that a copy of a letter from the Princess of Wales to the Prince Regent having appeared in a public paper, which letter refers to the proceedings that took place in an inquiry instituted by command of his Majesty in the year 1806, and contains among other matters certain animadversions upon the manner in which the Prince Regent has exercised his undoubted right of regulating the conduct and education of his daughter the Princess Charlotte; and his Royal Highness having taken into his consideration the said letter so published, and adverting to the directions heretofore given by his Majesty, that the documents relating to the said inquiry should be sealed up, and deposited in the office of his Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State, in order that his Majesty’s Government should possess the means of resorting to them if necessary, his Royal Highness has been pleased to direct that the said letter of the Princess of Wales, and the whole of the said documents, together with the copies of other letters and papers, of which a schedule is annexed, should be referred to your Lordships, being members of his Majesty’s Most Honourable Privy Council, for your consideration; and that you should report to his Royal Highness your opinion, whether, under all the circumstances of the case, it be fit and proper that the intercourse between the Princess of Wales and her daughter, the Princess Charlotte, should continue to be subject to regulations and restrictions.’
“Their Lordships adjourned their meetings to Tuesday, the 23rd of February; and the intermediate days having been employed in perusing the documents referred to them, by command of your Royal Highness, they proceeded on that and the following day to the further consideration of the said documents, and have agreed to report to your Royal Highness as follows:
“In obedience to the commands of your Royal Highness, we have taken into our most serious consideration the letter from her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales to your Royal Highness, which has appeared in the public papers, and has been referred to us by your Royal Highness, in which letter the Princess of Wales, amongst other matters, complains that the intercourse between her Royal Highness, and her Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte, has been subjected to certain restrictions.
“We have also taken into our most serious consideration, together with the other papers referred to us by your Royal Highness, all the documents relative to the inquiry instituted in 1806, by command of his Majesty, into the truth of certain representations respecting the conduct of her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales, which appear to have been pressed upon the attention of your Royal Highness in consequence of the advice of Lord Thurlow, and upon grounds of public duty, by whom they were transmitted to his Majesty’s consideration; and your Royal Highness having been graciously pleased to command us to report our opinions to your Royal Highness, whether, under all the circumstances of the case, it be fit and proper that the intercourse between the Princess of Wales and her daughter, the Princess Charlotte, should continue to be subject to regulation and restraint.
“We beg leave humbly to report to your Royal Highness, that after a full examination of all the documents before us, we are of opinion that, under all the circumstances of the case, it is highly fit and proper, with a view to the welfare of her Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte, in which are equally involved the happiness of your Royal Highness in your parental and royal character, and the most important interests of the State, that the intercourse between her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales and her Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte should continue to be subject to regulation and restraint.
“We humbly trust that we may be permitted, without being thought to exceed the limits of the duty imposed on us, respectfully to express the just sense we entertain of the motives by which your Royal Highness has been actuated in the postponement of the confirmation of her Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte, as it appears, by a statement under the hand of her Majesty the Queen, that your Royal Highness has conformed in this respect to the declared will of his Majesty, who had been pleased to direct that such ceremony should not take place till her Royal Highness should have completed her eighteenth year.
“We also humbly trust that we may be further permitted to notice some expressions in the letter of her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales, which may possibly be construed as implying a charge of too serious a nature to be passed over without observation. We refer to the words—“suborned traducers.” As this expression, from the manner it is introduced, may, perhaps, be liable to misconstruction (however impossible it may be to suppose that it can have been so intended), to have reference to some part of the conduct of your Royal Highness, we feel it our bounden duty not to omit this opportunity of declaring that the documents laid before us afford the most ample proof that there is not the slightest foundation for such an aspersion.”
(Signed)
[Subjoined is the reply of the Princess of Wales to the above:]
“The Princess of Wales informs Mr. Speaker that she has received from Lord Viscount Sidmouth a copy of a report made to his Royal Highness the Prince Regent by certain members of his Majesty’s Privy Council, to whom it appears that his Royal Highness was advised to refer certain documents and evidence regarding the character and conduct of the Princess of Wales. This report is of such a nature, that her Royal Highness is persuaded that no person can read it without considering it to contain aspersions on her character, though its vagueness renders it impossible to be precisely understood, or to know exactly with what she is charged. The Princess of Wales feels conscious of her innocence, and considers it due to herself, to the two illustrious Houses with which she is connected by blood and marriage, and to the people of this country, in which she holds such a distinguished rank, not to acquiesce for a moment in the reflections which have been cast upon her honour. The Princess of Wales has not been permitted to know on what evidence this report has been founded, nor has she had any opportunity of being heard in her own defence. What she knew on the subject was only from common rumour, until she received the report; nor does she know whether it proceeded from persons acting together as a body, to whom she could make her appeal, or only as individuals. Her Royal Highness throws herself upon the wisdom and justice of Parliament, and desires the fullest investigation of her conduct during the time that she has resided in this country. She fears no scrutiny, provided she be tried by impartial judges, in a fair and open manner, consistent with the laws of the land. Her Royal Highness wishes to be treated as innocent, or to be proved guilty. She desires Mr. Speaker to communicate this letter to the Hon. the House of Commons.”
OPENING OF THE COFFIN OF CHARLES I.
[The following is the passage from Sir H. Halford’s narrative referred to at page 227—note:]
“On removing the pall, a plain leaden coffin, with no appearance of ever having been enclosed in wood, and bearing an inscription, “King Charles, 1648,” in large legible characters, on a scroll of lead, encircling it, immediately presented itself to view. A square opening was then made in the upper part of the lid, of such dimensions as to admit a clear insight into its contents. These were, an internal wooden coffin, very much decayed, and the body carefully wrapped in cerecloth, into the folds of which a quantity of unctuous or greasy matter, mixed with resin, as it seemed, had been melted, so as to exclude as effectually as possible the external air. The coffin was completely full; and from the tenacity of the cerecloth, great difficulty was experienced in detaching it successfully from the parts which it enveloped. Wherever the unctuous matter had insinuated itself, the separation of the cerecloth was easy; and when it came off, a correct impression of the features to which it had been applied was observed in the unctuous substance. At length the whole face was disengaged from its covering. The complexion of the skin of it was dark and discoloured. The forehead and temples had lost little or nothing of their muscular substance: the cartilage of the nose was gone; but the left eye, in the first moment of exposure, was open and full, though it vanished almost immediately, and the pointed beard, so characteristic of the period of the reign of King Charles, was perfect. The shape of the face was a long oval; many of the teeth remained, and the left ear, in consequence of the interposition of the unctuous matter between it and the cerecloth, was found entire.
“It was difficult at this moment to withhold a declaration, that notwithstanding its disfigurement, the countenance did bear a strong resemblance to the coins, the busts, and especially to the pictures of King Charles I. by Vandyke, by which it had been made familiar to us. It is true that the minds of the spectators of this interesting sight were prepared to receive this impression: but it is also certain that such a facility of belief had been occasioned by the simplicity and truth of Mr. Herbert’s narrative, every part of which had been confirmed by the investigation, so far as it had advanced; and it will not be denied that the shape of the face, the forehead, and eye, and the beard, are most important features by which resemblance is determined.
“When the head had been entirely disengaged from the attachments which confined it, it was found to be loose, and, without any difficulty, was taken up and held to view. It was quite wet, and gave a greenish red tinge to paper, and to linen which touched it. The back part of the scalp was entirely perfect, and had a remarkable fresh appearance; the pores of the skin being more distinct, as they usually are when soaked in mixture; and the tendons and ligaments of the neck were of considerable substance and firmness. The hair was thick at the back part of the head, and in appearance nearly black. A portion of it, which has since been cleaned and dried, is of a beautiful dark brown colour; that of the beard was a redder brown. On the back part of the head, it was not more than an inch in length, and had probably been cut so short for the convenience of the executioner, or perhaps by the piety of friends soon after death, in order to furnish memorials of the unhappy King.
“On holding up the head to examine the place of separation from the body, the muscles of the neck had evidently retracted themselves considerably; and the fourth cervical vertebra was found to be cut through its substance, transversely, leaving the surfaces of the divided portions perfectly smooth and even, an appearance which could have been produced only by a heavy blow, inflicted with a very sharp instrument, and which furnished the last proof wanting to identify King Charles I.
“After this examination of the head, which served every purpose in view, and without examining the body below the neck, it was immediately restored to its situation, the coffin was soldered up again, and the vault closed.
“Neither of the other coffins had any inscription upon them. The larger one, supposed on good grounds to contain the remains of King Henry VIII., measured six feet ten inches in length, and had been enclosed in an elm one two inches in thickness; but this was decayed, and lay in small fragments near it. The leaden coffin appeared to have been beaten in by violence about the middle, and a considerable opening in that part of it exposed a mere skeleton of the King. Some beard remained upon the chin, but there was nothing to discriminate the personage contained in it.
“The smaller coffin, understood to be that of Queen Jane Seymour, was not touched; mere curiosity not being considered by the Prince Regent as a sufficient motive for disturbing these remains.”
THE ORANGE MATCH.
[The following extract from the Duke of Buckingham’s “Court of the Regency” may be read with interest in illustration of the seventeenth and eighteenth chapters of the Autobiography:]
“The Grand-Duchess of Oldenburg contrived to obtain considerable influence over the Princess Charlotte, and persuaded her to reject the Prince of Orange. The object of this was not suspected at the time; but it was a Russian intrigue that, shortly afterwards, fully explained itself. Some amusing speculations respecting this Russian Princess are indulged in by the authoress of the ‘Diary of George IV.,’ vol. iii. p. 48. The Prince Regent is stated to have kept her under strict espionage to make her marry one of his brothers—the Grand-Duchess had already (had) one husband—and to prevent her having any communication with the Princess of Wales, which was possible any day during her stay in England through a third party. The real object of the visit of the Duchess of Oldenburg could not have been suspected, or the Prince Regent would not have placed her exactly in that position in which she could succeed with the greatest ease. The writer especially adds in a subsequent page: ‘The Regent evidently wished his daughter to take the Prince of Orange; otherwise, why should he, who was so careful in excluding from Princess Charlotte’s society any one inclined to encourage her in independent principles, have permitted her to be intimate with this cunning Russian lady, whose very eyes betrayed the wily nature of her character?’
“It was said that the Princess Charlotte’s insurmountable objection to the union arose from repugnance to quitting her own country; but Lord Clancarty was commissioned to propose her constant residence in England, should the marriage take place.
“Some amusement may be found in tracing the course of this Russian intrigue. In January, 1814, the Emperor expressed to Lord Castlereagh the strong interest he felt in the proposed marriage of the Princess Charlotte and the Prince of Orange, and was extremely desirous that himself and his sister, the Grand-Duchess Catherine, should be permitted to visit England. A month or two subsequently, Russia exhibits much solicitude to obtain a direct interest in the affairs of Holland. A little later this Grand-Duchess precedes the Emperor as a visitor to England, and immediately endeavours to obtain the confidence of the Princess Charlotte, who thenceforth becomes intractable on the subject of the proposed alliance. Lord Castlereagh wrote to Lord Clancarty on the 26th of June: ‘The circumstances attending the rupture of the marriage are still mysterious;’ but the mystery, shortly afterwards, began to unfold itself. The Emperor returned to his own dominions by way of Holland, and immediately a marriage was rumoured between its hereditary Prince and the Grand-Duchess Helen. ‘Connected with this,’ writes Mr. George Jackson, at Berlin, ‘is the expectation affected to be entertained of Russia procuring East Friedland for the Duke of Oldenburg.’... In September the Czar allowed it to be known at St. Petersburg, as a secret, that a marriage was contemplated between the Prince of Orange, who had been invited to Russia, and the Grand-Duchess Anne. The following summer they were married.
“The Duchess of Oldenburg was also suspected of being a means of communication between the Princess Charlotte and her mother, and was evidently regarded by the latter with more than ordinary admiration.... Encouraged by a such a friend and such a mother, the young Princess proceeded on a course that her warmest friends regarded with deep concern.
“The intrigue that was going on at last became known to the Prince Regent, and his Royal Highness, accompanied by the Bishop of Salisbury, suddenly presented themselves (sic) at the residence of the Princess Charlotte, Warwick House, and announced their intention of taking her with them to Carlton House. The Princess having obtained leave to retire—probably to prepare for her journey—at once hurried down a back-stairs into the street, called a hackney-coach, and drove to her mother’s town residence, Connaught House. Her escape having transpired, her retreat was soon ascertained, and the Duke of York and the Lord Chancellor were sent to bring her back. It so happened that the Princess of Wales was then secretly negotiating with the Government for the means of travelling abroad, and feared that this step of the Princess Charlotte might compromise her, and prevent the fulfilment of her desire to leave the country, she therefore not only did not give her daughter a cordial reception, but absolutely persuaded her to go back before the arrival of the deputation sent for her by the Prince Regent. This advice was very far from agreeable. But we must allow Lord Eldon to relate the curious sequel. ‘When we arrived, I informed her a carriage was at the door, and we would attend her home. But home she would not go. She kicked and bounced, but would not go. Well, to do my office as gently as I could, I told her I was sorry for it; for, until she did go, she would be obliged to entertain us, as we would not leave her; at last she accompanied us.’
“Such an event could not pass without exciting much observation, and exaggerated accounts were circulated. The House of Lords, on the 18th of July, was startled with a violent speech from the Duke of Sussex, which included a variety of questions,[184] referring to this transaction, addressed to Lord Liverpool, who did not think proper to answer one of them, but insisted on the Prince Regent’s right to control his own child, and the impropriety of any interference on the part of the House of Lords. The Duke, not being satisfied, gave notice of a motion. The Lord Chancellor followed with some stringent observations to the same purpose as that of his colleague, and there the discussion terminated. On the 25th his Royal Highness made another speech, in which he withdrew his motion, as Lord Grey acknowledged, by his advice.”