The details which Reverdil gives us about the habits of the court are very curious. When they did not go hunting, they assembled to breakfast between eleven and twelve o'clock. The king, the queen, Counts Struensee and Brandt, with some of their male and female favourites, were always present; and when the state of the weather allowed it, breakfast was followed by a walk, in which Struensee gave his arm to the queen; the king, to the only maid-of-honour who was admitted to this familiarity; each of the other gentlemen to a lady; and chance did not decide the selection. From time to time, the same party dined at some summer-house, a distance away. Etiquette was banished from these parties; and the newly-appointed pages waited at table. They only entered when a bell was rung, and left the room when they had done what was wanted. On these excursions, the queen drove out in the same carriage with the king and Struensee. She placed herself between them at table; and if the king misbehaved himself, Reverdil led him out of the room. The queen even returned at night alone with the favourite. This princess, who, on her arrival from England, had been extremely affable and ingenious in finding occasions to say agreeable things to everybody, now only spoke with eagerness to the favourite; and if before and after dinner she addressed any one, whether male or female, Struensee was listening.

With this exception, the indecent tone supposed by the public did not prevail in this company; they resembled the servants of a large house who had sat down to table in their master's absence. A new comer must have been struck by the familiar tone, and at seeing a court where there were no great noblemen, and hardly any gentlemen.

Reverdil was astonished at not hearing a word about the queen dowager and her son, who lived at Fredensborg, about nine miles from Hirschholm. There seemed a settled determination to keep Prince Frederick apart from his brother; no appanage was granted him, though it was full time to think about it, nor was he initiated into affairs of state. Reverdil resolved to do what he could to satisfy the queen dowager by inducing the king to drive over and see her; but the latter would not consent. Hence the estrangement came from Christian, and not from the queen dowager.

We have seen how Prince Frederick was kept out of the king's box at the play; and Brandt was blamed for it, although it was done by the monarch's express order. Equal anger was felt because Brandt did not invite the prince to the private theatricals and dancing which filled up a portion of the evenings at Hirschholm. For this, so Reverdil says, Struensee was mainly to blame. He had seen at London and Berlin the princes paying their court to the king, and mixing themselves up with the grandees in the ante-chamber. On his return, he was shocked by the old Danish fashion, by which the courtiers did not come to the king's ante-room till they had paid their respects to the royal princes and princesses, who were thus placed on a level with the sovereign. He therefore resolved to make Prince Frederick undergo these humiliations until he had learned his duty.

It required a great occasion for the queen dowager and her son to be invited, at lengthened intervals, to dine at Hirschholm. When they arrived, they were kept waiting; and the frigid reception granted them left them but little doubt that their presence was disagreeable. They were not angry with the king, and did not explain this contempt by his caprices or his indolent apathy, but they blamed the young queen and her adherents. Hence serious aid frivolous subjects combined to foment the misunderstanding in the royal family and between relations. The lightest insults are not those which hurt the least.

Serious complaints were being raised about this time at the court of the queen dowager, in the capital and the provinces, about the education of the prince royal, or rather, because his education was not yet begun. He was said to be left in the gardens of Hirschholm to the inclemency of the seasons and his own imprudence, with no other society but that of two lads of the lowest rank. The most reasonable and the warmest patriots said bitterly, that a retarded education was a great fault in the case of a boy whose majority began at the age of thirteen; as if the natural progress of a boy could be accelerated in accordance with human institutions.

Such were the universal prejudice, and the language of the most moderate men. At the court, on the contrary, they were so satisfied with the method adopted, that the queen and Struensee actually had drawings made of the childish amusements of their young Emile, which were engraved and published. He could be seen in them entering his cold bath, playing at ball, or using his little rake and spade. They fancied that the entire universe would applaud this unique example of a truly royal education.

The queen might be mistaken as to her son's education, as it was carried on by a man of systems, but she was an excellent mother, and paid as much attention to her children as her position allowed. When on any rainy day the court was obliged to remain in-doors, the queen did not fail to appear after dessert, carrying her daughter on one of her arms, and leading her son by the other hand, while his two little playmates clung to her skirt. She seemed thoroughly to enjoy the happiness of being a mother. The prince was neither timid, nor indocile, nor fretful; but his education was very much behindhand. At the age of nearly four years, he did not yet know any language, but had made a jargon of Danish and German, which he had learned from his two playmates. The conclusion at which Reverdil arrives, though displaying an evident bias, is probably correct:—

"If the temperature had been less damp; if the young prince had had a sufficiently strong constitution to withstand these trials; if an intelligent and almost imperceptible but continued inspection had caused his amusements to help in developing his reason, this education would have been worth more than that of all his ancestors."

But this inspection was not made, owing to the jealousy of Struensee, who considered everything badly done that did not pass through his hands, and who had undertaken this inspection himself, like all the rest, without reflecting that he already had a great deal more work than he could do in the course of the day.

END OF VOL. I.

INDEX TO VOL. I.,

HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL.

A.

B.

C.

D.

E.

F.

G.