The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume Ii Part 48

No, ma'am," was all I dared answer.

She revived, however, finished the lecture, and went upstairs and played upon the Princess Augusta's harpsichord.

The king was hunting. Her anxiety for his return was

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greater than ever. The moment he arrived he sent a page to desire to have coffee and take his bark in the queen's dressing- room. She said she would pour it out herself, and sent to inquire how he drank it.

The king is very sensible of the great change there is in himself, and of her disturbance at it. It seems, but heaven avert it! a threat of a total breaking up of the const.i.tution.

This, too, seems his own idea. I was present at his first seeing Lady Effingham on his return to Windsor this last time. "My dear Effy," he cried, "you see me, all at once, an old man."

I was so much affected by this exclamation, that I wished to run out of the room. Yet I could not but recover when Lady Effingham, in her well-meaning but literal way, composedly answered, "We must all grow old, sir,- -I am sure I do."

He then produced a walking-stick which he had just ordered. "He could not," he said, "get on without it; his strength seemed diminis.h.i.+ng hourly."

He took the bark, he said But the queen," he cried, "is my physician, and no man need have a better; she is my friend, and no Man can have a better."

How the queen commanded herself I cannot conceive; but there was something so touching in this speech, from his hoa.r.s.e voice and altered countenance, that it overset me very much.

Nor can I ever forget him in what pa.s.sed this night. When I came to the queen's dressing-room he was still with her. He constantly conducts her to it before he retires to his own. He was begging her not to speak to him when he got to his room, that he might fall asleep, as he felt great want of that refreshment.

He repeated this desire, I believe, at least a hundred times, though, far enough from need Ing it, the poor queen never uttered one syllable! He then applied to me, saying he was really very well, except in that one particular, that he could not sleep.

The kindness and benevolence of his manner all this time was most penetrating: he seemed to have no anxiety but to set the queen at rest, and no wish but to quiet and give pleasure to all around him, To me, he never yet spoke with such excess of benignity: he appeared even solicitous to satisfy me that he should do well, and to spare all alarm; but there was a hurry in his manner and voice that indicated sleep to be

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indeed wanted. Nor could I, all night, forbear foreseeing "He sleeps now, or to-morrow he will be surely delirious!"

Sunday, Nov. 2.-The king was better, and prevailed upon to give up going to the early prayers. The queen and princesses went.

After they were gone, and I was following towards my room, the king called after me, and he kept me in discourse a full half hour nearly all the time they were away.

It was all to the same purport; that he was well, but wanted more rest ; yet he said he had slept the last night like a child. But his manner, still, was so touchingly kind, so softly gracious, that it doubled my concern to see him so far from well.

DISTRESS OF THE QUEEN.

Nov. 3.--We are all here in a most uneasy state. The king is better and worse so frequently, and changes so, daily, backwards and forwards, that everything is to be apprehended, if his nerves are not some way quieted. I dreadfully fear he is on the eve of some severe fever. The queen is almost overpowered with some secret terror. I am affected beyond all expression in her presence, to see what struggles she makes to support serenity.

To-day she gave up the conflict when I was alone with her, and burst into a violent fit of tears. It was very, very terrible to see! How did I wish her a Susan or a Fredy! To unburthen her loaded mind would be to relieve it from all but inevitable affliction. O, may heaven in its mercy never, never drive me to that solitary anguish more!- I have tried what it would do; I speak from bitter recollection of past melancholy experience.

Sometimes she walks up and down the room without uttering a word, but shaking her head frequently, and in evident distress and irresolution. She is often closeted with Miss Goldsworthy, of whom, I believe, she makes inquiry how her brother has found the king, from time to time.

The princes both came to Kew, in several visits to the king. The Duke of York has also been here, and his fond father could hardly bear the pleasure of thinking him anxious for his health. "So good," he says "is Frederick!"

To-night, indeed, at tea-time, I felt a great shock, in hearing, from General Bude, that Dr, Heberden had been called in. It is true more a.s.sistance seemed much wanting, yet the king's rooted aversion to physicians makes any new-comer tremen-

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dous. They said, too, it was merely for counsel, not that his majesty was worse.

Nov. 4.-Pa.s.sed much the same as the days preceding it, the queen in deep distress, the king in a state almost incomprehensible, and all the house uneasy and alarmed. The Drawing-room was again put off, and a steady residence seemed fixed at Windsor.

Nov. 5.-I found my poor royal mistress, in the morning, sad and sadder still; something horrible seemed impending, and I saw her whole resource was in religion. We had talked lately much upon solemn Subjects, and she appeared already preparing herself to be resigned for whatever might happen.

I was still wholly unsuspicious of the greatness of the cause she had for dread. Illness, a breaking up of the const.i.tution, the payment of sudden infirmity and premature old age for the waste of unguarded health and strength,--these seemed to me the threats awaiting her; and great and grievous enough, yet how short of the fact!

I had given up my walks some days; I was too uneasy to quit the house while the queen remained at home, and she now never left it. Even Lady Effingham, the last two days, could not obtain admission; She Could only hear from a page how the royal family went on.

At noon the king went out in his chaise, with the princess royal, for an airing. I looked from my window to see him; he was all smiling benignity, but gave so many orders to the postilions, and got in and out of the carriage twice, with such agitation, that again my fear of a great fever hanging over him grew more and more powerful. Alas! how little did I imagine I should see him no more for so long--so black a period!

When I went to my poor queen, still worse and worse I found her spirits. She had been greatly offended by some anecdote in a newspaper--the "Morning Herald"--relative to the king's indisposition. She declared the printer should be called to account. She bid me burn the paper, and ruminated upon who could be employed to represent to the editor that he must answer at his peril any further such treasonable paragraphs. I named to her Mr. Fairly, her own servant, and one so peculiarly fitted for any office requiring honour and discretion. "Is he here, then?" she cried. "No," I answered, but he was expected in a few days.

I saw her concurrence with this proposal. The princess royal soon returned. She came in cheerfully, and gave, in

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German, a history of the airing, and one that seemed Comforting.

Soon after, suddenly arrived the Prince of Wales. He came into the room.- He had just quitted Brighthelmstone. Something pa.s.sing within seemed to render this meeting awfully distant on both sides. She asked if he should not return to Brighthelmstone? He answered yes, the next day, He desired to speak with her they retired together.

FIRST OUTBURST OF THE KING's DELIRIUM.

I had but just reached my own room, deeply musing on the state of' things, when a chaise stopped at the rails; and I saw Mr.

Fairly and his son Charles alight, and enter the house. He walked lamely, and seemed not yet recovered from his late attack.

Though most happy to see him at this alarming time, when I knew he could be most useful, as there is no one to whom the queen opens so confidentially upon her affairs, I had yet a fresh stair to see, by his antic.i.p.ated arrival, though still lame, that he must have been sent for, and hurried hither.

Only Miss Planta dined with me. We were both nearly silent: I was shocked at I scarcely knew what, and she seemed to know too much for speech. She stayed with me till six o'clock, but nothing pa.s.sed, beyond general solicitude that the king might get better.

Meanwhile, a stillness the most uncommon reigned over the whole house. n.o.body stirred ; not a voice was heard - not a step, not a motion. I could do nothing but watch, without knowing for what : there seemed a strangeness in the house most extraordinary.

At seven o'clock Columb came to tell me that the music was all forbid, and the musicians ordered away ! This was the last step to be expected, so fond as his majesty is -of his concert, and I thought it might have rather soothed him: I could not understand the prohibition; all seemed stranger and stranger.

Very late came General Bude. He looked extremely uncomfortable.

Later still came Colonel Goldsworthy: his countenance all gloom, and his voice scarce articulating no or yes. General Grenville was gone to town. General Bud asked me if I had seen Mr.

Fairly; and last Of all, at length, he also entered. How grave he looked, how shut up in himself! A silent bow was his only salutation Page 229

how changed I thought it,--and how fearful a meeting, SO long expected as a solace!

Colonel Goldsworthy was called away: I heard his voice whispering some time in the pa.s.sage, but he did not return. Various small speeches now dropped, by which I found the house was all in disturbance, and the king in some strange way worse, and the queen taken ill!

At length, General Bude said he would go and see if any one was in the music-room. Mr. Fairly said he thought he had better not accompany him, for as he had not yet been seen, his appearance might excite fresh emotion. The general agreed, and went.

We were now alone. But I could not speak: neither did Mr.

Fairly. I worked---I had begun a ha.s.sock for my Fredy. A long and serious pause made me almost turn sick with anxious wonder and fear, and an inward trembling totally disabled me from asking the actual situation of things; if I had not had my work, to employ my eyes and hands, I must have left the room to quiet myself.

I fancy he penetrated into all this, though, at first, he had concluded me informed of everything; but he now, finding me silent, began an inquiry whether I was yet acquainted how bad all was become, and how ill the king? I really had no utterance for very alarm, but my look was probably sufficient; he kindly saved me any questions, and related to me the whole of the mysterious horror!

O my dear friends, what a history! The king, at dinner, had broken forth into positive delirium, which long had been menacing all who saw him most closely; and the queen was so overpowered as to fall into violent hysterics. All the princesses were in misery, and the Prince of Wales had burst into tears. No one knew what was to follow-- no one could conjecture the event.

He spoke of the poor queen, in terms of the most tender compa.s.sion; he pitied her, he said, from the bottom of his soul; and all her sweet daughters, the lovely princesses--there was no knowing to what we might look forward for them all!