The room, however, being at last clear, the Prince took Lord Hardwicke
into his confidence, evidently with the object of persuading him to
soften the hearts of the King and Queen and _inter alia_ referring to
the removal of the Princess from Hampton Court in much the same terms
used in his first letter to his father, but with this significant
addition: “What if the King, who was apt sometimes to be pretty quick,
should have objected to her going to London, and an altercation should
have arisen, what a condition would the poor Princess have been in!”
The two sat and discoursed for some time, and the old Chancellor gave
Frederick just the sort of advice an old lawyer would naturally give
a young man under the circumstances, urging submission and dutiful
behaviour to bring about a union of the family, and adding that it
would be the “zealous endeavour of himself with the other servants of
the King,” to bring about this end.
“He answered,” continued Hardwicke, “‘My Lord, I don’t doubt you in the
least, for I believe you to be a very honest man,’ and as I was rising
up embraced me, offering to kiss me. I instantly kneeled down and
kissed his hand, whereupon he raised me up and kissed my cheek.
“The scene had something in it moving, and my heart was full of the
melancholy prospect that I thought lay before me, which made me almost
burst into tears. The Prince observed this, and appeared moved himself,
and said: ‘Let us sit down, my Lord, a little, and recollect ourselves,
that we may not go out thus.’
“Soon after which I took my leave, and went directly to the House of
Lords.”
_Minutes of Lord Harrington and Sir Robert Walpole’s conversation with
the Prince by his bedside, August 1st, about five in the morning, and
taken down in writing about three hours after._
“August 1, 1737.
“The Prince of Wales this morning about five o’clock, when Lord
Harrington and Sir Robert Walpole waited upon him at St. James’s,
among other things said: he did not know whether the Princess was
come before her time or not. That she had felt great pain the Monday
before, which it being apprehended might prove her labour, of which
opinion Lady Archibald Hamilton and Mrs. Payne declared themselves to
be, but the physicians were then of another opinion, he brought her
from Hampton Court again. That on the following Friday the Princess’s
pains returning, the Prince carried her again to St. James’s, when
the physicians, Dr. Hollings and Dr. Broxolme, and Mrs. Cannons, were
of opinion it might prove her labour, but those pains likewise going
off, they returned again to Hampton Court on Saturday; that he should
not have been at Hampton Court on Sunday, but it being public day, he
feared it might be liable to some constructions; that the Princess,
growing ill again on Sunday, he brought her away immediately, that she
might be where proper help and assistance could be had.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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