Now did the duchess see, at last, who had forestalled her in her devoted "Mrs. Morley's" good graces; she only awaited a favorable opportunity to unbottle the phials of her wrath, and pour them on the heads of both the offenders. {462}The enormity of the crime shocked her. "I was struck with astonishment at such an instance of ingratitude," she wrote her husband, "and should not have believed it had there been any room for doubt." In reply to her very exaggerated statement of a trivial affair, the duke wrote some good advice. His letter was sent from Meldest, in South Germany, and he said: "The wisest thing is to have to do with as few people as possible. If you are sure Mrs. Masham speaks of business to the queen, I should think you might, with some caution, tell her of it, which would do good, for she certainly must be grateful, and will mind what you say." The duchess did not heed this advice of her clear-headed husband, but kept herself up to a pitch of excitement at what she called the barbarity, ingratitude, and wickedness of the queen. She accused her, too, of intrigue, though why the conversations she held with one of her attendants at the bedside of her declining husband should be so called it is difficult to understand. Her majesty treated Abigail Masham with confidence and consideration, because she assisted in the care of the prince-consort, who suffered from fearful attacks of asthma, and it was this attendant's duty to sleep at night on a pallet in the ante-chamber of her majesty's bed-room, within call. Not long after the duchess discovered the marriage, when she was alone with the queen one day, she took her to task for having kept it secret, and told her that it plainly showed a change in her majesty's feeling towards her. The queen replied, "That it was not _she_ who was changed, but the duchess," and added, "I believe I have begged Masham a hundred times to tell you of her marriage, but she would not."