[[A.D. 1727.]] Six months later King George I. set out for Hanover, and by the end of a week he was dead. He had landed in Holland and travelled quickly through the country, eating heartily wherever he stopped, and taking no heed of the violent pains that frequently attacked him after doing so. As he approached Osnaburg he became worse, and fell forward in his carriage, saying to his attendant, "I am a dead man!" He was carried to Osnaburg in an unconscious state, and died there on the eleventh of June, 1727, in the sixty-eighth year of his age. He was buried at Hanover. He had once promised the Duchess of Kendal that if it were possible for the departed to return to this world, he would visit her after his death. So when a large black raven flew in at that lady's window at Isleworth, she was so convinced that it was the soul of the departed monarch that she treated the bird with great tenderness and respect. {060} CHAPTER II. CAROLINE WILHELMINA DOROTHEA, WIFE OF GEORGE II. (A.D. 1683-1737.) |Caroline of Anspach, whose name appears in full in the heading of this reign, was a highly accomplished young lady. This was due partly to her excellent training and careful education, and partly to her naturally quick, inquiring mind; for she learned easily, seldom forgot anything worth remembering, and was a good judge of books and people. She loved philosophical studies, yet she was not at all pedantic. She was lively, witty, an excellent conversationist, and spoke several languages fluently. Her father died when she was still a child, and her mother marrying again not long afterwards, the young girl went to live with her guardians, the King and Queen of Prussia. This queen was the sister of George I., and daughter of Sophia Charlotte, Electress of Bradenburg, mentioned in the last reign. Caroline was fortunate in falling into the hands of so good and sensible a lady, to whom she was indebted for the formation of certain traits that made her remarkable when she grew to womanhood. Caroline was born in the year 1683, and spent her childhood at the court of Berlin, where she pursued her studies with little interruption. When she was about twenty-one years of age an embassy was sent from Lisbon to demand her hand in marriage for King Charles of Spain, who had seen her a short time before. Religion prevented this {061} [Illustration: 0067] {063}union; for Charles was a Catholic, and the Princess of Anspach refused him on that account. Even the prospect of filling so lofty a position as that of Queen of Spain was not so dazzling as to tempt her to renounce her Protestant faith. [[A.D. 1705.]] Shortly after she became the wife of the Electoral Prince of Hanover, and then it was said that heaven had especially reserved her to make Great Britain happy. But that was looking ahead, for she did not become queen until many years had elapsed.