The situation became so desperate that she determined to depart for once from her policy of outward abstention from English politics, and to take action independent of the Queen. The Whigs represented to her that the presence in England of some member of her family was imperatively necessary at this juncture. She agreed with them, and the Electoral Prince was most eager to go, and so was the Electoral Princess Caroline. A good deal has been written about the honourable conduct of the House of Hanover in refusing to embarrass Queen Anne, and certainly its conduct in this respect contrasted most favourably with that of William of Orange towards James the Second. But though this was true of the Elector George, who would do nothing behind the Queen’s back, it could hardly be held to apply to the Electress Sophia and her grandson. The Elector, had he been consulted, would certainly have opposed the idea of the Electoral Prince going to England before himself, as he would have regarded it as another intrigue to supplant him in the favour of the English by his son; so it was decided not to consult him at all. The Electress Sophia, George Augustus and Caroline put their heads together, and with the advice of certain Whig emissaries who were at Hanover, and of Prince Eugene of Savoy and Leibniz, they resolved that the Electress should order Schütz, the Hanoverian Envoy in England, to demand the writ for the Electoral Prince to take his seat in the House of Lords as Duke of Cambridge. As they knew that it would be useless to make such a request of the Queen, to whom it ought to have been made, Schütz was instructed to apply direct to the Lord Chancellor, in the hope that, when the knowledge of his demand got abroad, the Whig Lords would take the matter up, and make such a point of it that the Queen would be forced to give way. They little knew the strength of her resistance, for her determination to reign alone amounted to a mania. She would infinitely have preferred James’s coming to that of George Augustus, if she had to endure the presence of one claimant or the other. The demand was duly made. What followed is best told in the despatch which Bromley, the Secretary of State, wrote to Harley, a relative of Lord Oxford, who had been sent to Hanover a few days previously. Rumours had reached the Queen’s ears that intrigues were on foot there, and Harley had been despatched to find out the state of feeling and temporise matters. But before he arrived at Hanover the Electress’s orders had been given to Schütz, and the move which Anne hoped to prevent had been made. Bromley wrote:--