In January, 1787, the Court removed to London for the winter. During their residence in the capital, the Royal Family occupied Buckingham House, then called the Queen’s House. But the season in town was interrupted by short weekly visits to Windsor. The only Sundays of the year which George III. spent in London were the six Sundays of Lent. Miss Burney went to the play once or twice, and also attended ‘the Tottenham Street oratorios.’ She had more than one illness in the early part of this year; but her custodians courteously entreated their prisoner, and gave her liberty to go to her friends to refresh herself. Under this permission, she had opportunities of meeting Mrs. Cholmondeley, Sir Joshua, Mrs. Montagu, Mrs. Vesey, Horace Walpole,[79] and sundry other old acquaintances. But at the beginning of June the relaxations of this pleasant time, as well as the fatiguing journeys backwards and forwards to Windsor, came to an end, and the household were again settled in the Upper Lodge. The rest of the year passed in much the same way as the summer and autumn of 1786 had done, but with fewer noticeable incidents. In August occurred the commanded visit of Mrs. Siddons, to which we have before referred: “In the afternoon ... her Majesty came into the room, and, after a little German discourse with Mrs. Schwellenberg, told me Mrs. Siddons had been ordered to the Lodge, to read a play, and desired I would receive her in my room. “I felt a little queer in the office; I had only seen her twice or thrice, in large assemblies, at Miss Monckton’s, and at Sir Joshua Reynolds’s, and never had been introduced to her, nor spoken with her. However, in this dead and tame life I now lead, such an interview was by no means undesirable.