Hitherto in his quarrels with his parents Frederick had not always been in the wrong, but in 1737 he committed an unpardonable offence in connexion with the birth of his first legitimate child, Augusta, afterwards Duchess of Brunswick, and the mother of Caroline, the unhappy consort of George IV. Though he had known for many months that the Princess of Wales was with child he did not inform his parents of the approaching event until July 5. But that was the least part of his transgression. Twice in that month he took the Princess secretly from Hampton Court to St. James's Palace, and on the second occasion, with only Lady Archibald Campbell in attendance, arrived in London but a few hours before the _accouchement_. [Illustration: _Photo by Emery Walker_ _From a portrait by Enoch Seaman_ CAROLINE, CONSORT OF GEORGE II] [Illustration: _Photo by Emery Walker_ _From a portrait by T. Worlidge_ GEORGE II] The Queen had determined to be present at the birth.--"She [the Princess of Wales] cannot be brought to bed as quick as one can blow one's nose," she had told the King, "and I will be sure it is her child." Both were furious at being circumvented, and the King expressed his anger in no measured terms. "See now, with all your wisdom, how they have outwitted you," the King addressed his wife. "This is all your fault. There is a false child will be put upon you, and how will you answer it to all your children? This has been fine care and fine management for your son William: he is much indebted to you." The Queen drove to St. James's without delay, saw the child, and abandoned her suspicions. "God bless you, poor little creature," she said as she kissed it, "you have come into a disagreeable world." Had it been a big, healthy boy, instead of a girl, she said, she might not so readily have accepted the paternity claimed for it. "The King has commanded me," Lord Essex[18] wrote from Hampton Court to the Prince of Wales on August 3, "to acquaint your Royal Highness that his Majesty most heartily rejoices at the safe delivery of the Princess; but that your carrying away of her Royal Highness from Hampton Court, the then residence of the King, the Queen, and the Royal Family, under the pains and certain indication of immediate labour, to the imminent danger and hazard both of the Princess and her child, and after sufficient warnings for a week before, to have made the necessary preparations for this happy event, without acquainting his Majesty, or the Queen, with the circumstances the Princess was in, or giving them the least notice of your departure, is looked upon by the King to be such a deliberate indignity offered to himself and to the Queen, that he resents it to the highest degree."[19] [18] William Capel, third Earl of Essex. [19] _Letters ... between the King, Queen, Prince and Princess of Wales, on the occasion of the birth of the young Princess, 1737._