I always consider him as an old friend that has been in the wrong; but does one love one's friend less for being in the wrong even towards oneself? I don't, and I would not value the friendship of those who measure friendship by my deservings. God help me if all my friends thought thus."[132] [130] Second son of Francis, fifth Baron Napier. [131] It has been said that Sir Charles announced the capture of Scinde in the briefest despatch on record--"Peccavi." Only such a brilliant exploit can be accepted as excuse for such an execrable joke. [132] _Life and Letters of Lady Sarah Lennox._ CHAPTER VII THE ROYAL MARRIAGE The rumour that the King would espouse a Princess of Brunswick had arisen from a proposal to that effect made by the Princess Dowager, but for many reasons this suggestion was not acted upon. Subsequently a princess of the house of Hesse was thought of, but her levity of conduct was such that, when it came to the point, it was found that "nobody would take it upon them to recommend her." Eventually Lord Bute instructed a Colonel Graeme or Graham to visit the German courts to find a princess who should be "perfect in her form, of pure blood and healthy constitution, possessed of elegant accomplishments, particularly music, to which the King was much attached, and of a mild and obliging disposition." The appointment of Graeme for this responsible errand caused much surprise, for the selected envoy had been notorious as a Jacobite; which provoked Hume to the remark that Graeme had exchanged the dangerous office of making a king for the more lucrative one of making a king's marriage. However, the envoy was conscientious, and "in the character of a private gentleman, played lotto with the ladies of one court, and drank the aperient waters with the antiquated dames of another, merely to hear the tittle-tattle of the day, respecting the positive or negative virtues, the absence or excellence of personal charms, which at that time distinguished the marriageable princesses of the numerous royal, ducal, or princely families of Protestant Germany."[133] Graeme carried out his task to the best of his ability. He had been commanded to seek a peerless Dulcinda: he found Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz,[134] who subsequently rewarded him for his share in her promotion by the bestowal of one of the richest places in the gift of the Queen of England, the Mastership of St. Catherine's Hospital. [133] Huish: _The Public and Private Life of George III_. [134] Princess Charlotte Sophia, younger daughter of Charles Louis, Duke of Miroir, the second son of the Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. The Princess was born on May 16, 1744; her father died in 1751. [Illustration: _From a drawing by T. McArdell_ QUEEN CHARLOTTE]