A dying wife might have shown more decency, but she could hardly have been more complaisant. Accordingly, when, after the above dignified scene had been brought to a close, the Queen fell into a profound sleep, George kissed her unconscious cheeks a hundred times over, expressed an opinion that she would never wake to recognition again, and gave evidence, by his words and actions, how deeply he really regarded the dying woman before him. It happened, however, that she _did_ wake to consciousness again; and then, with his usual inconsistency of temper, he snubbed as much as he soothed her, yet without any deliberate intention of being unkind. She expressed her conviction that she should survive till the Wednesday. It was her peculiar day, she said. She had been born on a Wednesday, was married on a Wednesday, first became a mother on a Wednesday, was crowned on a Wednesday, and she was convinced she should die on a Wednesday. Her expressed indifference as to seeing Walpole is in strong contrast with the serious way in which she _did_ hold converse with him on his being admitted to a parting interview. Her feeling of mental superiority over the King was exhibited in her dying recommendation to the minister to be careful of the Sovereign. This recommendation being made in the Sovereign’s presence was but little relished by the minister, who feared that such a bequest, with the Queen no longer alive to afford him protection, might ultimately work his own downfall. George, however, was rather grateful than angry at the Queen’s commission to Walpole, and subsequently reminded him with grave good-humour, that _he_, the minister, required no protection, inasmuch as the Queen had rather consigned the King to the protection of the minister; and ‘his kindness to the minister seemed to increase for the Queen’s sake.’ The day which opened with a sort of despair, closed with a faint prospect of hope. The surgeons declared that the mortification had not progressed; and Lord Hervey does not scruple to infer that it had never begun, and that the medical men employed were, like most of their colleagues, profoundly ignorant of that with which they professed to be most deeply acquainted. The fairer prospect was made known to the Queen, in order to encourage her, but Caroline was not to be deceived. At twenty-five, she remarked, she might have dragged through it, but at fifty-five it was not to be thought of. She still superstitiously looked to the Wednesday as the term of her career.