This was the highest possible praise _such_ a husband could bestow; and he doubtless loved his wife as well as a husband, so trained, could love a consort. His own sharp words to her, even in her illness, were no proof to the contrary; and amid tokens of his uncouth tenderness, observing her restless from pain, and yet desirous of sleep, he would exclaim, ‘How the devil can you expect to sleep when you never lie still a moment?’ This was meant for affection; so, too, was the remark made to her one morning when, on entering her room, he saw her gazing, as invalids are wont to gaze, idly on vacancy, ‘with lack-lustre eye.’ He roughly desired her to cease staring in that disagreeable way, which made her look, he said, with refined gallantry, just like a calf with its throat cut! His praise of her, as Lord Hervey acutely suggested, had much of self-eulogy in view; and when he lauded her excellent sense, it had especial reference to that exemplification of it when she was wise enough to accept _him_ for a husband. He wearied all hearers with the long stories which he recounted both of Caroline and himself, as he sat at night, with his feet on a stool, pouring out prosily his never-ending narrative. The Princess Amelia used to endeavour to escape from the tediousness of listening by pretending to be asleep, and to avenge herself for being compelled to listen by gross abuse of her royal father when he left the room--calling him old fool, liar, coward, and a driveller, of whose stories she was most heartily sick.