On the occasion of the King’s birthday on the following month the Princess again repaired to court. The welcome resembled that which she had received at her last visit, but there was an incident at this which rendered it more interesting, at all events to lookers-on. It was at this drawing-room that the Prince and Princess of Wales encountered each other for the last time. They met in the very centre of the apartment--they bowed, stood face to face for a moment, exchanged a few words which no one heard, and then passed on; _he_, stately as an iceberg, and as cold--_she_, with a smile, half mirthful, half melancholy, as though she rejoiced that she was there in spite of him, and yet regretted that her visit was not under happier auspices. The triumph, however, was complete as far as it went, for she assuredly was present that day contrary to the inclination of both her husband and her mother-in-law. There was one being upon earth whom this Princess unreservedly loved, and of whom she was deprived this year--her father, the Duke of Brunswick. He had been but an indifferent husband and father, but his wife did not complain, and his daughter Caroline feared and adored him. The father of the Princess of Wales, at the age of seventy-one, perished on the fatal field of Jena, on that day on which Prussia was made to pay the penalty of mingled treachery and imbecility. It had been her policy, throughout the troubles of the time, to save herself at any other nation’s cost. Such a policy caused her to fall into the ruin which overcame her at Jena, without securing the sympathy even of those nations which then fought against the then common enemy. In this battle the father of Caroline had done his utmost to win victory for Prussia, but in vain, and he lost his own life in the attempt. His ability and courage were all cast away. He had with him in the camp a very unseemly companion, in the person of a French actress, who was the friend of his aide-de-camp, Montjoy. This officer was close to him when, in the midst of his staff, and at a distance altogether from where the battle was raging, the old Duke was shot by a man on foot, ‘who presented his carabine so close that the ball went in under the left eye (the Duke was on horseback) and came out above the right, quite through the upper part of the nose.’ It is Lord Malmesbury who suggests, without pretending to assert, that ‘Montjoy’s brother, the Grand Veneur to Prince Max, the pretended King of Bavaria, and who was with Bonaparte, knew exactly where the Duke of Brunswick was to be found, and by a connivance with Montjoy produced the event.’