Early in November he became delirious, but the medical men, Warren, Heberden, and Sir G. Baker, could not tell whether the malady would turn, at a critical point, for life or death; or whether, if for the former, the patient would be afflicted or not with permanent loss of reason. The disease was now settled in the brain, with high fever. The Princes of the Blood were all assembled at Windsor, in the room next to that occupied by the sufferer, and a regency bestowing kingly power on the Prince of Wales was already talked of. When the fact of the King’s illness could no longer be with propriety concealed, the alarm without the royal residence was great, and the disorder scarcely less within. The most graphic picture of the state of affairs is drawn by Lord Bulkeley. ‘The Queen,’ he says, ‘sees nobody but Lady Constance, Lady Charlotte Finch, Miss Burney, and her two sons, who, I am afraid, do not announce the state of the King’s health with that caution and delicacy which should be observed to the wife and the mother, and it is to them only that she looks up. I understand her behaviour is very feeling, decent, and proper. The Prince has taken the command at Windsor, in consequence of which there is no command whatsoever; and it was not till yesterday that orders were given to two grooms of the bedchamber to wait for the future, and receive the inquiries of the numbers who inquire; nor would this have been done if Pitt and Lord Sydney had not come down in person to beg that such orders might be given. Unless it was done yesterday, no orders were given for prayers in the churches, nor for the observance of other forms, such as stopping the playhouses, &c., highly proper (?) at such a juncture. What the consequence of this heavy misfortune will be to government, you are more likely to know than I am; but I cannot help thinking that the Prince will find a greater difficulty in making a sweep of the present ministry in his character of Fiduciary Regent than in that of King. The stocks are already fallen two per cent., and the alarms of the people of London are very little flattering to the Prince. I am told that message after message has been sent to Fox, who is touring with Mrs. Armistead on the continent; but I have not heard that the Prince has sent for him, or has given any orders to Fox’s friends to that effect. The system of favouritism is much changed since Lord Bute’s and the Princess Dowager’s time; for Jack Payne, Master Leigh, an Eton schoolboy, and Master Barry, brother to Lord Barrymore, and Mrs. Fitz, form the cabinet at Carlton House.’