The poor little Princess, in these first months of her married life at Hanover, surrounded by spies and enemies, must often have longed to flee from the hollow splendours of the court to the home life at Celle and the arms of her loving mother. While all this importance was attached to the outward semblance, no one at Hanover heeded, and no one cared, whether she was happy or not. It was hardly possible for her to have been happy. Sophie Dorothea was the victim of one of the cruellest of state marriages, and her only hope of happiness lay in the chance of some love and forbearance on the part of her husband. In these first months of marriage her nature was plastic to her husband’s touch. A kind word might have wrought her to love, as a harsh one often drove her to tears and anger. With a little kindness, a little sympathy, all the misery and mistakes of later years might have been averted, but George Louis had no kind words for the daughter of “Madame” of Celle, and even thus early in her married life she was neglected, insulted, and forced through experiences from which her girlish purity recoiled. Even if she had no claim on his affection, she might have had some on his pity. She was all alone and with none to help or advise her, for though Celle was only twenty miles away, the strained relations between the two courts were not at this date so relaxed as to admit of much visiting between them, and the means of communication were so bad that her father’s principality seemed another country. Sophie Dorothea had brought with her from Celle a trusted friend, if not a very wise one, in a young lady, Fräulein Eléonore Knesebeck, who followed her to Hanover, as confidential lady-in-waiting. She was a few years older than the Princess, and the daughter of one of the councillors at Celle, whose name appears as signing the marriage contract between Duke George William and Duchess Eléonore. She was a woman of some ability, and though no beauty, had a fair share of good looks. Her devotion to the Princess was beyond doubt, but her discretion, unfortunately, was doubtful indeed, and even in these early days she repeated to Sophie Dorothea many things that would have been better ignored, and incited her against her enemies.