I have just re-read this book in 1840: I cannot help being struck with this continual romance of my life. What a series of missed destinies! Had I returned to England with little George, the possible heir to that crown, I should have seen the new dream fade away which could have made me change my country, in the same way as, if I had not been married, I should have remained, on the first occasion, in the land of Shakespeare and Milton. The young Duke of Cumberland, who has lost his sight, did not marry his cousin the Queen of England. The Duchess of Cumberland has become Queen of Hanover: where is she? Is she happy? Where am I? Thank God, in a few days I shall no longer have to turn my eyes over my past life, nor to put these questions to myself. But it is impossible for me not to pray Heaven to shed its favours over the last years of the Princess Frederica[137]. I had been sent to Berlin with the olive-branch, and because my presence brought trouble into the administration; but, knowing the inconstancy of fortune, and feeling that my political part was not played out, I watched events: I did not wish to abandon my friends. I soon perceived that the reconciliation between the Royalist Party and the Ministerial Party was not sincere; distrust and prejudice remained; they did not do what they had promised me: they were beginning to attack me. The entrance into the Council of Messieurs de Villèle and de Corbière had excited the jealousy of the Extreme Right; it no longer marched under the banner of the first, and he, whose ambition was impatient, was beginning to grow weary. We exchanged some letters. M. de Villèle regretted having entered the Council: he was wrong; the proof that I had seen right was that, before a year passed, he had become Minister of Finance and M. de Corbière obtained the Interior[138]. [Sidenote: Letter to the Baron Pasquier.] I also had an explanation with M. le Baron Pasquier; I wrote to him, on the 10th of February 1821: