On the ensuing day she saw Sir Robert Walpole. 'My good Sir Robert,'
she thus addressed him, 'you see me in a very indifferent situation. I
have nothing to say to you but to recommend the king, my children, and
the kingdom to your care.'
Lord Hervey, when the minister retired, asked him what he thought of the
queen's state.
'My lord,' was the reply, 'she is as much dead as if she was in her
coffin; if ever I heard a corpse speak, it was just now in that room!'
It was a sad, an awful death-bed. The Prince of Wales having sent to
inquire after the health of his dying mother, the queen became uneasy
lest he should hear the true state of her case, asking 'if no one would
send those ravens,' meaning the prince's attendants, out of the house.
'They were only,' she said, 'watching her death, and would gladly tear
her to pieces whilst she was alive.' Whilst thus she spoke of her son's
courtiers, that son was sitting up all night in his house in Pall Mall,
and saying, when any messenger came in from St. James's, 'Well, sure, we
shall soon have good news, she cannot hold out much longer.' And the
princesses were writing letters to prevent the Princess Royal from
coming to England, where she was certain to meet with brutal unkindness
from her father, who could not endure to be put to any expense.
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