d been brought thus disagreeably into
this disagreeable world. But the conduct of the prince was regarded as
unpardonable, and he was banished by Royal letter from the King's
palace, whether at Hampton Court or St. James's. The prince's own
party, Pulteney and his colleagues, utterly refused to give their
sanction to the extraordinary course which Frederick had taken.
Bolingbroke wrote from France, angrily and scornfully condemning it.
But the Patriots were willing, and resolved to stand the prince's
friends all the same, and they had not even the courage to advise him
to make a frank and full apology for his conduct. Indeed the action of
the prince seems to suggest an approach to insanity rather than
deliberate and reasoned perverseness. He had forced his wife to run
the risk of losing her own life and her child's life, he had grossly
and wantonly offended his father and mother, and he had thrown a
secrecy and mystery round the birth of the infant which, if ever there
came to be a dispute about the succession, would give his enemies the
most plausible excuse for proclaiming that a spurious child had been
imposed upon the country. As a friend of the Queen said at the time,
if ever the Crown came to be fought for again, the only question could
be whether the people would rather have the Whig bastard or the Tory
bastard.

The whole business, as might be expected, caused a terrible scandal.
Not merely was the prince banished from the palace, not merely did the
King refuse to see him or to hold further communication with him, but
it was formally announced by the Secretaries of State to all the
foreign ministers that it would be considered a mark of respect to the
Sovereign if they would abstain from visiting the prince. Furthermore,
a message was sent in {109} writing to all peers, peeresses, and privy
councillors, declaring that no one who went to the prince's court would
be admitted into the King's presence. Never probably was domestic
dirty linen more publicly washed. Nevertheless, it very soon was made
apparent that the course taken by the King was in strict accordance
with a precedent which at one time had a very direct application to
himself. Some of the prince's friends thought it a clever stroke of
policy just then to print and publish the letters which passed between
the late King and the present Sovereign when the latter was Prince of
Wales and got into a quarrel with his father. The late King sent his