ng mistress of the robes to Queen Caroline. She
is now past the bloom of youth, but her attractions are not in their
wane; but endured until she had attained her seventy-ninth year. Of a
middle height, well made, extremely fair, with very fine light hair, she
attracts regard from her sweet, fresh face, which had in it a comeliness
independent of regularity of feature. According to her invariable
custom, she is dressed with simplicity; her silky tresses are drawn
somewhat back from her snowy forehead, and fall in long tresses on her
shoulders, not less transparently white. She wears a gown of rich silk,
opening in front to display a chemisette of the most delicate cambric,
which is scarcely less delicate than her skin. Her slender arms are
without bracelets, and her taper fingers without rings. As she stands
behind the queen, holding her majesty's fan and gloves, she is obliged,
from her deafness, to lean her fair face with its sunny hair first to
the right side, then to the left, with the helpless air of one
exceedingly deaf--for she had been afflicted with that infirmity for
some years: yet one cannot say whether her appealing looks, which seem
to say, 'Enlighten me if you please,'--and the sort of softened manner
in which she accepts civilities which she scarcely comprehends do not
enhance the wonderful charm which drew every one who knew her towards
this frail, but passionless woman.

[Illustration: SCENE BEFORE KENSINGTON PALACE--GEORGE II. AND QUEEN
CAROLINE.]

The queen forms the centre of the group. Caroline, daughter of the
Marquis of Brandenburgh-Anspach, notwithstanding her residence in
England of many years, notwithstanding her having been, at the era at
which this biography begins, ten years its queen--is still German in
every attribute. She retains, in her fair and comely face, traces of
having been handsome; but her skin is deeply scarred by the cruel
small-pox. She is now at that time of life when Sir Robert Walpole even
thought it expedient to reconcile her to no longer being an object of
attraction to her royal consort. As a woman, she has ceased to be
attractive to a man of the character of George II.; but, as a queen, she
is still, as far as manners are concerned, incomparable. As she turns to
address various members of the assembly, her style is full of sweetness
as well as of courtesy, yet on other occasions she is majesty itself.
The tones of her voice, with its still foreign accent, are most
cap