e friendly to her measures, Since Margaret of Anjou, no
queen-consort had exercised such weight in the political affairs of
England, and the personal address which she displayed on many occasions,
had no small share in reclaiming from their political heresy many of
those determined Tories, who, after the reign of the Stuarts had been
extinguished in the person of Queen Anne, were disposed rather to
transfer their allegiance to her brother the Chevalier de St. George,
than to acquiesce in the settlement of the crown on the Hanover family.
Her husband, whose most shining quality was courage in the field of
battle, and who endured the office of King of England, without ever being
able to acquire English habits, or any familiarity with English
dispositions, found the utmost assistance from the address of his
partner, and while he jealously affected to do everything according to
his own will and pleasure, was in secret prudent enough to take and
follow the advice of his more adroit consort. He intrusted to her the
delicate office of determining the various degrees of favour necessary to
attach the wavering, or to confirm such as were already friendly, or to
regain those whose good-will had been lost.

With all the winning address of an elegant, and, according to the times,
an accomplished woman, Queen Caroline possessed the masculine soul of the
other sex. She was proud by nature, and even her policy could not always
temper her expressions of displeasure, although few were more ready at
repairing any false step of this kind, when her prudence came up to the
aid of her passions. She loved the real possession of power rather than
the show of it, and whatever she did herself that was either wise or
popular, she always desired that the King should have the full credit as
well as the advantage of the measure, conscious that, by adding to his
respectability, she was most likely to maintain her own. And so desirous
was she to comply with all his tastes, that, when threatened with the
gout, she had repeatedly had recourse to checking the fit, by the use of
the cold bath, thereby endangering her life, that she might be able to
attend the king in his walks.

It was a very consistent part of Queen Caroline's character, to keep up
many private correspondences with those to whom in public she seemed
unfavourable, or who, for various reasons, stood ill with the court. By
this means she kept in her hands the thread of many a political intr