_Sunday, May 21, 1786._--I have now quite a new business to write upon.
Late on Saturday night news reached my father of the death of the worthy
Mr. Stanley, who has been long in a declining state of health. His place
of master of the king's band my dear father had been promised formerly.
Now he was once more to apply for it; and early on Sunday morning he
went to Mr. Smelt, to beg his advice what way to proceed.
Just as I was at the door, and going to church, my father returned, and
desired me to come back, as he had something to communicate to me. Mr.
Smelt, he then told me, had counselled him to go instantly to Windsor,
not to address the king, but to be seen by him. “Take your daughter,” he
said, “in your hand, and walk upon the Terrace. The king's seeing you at
this time he will understand, and he is more likely to be touched by a
hint of that delicate sort than by any direct application.”
My father determined implicitly to follow this advice. But let me not
omit a singular little circumstance, which much enlivened and encouraged
our expedition. While I was changing my dress for the journey, I
received a letter from Miss Port, which was sent by a private hand, and
ought to have arrived sooner, and which pressed my visit to my dear Mrs.
Delany very warmly, and told me it was by the queen's express wish. This
gave me great spirits for my dear father's enterprise, and I was able to
help him on the road, from so favourable a symptom.
When we got to Windsor, my father saw me safe to Mrs. Delany's, and then
went himself to Dr. Lind's. With what joy did I fly into the dear, open
arms of this most venerable of women! Her reception had all the warm
liveliness of pleasant surprise, added to its unfailing kindness.
Miss Port, with her usual partiality, was in high glee from the
surprise. I dined and drank tea with them. Mrs. Delany related to me the
most flattering speech made to her by the queen, about my coming to
her as “the friend best suited to solace her in her disturbances,” and
assured me she had quite interested herself in pressing Mrs. Delany to
hasten me.
'Tis very extraordinary what a gracious disposition towards me this
sweet queen always manifests, and what peculiar elegance there is in the
expressions she makes use of in my favour. They were now particularly
well-timed, and gave me most pleasant hopes for my dear father. He came
to tea at Mrs. Delany's, and, at the proper hour, went to the Terrace,
with the good-natured Dr. Lind, who is always ready to oblige. I waited
to go with a female party, which was arranged for me by Mrs. Delany, and
soon followed.
All the royal family were already on the Terrace before we arrived.
The king and queen, and the Prince of Mecklenburg, and her majesty's
mother--walked together. Next them the princesses and their ladies, and
the young princesses, making a very gay and pleasing procession, of one
of the finest families in the world. Every way they moved, the crowd
retired to stand up against the wall as they passed, and then closed in
to follow. When they approached towards us, and we were retreating,
Lady Louisa Clayton placed me next herself, making her daughters stand
below--a politeness and attention without which I had certainly not been
seen; for the moment their majesties advanced, I involuntarily looked
down, and drew my hat over my face. I could not endure to stare at them,
and, full of our real errand, I felt ashamed, even of being seen by
them. The very idea of a design, however far from illaudable is always
distressing and uncomfortable. Consequently, I should have stood in the
herd, and unregarded; but Lady Louisa's kindness and good breeding put
me in a place too conspicuous to pass unnoticed. The moment the queen
had spoken to her, which she stopped to do as soon as she came up to
her, she inquired, in a whisper, who was with her; as I know by hearing
my own name given for the answer. The queen then instantly stepped
nearer me, and asked me how I did; and then the king came forward, and,
as soon as he had repeated the same question, said, “Are you come to
stay?”
“No, sir, not now.”
“No; but how long shall you stay?”
“I go to-night, sir.”
“I was sure,” cried the queen, “she was not come to stay, by seeing her
father.”